The Chukovsky Diaries.

“In sleeplessness, it’s terrible to stay in your own society longer than you need. You terribly bored yourself - and hence the craving for death: to stifle this shy interlocutor, to obscure, to quench. You’re terribly thirsty for this repayment, I’ve been desperate tonight. I will never end. You lie on a pillow, sleep, but not to the end, even some piece - and you would be all in the unconscious, but it is a small piece that is missing. The question is: “Do I sleep or do I not sleep?” Will I go to sleep or will I not go to sleep?" you spy on this little piece, and it's because of this spying that you don't sleep at all. Today I hit myself with a fist on my skull! He beat to the blues - a foolish skull, would change - oh! Oh oh! Oh oh!”

by 17.05. 1924 in Moscow.