Loneliness feels like such a shameful experience, so counter to the lives we are supposed to lead, that it becomes increasingly inadmissible, a taboo state whose confession seems destined to cause others to turn and flee.
Loneliness is difficult to confess; difficult too to categorise. What does it feel like to be lonely? It feels like being hungry: like being hungry when everyone around you is readying for a feast. You can be lonely anywhere, but there is a particular flavour to the loneliness that comes from living in a city, surrounded by millions of people.
I have never felt lonelier than during those first few months after I had come back to Australia in 1985, when I tried to settle into a new life in Sydney. I had felt lonely before; in fact, I have felt lonely for most of my life because I've always been an "Einzelgänger" and did some of my best work when being alone, unlike others who feel distracted, even bowed down, by domestic woes, by the pressures of family, a mortgage and 2.3 kids. And yet, nothing was as bad as those first few months in Sydney even though I can't even describe it now because loneliness is like a bad toothache: when you suffer from it, it dominates your life, but after it's gone you wonder what the fuss was all about.
To recapture some of that feeling, I've just ordered Olivia Laing's book "The Lonely City - Adventures in the Art of Being Alone". What also attracted me to this book was her use of so many of Hopper's paintings with which I've had an affinity for many years, one of his more famous ones being "Nighthawks". That man with his back to you could've been me in Sydney in 1985 (although I've never been much of a hat-man).
If you’re lonely, this book is for you - and I've just ordered a brandnew copy for $22.95 (let it not be said that I only buy second-hand books!)
