“Anything that can’t be done in bed isn’t worth doing at all.” Groucho Marx
We all do it, but no one talks about it: Bernd Brunner invites you along on an easy-going tour through the underrated art of lying down
We spend a good third of our life lying down: sleeping and dreaming, making love, thinking, dosing, suffering, and getting well. Most people think of this position as something negative and associate it with stagnation, passivity, and laziness. Yet time spent horizontally can be invaluable – offering moments of contemplation that often lead to our best ideas. If Michelangelo hadn’t lain down, he would never have gotten the idea to turn the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel into one of mankind’s greatest works of art.
Bernd Brunner‘s ode to lying down is a rich exploration of cultural history and an entertaining collection of tales all in one. He approaches the horizontal state from a number of directions, but never loses his keen sense for the odd and bizarre. From Stone Age repose to the story of the mattress or the latest findings in sleep research: Horizontal Living is an exciting way to relax. An elegantly written study of an art that we all do well.
“Savouring every word of Bernd Brunner's charming and Montaignesque Art of Lying Down” (Praise for the translated English-language edition by Sarah Bakewell, author of the award-winning and bestselling books “How To Live, or, A Life of Montaigne” and “At the Existentialist Café: Freedom, Being and Apricot Cocktails”)
