Freud - Complete Works (529 page)

Introductory Lectures On Psycho-Analysis

3206

   In the same way tunes that come
into one’s head without warning turn out to be determined by
and to belong to a train of thought which has a right to occupy
one’s mind though without one’s being aware of its
activity. It is easy to show then that the relation to the tune is
based on its text or its origin. But I must be careful not to
extend this assertion to really musical people, of whom, as it
happens, I have had no experience. It may be that for such people
the musical content of the tune is what decides its emergence. The
earlier case is certainly the commoner one. I know of a young man,
for instance, who was positively persecuted for a time by the tune
(incidentally a charming one) of Paris’s song in
La belle
Hélène
, till his analysis drew his attention to a
contemporary competition in his interest between an
‘Ida’ and a ‘Helen’.

   If then things that occur to one
quite freely are determined in this way and form parts of a
connected whole, we shall no doubt be justified in concluding that
things that occur to one with a single link - namely their link
with the idea which serves as their starting-point - cannot be any
less determined. Investigation shows, in fact, that, apart from the
link we have given them with the initial idea, they are found to be
dependent as well on groups of strongly emotional thoughts and
interests, ‘complexes’, whose participation is not
known at the moment - that is to say, is unconscious.

   The occurrence of ideas with
links of this kind has been the subject of very instructive
experimental researches, which have played a notable part in the
history of psycho-analysis. The school of Wundt had introduced what
are known as association-experiments, in which a
stimulus
word
is called out to the subject and he has the task of
replying to it as quickly as possible with any
reaction
that
occurs to him. It is then possible to study the interval that
passes between the stimulus and the reaction, the nature of the
answer given as a reaction, possible errors when the same
experiment is repeated later, and so on. The Zurich school, led by
Bleuler and Jung, found the explanation of the reactions that
followed in the association-experiment by getting the subjects to
throw light on their reactions by means of subsequent associations,
if those reactions had shown striking features. It then turned out
that these striking reactions were determined in the most definite
fashion by the subject’s complexes. In this manner Bleuler
and Jung built the first bridge from experimental psychology to
psycho-analysis.

   Having learnt thus much, you will
be able to say: ‘We acknowledge now that thoughts that occur
to one freely are determined and not arbitrary as we supposed. We
admit that this is also true of thoughts occurring in response to
the elements of dreams. But that is not what we are concerned with.
You assert that what occurs to the dreamer in response to the
dream-element will be determined by the psychical background
(unknown to us) of that particular element. This does not seem to
us to be proved. We quite expect that what occurs to the dreamer in
response to the dream-element will turn out to be determined by one
of the dreamer’s complexes, but what good does that do us?
This does not lead us to an understanding of dreams but, like the
association-experiment, to a knowledge of these so-called
complexes. But what have they got to do with dreams?’

Introductory Lectures On Psycho-Analysis

3207

   You are right, but you are
overlooking one factor. Moreover it is precisely the factor on
account of which I did not choose the association-experiment as the
starting-point of this exposition. In that experiment the single
determinant of the reaction - that is, the stimulus-word - is
arbitrarily chosen by us. The reaction is in that case an
intermediary between the stimulus-word and the complex which has
been aroused in the subject. In dreams the stimulus-word is
replaced by something that is itself derived from the
dreamer’s mental life, from sources unknown to him, and may
therefore very easily itself be a ‘derivative of a
complex’. It is therefore not precisely fantastic to suppose
that the further associations linked to the dream-elements will be
determined by the same complex as that of the element itself and
will lead to its discovery.

   Let me show you from another
instance that the facts are as we expect. The forgetting of proper
names is actually an excellent model of what happens in
dream-analysis; the difference is only that events that are shared
between two people in dream-analysis are combined in a single
person in the parapraxis. If I forget a name temporarily, I
nevertheless feel in myself a certainty that I know it - a
certainty which in the case of the dreamer we only arrived at by
the round-about path of the Bernheim experiment. The name which I
have forgotten but which I know is, however, not accessible to me.
Experience soon teaches me that thinking about it, with however
much effort, is of no help. But in place of the forgotten name I
can always call up one or several substitute names. It is only
after a substitute name of this kind has occurred to me
spontaneously that the conformity of this situation with that of
dream-interpretation becomes obvious. Like this substitute name,
the dream-element is not the right thing, but only takes the place
of something else - of the genuine thing which I do not know and
which I am to discover by means of the dream-analysis. The
difference is once more only that in the case of forgetting the
name, I recognize the substitute unhesitatingly as something
ungenuine, whereas we had to acquire this view laboriously in the
case of the dream-element. Now in the case of forgetting a name
there is also a method by which we can start from the substitute
and arrive at the unconscious genuine thing, the forgotten name. If
I direct my attention to the substitute names and allow further
ideas in response to them to occur to me, I arrive by shorter or
longer detours at the forgotten name, and I find when this happens
that both the spontaneous substitute name and the ones that I have
called up are connected with the forgotten one and were determined
by it.

Introductory Lectures On Psycho-Analysis

3208

   I will describe an analysis of
this kind to you. I noticed one day that I could not recall the
name of the small country on the Riviera, of which Monte Carlo is
the chief town. It was very tiresome, but so it was. I summoned up
all that I knew about that country. I thought of Prince Albert of
the House of Lusignan, of his marriages, of his devotion to
deep-sea researches, and everything else I could bring together,
but it was of no avail. So I gave up reflection and allowed
substitute names to occur to me instead of the lost one. They came
rapidly: Monte Carlo itself, then Piedmont, Albania, Montevideo,
Colico. Of this series I was struck first by Albania, which was at
once replaced by Montenegro, no doubt because of the contrast
between white and black.¹ I then saw that four of these
substitute names contained the same syllable ‘mon’,
then suddenly I had the forgotten word and exclaimed aloud:
‘Monaco!’ So the substitute names had in fact arisen
from the forgotten one: the first four came from its first syllable
while the last reproduced its syllabic structure and its whole last
syllable. Moreover I was able to discover quite easily what it was
that had temporarily deprived me of the name. Monaco is also the
Italian name for Munich; and it was that town which exerted the
inhibitory influence.

   No doubt this example is a good
one, but it is too simple. In other cases it would have been
necessary to call up a longer string of ideas in response to the
first substitute name, and then the analogy with dream-analysis
would have been clearer. I have had experiences of that sort too.
On one occasion a stranger had invited me to drink some Italian
wine with him, but when we were in the inn it turned out that he
had forgotten the name of the wine which he intended to order
because of his very agreeable recollections of it. From a quantity
of substitute ideas of different kinds which came into his head in
place of the forgotten name, I was able to infer that thoughts
about someone called Hedwig had made him forget the name. And he
not only confirmed the fact that he had first tasted this wine when
he was with someone of that name, but with the help of this
discovery he recalled the name of the wine. He was happily married
at the present time and this Hedwig belonged to earlier days which
he had no wish to remember.

   But if it is possible in the case
of forgetting a name, it must also be possible in interpreting
dreams to proceed from the substitute along the chain of
associations attached to it and so to obtain access to the genuine
thing which is being held back. From the example of the forgotten
name we may conclude that the associations to the dream-element
will be determined both by the dream-element and also by the
unconscious genuine thing behind it. In this way, then, we seem to
have produced some justification of our technique.

  
¹
[‘
Albus
’ the Latin for
‘white’, and ‘
negro
’ the Spanish or
Portuguese for ‘black’.]

Introductory Lectures On Psycho-Analysis

3209

LECTURE VII

THE
MANIFEST CONTENT OF DREAMS AND THE LATENT DREAM-THOUGHTS

LADIES AND
GENTLEMEN
, - As you see, our study of parapraxes has not
been unprofitable. Thanks to our labours over them we have, subject
to the premisses I have explained to you, achieved two things: a
conception of the nature of dream-elements and a technique for
interpreting dreams. The conception of dream-elements tells us that
they are ungenuine things, substitutes for something else that is
unknown to the dreamer (like the purpose of a parapraxis),
substitutes for something the knowledge of which is present in the
dreamer but which is inaccessible to him. We are in hopes that it
will be possible to carry over the same conception to whole dreams,
which are made up of such elements. Our technique lies in employing
free association to these elements in order to bring about the
emergence of other substitutive structures, which will enable us to
arrive at what is concealed from view.

   I now propose that we should
introduce a change into our nomenclature which will give us more
freedom of movement. Instead of speaking of
‘concealed’, ‘inaccessible’, or
‘ungenuine’, let us adopt the correct description and
say ‘inaccessible to the dreamer’s consciousness’
or ‘
unconscious
’. I mean nothing else by this
than what may be suggested to you when you think of a word that has
escaped you or the disturbing purpose in a parapraxis - that is to
say, I mean nothing else than ‘
unconscious at the
moment
’. In contrast to this, we can of course speak of
the dream-elements themselves, and the substitutive ideas that have
been newly arrived at from them by association, as
‘
conscious
’. This nomenclature so far involves
no theoretical construction. No objection can be made to using the
word ‘unconscious’ as an apt and easily understandable
description.

Introductory Lectures On Psycho-Analysis

3210

   If we carry over our conception
of the separate elements to the whole dream, it follows that the
dream as a whole is a distorted substitute for something else,
something unconscious, and that the task of interpreting a dream is
to discover this unconscious material. From this, however, there at
once follow three important rules, which we must obey during the
work of interpreting dreams.

   (1) We must not concern ourselves
with what the dream
appears
to tell us, whether it is
intelligible or absurd, clear or confused, since it cannot possibly
be the unconscious material we are in search of. (An obvious
limitation to this rule will force itself on our notice later.) (2)
We must restrict our work to calling up the substitutive ideas for
each element, we must not reflect about them, or consider whether
they contain anything relevant, and we must not trouble ourselves
with how far they diverge from the dream-element. (3) We must wait
till the concealed unconscious material we are in search of emerges
of its own accord, exactly as the forgotten word
‘Monaco’ did in the experiment I have described.

   Now, too, we can understand to
what extent it is a matter of indifference how much or how little
the dream is remembered and, above all, how accurately or how
uncertainly. For the remembered dream is not the genuine material
but a distorted substitute for it, which should assist us, by
calling up other substitutive images, to come nearer to the genuine
material, to make what is unconscious in the dream conscious. If
our memory has been inaccurate, therefore, it has merely made a
further distortion of this substitute - a distortion, moreover,
which cannot have been without a reason.

   The work of interpreting can be
performed on one’s own dreams just as on other
people’s. In fact one learns more from one’s own: the
process carries more conviction. If, then, we make the attempt, we
notice that something is opposing our work. It is true that ideas
occur to us, but we do not allow all of them to count; testing and
selecting influences make themselves felt. In the case of one idea
we may say to ourselves: ‘No, this is not relevant, it does
not belong here’; in the case of another: ‘this is too
senseless’ and of a third: ‘this is totally
unimportant’. And we can further observe how with objections
of this sort we may smother ideas and finally expel them
altogether, even before they have become quite clear. Thus on the
one hand we keep too close to the idea which was our starting
point, the dream-element itself; and on the other hand we interfere
with the outcome of the free associations by making a selection. If
we are not by ourselves while interpreting the dream, if we get
someone else to interpret it, we become very clearly aware of yet
another motive which we employ in making this illicit selection,
for sometimes we say to ourselves: ‘No, this idea is too
disagreeable; I will not or cannot report it.’