Primary Texts

Insomnia

by Cornelius Eady

You'll never sleep tonight.
Trains will betray you, cars confess
Their destinations,

Whether you like it
Or not.

They want more
Than to be in
Your dreams.

They want to tell you
A story.

They yammer all night and then
The birds take over,
Jeering as only
The well-rested can.

Source: Acquainted with the Night: Insomnia Poems.  Ed. Lisa Russ Spaar.  Columbia UP, 1999.  25. 

Auden, W.H. "Lullaby"

Blake, William. "The Angel"

--. "A Cradle Song"

--. "A Dream"

--. "The Little Girl Lost"

--. "The Little Girl Found"

--. "Night"

Baudelaire, Charles. "The Abyss"

--. "Cats"

--. "The Death of the Poor"

--. "The Ghost"

--. "The Joyful Corpse"

--. "The Kind-Hearted Servant of Whom You Were Jealous"

--. "Lethe"

--. "Out of the Depths Have I Cried"

--. "Parisian Dream"

--. "Posthumous Remorse"

Campion, Thomas. "Sleepe, Angry Beauty"

Daniel, Samuel. "Care-charmer Sleep"

Dickinson, Emily. "Sleep Is Supposed to Be"

Eady, Cornelius. "Insomnia"

Graves, Robert. "The Twin of Sleep"

Gunn, Thom. "The Night Piece."

Keats, John. "To Sleep"

MacCaig, Norman. "Dream World"

Montale, Eugenio. "In Sleep"

Oates, Joyce Carol. "Insomnia"

Orr, Gregory. "Insomnia Song"

Pessoa, Fernando. "The Sleep that Comes Over Me"

Rimbaud, Arthur. "The Sleeper in the Valley" 

Sidney, Philip. "Come, Sleep!"

---. "Morpheus" (from Astrophil and Stella)

Smith, Stevie. "Nodding"

Wilbur, Richard. "Walking to Sleep"

Yeats, W.B. "Lullaby"

"Symbols and the Interpretation of Dreams," by Carl Jung

This relatively short essay provides an introduction both to Jungian dream theory and to the notion of the collective unconscious.

Jung, C.G. "Symbols and the Interpretation of Dreams." The Undiscovered Self. Princeton UP, 1990.

Dreams, by Carl Jung

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Once a devoted disciple of Freud, Jung would eventually come to disagree profoundly with his mentor over the subject of dream interpretation. This volume contains a number of Jung's essays on the nature of dreams and how to analyze them. Where Freud believed that dreams contain disguised wishes too scandalous for the conscious mind to recognize, Jung believed that dreams serve a compensatory function, balancing the conscious and unconscious minds.

Jung, Carl. Dreams. MJF Books, 1997.

On the Nightmare, by Ernest Jones

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One of Freud's most devoted disciples, Jones was a dominant figure in the psychoanalytic movement in the English-speaking world. On the Nightmare is both a psychoanalytic and cultural critique of common nightmare themes and superstitions: witchcraft, vampires, devils, and the like.

Jones, Ernest. On the Nightmare. New York: Liveright, 1951.

The Interpretation of Dreams, by Sigmund Freud

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Published at the dawn of the 20th century, Freud's first major work changed the way the western world thought about dreams, and the whole human psyche. "A dream is the fulfillment of a wish" he argues. But often the fulfillment and the wish itself are hidden from the understanding of the dreamer. Although fraught with bias and error, and largely discounted today, Freud's dream theory paved the way for modern psychoanalysis.

Freud, Sigmund. The Interpretation of Dreams. Trans. James Strachey. New York: Avon, 1998.

An Introduction to the Psychology of Dreaming, by Kelly Bulkeley
A student-friendly overview--both historical and psychological--of the western world's treatment of dreams. Bulkeley focuses on 20th-and-21st-century dream theories, which make this a useful companion volume to the works of Freud, Jung, and contemporary dream theorists.

Bulkeley, Kelly. An Introduction to the Psychology of Dreaming. Praeger, 1997.

Christopher's Dreams: Dreaming and Living With AIDS

Psychotherapist Bosnak used Jungian dream analysis with his young patient Christopher, who found out that he had AIDS shortly after he began therapy. Christopher's dream journal, and Bosnak's account of their analysis, comprise an in-depth look at the way one man's dreaming mind processed his illness and imminent death.

Bosnak, Robert. Christopher’s Dreams: Dreaming and Living with Aids. Delta, 1997.

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(ENGLISH) Voltaire.  Philosophical Dictionary.  Trans.  Theodore Besterman.  Penguin Classics, 1984. 

(FRENCH) Voltaire. Dictionnaire philosophique IV. [Philosophical Dictionary IV]. Oeuvres complètes de Voltaire. [Complete Works of Voltaire]. Vol. 20. Paris: Garnier, 1879. 52 vols. 1877-1885.

Maine de Biran. Rapports du physique et du moral de l’homme. [Relationship of the Physical and the Moral of Man]. Oeuvres. [Works]. Ed. F.C.T. Moore. Vol. 6. Paris: J.Vrin, 1984.

Maine de Biran. Nouvelles considérations sur les rapports du physique et du moral de l’homme. [New Considerations on the Relationship of the Physical and the Moral of Man]. Oeuvres. [Works]. Ed. Bernard Baertschi. Vol. 9. Paris: J. Vrin, 1990.

Jouffroy, Théodore. Mélanges philosophiques. [Philosophical Writings]. 5th ed. Paris: Hachette, 1875.

Flanagan, Owen. Dreaming Souls: Sleep, Dreams, and the Evolution of the Conscious Mind. Oxford UP, 1999.

Méditation sixième by René Descartes

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(English) Descartes, René. Meditations and Other Metaphysical Writings. Trans. Desmond M. Clarke. Penguin Classics, 1999.

(French) Descartes, René. “Méditation sixième.” [“Sixth Meditation”]. Oeuvres et lettres. [Works and Letters]. Gallimard, 1953.

Discours de la méthode by René Descartes

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Check out a print version:

(English) Descartes, René. Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy. Ed. Donald Cress. Hackett, 1999.

(French) Descartes, René. Discours de la méthode. [Discourse on Method]. Paris: GF-Flammarion, 1966.

Tissot, Clément Joseph. Effets du sommeil et de la veille dans le traitement des maladies externes. [Effects of Sleep and Wakefulness in the Treatment of External Illness]. 1781. Besançon: Briot, 1795.

Thorpy, Michael J. “History of Sleep and Man.” The Encyclopedia of Sleep and Sleep Disorders. Ed. Michael J. Thorpy and Jan Yager. New York: Facts on File, 1991. ix-xxxiii.

Tardy de Montravel. Essai sur la théorie du somnambulisme magnétique. [Essay on the Theory of Magnetic Somnambulism]. Paris: Gastelier, 1785.

Histoire du rêve, by Yannick Ripa.

A cultural history of dream in nineteenth-century France, with an emphasis on material history, and the everyday role of dreams among the common folk.

Ripa, Yannick. Histoire du rêve: Regards sur l’imaginare des Français au XIXe siècle. [History of Dream: A Look at the French Imaginary of the 19th Century]. Paris: Oliver Orban, 1988.

Histoire du reve: Regards sur l'imaginaire des Francais au XIXe siecle

Puységur, A.M.J. Chastenet de.  Recherches, expériences et observations physiologiques sur l’homme dans l’état de somnambulisme naturel et dans le somnambulisme provoqué par l’acte magnétique. [Research, Experiments and Physiological Observations on Man in the State of Natural Somnambulism and in Somnambulism Provoked by the Magnetic Act]. Paris: Dentu, 1811.