A Pause In the Action

A History of Rest

- Alain Corbin

'Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed," begins a sonnet of Shakespeare's, soon pausing to note: "But then begins a journey in my head." Or as Pascal put it a few decades later, a bit more pointedly: "Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest," where he "faces his nullity, loneliness, inadequacy, dependence, helplessness, emptiness." Rest is not the same thing as peace of mind. We are, paradoxically, often most restless when we are at rest.

In "A History of Rest," the French historian Alain Corbin takes us on a tour of human attempts to unwind. Among other things, he explores the ancient belief that rest is best achieved in bucolic nature, quoting Virgil on the pleasures of snoozing by "moss-pillowed fountains." He tells us, too, of the 19th-century notion of "public rest," in which citizens were to enjoy a break from political discussion.

(What a wonderful idea!) Mr. Corbin discusses both intentional retreats from the world, as when Charles V abdicated in 1555-56 to spend his remaining days in a monastery, and not-so-intentional ones. In France, nobles who displeased the monarch could find themselves banished to the countryside to cool their heels. Apparently we have this practice to thank for the restoration of several magnificent châteaux. The invention of aids to rest like the chaise lounge make an appearance in Mr. Corbin's engaging book (translated by Helen Morrison), as do resting cures for tuberculosis.