She and her friend remain seated while her younger sister, who still has
opportunities to marry, hands her up the coal “because she did not know
it would last so long.” What would last so long is not told in the
dream. In relating it we would supply “the performance”; but in the
dream we must take the sentence as it is, declare it ambiguous, and add
“until she marries.” The interpretation “secret love” is then confirmed
by the mention of the cousin who sits with his wife in the parquette,
and by the open love-affair attributed to the latter. The contrasts
between secret and open love, between her fire and the coldness of the
young wife, dominate the dream. Moreover, here again there is a person
“in high position” as a middle term between the aristocrat and the
musician entitled to high hopes.
By means of the above discussion we have at last brought to light a
third factor, whose part in the transformation of the dream thoughts
into the dream content is not to be considered trivial; _it is the
regard for presentability_ (_German: Darstellbarkeit_) _in the peculiar
psychic material which the dream makes use of_,—that is fitness for
representation, for the most part by means of visual images. Among the
various subordinate ideas associated with the essential dream thoughts,
that one will be preferred which permits of a visual representation, and
the dream-activity does not hesitate promptly to recast the inflexible
thought into another verbal form, even if it is the more unusual one, as
long as this form makes dramatisation possible, and thus puts an end to
the psychological distress caused by cramped thinking. This pouring of
the thought content into another mould may at the same time be put at
the service of the condensation work, and may establish relations with
another thought which would otherwise not be present. This other thought
itself may perhaps have previously changed its original expression for
the purpose of meeting these relations half-way.
In view of the part played by puns, quotations, songs, and proverbs in
the intellectual life of educated persons, it would be entirely in
accordance with our expectation to find disguises of this sort used with
extraordinary frequency. For a few kinds of material a universally
applicable dream symbolism has been established on a basis of generally
known allusions and equivalents. A good part of this symbolism,
moreover, is possessed by the dream in common with the psychoneuroses,
and with legends and popular customs.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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