Yes, what about dreams in Spenser? Britomart's dream, Arthur's dream,
etc.? I heard a talk by Anne Carson about sleep and dreams in Homer,
Virgil, etc. Very interesting!
On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 [log in to unmask] wrote:
> David and all,
>
> Can't resist this provocation. First, David, you're writing to someone fascinated with dreamwork, whose own dreams crumble like an ancienne madeleine, probably stupid from the start. Second, I never meant to impugn the authenticity of any of the dreams related directly by the dreamers -- least of all Bert's, which to me was the most affecting. But third, when we're thinking as Spenserians (and there are dreamlike moments in Sidney as well), is the distinction between authentic and make-believe ever available to us?
>
> Yours, Jon
> -------------- Original message ----------------------
> From: "David L. Miller" <[log in to unmask]>
> > Jon, your reference to make-believe dreams is another provocation. One,
> > and only, one, of the dreams retold on this thread strikes me as bogus.
> >
> > I may well be wroing. But what is the basis of such a judgment to
> > begin with?
> >
> > D
> >
> >
> > >>> [log in to unmask] 1/26/2005 9:40:22 PM >>>
> > Something in Bert's dream narrative brought back to mind the absurdly
> > long novel, "Pinocchio in Venice," by Robert Coover. (Anxiously, I
> > wonder if I've got the author's name right.) I bogged down about a
> > third of the way through, and have worried ever since that I probably
> > missed wonderful things in the later episodes of Error's endless train.
> > In Coover's continuation of the Pinocchio story, the boy has grown up to
> > be a distinguished, or at least industrious, professor of humanities,
> > and late in life he has come back to Italy. His experience there is one
> > anxiety dream morphing into another.
> >
> > Shouldn't a session in some conference be reserved for the retirees to
> > entertain the ephebes with their real and make-believe dreams? Or maybe
> > what we need is a Porlock Superbowl.
> >
> > Cheers, Jon Quitslund
> >
> > -------------- Original message ----------------------
> > From: "A.C. Hamilton" <[log in to unmask]>
> > > Reading the anxiety dreams of others led me to have an anxiety dream
> > last
> > > night even though I have been retired more years than I wish to
> > remember.
> > > It was the standard dream: the deadline was soon approaching for me
> > to give
> > > a lecture but I couldn't find the lecture room. I didn't have a
> > manuscript
> > > to read; I didn't even know my topic. Often I ask for directions as
> > I
> > > wander through a busy city but I never find the place. Last night
> > the
> > > darkened city was deserted, and I met no one until I entered a
> > > fortress-like, concrete building where I met an elderly woman. I have
> > met
> > > her in many dreams and know her as my anima: she is grey-haired,
> > very
> > > short, very powerfully built, ugly and totally terrifying. Often she
> > is
> > > behind a door to grab me as I enter a room but last night she
> > directed me
> > > to a flight of stairs that led ever downward. After a while I
> > realized that
> > > it was far too late to give the lecture, and also that I was deep
> > > underground. At that point I woke up. Bert
>
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