A friend of a friend to be....”
The dream thus contains the “lucky (big) throw,” which is not, however, a wish-fulfilment only. It also conceals the painful reflection that in his striving after friendship he has often had the misfortune to be “thrown down,” and the fear lest this fate may be repeated in the case of the young man next whom he has enjoyed the performance of Fidelio. This is now followed by a confession which quite puts this refined dreamer to shame, to the effect that once, after such a rejection on the part of a friend, out of burning desire he merged into sexual excitement and masturbated twice in succession.
The other dream is as follows: Two professors of the university who are known to him are treating him in my stead. One of them does something with his penis; he fears an operation. The other one thrusts an iron bar at his mouth so that he loses two teeth. He is bound with four silken cloths.
The sexual significance of this dream can hardly be doubted. The silken cloths are equivalent to an identification with a homosexual of his acquaintance. The dreamer, who has never achieved coition, but who has never actually sought sexual intercourse with men, conceives sexual intercourse after the model of the masturbation which he was once taught during the time of puberty.
I believe that the frequent modifications of the typical dream of dental irritation—that, for example, of another person drawing the tooth from the dreamer’s mouth, are made intelligible by means of the same explanation. It may, however, be difficult to see how “dental irritation” can come to have this significance. I may then call attention to a transference from below to above which occurs very frequently. This transference is at the service of sexual repression, and by means of it all kinds of sensations and intentions occurring in hysteria which ought to be enacted in the genitals can be realised upon less objectionable parts of the body. It is also a case of such transference when the genitals are replaced by the face in the symbolism of unconscious thought. This is assisted by the fact that the buttocks resemble the cheeks, and also by the usage of language which calls the nymphæ “lips,” as resembling those that enclose the opening of the mouth. The nose is compared to the penis in numerous allusions, and in one place as in the other the presence of hair completes the resemblance. Only one part of the anatomy—the teeth—are beyond all possibility of being compared with anything, and it is just this coincidence of agreement and disagreement which makes the teeth suitable for representation under pressure of sexual repression.
I do not wish to claim that the interpretation of the dream of dental irritation as a dream of masturbation, the justification of which I cannot doubt, has been freed of all obscurity.[[CG]] I carry the explanation as far as I am able, and must leave the rest unsolved. But I must also refer to another connection revealed by an idiomatic expression. In our country there is in use an indelicate designation for the act of masturbation, namely: To pull one out, or to pull one down.[[CH]] I am unable to say whence these colloquialisms originate, and on what symbolisms they are based, but the teeth would well fit in with the first of the two.[[CI]]
Dreams in which one is flying or hovering, falling, swimming, or the like, belong to the second group of typical dreams. What do these dreams signify? A general statement on this point cannot be made. They signify something different in each case, as we shall hear: only the sensational material which they contain always comes from the same source.
It is necessary to conclude, from the material obtained in psychoanalysis, that these dreams repeat impressions from childhood—that is, that they refer to the movement games which have such extraordinary attractions for the child. What uncle has never made a child fly by running across the room with it with arms outstretched, or has never played falling with it by rocking it on his knee and then suddenly stretching out his leg, or by lifting it up high and then pretending to withdraw support. At this the children shout with joy, and demand more untiringly, especially if there is a little fright and dizziness attached to it; in after years they create a repetition of this in the dream, but in the dream they omit the hands which have held them, so that they now freely float and fall. The fondness of all small children for games like rocking and see-sawing is well known; and if they see gymnastic tricks at the circus their recollection of this rocking is refreshed. With some boys the hysterical attack consists simply in the reproduction of such tricks, which they accomplish with great skill. Not infrequently sexual sensations are excited by these movement games, harmless as they are in themselves.[[CJ]] To express the idea by a word which is current among us, and which covers all of these matters: It is the wild playing (“Hetzen”) of childhood which dreams about flying, falling, vertigo, and the like repeat, and the voluptuous feelings of which have now been turned into fear. But as every mother knows, the wild playing of children has often enough culminated in quarrelling and tears.
I therefore have good reason for rejecting the explanation that the condition of our dermal sensations during sleep, the sensations caused by the movements of the lungs, and the like, give rise to dreams of flying and falling. I see that these very sensations have been reproduced from the memory with which the dream is concerned—that they are, therefore, a part of the dream content and not of the dream sources.
This material, similar in its character and origin consisting of sensations of motion, is now used for the representation of the most manifold dream thoughts. Dreams of flying, for the most part characterised by delight, require the most widely different interpretations—altogether special interpretations in the case of some persons, and even interpretations of a typical nature in that of others. One of my patients was in the habit of dreaming very often that she was suspended above the street at a certain height, without touching the ground. She had grown only to a very small stature, and shunned every kind of contamination which accompanies intercourse with human beings. Her dream of suspension fulfilled both of her wishes, by raising her feet from the ground and by allowing her head to tower in the upper regions. In the case of other female dreamers the dream of flying had the significance of a longing: If I were a little bird; others thus become angels at night because they have missed being called that by day. The intimate connection between flying and the idea of a bird makes it comprehensible that the dream of flying in the case of men usually has a significance of coarse sensuality.[[CK]] We shall also not be surprised to hear that this or that dreamer is always very proud of his ability to fly.