Dream Psychology | Page 9

dream expresses the
realization of the desire somewhat indirectly; some connection, some sequel must be
known--the first step towards recognizing the desire. Thus, when a husband related to me
the dream of his young wife, that her monthly period had begun, I had to bethink myself
that the young wife would have expected a pregnancy if the period had been absent. The
dream is then a sign of pregnancy. Its meaning is that it shows the wish realized that
pregnancy should not occur just yet. Under unusual and extreme circumstances, these
dreams of the infantile type become very frequent. The leader of a polar expedition tells
us, for instance, that during the wintering amid the ice the crew, with their monotonous
diet and slight rations, dreamt regularly, like children, of fine meals, of mountains of
tobacco, and of home.
It is not uncommon that out of some long, complicated and intricate dream one specially
lucid part stands out containing unmistakably the realization of a desire, but bound up
with much unintelligible matter. On more frequently analyzing the seemingly more
transparent dreams of adults, it is astonishing to discover that these are rarely as simple as
the dreams of children, and that they cover another meaning beyond that of the
realization of a wish.
It would certainly be a simple and convenient solution of the riddle if the work of
analysis made it at all possible for us to trace the meaningless and intricate dreams of
adults back to the infantile type, to the realization of some intensely experienced desire of
the day. But there is no warrant for such an expectation. Their dreams are generally full
of the most indifferent and bizarre matter, and no trace of the realization of the wish is to
be found in their content.
Before leaving these infantile dreams, which are obviously unrealized desires, we must
not fail to mention another chief characteristic of dreams, one that has been long noticed,
and one which stands out most clearly in this class. I can replace any of these dreams by a
phrase expressing a desire. If the sea trip had only lasted longer; if I were only washed
and dressed; if I had only been allowed to keep the cherries instead of giving them to my

uncle. But the dream gives something more than the choice, for here the desire is already
realized; its realization is real and actual. The dream presentations consist chiefly, if not
wholly, of scenes and mainly of visual sense images. Hence a kind of transformation is
not entirely absent in this class of dreams, and this may be fairly designated as the dream
work. _An idea merely existing in the region of possibility is replaced by a vision of its
accomplishment._

II
THE DREAM MECHANISM
We are compelled to assume that such transformation of scene has also taken place in
intricate dreams, though we do not know whether it has encountered any possible desire.
The dream instanced at the commencement, which we analyzed somewhat thoroughly,
did give us occasion in two places to suspect something of the kind. Analysis brought out
that my wife was occupied with others at table, and that I did not like it; in the dream
itself exactly the opposite occurs, for the person who replaces my wife gives me her
undivided attention. But can one wish for anything pleasanter after a disagreeable
incident than that the exact contrary should have occurred, just as the dream has it? The
stinging thought in the analysis, that I have never had anything for nothing, is similarly
connected with the woman's remark in the dream: "You have always had such beautiful
eyes." Some portion of the opposition between the latent and manifest content of the
dream must be therefore derived from the realization of a wish.
Another manifestation of the dream work which all incoherent dreams have in common is
still more noticeable. Choose any instance, and compare the number of separate elements
in it, or the extent of the dream, if written down, with the dream thoughts yielded by
analysis, and of which but a trace can be refound in the dream itself. There can be no
doubt that the dream working has resulted in an extraordinary compression or
condensation. It is not at first easy to form an opinion as to the extent of the condensation;
the more deeply you go into the analysis, the more deeply you are impressed by it. There
will be found no factor in the dream whence the chains of associations do not lead in two
or more directions, no scene which has not been pieced together out of two or more
impressions and events. For instance, I once dreamt about a kind of swimming-bath
where the bathers suddenly separated in all directions;