The Interpretation of Dreams

The Interpretation of Dreams

Reviewed by Faisal Zaidi

Sigmund Freud's book, dated 1900, which treated dreams as disguised expressions of wishes.

What it is

Peter Watson opens The Modern Mind with the book as the first big idea of the twentieth century, and follows how interest in it grew through people such as Wilhelm Stekel, who called on Freud after reading a review, and later writers who took up the psychoanalysis of dreams.

In effect

In the article on why we dream, it marks the start of the modern history of the question.

What it does not say

It is a historical work of theory, not a research finding, and later dream research tested other ideas.

Sources

  1. Watson, P. The Modern Mind: An Intellectual History of the 20th Century.