big eye

big eye (uncountable)

1. (Antarctica) Insomnia due to the lengths of the days and nights in the polar regions.
   • 1969, Thomas Keneally, The Survivor:

     He would permit Mrs Leeming, he said with a sly Irish smile, to visit the pit site only if she got a full night's sleep, no big-eye, no waiting up for the midnight sun.

   • 1969, Gay Gaer Luce, Julius Segal, Insomnia, Doubleday, page 7:

     One of the favorite myths of polar expeditions involves the "Big Eye," the fierce insomnia which is said to persecute the new arrival and which has been lent an almost legendary aura.

   • 2009, Jon Stephenson, Crevasse Roulette, Rosenberg, →ISBN, page 113:

     They had a cinema with several shows each week, but I missed these. There was provision for 'the big eye', their term for insomnia, so that anyone afflicted could watch a movie at virtually any time.

• midnight sun
• polar night

• Hince, Bernadette (2000) The Antarctic Dictionary, Csiro Publishing, →ISBN

• beigey