Dream Galaxy

Research case · People & kin

An opera I had never heard

Baltimore, USA · before 1911

I had never even heard of the opera before, but that night I dreamed that I heard it performed. The dream was a very vivid one, so vivid that several times during the next day I found myself humming airs from the dream opera.

Original text — The World of Dreams, Havelock Ellis

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Source
The World of Dreams — Havelock Ellis, 1911. Case report
Rights
Public domain (US)
Record type
Research case
Place
Baltimore, USA · American
Date
before 1911
Uncertainty
Moderate — Reported in Havelock Ellis’s study of dreams.
Imagery
Music · Crowd
Feelings
Wonder · Joy

How traditions have read this kind of dream

Psychological

Family members, friends and strangers populate most dreams. Freud read many such dreams as wishes in disguise; contemporary researchers emphasise continuity with waking relationships and concerns.

Freud, Dream Psychology (1920)

Mythological

Dreams in epic and scripture are often addressed to someone — a wife waiting for a husband, a son receiving a vision for his family — and are told aloud to be understood.

Odyssey XIX; Genesis 37

Chinese traditions

Confucius lamented that he no longer dreamed of the Duke of Zhou; in Chinese letters, dreaming of someone is a measure of how much they are on one’s mind.

Analects 7.5

These are cultural lenses, not a diagnosis.

Dreams that share its images