Description

In terms of the cultural significance of the dream, the century between the early Enlightenment, Romanticism and the beginning of the Restoration was a period of radical shifts. The Enlightenment defined it as a subject for psychological analysis, in Romanticism it offered insights into an unconscious which was conceived in terms of natural philosophy. Literature and art were always actively involved in these transformation processes. They developed a variety of formally and functionally different dream representations, which were on occasion characterised by irony and social criticism. The essays collected in this volume draw attention to previously neglected texts by, among others, Droste-Hülshoff, Wolzogen, Kant, Goethe and contributors to the Magazin zur Erfahrungsseelenkunde. Additionally, they offer new insights into the discursive context of dream representations by authors and artists who already enjoy 'canonical' status in dream studies, such as Novalis, Tieck, Kleist, E.T.A. Hoffmann and Fuseli.