I want to discuss dreams in relation to literary creation. The requirements of good literature are many and varied, but perhaps the most basic of these is imagination. The creative writer allows thoughts to flow freely from the depths of the unconscious mind to consciusness. Then, calling upon techical skill, the writer molds these ideas into structured patterns. Technique and style may be essential, but without that initial spark of inspired thought, the story lacks life and is thus considered dead.
All of us initially have the potential of creating "stories," although few have learned to develop these into literary works. This is proved most commonly by our dreams. While dreaming, our imagination is allowed to run free, without restraint. In dreams we experience fantasies, often of incomparable magnitude. Were the ordinary person able to recall these dreams to consciousness at will, that person would be well on the way to experiencing what the world's great literary artists experience on a regular basis. But it is here that most of us fail. We all dream while sleeping; only the rare individual is able to dream and create while awake.
I, too, have experienced such periods of creativity in dreams. I recall dreaming that my mother had come to visit me at my sorority house. After a series of inconsequential incidents, I walked her to her car in front of the house and watched her drive away. As far as I knew, there was only one way to return to the house. This was by means of a long, winding path around one side of the house and through a desolate black forest of dead and dying trees. Not wishing to walk back alone along this rather ominous trail, I chose to explore the other side of the house for a quicker route.
I soon found that the entrance to the house was only a short distance away. However, this route was broken by the presence of a smooth cliff. I did not consider this to be a drop of any significant distance, and since it now appeared that this was the only way to get back to the house, I began to look for an easy way to get down.
There was a single lamp post that extended from the base of the cliff to the ledge on which I stood. I jumped onto the dome-shaped hood of the light. It's heat warmed my feet, my hands as I clasped its edge, my body as I slowly lowered myself downward. Glancing toward the ground, I gasped in horror. Suddenly, the ground was miles beneath me. I was terrified. I began to panic. My arms trembled. My heart pounded uncontrollably. Instantly there were crowds of people below, all yelling, "Don't jump!" I tried to explain that I wasn't jumping, I was falling. But no words came forth.
Here the dream ended. Try though I may, my "vision" fails me. I am helpless to extricate myself from this situation because, unlike the creative artist, I cannot dream with my eyes open. Thus, I seem to be permanently "hung up," not having any idea how to get beyond the lamp post, unable to fashion an appropriate ending or frame device that would transform this fantasy from a mere dream into an artistically competent literary statement.
At this point the division in creativity occurs between the oridinary person and the true artist. I may dream, but the artist can dream at will, while awake, and then transform this dream into a coherent and unified entity. We both create, but the artist's creativity is controlled and sophisticated, while mine is crude and untrained. Only when we all learn to unchain the unconsicous, to trust it and ourselves, can we ever hope to achieve success in the creation of literature. Today, only a few can do this. But someday, perhaps, this free-flowing creativity may be as common as dreaming itself.
— Juli Reiner
© Copyright 2002 by Robert J. R. Rockwood. All rights reserved.