Sleep, You Dreamers! A 24-hour Competition
THE COMPETITION IS OVER - THANKS TO ALL WHO JOINED IN OR JUST ENJOYED (OR TOLERATED) 24 HOURS OF SILLINESS. WE WILL ANNOUNCE THE SUPER WINNER TOMORROW!
It’s time to face facts; no one is getting enough sleep. The average North American now sleeps approximately six and a half hours a night, an erosion from eight hours a generation ago, and (hard as it is to believe) down from ten hours in the early twentieth century. Imagine!
And we know who’s to blame. Within the globalist neoliberal paradigm, sleeping is for losers! A victim of the expanding non-stop processes of twenty-first-century capitalism! An uncompromising interruption of the theft of time! Well... no more!
We’re giving away 24 copies of 24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep in a 24 hour period. That’s a lot of 24s but more importantly ONE BOOK EVERY HOUR. Plus it comes wrapped in your very own Verso tote bag. And all we want you to do is sleep. Sleep indoors, outdoors, under your desk, on your desk (watch the laptop), or to the side of your desk. Sleep at work or on your way to work: bus/train/plane or bike [healthandsafetydisclaimer]. Sleep eating, sitting, standing - the weirder the better. Wellness experts actually say that curling up in a ball on the floor is the healthiest way to deal with the non-stop agony of the workday! So find youself a nice spot and tweet us the evidence.
We want photos of you, your friends, your pets, pets you might know, sleeping animals you've never met and any politicians caught sleeping their way through the day.
As always, points will be given for humour, originality and wit. Tweet us your photo or image using the hashtag #theendofsleep
The marketplace now operates through every hour of the clock, pushing us into constant activity and straining our community and political expression. 24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep explores some of the ruinous consequences of the expanding non-stop processes of twenty-first-century capitalism. Jonathan Crary shows us that sleep, as a restorative withdrawal that is intrinsically incompatible with 24/7 capitalism, points to other more formidable and collective refusals of world-destroying patterns of growth and accumulation. Described as “a polemic as finely concentrated as a line of pure cocaine” by the Los Angeles Review of Books. But you can sleep after reading it.
The serious stuff:
The competition will start at 18.00 GMT/13.00 EST on Wednesday 23rd July and end 18.00 GMT/13.00 EST on Thursday 24th July.
It is open to readers anywhere in the world as long as you have a working shipping address.
All entries must be posted on twitter along with the hashtag #theendofsleep
This is a photo/image only competition: you can send in pictures of yourself, someone you know (please get their permission! Snapchat screengrabs in particular), pictures of people you don’t know, animals, lego people, politicians you want to make fun of, funny images or cartoons (the more creative the better) – with or without caption.
A winner will be picked at the end of each hour (yes, through the night) and will receive a copy of 24/7 by Jonathan Crary PLUS a Verso tote bag. We’ll tweet the winner under the hashtag #theendofsleep
At the end of the 24-hour period we will pick a SUPER WINNER (ie: our favourite entry from the competition) who will receive 7 Verso books of their choice (as long as they are in print and available). This winner will be announced on Friday 25th July at 17.00 GMT/14.00 EST.
Apologies, but this is a twitter only competition!
