Boring Books for Bedtime Readings to Help You Sleep
Boring Books for Bedtime is a weekly sleep podcast in which we calmly, quietly read something rather boring to silence the brain chatter keeping you awake. Think Aristotle, Thoreau, and whoever wrote the 1897 Sears Catalog—mostly nonfiction, mostly old, a perfect blend of vaguely-but-not-too interesting. If you're on Team Sleepless, lie back, take a deep breath, and let us read you to rest.
Episodes
Let’s relax with more from Mrs. Emily Post as she advises us on making calls, the art of social climbing, and the niceties of leaving one’s card. Truly a calling card for sleep!
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Let’s relax and sleep with advice on staging a play, including roles behind the curtain, choosing actors, and blocking the action, courtesy of a scene from Oscar Wilde. The drama!
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Let's relax with some sleep-inducing science and learn why space-time is neither space nor time, but so much more. If you’re not entirely sure what the “more” is, never mind. You’ll be asleep anyway.
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Let’s continue our relaxing hike through Yellowstone National Park, marvel at geysers and hot springs, imagine prehistoric forests, and appreciate the beauty off the beaten path. Dreamy!
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Let’s learn more from Mrs. Beeton about vegetable soups and their ingredients, all of which will be ruined by hours-long boiling. Also, the Prince of Wales is honored with tiny turnip balls.
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Tonight, let’s relax with more from the fascinating world of bees and learn all about murderous queens, busy workers, growing larvae, and lazy drones. It’s all sweet honey for your sleepy mind.
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Let’s relax with the spread of Christianity in Britain, penned by a saint who was actually there. But first, a preface, an intro, and a biography of the blessed Bede! We do get to the history eventually, but you’ll probably be asleep.
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Let’s relax and sleep to more 19th-century know-how, and learn how to set up a cheese factory, get milk to curdle, and appreciate our buddy, lactic acid.
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Let’s take a relaxing shop through some of Sears’ lesser-known offerings—houses! From Craftsmans to cottages or an entire apartment building, it can all be delivered to you, guaranteed.
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Let’s return to Pliny’s relaxing opus and learn about the seasons, planting schedules, and the best time to buy a winter cloak so you don’t get price gouged. It’s all written in the stars!
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Let’s relax and sleep with quiet thoughts on a loud art, including speculation on Eastern origins, deadly Greek fire, and every mention of fireworks in Europe for a thousand years (no, really).
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By listener request, let’s relax and sleep with this guide to the purchasing, care, and training of horses in Ancient Greece. To sum up, hooves are everything, and kindness counts. Good advice!
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Let’s hear from the world’s greatest showman how to live a wealthy, happy life. Sleepy spoiler alert: do things you’re good at, don’t envy others, and spend less than you make. Talk about boring!
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Let’s continue with this sleepy theory about the Earth and how fish migrations absolutely, positively prove that it must be hollow. What other explanation could there be? None, says Symmes!
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Let’s finish our tour of the sleepy world of spices, learn about grains of paradise (my favorite medieval spice), and reveal the connection between saffron and…crocodiles? Sure, why not.
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Let’s relax and sleep with more about apple history, creating hybrids, and the validity of Van Mons’ theories of propagation. Yeah, I don’t know either, but I guess he was big in Belgium.
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Let's relax with a subject near and dear to your reader’s heart—cats! Drift off to the intelligence of felines, the first cat show, and drama at the Cat Club. Scandalous!
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Let’s return to Aristotle’s classic on the purpose of life. What’s it all for, anyway? No real answers here tonight, alas, but at least he can help us sleep through the confusion.
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