Train (Advance Reading Copy)

Train (Advance Reading Copy)

Untitled (fiest of the final two images in 'The Somnambulist')

I remember attending a lecture given by Ralph Gibson in the mid-1970s, not long after the last book in his early 'trilogy' had been published. Gibson showed work from all three volumes, and when he came to this, the image now on the cover of Pete Dexter's 'Train', he said it was the penultimate photo in a series of images sequenced to represent a dream. The dreamer is pulling himself out of the water (read: unconscious); he is on the verge of wakefulness. The triangular shape at the bottom of the boat becomes, in the next and final image, the corner of the dreamer's room; it is the first thing he sees upon awakening (This final image may be found on the cover of writer David Wong Louie's 'The Pangs of Love').

So far, I've found three books with jackets using photographs from Gibson's 'The Somnambulist'. Perhaps, in time, the entire book will be reproduced on covers.