Immortality

Immortality

Untitled 1968 [from 'The Somnambulist']

The image on the cover of Immortality was originally published in photographer Ralph Gibson's book, The Somnambulist, which came out in 1970. It was the first of a trilogy (the others being Deja Vu and Days at Sea), and published by Lustrum, Gibson's own press. By definition, a somnambulist is a sleepwalker, but Gibson used the title as metaphor for a kind of novel-without-words, dealing with the unconscious mind. This picture, of a silhouetted, haloed hand about to grasp a doorknob, appears early in The Somnambulist, and may be seen to symbolize the transition between the life of the world and the life of dreams.

See 'Multiple Uses' for other books with the same cover image: