Why Can't We Sleep?

At least one in three adults sleeps badly. New companies offer specially engineered mattresses and high tech sleep apps, and our bookshelves and browser histories are littered with experts promising to 'fix' our insomnia and restore a normal night's sleep. But what if there's no such thing as normal ? Why Can't We Sleep ? delves into the history of sleep — from the surprising truth around the pre-Industrial Revolution 'double sleep', via Freudian dream analysis and the discovery of the REM phase, all the way to rocketing sleeping pill prescriptions and modern sleep gurus making dire claims for our health.
And along the way, it dispels the pervasive myths and anxieties around this most universal human experience. Weaving together cultural, social and psychoanalytic research, Darian Leader looks beneath the headlines to explore the realities of sleep, dreams and insomia.