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Delusion and Dream : an Interpretation in the Light of Psychoanalysis of Gradiva

Delusion and Dream : an Interpretation in the Light of Psychoanalysis of Gradiva

Author: Sigmund Freud
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Chapter 1 No.1

Word Count: 10817    |    Released on: 01/12/2017

which have never been dreamed, those created by authors, and attributed to fictitious characters in their productions. The proposal to submit this kind of dream to investigation might appea

raumdeutung has dared, against the protests of orthodox science, to take sides with the ancients and superstitious. He is, of course, far from accepting in dreams a prevision of the future, for the disclosure of which man has, from time immemorial, striven vainly. He could no

roblem be insincerely and untruthfully presented to him as easy and simple, to save his own effort, may seek in the above-mentioned Traumdeutung ample pr

The first question is, rather, whether the dream has any meaning at all, whether one should grant it the value of a psychic process. Science answers, No; it explains the dream as a purely physiological process, behind which one need not seek meaning, signi

heroes through the dreams of the latter. Story-tellers are valuable allies, and their testimony is to be rated high, for they usually know many things between heaven and earth that our academic wisdom does not even dream of. In psychic knowledge, indeed, they are far ahead of us ordinary people, because they draw from sources that we have not yet made accessible for scienc

a little insight into the nature of creative literary production. Actual dreams are considered to be unrestrained and irregular formations, and now come the free copies of such dreams; but there is much less freedom and arbitrariness in psych

stigations of widely different writers, among whom we are wont to honour some, individually, as the most profound connoisseurs of psychic life. Yet these pages will be filled by an investigation of the former kind. It so happened, in the group of men who started the idea, that some one remembered that the bit of fiction which he had most recently enjoyed contained several dreams which looked at him with familiar expression and invited him to try on them the method of Traumdeutung. He admitted that the material and setting of the litt

some time with Gradiva, which first appeared in the book world in 1903. To those who have already read Gradiva, I will recall the conten

ity-city and study with interest. The relief represents a mature young girl walking. She has gathered up her voluminous gown slightly, so that her sandalled feet become visible. One foot rests wholly on the ground; the other is raised to follow and touches the gro

se to be occupied with the relief. He finds in it a "sense of present time," as if the artist had fixed the picture on the street "from life." He confers upon the girl represented walking a name, Gradiva, "the girl splendid in walking," spins a yarn that she is the daughter of a distinguished family, perhaps of a "patrician ?dile, whose office was connected with the worship of Ceres," and is on the way to the temple of the goddess. Then it is repulsive to him to place her in the m

eign to him. "Women had formerly been for him only a conception in marble or bronze, and he had never given his feminine contemporaries the least consideration." Society life has always seemed to him an unavoidable torture; young ladies whom he meets, in such connections, he fails to see and hear, to such a degree that, on the next encounter, he passes without greeting, which, of course, serves to place him in an unfavourable light with them. Now, however, the scientific t

ere had moved him, but now suddenly it seemed natural to him, as she was, of course, a Pompeiian girl, that she was living in her native city and, without his having any suspicion of it, was his contemporary." (G. p. 20.) Fear about her impending fate draws from him a cry of warning, in answer to which the unperturbed apparition turns her face toward h

f life in the noisy metropolis, he retains for some time the belief in the reality of what he has dreamed; when he has finally rid himself of the idea that he was really present, nearly two thousand years ago, at the destruction of Pompeii, there yet r

n recognizes the gait characteristic of her; without deliberation he hastens to the street to overtake her, and the laughter and jeers of the people, at his unconventional morning attire, first drive him quickly back home. In his room, it is again the singing canary in the cage who occupies him and stimulates him to a comparison with himself. He,

ompletely in his science, and has withdrawn entirely from life and its pleasures. Marble and bronze are, for his feelings, the only things really alive and expressing the purpose and value of human life. Yet, perhaps with kind intent, Nature has put into his blood a thoroughly unscientific sort of corrective, a most lively imagination, which can impress itself not only on his dreams, but also on his waking life. By such separation of imagination and intellectual capacity, he is destined to be a poet or a neurotic, and he belongs to that race of beings whose realm is not of this world. So it happens that his interest is fixed upon a bas-relief which represents a girl walking in an u

nd "Gretchens," is utterly unable to understand the acts and impulses of the couples. He arrives at the conclusion that, of all the follies of humanity, "marriage, at any rate, took the prize as the greatest and most incomprehensible one, and the senseless wedding trips to Italy somehow capped the climax of this buffoonery." (G. p. 30.) At Rome, disturbed in his sleep by the proximity of a loving couple, he flees, forthwith, to Naples, onl

lies, in which he is inclined to see the incarnation of absolute evil and worthlessness. The two tormentors blend into one; many fly-coup

his surroundings alone, but to a degree found its origin in him." (G. p. 40.) He feel

a lifeless, arch?ological view and what came from its mouth was a dead, philological language. These helped in no way to a comprehension with soul, mind and heart, as the saying is, but he, who possessed a desire for that, had to stand alone here, the only living person in the hot noonday silence, among the remains of the past, in order not to see with physical eyes nor hear with corporeal ears. Then-the dead awoke, and Pompeii began to live again." (G. p. 48.) While thus, by means of his imagination, he endows the past with life, he suddenly sees, indubitably, the Gradiva of his bas-relief ste

course, found no occasion, as yet, to explain to us whether he wishes to leave us in our world, decried as dull and ruled by the laws of science, or to conduct us into another fantastic one, in which reality is ascribed to ghosts and spirits. As Hamlet and Macbeth show, we are ready to follow him into such a place without hesitation. The delusion of the imaginative arch?ologist would need, in that case, to be measured by another standard. Yes, when we consider how improbable must be the real existence of a per

whom the house may have been named, and about Gradiva's relation to the latter; these show that his science has now given itself over completely to the service of his imagination. After entering this house, he again suddenly discovers the apparition, sitting on low steps between two yellow pillars. "Spread out on her knees lay something white, which he was unable to distinguish clearly; it seemed to be

judgment of the poor man, whom the real noonday sun actually burns; but we know now, after recovering from brief confusion, that Gradiva is a living German girl, a fact which we wish to reject as utterly improbable.

or the noon hour of spirits; but why, after the answer given in German, does the exclamation escape him: "I knew that your voice sounded like that"? Not only we, but the girl, too, must ask, and Hanold must admit that he has never heard her voice before, but expected to hear it in the dream, when he called to her, as she lay down to sleep on the steps of the temple. He begs her to repeat that action, but she then rises, directs a strange glance at him, and, after a few steps, disappears between the pillars of the court. A beautiful butterfly had, shortly before that, fluttered about her a few times; in his interpretati

either of the only two lodgings known to him in Pompeii is a person to be found who possesses the most remote resemblance to Gradiva. Of course he had rejected, as unreasona

l alive!" This time, however, he has evidently been too critical, for the apparition possesses a voice which asks him whether he wishes to bring her the white flower, and draws the man, who has again lost his composure, into a long conversation. Our author informs us, readers, to whom Gradiva has already become interesting as a living personality, that the ill-humoured and repellent glance of the day before has given way to an expression of searching inquisitiveness or curiosity. She really sounds him, demands, in explanation of his remark of the preceding day, when he had stood near her as she lay down to sleep, in this way learns of the dream in which she perished with her native city, then of the bas-relief, and of the position of the foot, which attracted the young arch?ologist. Now she shows herself ready to demonstrate her manner of walking, whereby the substitution of light, sand-coloured, fine leather shoes for the sandals, which she explains as adaptation to the present, is est

but it sounds to me like bitter

table," she responds. "And I have lo

cluster. "To those who are more fortunate one gives roses in spring, but for me the flower of oblivion is the right one

the ground story of the delusion-structure, and investigate it then as thoroughly as possible. If Zo? is the right person, we shall soon learn how one cures delusions like those of our hero. We should also like to know how such a delusion originates. It would be very striking, and yet not without example and parallel, if the treatment and investigation of the delusion shou

ehind picks up something white, which Gradiva has left, not a papyrus leaf, but a sketch-book with pencil drawings of Pompeii. We should say that the fact that

he latter turns to him and says: "Are you interested in Faraglionensis? I should hardly have supposed it, but it seems thoroughly probable that they are found, not only in the Faraglioni of Capri, but also dwell permanently on the mainland. The method suggested by my colleague, Eimer, is really good; I have already used it often with the best of success. Please remain quite still." (G. p. 74.) The speaker stops talking then, and holds a little snare, made of a long grass-blade, before a narrow crevice, from which the blue, chatoyant, little head of a lizard peeps. Hanold leaves the lizard-hunter with the critical thought that it is hardly credible what foolishly remarkable purposes can cause people to make the long trip to Pompeii, in which criticism he does not, of course, include himself and his intention of seeking foot-prints of Gradiva in the ashes of Pompeii. The gentleman's face, moreover, seems familiar to him, as if he has noticed it casually in one of the two hotels; the man's manner of addressing him has also sounded as if directed at an acquaintance. As he continues his wandering, a si

ich has been started. Not far from the Forum a couple of young lovers were excavated in an embrace, and in the dream he saw Gradiva lie down to sleep in that ve

the difference in the colour of their hair. They are the first people whom he has encountered on this trip who seem possibly congenial. A red Sorrento rose, which the young girl wears, awakes in him some memory-he cannot recall what. Finally he goes to bed and dreams; it is remarkable nonsense, but apparently concocted of the day's experiences. "Somewhere in the sun Gradiva sat making a trap out of a blade

sion has become full of flaws; he already doubts if she is permitted to stay in Pompeii in the noon hour only, and not at other times. Emphasis, on that account, is transferred to the object recently acquired, and the jealousy connected with it torments him in all sorts of disguises. He might almost wish that the apparition should remain visible to only his eyes and escape the notice of others; in that way, he might consider her his exclusive property. During his ramble awaiting the noon hour he has a surprising encounter. In the Casa del Fauno he happens upon two people who doubtless belie

; the other half of this she consumes with apparent appetite. Thereat her faultless teeth gleam between her lips and, in biting the crust, cause a slight crunching sound. To her remark, "It seems to me as if we had already eaten our bread thus together once two thousand years ago. Can't you remember it?" (G. p. 88.) he cannot answer, but the strengthening of his mind by the nourishment, and all the evidences of present time in her do not fail to have effect on him. Reason stirs in him and makes him doubt the whole delusion that Gradiva is only a noonday ghost; on the other hand, there is the objection that she, herself, has just said that she had already shared her repast with him two thousand years ago. As a means of settling th

ert Hanold, of Gradiva's calling his name, which he had told to no one in Pompeii. For at this critical moment, the congenial lovers appear from the Casa del Fauno and the young lady calls, in a t

hing interesting alone here. Of course I had not reckoned at all on the find which I made-I mean the good fortune of meeting you, Gisa." (G. p. 92.) Zo? now feels obliged to leave at once, to be company for her father at the "Sole." So she goes, after she has introduced herself to us as the daughter of the zoologist and lizard-catcher, and has admitted in ambiguous words her therapeutic intentions and other secret ones. The direction which she takes is not that of the "Sun Hotel," in which her father is awaiting her, but it seems to her, too, that in the region of the Villa of Diomede a shadowy form is seeking its burial-place and disappears under one of the monuments; therefore, with foot poised each time almost perpendicularly, she directs her steps to the Street of Tombs. Thither, in shame and confusion, Hanold has fled, and is wandering up and down in the portico of the court without stopping, occupied with settling the rest of

s Gradiva, who has apparently come to give him the last bit of her treatment. She interprets rightly his first instinctive movement to flee, as an attempt to leave the place, and points out to him that he cannot escape, for outside a frightful cloudburst is in p

hat way-how I could be so stupid, I can't understand-but I can't understand eithe

e surprised, for you have long ago accustomed me to it. To make that discovery again, I should not

ur house, in the corner house; in my window, in a cage,

from afar. That is surely the same bird whos

father, Richard Bertgang

s name. It seems as if the disappointment of a superficial sol

of thought, when he repeats, "Then are you-are you

om the living girl; she makes former privileges of use to her here. "If you find that form of address more suitable between us, I can use it too, you know, but the other came to me more naturally. I don't know whether I looked different when we used to

whose sway in childhood Zo?'s words have testified to? And when Gradiva puts to the arch?ologist the question whether it does not seem to him that they have once already, two thousand years ago, shared their luncheon, does not the incomprehensible question become suddenly senseful, when we substitute for the historical past the personal childhood, whose memories persist vividly for the girl, but seem to be forgotten by the young man? Does not the idea suddenly dawn upon us that the fancies of the young man about his Gradiva may be an echo of his childhood memories? Then they would, therefore, be no arbitrary products of his imagination, but determined, without his knowing it, by the existing material of childhood impressions

magined that you had become an intolerable person, who had no longer, at least for me, an eye in his head, a tongue in his mouth, nor any of the memories that I retained of our childhood friendship. So I probably looked different from what I did formerly, for when, occasionally, I met you at a party, even last winter, you did not look at me and I did not hear your voice; in this, of course, there was nothing that marked me out especially, for you treated all the others in the same way. To you I was but air, and you, with your shock of light hair, which I had formerly pulled so often, were as boresome, dry and tong

s interest. So she has to look around for another person, and clings with especial fervour to the playmate of her youth. When he, too, no longer has any eyes for her, it does not destroy her love, rather augments it, for he has become like her father, like him absorbed by science and, by it, isolated from life and from Zo?. So it is granted to her to be faithful in unfaithfulness, to find her father again in her beloved, to embrace both with the same feeling as we may say, to make them both identical in her emotions. Where do we get justification for this little psychological analysis, which may easily seem autocratic? In a si

he obliteration, of the memory. The repressed material cannot, as a rule, break through, of itself, as a memory, but remains potent and effective. Some day, under external influence, it causes psychic results which one may accept as products of transformation or as remnants of forgotten memories; and if one does not view them as such, they remain incomprehensible. In the fancies of Norbert Hanold about Gradiva, we thought we recognized already the remnants of the repressed memories of his childhood friendship with Zo? Bertgang. Quite legitimately one may expect such a recurrence of the repressed material, if the man's erotic feelings cling to the repressed ideas, if his erotic life has been involved in the repression. Then there is truth in the old Latin proverb which was perhaps originally aimed at expulsion through external influences, not at inner conflict: "You may drive out natural disposition with a two-pronged fork, but it will always return," but it does not tell all, announces only the fact of the recurrence of repressed material, and does not describe at all the most remarkable manner of this recurrence, which is accompl

gitimate and correct that an antique relief should awaken in him the forgotten memory of the girl beloved in his childhood; it would be his well-deserved fate to h

s entire interest in Gradiva to her person. This is exactly what she does not believe him capable of, and what, in spite of all the disguises of the delusion, she recognizes as such. Her psychic treatment of him has a beneficent effect; he feels himself free

necessary." (G. p. 102.) She has apparently not yet pardoned him for the détour which he made from the c

the same meaning as Gradiva and signifies '

, by the disclosure of the repression behind it, always act in just that way. When they have once understood, they themselves offer the solutions for the last and most significant riddles of their strange condition in suddenly emerging ideas. We had already believed, of course, that the Greek ancestry of the mythical Gradiva

sturbed them in Meleager's house, and by the acknowledgment that the latter was the first girl who had impressed him much. When Zo? is then about to take a cool departure, with the remark that now everything is reasonable again, she herself not least of all, that he might look up Gisa Hartleben, or whatever her name might now be, and be of scientific assistance to her about the purpose of her stay in Pompeii, but she has to go now to the "Albergo del Sole" where her father is already waiting f

ologist and give him the choice of the faraglionensis on the mainland or his daughter, a proposal in which mockery, as one may easily note, is combined with bitterness, an admonition to the betrothed, also, not to follow too closely the model after which his beloved has chosen him. Norbert Hanold sets us at rest on this matter, as he expresses, by all sorts of apparently trivial symptoms, the great transformation which has come over him. He voices the intention of taking a wedding trip with his Zo? to Italy and Pompeii, as if he had never been indignant at the newly

re, old stepping-stones cross the street, Norbert Hanold stops and asks the girl to go ahead. She understands him and, "raising her dress slightly with her left hand, Gradiva rediviva Zo? Bertgang, viewed by him w

at the same time makes inaccessible and conserves something psychic, than the burial which was the fate of Pompeii, and from which the city was able to arise again through work with the spade. Therefore in his imagination the young arch?ologist had to transport to Pompeii the original fig

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