Review: A Horse At Night by Amina Cain
Amina Cain’s latest work of creative nonfiction captures a world waiting to be written—she urges her reader to “write into falling snow, falling rain, falling leaves. Write into the dark stove. A bird of paradise. Write into the ceiling and the scalloped edge. Write into a drawing of a necklace [...] Into the times you were unhappy.”
For anyone who values writing as a means of illuminating details and perspectives that wane in everyday light, this invitation is an enticing one. But what does it mean to write “into” something?
A Horse at Night (The Dorothy Project, 136pp, paperback) is an essayistic approach to this very question. What is writing? Where is it located? Does it skate upon the surface of our memories, or does it stir inside our bodies? Is writing an urge or is it the result of one? Writing, through Cain’s lens, emerges like a secret hidden within reach, a dried out flower perhaps, pressed between the pages of your favourite book. And I challenge anyone—“writer” or otherwise—to read this book and resist the desire to seek language on every surface.
A Horse At Night is as much a book on reading as it is about writing, and it expresses the slipperiness between the two practices. My own copy is adorned with asterisks marking Cain’s unique constellation of literary influences, reminding me to investigate texts I'd not heard of. For me this included Helen Humphreys’ the Frozen Thames, Junichiro Tanizaki’s In Praise of Shadows, and Anat Pick’s Creaturely Poetics, whose titles alone nod to the breadth of Cain’s literary taste.
As with any book that relies on texts its readers are unlikely to be familiar with, A Horse at Night becomes an open conversation. Whilst sometimes reading a book relying so heavily on unfamiliarity can be frustrating, in this case the references are not abrasive or eclipsing. I found they came to represent a kind of conversational prompt, urging the reader to consult their own reading, and to try applying Cain’s musings to our personal libraries.
At one point Cain considers Elena Ferrante’s The Lost Daughter and Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Lolly Willowes, considering the way the “novels have become part of my inner life, which is always a part of one’s solitude.” As I read the line above I wondered which novels had in turn become part of my inner life, my solitude. Cain’s delicate assertions led me down paths like these, the author becoming a kind of guiding figure, opening doors just wide enough, then leaving me to wonder through them alone.
I am reminded of Olivia Laing’s The Lonely City. Both texts tread a tentative line between memoir and nonfiction and ground themselves in works of art. Whilst the gentle, restless nature of Cain’s text is in many ways its strength, I feel it would have benefited from a more consistent organizing principle, as loneliness in New York City serves for Laing. I wanted Cain to hover a moment longer on her topics—hold the lamp closer, arrange her thoughts more tightly around a central feeling or event.
Cain states that “to write, to do any kind of work well, I believe we must at least have a solitude of mind, a solitude of seeing.” She continues to say that “there is life that surrounds each one of us that no one else should enter, lest they drive it off.” Thoughts like these champion reading and writing as both a deeply meditative and generative force for self exploration. If contemplative ruminations and gestures prompting a literary and creative journey of your own are enough for you, this intriguing book is well worth reaching for.
