Gerald Gillespie is professor emeritus at Stanford University and a former president of the International Comparative Literature Association.

"But be that as it may, poetizing nowadays is everywhere still in a critical state, because there are so few deranged people anymore and such a surplus of rational ones is on hand that they can, out of their own means, occupy all specialties, even poetry. A sheer madman like me finds no employment under such circumstances, and therefore I'm merely skirting poetry now; that is, I have become a humorist, for which, as night watchman, I have the greatest leisure." (from "Second Nightwatch")"

• Preface Introduction THE NIGHTWATCHES Nightwatch 1. The dying freethinker Nightwatch 2. The devil's apparition Nightwatch 3. Stony Crispin's discourse on the chapter de adulteriis Nightwatch 4. Woodcuts; along with the life of a madman as a marionette play Nightwatch 5. The brothers Nightwatch 6. Doomsday Nightwatch 7. Self-portraiture - Funeral oration on a child's birthday - The itinerant minstrel - Suit for slander Nightwatch 8. The poet's apotheosis - Farewell letter to life - Hanswurst's prologue to the tragedy Man Nightwatch 9. The madhouse - Monologue of the insane creator of the world - The reasonable fool Nightwatch 10. The winter's night - Love's dream - The white and the crimson bride - The nun's burial - Run through the musical scale Nightwatch 11. Premonitions of one born blind - The vow - The first sunrise Nightwatch 12. The solar eagle - The immortal wig - The false pigtail - Apology of life - The comedian Nightwatch 13. Dithyramb on spring - The title without book - The invalid home of the gods - The backside of Venus Nightwatch 14. The love of two fools Nightwatch 15. The marionette theater Nightwatch 16. The Bohemian woman - The man with second sight - The father's grave Afterword: Authorship and Reception Notes Select Bibliography

Gerald Gillespie is professor emeritus at Stanford University and a former president of the International Comparative Literature Association.

"But be that as it may, poetizing nowadays is everywhere still in a critical state, because there are so few deranged people anymore and such a surplus of rational ones is on hand that they can, out of their own means, occupy all specialties, even poetry. A sheer madman like me finds no employment under such circumstances, and therefore I'm merely skirting poetry now; that is, I have become a humorist, for which, as night watchman, I have the greatest leisure." (from "Second Nightwatch")"

• Preface Introduction THE NIGHTWATCHES Nightwatch 1. The dying freethinker Nightwatch 2. The devil's apparition Nightwatch 3. Stony Crispin's discourse on the chapter de adulteriis Nightwatch 4. Woodcuts; along with the life of a madman as a marionette play Nightwatch 5. The brothers Nightwatch 6. Doomsday Nightwatch 7. Self-portraiture - Funeral oration on a child's birthday - The itinerant minstrel - Suit for slander Nightwatch 8. The poet's apotheosis - Farewell letter to life - Hanswurst's prologue to the tragedy Man Nightwatch 9. The madhouse - Monologue of the insane creator of the world - The reasonable fool Nightwatch 10. The winter's night - Love's dream - The white and the crimson bride - The nun's burial - Run through the musical scale Nightwatch 11. Premonitions of one born blind - The vow - The first sunrise Nightwatch 12. The solar eagle - The immortal wig - The false pigtail - Apology of life - The comedian Nightwatch 13. Dithyramb on spring - The title without book - The invalid home of the gods - The backside of Venus Nightwatch 14. The love of two fools Nightwatch 15. The marionette theater Nightwatch 16. The Bohemian woman - The man with second sight - The father's grave Afterword: Authorship and Reception Notes Select Bibliography

Gerald Gillespie is professor emeritus at Stanford University and a former president of the International Comparative Literature Association.

"But be that as it may, poetizing nowadays is everywhere still in a critical state, because there are so few deranged people anymore and such a surplus of rational ones is on hand that they can, out of their own means, occupy all specialties, even poetry. A sheer madman like me finds no employment under such circumstances, and therefore I'm merely skirting poetry now; that is, I have become a humorist, for which, as night watchman, I have the greatest leisure." (from "Second Nightwatch")"

• Preface Introduction THE NIGHTWATCHES Nightwatch 1. The dying freethinker Nightwatch 2. The devil's apparition Nightwatch 3. Stony Crispin's discourse on the chapter de adulteriis Nightwatch 4. Woodcuts; along with the life of a madman as a marionette play Nightwatch 5. The brothers Nightwatch 6. Doomsday Nightwatch 7. Self-portraiture - Funeral oration on a child's birthday - The itinerant minstrel - Suit for slander Nightwatch 8. The poet's apotheosis - Farewell letter to life - Hanswurst's prologue to the tragedy Man Nightwatch 9. The madhouse - Monologue of the insane creator of the world - The reasonable fool Nightwatch 10. The winter's night - Love's dream - The white and the crimson bride - The nun's burial - Run through the musical scale Nightwatch 11. Premonitions of one born blind - The vow - The first sunrise Nightwatch 12. The solar eagle - The immortal wig - The false pigtail - Apology of life - The comedian Nightwatch 13. Dithyramb on spring - The title without book - The invalid home of the gods - The backside of Venus Nightwatch 14. The love of two fools Nightwatch 15. The marionette theater Nightwatch 16. The Bohemian woman - The man with second sight - The father's grave Afterword: Authorship and Reception Notes Select Bibliography