Six mirrors in the barber’s shop

Tokyo, Japan · 1908

真中に立って見廻すと、四角な部屋である。窓が二方に開いて、残る二方に鏡が懸っている。鏡の数を勘定したら六つあった。

Original text — Ten Nights of Dreams, First Night, Natsume Sōseki

Standing in the middle and looking around, I saw a square room. Windows opened on two sides; mirrors hung on the other two. I counted six mirrors.

Translation · Editorial translation (draft)

Open this dream in the galaxy →

Source: Ten Nights of Dreams, First Night — Natsume Sōseki, 1908
Rights: Public domain (author died 100+ years ago)
Record type: Literary dream
Place: Tokyo, Japan · Japanese
Date: 1908
Uncertainty: Moderate — Literary dream sequence; each night is a short story told as a dream.
Imagery: Mirror · House · City · Faces
Feelings: Confusion · Wonder

How traditions have read this kind of dream

Psychological

Houses, corridors and endless stairs are frequent dream settings. Some writers read buildings as figures for the self; others note simply that dreams rebuild the spaces we move through every day.

cf. Stevenson, A Chapter on Dreams (1888)

Mythological

Labyrinths, towers and underground cities appear in myths from Crete to Babel — built places where people lose their way, reach too high, or find hidden kingdoms.

Greek myth; Genesis 11

Chinese traditions

Tang tales like “The Governor of Nanke” place a whole kingdom of palaces inside a dream, only to reveal it as an ants’ nest — a lasting image for the brevity of worldly glory.

Li Gongzuo, c. 802

These are cultural lenses, not a diagnosis.

Dreams that share its images

Irma’s injection Bellevue, near Vienna · 23–24 July 1895
My friend, alive, no longer editing England · before 1911
The scene I had to write England · before 1911
A fire in a hotel in a strange city Zurich, Switzerland · c. 1913
The millet was not yet cooked Handan, China (story setting) · c. 780
Who is dead in the White House? Washington, D.C., USA · early April 1865 (as reported)