I may also construct a collective person for the condensation of the
dream in another manner, by uniting the actual features of two or more
persons in one dream image. It is in this manner that Dr. M. in my dream
was constructed, he bears the name of Dr. M., and speaks and acts as Dr.
M. does, but his bodily characteristics and his suffering belong to
another person, my eldest brother; a single feature, paleness, is doubly
determined, owing to the fact that it is common to both persons. Dr. R.
in my dream about my uncle is a similar composite person. But here the
dream image is prepared in still another manner. I have not united
features peculiar to the one with features of the other, and thereby
abridged the remembered image of each by certain features, but I have
adopted the method employed by Galton in producing family portraits, by
which he projects both pictures upon one another, whereupon the common
features stand out in stronger relief, while those which do not coincide
neutralize one another and become obscure in the picture. In the dream
of my uncle the _blond beard_ stands out in relief, as an emphasized
feature, from the physiognomy, which belongs to two persons, and which
is therefore blurred; furthermore the beard contains an allusion to my
father and to myself, which is made possible by its reference to the
fact of growing grey.
The construction of collective and composite persons is one of the chief
resources of the activity of dream condensation. There will soon be an
occasion for treating of this in another connection.
The notion “dysentery” in the dream about the injection likewise has a
manifold determination, on the one hand because of its paraphasic
assonance with diphtheria, and on the other because of its reference to
the patient, whom I have sent to the Orient, and whose hysteria has been
wrongly recognised.
The mention of “propyls” in the dream also proves to be an interesting
case of condensation. Not “propyls” but “amyls” were contained in the
dream thoughts. One might think that here a simple displacement had
occurred in the dream formation. And this is the case, but the
displacement serves the purposes of condensation, as is shown by the
following supplementary analysis. If I dwell for a moment upon the word
“propyls,” its assonance to the word “propylæum” suggests itself to me.
But the propylæum is to be found not only in Athens but also in Munich.
In the latter city I visited a friend the year before who was seriously
ill, and the reference to him becomes unmistakable on account of
_trimethylamin_, which follows closely upon _propyls_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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