Hart has degrees in literature and creative writing and focuses her published writing on literary themes. In this essay, Hart interprets Tolstaya's short story as a metaphor for the psychological challenges between the rational mind and the imagination of an writer.

Tatyana Tolstaya's "Night" was published in Sleepwalker in a Fog, a collection of short stories in which, according to Michiko Kakutani in her review published in the New York Times, all Tolstaya's characters "indulge in wistful daydreams." Backing up this view is David Plante, also writing a review in the New York Times. But Plante adds that "the dreams, and the characters lost like sleepwalkers in their own dreams" all have to do with the historical and moral reality of Russia. Plante is referring to the suppression, and sometimes persecution, of the people's voice by the Russian government. Although it might have been Tolstaya's intention to...