Part 12
For two dreams, one of my daughters, at that time eight and a half years old, the other of a boy five and a quarter years of age, I am indebted to an excursion to the beautiful Hallstatt in the summer of 1896. I must make the preliminary statement that during this summer we were living on a hill near Aussee, from which, when the weather was good, we enjoyed a splendid view of the Dachstein from the roof of our house. The Simony Hut could easily be recognised with a telescope. The little ones often tried to see it through the telescope—I do not know with what success. Before the excursion I had told the children that Hallstatt lay at the foot of the Dachstein. They looked forward to the day with great joy. From Hallstatt we entered the valley of Eschern, which highly pleased the children with its varying aspects. One of them, however, the boy of five, gradually became discontented. As often as a mountain came in view, he would ask: “Is that the Dachstein?” whereupon I would have to answer: “No, only a foot-hill.” After this question had been repeated several times, he became altogether silent; and he was quite unwilling to come along on the flight of steps to the waterfall. I thought he was tired out. But the next morning, he approached me radiant with joy, and said: “Last night I dreamt that we were at Simony Hut.” I understood him now; he had expected, as I was speaking of the Dachstein, that on the excursion to Hallstatt, he would ascend the mountain and would come face to face with the hut, about which there had been so much discussion at the telescope. When he learned that he was expected to be regaled with foot-hills and a waterfall, he was disappointed and became discontented. The dream compensated him for this. I tried to learn some details of the dream; they were scanty. “Steps must be climbed for six hours,” as he had heard.
On this excursion wishes, destined to be satisfied only in dreams, had arisen also in the mind of the girl of eight and a half years. We had taken with us to Hallstatt the twelve-year-old boy of our neighbour—an accomplished cavalier, who, it seems to me, already enjoyed the full sympathy of the little woman. The next morning, then, she related the following dream: “Just think, I dreamt that Emil was one of us, that he said papa and mamma to you, and slept at our house in the big room like our boys. Then mamma came into the room and threw a large handful of chocolate bars under our beds.” The brothers of the girl, who evidently had not inherited a familiarity with dream interpretation, declared just like the authors: “That dream is nonsense.” The girl defended at least a part of the dream, and it is worth while, from the point of view of the theory of neuroses, to know which part: “That about Emil belonging to us is nonsense, but that about the bars of chocolate is not.” It was just this latter part that was obscure to me. For this mamma furnished me the explanation. On the way home from the railway station the children had stopped in front of a slot machine, and had desired exactly such chocolate bars wrapped in paper with a metallic lustre, as the machine, according to their experience, had for sale. But the mother had rightly thought that the day had brought enough wish-fulfilment, and had left this wish to be satisfied in dreams. This little scene had escaped me. I at once understood that portion of the dream which had been condemned by my daughter. I had myself heard the well-behaved guest enjoining the children to wait until papa or mamma had come up. For the little one the dream made a lasting adoption based on this temporary relation of the boy to us. Her tender nature was as yet unacquainted with any form of being together except those mentioned in the dream, which are taken from her brothers. Why the chocolate bars were thrown under the bed could not, of course, be explained without questioning the child.
From a friend I have learnt of a dream very similar to that of my boy. It concerned an eight-year-old girl. The father had undertaken a walk to Dornbach with the children, intending to visit the Rohrerhütte, but turned back because it had grown too late, and promised the children to make up for their disappointment some other time. On the way back, they passed a sign which showed the way to the Hameau. The children now asked to be taken to that place also, but had to be content, for the same reason, with a postponement to another day. The next morning, the eight-year-old girl came to the father, satisfied, saying: “Papa, I dreamt last night that you were with us at the Rohrerhütte and on the Hameau.” Her impatience had thus in the dream anticipated the fulfilment of the promise made by her father.
Another dream, which the picturesque beauty of the Aussee inspired in my daughter, at that time three and a quarter years old, is equally straightforward. The little one had crossed the lake for the first time, and the trip had passed too quickly for her. She did not want to leave the boat at the landing, and cried bitterly. The next morning she told us: “Last night I was sailing on the lake.” Let us hope that the duration of this dream ride was more satisfactory to her.
My eldest boy, at that time eight years of age, was already dreaming of the realisation of his fancies. He had been riding in a chariot with Achilles, with Diomed as charioteer. He had, of course, on the previous day shown a lively interest in the _Myths of Greece_, which had been given to his elder sister.
If it be granted that the talking of children in sleep likewise belongs to the category of dreaming, I may report the following as one of the most recent dreams in my collection. My youngest girl, at that time nineteen months old, had vomited one morning, and had therefore been kept without food throughout the day. During the night which followed upon this day of hunger, she was heard to call excitedly in her sleep: “Anna Feud, strawberry, huckleberry, omelette, pap!” She used her name in this way in order to express her idea of property; the menu must have included about everything which would seem to her a desirable meal; the fact that berries appeared in it twice was a demonstration against the domestic sanitary regulations, and was based on the circumstance, by no means overlooked by her, that the nurse ascribed her indisposition to an over-plentiful consumption of strawberries; she thus in the dream took revenge for this opinion which was distasteful to her.[AA]
If we call childhood happy because it does not yet know sexual desire, we must not forget how abundant a source of disappointment and self-denial, and thus of dream stimulation, the other of the great life-impulses may become for it.[AB] Here is a second example showing this. My nephew of twenty-two months had been given the task of congratulating me upon my birthday, and of handing me, as a present, a little basket of cherries, which at that time of the year were not yet in season. It seemed difficult for him, for he repeated again and again: “Cherries in it,” and could not be induced to let the little basket go out of his hands. But he knew how to secure his compensation. He had, until now, been in the habit of telling his mother every morning that he had dreamt of the “white soldier,” an officer of the guard in a white cloak, whom he had once admired on the street. On the day after the birthday, he awakened joyfully with the information which could have had its origin only in a dream: “He(r)man eat up all the cherries!”[AC]
What animals dream of I do not know. A proverb for which I am indebted to one of my readers claims to know, for it raises the question: “What does the goose dream of?” the answer being: “Of maize!” The whole theory that the dream is the fulfilment of a wish is contained in these sentences.[AD]
We now perceive that we should have reached our theory of the hidden meaning of the dream by the shortest road if we had merely consulted colloquial usage. The wisdom of proverbs, it is true, sometimes speaks contemptuously enough of the dream—it apparently tries to justify science in expressing the opinion that “Dreams are mere bubbles;” but still for colloquial usage the dream is the gracious fulfiller of wishes. “I should never have fancied that in the wildest dream,” exclaims one who finds his expectations surpassed in reality.
IV DISTORTION IN DREAMS
If I make the assertion that wish fulfilment is the meaning of every dream, that, accordingly, there can be no dreams except wish dreams, I am sure at the outset to meet with the most emphatic contradiction. Objections will be made to this effect: “The fact that there are dreams which must be understood as fulfilments of wishes is not new, but, on the contrary, has long since been recognised by the authors. _Cf._ Radestock[54] (pp. 137–138), Volkelt[72] (pp. 110–111), Tissié[68] (p. 70), M. Simon[63] (p. 42) on the hunger dreams of the imprisoned Baron Trenck, and the passage in Griesinger[31] (p. 11). The assumption that there can be nothing but dreams of wish fulfilment, however, is another of those unjustified generalisations by which you have been pleased to distinguish yourself of late. Indeed dreams which exhibit the most painful content, but not a trace of wish fulfilment, occur plentifully enough. The pessimistic philosopher, Edward von Hartman, perhaps stands furthest from the theory of wish fulfilment. He expresses himself in his _Philosophy of the Unconscious_, Part II. (stereotyped edition, p. 34), to the following effect:—
“‘As regards the dream, all the troubles of waking life are transferred by it to the sleeping state; only the one thing, which can in some measure reconcile a cultured person to life-scientific and artistic enjoyment is not transferred....’ But even less discontented observers have laid emphasis on the fact that in dreams pain and disgust are more frequent than pleasure; so Scholz[59] (p. 39), Volkelt[72] (p. 80), and others. Indeed two ladies, Sarah Weed and Florence Hallam,[33] have found from the elaboration of their dreams a mathematical expression for the preponderance of displeasure in dreams. They designate 58 per cent. of the dreams as disagreeable, and only 28·6 per cent. as positively pleasant. Besides those dreams which continue the painful sensations of life during sleep, there are also dreams of fear, in which this most terrible of all disagreeable sensations tortures us until we awake, and it is with just these dreams of fear that children are so often persecuted (_Cf._ Debacker [17] concerning the Pavor Nocturnus), though it is in the case of children that you have found dreams of wishing undisguised.”
Indeed it is the anxiety dreams which seem to prevent a generalisation of the thesis that the dream is a wish-fulfilment, which we have established by means of the examples in the last section; they seem even to brand this thesis as an absurdity.
It is not difficult, however, to escape these apparently conclusive objections. Please observe that our doctrine does not rest upon an acceptance of the manifest dream content, but has reference to the thought content which is found to lie behind the dream by the process of interpretation. Let us contrast the _manifest_ and the _latent dream content_. It is true that there are dreams whose content is of the most painful nature. But has anyone ever tried to interpret these dreams, to disclose their latent thought content? If not, the two objections are no longer valid against us; there always remains the possibility that even painful and fearful dreams may be discovered to be wish fulfilments upon interpretation.[AE]
In scientific work it is often advantageous, when the solution of one problem presents difficulties, to take up a second problem, just as it is easier to crack two nuts together instead of separately. Accordingly we are confronted not merely with the problem: How can painful and fearful dreams be the fulfilments of wishes? but we may also, from our discussion so far, raise the question: Why do not the dreams which show an indifferent content, but turn out to be wish-fulfilments, show this meaning undisguised? Take the fully reported dream of Irma’s injection; it is in no way painful in its nature, and can be recognised, upon interpretation, as a striking wish-fulfilment. Why, in the first place, is an interpretation necessary? Why does not the dream say directly what it means? As a matter of fact, even the dream of Irma’s injection does not at first impress us as representing a wish of the dreamer as fulfilled. The reader will not have received this impression, and even I myself did not know it until I had undertaken the analysis. If we call this peculiarity of the dream of needing an explanation _the fact of the distortion_ of dreams, then a second question arises: What is the origin of this disfigurement of dreams?
If one’s first impressions on this subject were consulted, one might happen upon several possible solutions; for example, that there is an inability during sleep to find an adequate expression for the dream thoughts. The analysis of certain dreams, however, compels us to give the disfigurement of dreams another explanation. I shall show this by employing a second dream of my own, which again involves numerous indiscretions, but which compensates for this personal sacrifice by affording a thorough elucidation of the problem.
_Preliminary Statement._—In the spring of 1897 I learnt that two professors of our university had proposed me for appointment as Professor extraord. (assistant professor). This news reached me unexpectedly and pleased me considerably as an expression of appreciation on the part of two eminent men which could not be explained by personal interest. But, I immediately thought, I must not permit myself to attach any expectation to this event. The university government had during the last few years left proposals of this kind unconsidered, and several colleagues, who were ahead of me in years, and who were at least my equals in merit, had been waiting in vain during this time for their appointment. I had no reason to suppose I should fare better. I resolved then to comfort myself. I am not, so far as I know, ambitious, and I engage in medical practice with satisfying results even without the recommendation of a title. Moreover, it was not a question whether I considered the grapes sweet or sour, for they undoubtedly hung much too high for me.
One evening I was visited by a friend of mine, one of those colleagues whose fate I had taken as a warning for myself. As he had long been a candidate for promotion to the position of professor, which in our society raises the physician to a demigod among his patients, and as he was less resigned than I, he was in the habit of making representations from time to time, at the offices of the university government, for the purpose of advancing his interests. He came to me from a visit of that kind. He said that this time he had driven the exalted gentleman into a corner, and had asked him directly whether considerations of creed were not really responsible for the deferment of his appointment. The answer had been that to be sure—in the present state of public opinion—His Excellency was not in a position, &c. “Now I at least know what I am at,” said my friend in closing his narrative, which told me nothing new, but which was calculated to confirm me in my resignation. For the same considerations of creed applied to my own case.
On the morning after this visit, I had the following dream, which was notable on account of its form. It consisted of two thoughts and two images, so that a thought and an image alternated. But I here record only the first half of the dream, because the other half has nothing to do with the purpose which the citation of the dream should serve.
I. _Friend R. is my uncle—I feel great affection for him._
II. _I see before me his face somewhat altered._
_It seems to be elongated; a yellow beard, which surrounds it, is emphasised with peculiar distinctness._
Then follow the other two portions, again a thought and an image, which I omit.
The interpretation of this dream was accomplished in the following manner:
As the dream occurred to me in the course of the forenoon, I laughed outright and said: “The dream is nonsense.” But I could not get it out of my mind, and the whole day it pursued me, until, at last, in the evening I reproached myself with the words: “If in the course of dream interpretation one of your patients had nothing better to say than ‘That is nonsense,’ you would reprove him, and would suspect that behind the dream there was hidden some disagreeable affair, the exposure of which he wanted to spare himself. Apply the same thing in your own case; your opinion that the dream is nonsense probably signifies merely an inner resistance to its interpretation. Do not let yourself be deterred.” I then proceeded to the interpretation.
“R. is my uncle.” What does that mean. I have had only one uncle, my uncle Joseph.[AF] His story, to be sure, was a sad one. He had yielded to the temptation, more than thirty years before, of engaging in dealings which the law punishes severely, and which on that occasion also it had visited with punishment. My father, who thereupon became grey from grief in a few days, always used to say that Uncle Joseph was never a wicked man, but that he was indeed a simpleton; so he expressed himself. If, then, friend R. is my uncle Joseph, that is equivalent to saying: “R. is a simpleton.” Hardly credible and very unpleasant! But there is that face which I see in the dream, with its long features and its yellow beard. My uncle actually had such a face—long and surrounded by a handsome blond beard. My friend R. was quite dark, but when dark-haired persons begin to grow grey, they pay for the glory of their youthful years. Their black beard undergoes an unpleasant change of color, each hair separately; first it becomes reddish brown, then yellowish brown, and then at last definitely grey. The beard of my friend R. is now in this stage, as is my own moreover, a fact which I notice with regret. The face which I see in the dream is at once that of my friend R. and that of my uncle. It is like a composite photograph of Galton, who, in order to emphasise family resemblances, had several faces photographed on the same plate. No doubt is thus possible, I am really of the opinion that my friend R. is a simpleton—like my uncle Joseph.
I have still no idea for what purpose I have constructed this relationship, to which I must unconditionally object. But it is not a very far-reaching one, for my uncle was a criminal, my friend R. is innocent—perhaps with the exception of having been punished for knocking down an apprentice with his bicycle. Could I mean this offence? That would be making ridiculous comparisons. Here I recollect another conversation which I had with another colleague, N., and indeed upon the same subject. I met N. on the street. He likewise has been nominated for a professorship, and having heard of my being honoured, congratulated me upon it. I declined emphatically, saying, “You are the last man to make a joke like this, because you have experienced what the nomination is worth in your own case.” Thereupon he said, though probably not in earnest, “You cannot be sure about that. Against me there is a very particular objection. Don’t you know that a woman once entered a legal complaint against me? I need not assure you that an inquiry was made; it was a mean attempt at blackmail, and it was all I could do to save the plaintiff herself from punishment. But perhaps the affair will be pressed against me at the office in order that I may not be appointed. You, however, are above reproach.” Here I have come upon a criminal, and at the same time upon the interpretation and trend of the dream. My uncle Joseph represents for me both colleagues who have not been appointed to the professorship, the one as a simpleton, the other as a criminal. I also know now for what purpose I need this representation. If considerations of creed are a determining factor in the postponement of the appointment of my friends, then my own appointment is also put in question: but if I can refer the rejection of the two friends to other causes, which do not apply to my case, my hope remains undisturbed. This is the procedure of my dream; it makes the one, R., a simpleton, the other, N., a criminal; since, however, I am neither the one nor the other, our community of interest is destroyed, I have a right to enjoy the expectation of being appointed a professor, and have escaped the painful application to my own case of the information which the high official has given to R.
I must occupy myself still further with the interpretation of this dream. For my feelings it is not yet sufficiently cleared up. I am still disquieted by the ease with which I degrade two respected colleagues for the purpose of clearing the way to the professorship for myself. My dissatisfaction with my procedure has indeed diminished since I have learnt to evaluate statements made in dreams. I would argue against anyone who urged that I really consider R. a simpleton, and that I do not credit N.’s account of the blackmail affair. I do not believe either that Irma has been made seriously ill by an injection given her by Otto with a preparation of propyl. Here, as before, it is only the _wish that the case may be as the dream expresses it_. The statement in which my wish is realised sounds less absurd in the second dream than in the first; it is made here with a more skilful utilisation of facts as points of attachment, something like a well-constructed slander, where “there is something in it.” For my friend R. had at that time the vote of a professor from the department against him, and my friend N. had himself unsuspectingly furnished me with the material for slander. Nevertheless, I repeat, the dream seems to me to require further elucidation.