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diff --git a/30556-8.txt b/30556-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d4b44c8 --- /dev/null +++ b/30556-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7116 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Sleep Walking and Moon Walking, by Isidor Isaak Sadger + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sleep Walking and Moon Walking + A Medico-Literary Study + +Author: Isidor Isaak Sadger + +Translator: Louise Brink + +Release Date: November 28, 2009 [EBook #30556] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLEEP WALKING AND MOON WALKING *** + + + + +Produced by Bryan Ness, Jana Srna and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + + + + + + + + + [ Transcriber's Note: + Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as + possible, including inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation; + changes (corrections of spelling and punctuation) made to the + original text are listed at the end of this file. + ] + + + + + Nervous and Mental Disease Monograph Series No. 31 + + + SLEEP WALKING AND MOON WALKING + + A MEDICO-LITERARY STUDY + + BY + DR. J. SADGER + VIENNA + + + TRANSLATED BY + LOUISE BRINK + + + NEW YORK AND WASHINGTON + + NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASE PUBLISHING + COMPANY + + 1920 + + + + + NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASE + MONOGRAPH SERIES + + + Edited by + Drs. SMITH ELY JELLIFFE and WM. A. WHITE + + +Numbers Issued + +1. Outlines of Psychiatry. (7th Edition.) $3.00. By Dr. William A. +White. + +2. Studies in Paranoia. (Out of Print.) By Drs. N. Gierlich and M. +Friedman. + +3. The Psychology of Dementia Praecox. (Out of Print.) By Dr. C. G. +Jung. + +4. Selected Papers on Hysteria and other Psychoneuroses. (3d Edition.) +$3.00. By Prof. Sigmund Freud. + +5. The Wassermann Serum Diagnosis in Psychiatry. $2.00. By Dr. Felix +Plaut. + +6. Epidemic Poliomyelitis. New York, 1907. (Out of Print.) + +7. Three Contributions to Sexual Theory. (4th reprinting.) $2.00. By +Prof. Sigmund Freud. + +8. Mental Mechanisms. (Out of Print.) $2.00. By Dr. Wm. A. White. + +9. Studies in Psychiatry. (Out of Print.) New York Psychiatrical +Society. + +10. Handbook of Mental Examination Methods. (Out of Print.) By Shepherd +Ivory Franz. + +11. The Theory of Schizophrenic Negativism. $1.00. By Professor E. +Bleuler. + +12. Cerebellar Functions. $3.00. By Dr. André-Thomas. + +13. History of Prison Psychoses. $1.25. By Drs. P. Nitsche and K. +Wilmanns. + +14. General Paresis. $3.00. By Prof. E. Kraepelin. + +15. Dreams and Myths. $1.00. By Dr. Karl Abraham. + +16. Poliomyelitis. $2.00. By Dr. I. Wickmann. + +17. Freud's Theories of the Neuroses. $2.00. By Dr. E. Hitschmann. + +18. The Myth of the Birth of the Hero. $1.00. By Dr. Otto Rank. + +19. The Theory of Psychoanalysis. (Out of Print.) By Dr. C. G. Jung. + +20. Vagotonia. $1.00. (3d Edition.) By Drs. Eppinger and Hess. + +21. Wishfulfillment and Symbolism in Fairy Tales. $1.00. By Dr. Ricklin. + +22. The Dream Problem. $1.00. By Dr. A. E. Maeder. + +23. The Significance of Psychoanalysis for the Mental Sciences. $1.50. +By Drs. O. Rank and D. H. Sachs. + +24. Organ Inferiority and its Psychical Compensation. $1.50. By Dr. +Alfred Adler. + +25. The History of the Psychoanalytic Movement. $1.00. By Prof. S. +Freud. + +26. Technique of Psychoanalysis. $2.00. By Dr. Smith Ely Jelliffe. + +27. Vegetative Neurology. $2.50. By Dr. H. Higier. + +28. The Autonomic Functions and the Personality. $2.00. By Dr. Edward J. +Kempf. + +29. A Study of the Mental Life of the Child. $2.00. By Dr. H. von +Hug-Hellmuth. + +30. Internal Secretions and the Nervous System. $1.00. By Dr. M. Laignel +Lavastine. + +31. Sleep Walking and Moon Walking. $2.00. By Dr. J. Sadger. + + + Copyright, 1920, by + NERVOUS AND MENTAL DISEASE PUBLISHING COMPANY + 3617 10th St. N. W., Washington, D. C. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + Translator's Preface v + + Introduction vii + + PART I. Medical 1 + + PART II. Literary Section 45 + + Conclusion and Résumé 137 + + Index 139 + + + + +TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE + + +Psychoanalysis holds a key to the problem of sleep walking, which alone +has been able to unlock the mysteries of its causes and its +significance. This key is the principle of wish fulfilment, an +interpretative principle which explains the mechanisms of the psyche and +illuminates the mental content which underlies these. Sleep walking as a +method of wish fulfilment evidently lies close to the dream life, which +has become known through psychoanalysis. Most of us when we dream, +according to the words of Protagoras, "lie still, and do not stir." In +some persons there is however a special tendency to motor activity, in +itself a symptomatic manifestation, which necessitates the carrying out +of the dream wish through walking in the sleep. The existence of this +fact, together with the evidence of an influence of the shining of the +moon upon this tendency to sleep walking, give rise to certain questions +of importance to medical psychology. The author of this book has pursued +these questions in relation to cases which have come to him for +psychoanalysis, in the investigation of actual records of sleep walking +given in literature and in the study of rare instances where it has been +made the subject of a literary production or at least an episode in tale +or drama. In each case the association with moonlight or some other +light has been a distinct feature. + +The author's application of psychoanalysis to these problems has the +directness and explicitness which we are accustomed to find in Freud's +own writings. This is as true in the literary portion of the work as in +the medical but it never intrudes to mar the intrinsic beauty of certain +of the selections nor the force of the intuitive revelations which the +writers of the preceding science have made in regard to sleep walking +and walking in the moonlight. Sadger has skilfully utilized these +revelations to convince us of the truth of the psychoanalytic +discoveries and has used the latter only to make still more explicitly +and scientifically clear the testimony of the poetic writers and to +point out the applicability of their material to medical problems. The +choice of this little understood and little studied subject and its +skilful presentation on the part of the author, as well as the +introduction to the reader of the literary productions of which use has +been made, give the book a peculiar interest and value. It is also of +especial service in its brief but profoundly suggestive study of the +psychic background of Shakespeare's creative work as illustrated in the +sleep walking of Lady Macbeth. The endeavor in the translation has been +to make accessible to our English readers the clear and direct +psychoanalysis of the author and the peculiar psychologic and literary +value of the book. + + + + +INTRODUCTION[1] + + [1] Über Nachtwandeln und Mondsucht. Eine medizinisch-literarische + Studie, von Dr. J. Sadger, Nervenarzt in Wien; Schriften zur + angewandten Seelenkunde, Herausgegeben von Prof. Dr. Sigm. Freud, + Sechzehntes Heft, Leipzig und Wien, Franz Deuticke, 1914. + + +Sleep walking or night wandering, known also by its Latin name of +noctambulism, is a well-known phenomenon. Somnambulism is not so good a +term for it, since that signifies too many things. In sleep walking a +person rises from his bed in the night, apparently asleep, walks around +with closed or half opened eyes, but without perceiving anything, yet +performs all sorts of apparently purposeful and often quite complicated +actions and gives correct answers to questions, without afterward the +least knowledge of what he has said or done. If this all happens at the +very time and under the influence of the full moon, it is spoken of as +moon walking or being moonstruck. + +Under the influence of this heavenly body the moonstruck individual is +actually enticed from his bed, often gazes fixedly at the moon, stands +at the window or climbs out of it, "with the surefootedness of the sleep +walker," climbs up upon the roof and walks about there or, without +stumbling, goes into the open. In short, he carries out all sorts of +complex actions. Only it would be dangerous to call the wanderer by +name, for then he would not only waken where he was, but he would +collapse frequently and fall headlong with fright if he found himself on +a height. + +Besides there is absolute amnesia succeeding this. Upon persistent +questioning there is an attempt to fill in the gaps in memory by +confabulation, like the effort to explain posthypnotic action. +Furthermore, it is asserted that a specially deep sleep always ushers in +night wandering, that indeed the latter in general is only possible in +this condition. It is more frequent with children up to puberty and +throughout that period than with adults. At the same time the first +outbreak of sleep walking occurs often at the first appearance of sexual +maturity. According to a widespread folk belief sleep walking will cease +in a girl when she becomes pregnant with her first child. + +It seems to me that practically no scientific treatment of this problem +exists. Modern psychiatry, so far as it takes a sort of general notice +of it, contents itself, as Krafft-Ebing does, with calling night +wandering "a nervous disease," "apparently a symptomatic manifestation +of other neuroses, epilepsy, hysteria, status nervosus."[2] The older +literature is more explicit. It produces not only a full casuistic but +seeks to give some explanation aside from a reference to neurology.[3] +So, for example, the safety in climbing upon dangerous places finds this +explanation, that the sleep walker goes there with closed eyes and in +this way does not see the danger, knows no giddiness and above all is in +possession of a specially keen muscular sense. + + [2] Lehrbuch der gerichtlichen Psychopathologie. + + [3] I introduce as the most important sources Peter Jessen: "Versuch + einer wissenschaftlichen Begründung der Psychologie," Berlin, 1855 + (with many examples); Heinrich Spitta: "Die Schlaf- und Traumzustände + der menschlichen Seele," 2d edition, 1882 (with abundant casuistic and + literature); finally based upon these L. Löwenfeld: "Somnambulismus + und Spiritismus," Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens, Vol. I, + 1900. + +The phenomena of sleep walking and moon walking must be acknowledged, as +far as I can see, almost entirely as pathological yet connected or +identical with analogous manifestations of normal profound sleep. The +dreams in such sleep, in contrast with those of light sleep, are +characterized by movements. These often amount merely to speaking out, +laughing, weeping, smacking, throwing oneself about and so on, or +occasionally to complicated actions, which begin with leaving the bed. +Further comparison shows the night wandering as symptomatically similar +to hysterical and hypnotic somnambulism. This interpretation might be +objected to upon the ground that unfortunately we know nothing of the +origin of the motor phenomena of the dream and that understanding of the +hysterical and hypnotic somnambulism is deplorably lacking. Still less +has science to say about the influence of the moon upon night wandering. +The authors extricate themselves from the difficulty by simply denying +its influence. They bring forward as their chief argument for this that +many sleep walkers are subject to their attacks as frequently in dark as +in moonlight nights and when sleeping in rooms into which no beam of +moonlight can penetrate. Spitta indeed explains it thus: "The much +discussed and romantically treated 'moon walking' is a legend which +stands in contradiction to hitherto observed facts. That the phantasy of +the German folk mind drew to itself the pale ghostly light of the moon +and could reckon from it all sorts of wonderful things, proves nothing +to us." I can only say here that ten negative cases signify nothing in +the face of a single positive one and a thousand-fold experience +undoubtedly represents a certain connection between the light of the +full moon and the most complicated forms of sleep walking. + +Not merely does science avoid these things on account of their +strangeness, but also the poets best informed in the things of the soul, +whom the problems of night wandering and moon walking should stimulate. +From the entire province of artistic literature I can mention only +Shakespeare's "Macbeth," Kleist's "Prinz von Homburg," the novel "Maria" +by Otto Ludwig, "Das Sündkind" by Anzengruber, "Jörn Uhl" by Gustav +Frenssen and "Aebelö" by Sophus Michaelis.[4] Finally Ludwig Ganghofer +has briefly sketched his own sleep walking in his autobiographical +"Lebenslauf eines Optimisten," and Ludwig Tieck has given unrestrained +expression to his passionate love toward this heavenly body in different +portions of his works. + + [4] The text of Bellini's "Nachtwandlerin" could hardly be called + literature, nor Theodor Mundt's fabulous novel, "Lebensmagie, + Wirklichkeit und Traum." The latter I will mention later in the text. + +Only in "Maria" and in "Aebelö" however do these themes play an +important part, while in the other works mentioned they serve properly +only as adornment and episodic ornament. I am not able to explain this +unusual restraint, unless we accept the fact that our best poets shrink +from touching upon questions which they themselves can so little +understand. + +It has been expected that the psychoanalytic method, which casts such +light upon the unconscious, might do much to advance the understanding +of the problems of sleep walking and moon walking. But unfortunately no +one undergoes such an expensive and time-consuming treatment as +psychoanalysis for moon walking, so that the hoped for illumination can +come at the best only as a by-product in the psychoanalysis of +neurotics. That has in fact been my good fortune twice, where I have +been able to lift the curtain, though only a little, in two cases among +my patients and also in individuals who were otherwise healthy. What I +discovered there, I will relate in detail in what follows. + +One point of view I will first set forth. Two questions appear to me to +stand out among those closely bound with our theme. First on the motor +side. Why does not the sleep walker, who is enjoying apparently a +specially deep slumber, sleep on quietly and work out the complexes of +his unconscious somehow in a dream, even though with speech or movement +there? Why instead is he urged forth and driven to wander about and +engage in all sorts of complicated acts? It is one of the most important +functions of the dream to prolong sleep quietly. And then in the second +place, What value and significance must be attributed to the moon and +its light? These two chief questions must be answered by any theory that +would do justice to the question of sleep walking and moon walking. + + + + +PART I + +Medical + + +CASE I. Some years ago I treated a hysterical patient, exceedingly +erotic. She was at that time twenty-two years old, and on her father's +as well as on the mother's side, from a very degenerate family. +Alcoholism and epilepsy could be traced with certainty to the third +ascendant on both sides. The father's sister is mentally diseased, the +patient's mother was an enuretic in her earlier years and a sleep +walker. This mother, like her father when he was drunk, was markedly +cruel and given to blows, characteristics, which according to our +patient, sometimes almost deprived her of her senses and in her anger +bordered upon frenzy. + +The patient herself had been as the youngest child the spoiled darling +of both parents and until her seventh year had been taken by them into +their bed in the morning to play. In her first three years she always +slept between the parents, preferably on the inner side of one of the +two beds and with her legs spread, so that, in her mother's words: "One +foot belongs to me and one to her father!" She was most strongly drawn, +however, to the mother, toward whom at an early age she was sexually +stimulated, already in her first year, if her statements can be relied +upon, when she sat upon her mother's lap while nursing. + +The little one early learned also that, when one is sick, one receives +new playthings and especially much petting and tenderness, on account of +which she often pretended to be sick purposely or she phantasied about +dark forms and ugly faces, which of course she never saw, except to +compel the mother to stay with her and show her special love and +tenderness. Already in her second year she would go to bed most +dutifully, "right gladly" to please father and mother and gain sexual +pleasure thereby. The father then let her ride on his knee, stroked her +upon her buttocks and kissed her passionately upon the lips. The desire +after the mother became the stronger. When the latter had lain down and +the little one had been good, then the child would creep to the mother +under the feather bed and snuggle close to her body ("wind herself fast +like a serpent"). The mother's firm body gave her extraordinary +pleasure, yes, not infrequently it led to the expulsion of a secretion +from the cervix uteri. ("The good comes," as she expressed it.) I +mention convulsive attacks and enuresis nocturna, as pathological +affections of her childhood which belong to my theme. The patient had in +fact suffered in her first year a concussion of the brain, through being +thrown against a brick wall, with organic eclamptic attacks as a result. +The great love which she had experienced because of this led her also +later to imitate those attacks hysterically. In the fourth year, for +example, when she had to sleep in a child's crib, no longer between the +beloved parents, she immediately produced attacks of anxiety in which +she saw ugly faces and witches as in the beginning of the eclamptic +convulsions. Thereupon the frightened mother took her again into her own +bed. Later also she often began to moan and fret until the mother would +take her in her arms to ward off the threatened attacks, and thus she +could stimulate herself to her heart's content. As she reports, at the +height of the orgasm she expelled a secretion, her body began to writhe +convulsively, her face became red as fire, her eyes rolled about and she +almost lost herself in her great pleasure. + +Concerning her enuresis, in its relation to urethral eroticism, the +patient relates the following: "When I pressed myself against my +mother's or brother's thigh, not only 'the good' came, but frequently +also urine with it. At about eight years old there was often a very +strong compulsion to urinate, especially at night, which would cause me +to wet my bed. This was however according to my wish to pass not urine +but that same secretion which I had voided at two or three years old, +when I became so wildly excited with my mother, that is when, lying in +bed with her, I pressed her thigh between mine. I could not stop it in +spite of all threats or punishments. Very curiously I usually awoke when +I voided urine, but I could not retain it in the face of the great +pleasure." + +I lay emphasis upon a specially strong homosexual tendency[5] among her +various perversions, although she had the usual sex relations with a +legion of men with complete satisfaction. Furthermore, as +sadistic-masochistic traits, there was an abnormal pleasure in giving +and receiving blows and a passionate desire for blood. It was a sexual +excitement that occurred when she saw her own blood or that of others. I +have elsewhere[6] described this blood sadism and I will refer here to +only two features, which are of significance also in regard to her moon +walking. The first is her greatly exaggerated vaginal eroticism, which +at menstruation especially was abnormally pleasurably excited. The +second, on the other hand, was that our patient already at the age of +two years should have experienced sexual pleasure in the mother's +hemoptysis. Sitting on the mother's lap she stimulated herself upon the +latter's breast, when she began to scrape and then to cough up blood. +She reached after her bloody lips in order afterward to lick off her own +fingers. As a result of the sexual overexcitement which occurred then, +blood has afforded her enormous pleasure ever since, when she has looked +upon it. + + [5] This homosexual tendency was first directed toward her own mother + in childhood and early puberty. + + [6] "Über den sado-masochistischen Komplex," Jahrb. f. psychoanal. + Forsch., Vol. 5, pp. 224-230. + +As for the rest of her life, I will refer to two other points only, +which are not without importance for our problem. First of all was the +change of dwelling after the father's death in our patient's seventh +year. The other is her burning desire, arising in her third or fourth +year, to play mother and most eagerly with a real live child. A baby +doll, of which she came into possession, was only a substitute, although +for want of something better she carried this around passionately and +did not once lay it out of her arms while asleep. At the age of eight it +was her greatest delight to trudge around with a small two year old girl +from the house and sing her to sleep as her mother had once done to her. +"Carrying that child around was my greatest delight until I was fourteen +years old." + +I mentioned above that her mother had been sadistic and at the same time +a sleep walker. "Mother herself told me that she also rather frequently +walked at night. As a child she would wander around in her room without +being able to find her bed again. Over and over again she would pass it +without finding her way into it. Then she would begin to cry loudly with +fright for her bed until Grandmother awoke and lifted her into bed. In +the morning she remembered nothing at all about it. + +"It was the same way with her desire to urinate. Every night she had a +frightful need to urinate and hunted for the chamber, but, although it +always stood in its accustomed place, she was not able to find it. +Meanwhile the desire grew more severe, so that she began moaning +fearfully in her sleep while hunting. She sought all over the room, even +crept around under the bed without touching or noticing the chamber, +which was there. Often she did not then return to her bed until +Grandmother was awakened by her moans, brought her what she wanted and +helped her to bed. It happened rather frequently that, because of the +very great need, she wet the bed or the room while on her search, +whereupon naturally a whipping followed. Sometimes she lay quite quiet +later on in her sleep, but when she could not find her bed, was obliged +to pass half the night in the cold room. Once when I myself wet my bed, +she struck me with the words: 'Every time that this happens you will be +whipped; my mother whipped me for this reason.' Although she knew from +her own experience that it could not be helped, yet she struck me. + +"Besides the moon exercised a great power over my mother. Since the +house in which she lived was low and stood out in the open country, and +there were no window blinds, on bright moonlight nights the moon shone +into the farthest corner. In the corner stood a box, on which were a +number of flower pots, figures and glass covers. Upon this box she +climbed, after she had first taken down one object after another and +placed them on the floor without breaking anything. Then she began to +dance upon the top of the box, but only on bright moonlight nights. +Finally she put everything back in exactly the same place to a hair's +breadth and climbed out of the window, but not before she had removed +there a number of flower pots out of the way. From the window she +reached the court where she rambled about, climbed over the garden fence +and walked around at least an hour. Then she went back, arranged the +flowers on the window in exact order and--could not find her way to bed. +There was always a scene the next day if Grandmother had been wakened in +the night." + +The most noteworthy feature in this statement, beside the phenomenon of +sadism, later taken over by the daughter, the urethral eroticism and the +susceptibility toward the moonlight, is the behavior of the mother while +walking in her sleep. She plainly has an idea where the flower pots +stand, which she removes from the box and the window, but on the other +hand she comes in contact neither with the bed nor the chamber, which +yet are in their usual places. We will also take note further on of the +dancing upon the box in the bright moonlight as well as the climbing out +of the window, climbing and walking about. + +Before I go on with my patient's story, something should be said +concerning its origin. She had been undergoing psychoanalytic treatment +with me for nine months on account of various severe hysterical +symptoms, which I will not here touch upon further, when she one day +came out with the proposal that she write for me her autobiography. I +agreed to it and she brought me little by little about two hundred +fifty pages of folio, which she had prepared without any influence on my +part, except of course that she had, in those months of treatment, made +the technique of the analysis very much her own as far as it touched +upon her case. Practically nothing in our work together in solving her +difficulties was said of her sleep walking. I have also in no way +influenced or been able to influence her explanation. It originates +solely from the patient's associations and the employment of her newly +acquired knowledge of the unconscious in the interpretation of her +symptoms. + +I find then in her account of her life some highly interesting points. +"Even at two or three years old Mother at my entreaties must soothe me +to sleep. As we lay together in bed I pretended often to be asleep and +reached as if 'in my sleep' after my mother's breast in order to revel +in sensation there. Also I often uncovered myself, again ostensibly in +my sleep, and laid myself down quite contentedly. Then I awoke my mother +by coughing, and when she awoke she stroked me and fondled me, and as +was her custom kissed me also upon the genitals. Frequently I stood up +in bed between my parents--a forerunner of my later sleep walking--and +laid myself down at my mother's feet, asleep as she thought, but in +reality awake only with eyes closed. Then I pulled the feather bed away +from Mother and blinked at her in order to see her naked body, which I +could do better from the foot than if I had lain near her. + +"If she awoke she took me up to my place, kissed me repeatedly over my +whole body and covered me up. I opened my eyes then as if just +awakening, she kissed me on the eyes and said I should go quietly to +sleep again, which I then did. + +"Still earlier, at one or two years, I pretended to be asleep when my +parents went to bed, that I might obtain caresses, because Father and +Mother always said, 'See, how dear, what a little angel!' They kissed me +then and I opened my eyes as if waking from deep sleep. This was the +first time that I pretended to be asleep. I often lay thus for a long +time apparently asleep but really awake. For when the parents saw that I +was asleep, they told one another all sorts of things about us children. +Especially Mother often spoke of my fine traits, or that people praised +me and found me 'so dear' which she never said in my presence lest she +should make me vain." + +Here is an early preceding period when the little one deliberately +pretends to be asleep in order to hear loving things, receive caresses +and experience sexual activity without having to be held accountable or +to be afraid of receiving punishment, because everything happens in +sleep. In the same way similar erotic motives and analogous behavior may +be found in the account of her other actions while asleep. As she began +to talk at two years old her parents begged her to tell everything that +had happened to her, for example in the absence of either of them. She +must tell to the minutest detail, when she awoke early lying between her +parents, what had happened to her during the day before, what she had +done with her brothers and sisters, what had taken place for her at +school, and so on. She responded so much the more gladly, because in +narrating all this she could excite herself more or less as well upon +the father's as upon the mother's body. + +In fact, this was the very source of a direct compulsion to have to tell +things, from which she often had to suffer frightfully. The very bigoted +mother sent her regularly from her sixth year on with her sister to the +preaching services with the express injunction to report the sermons at +home. And although on account of her poor head she had to struggle +grievously with every poem or bit of lesson which she had to learn for +school, yet now at home she would seat herself upon a hassock, spread a +handkerchief over her shoulders and begin to drone out the whole sermon +as she had heard it in the church from the minister. And this all merely +out of love for her mother! Furthermore she was, according to her own +words, directly in love with her teacher in the school, who often struck +her on account of her inattentiveness and certainly did not treat her +otherwise with fondness. Here is a motive for the later learning, +singing and reciting of poetry during the sleep walking, while the +pleasure in being struck when at fault was increased by self reproach, +that she in spite of all her pains was so bad at learning. + +"During my whole childhood," the patient states, "I talked a great deal +in my sleep. When I had a task to learn by heart, I said over the given +selection or the poem in my sleep. This happened the first time when I +was eight years old, on a bright moonlight night. I was sleeping at the +time in the bed with my sister and I arose in the night, recited a poem +and sang songs. At about the same period, standing on a chair or on the +bed, I repeated parts of sermons which I had heard the day before at +church. Besides I prattled about everything which I had done the +previous day or about my play. How often I was afraid that I would +divulge something from my sexual play with my brother! That must never +have happened, however, or mother would have mentioned it to me, for +she always told me everything that I said during the night." I might +perhaps sum up this activity in her sleep after this fashion: Day and +night she is studying for the beloved but unresponsive teacher and +strives to win and to keep her good will as well as that of the mother +through the repeating of sermons and relating of all the events of the +day. + +"As for the talking in my sleep, I began at the age of two or three, +though awake, to pretend to be asleep and to speak out as if asleep. For +example I acted as if I were tormented with frightful dreams and cried +out with great terror, ostensibly in a dream: 'Mother, Mother, take me!' +or 'Stay with me!' or something of the sort. Then Mother took me, as I +had anticipated, under her feather bed and quieted me, but I naturally +became excited while I pressed my legs about her body presumably from +fear of witches and immediately there occurred a 'convulsive attack,' +that is I now experienced such lustful pleasure that 'the good' came." + +Attention may further be called to the fact that she threw herself about +violently in her sleep, which caused her, as the daughter of so brutal a +mother, who was herself a sado-masochist, an excessive amount of +pleasurable sensation. When only two or three years old, as she lay +between the parents, she pushed them with hands and feet, of which she +was quite conscious, while they thought it happened in sleep. This +brought the advantage that she was not responsible for anything which +happened in sleep, for it occurred when she was in an unconscious +condition. + +The changing of the home in her seventh year, after the death of the +father, led to her sharing the bed of her sister six years older than +she. "My sister had the habit of throwing off the covers in her sleep or +twisting her legs about mine. I, on the other hand, always hit her in my +sleep with hands or feet. Naturally I could not help it since it +actually happened while I was asleep, yet when my sister could stand it +no longer I had to go and lie with Mother. I also struck her in my +sleep. Besides I nestled up against her body, especially her buttocks, +and experienced very pleasurable excitement. For it was simply +impossible with her strong body and in the narrow bed to avoid touching +my mother. Only I did it to her quite consciously, but she was of the +impression that I pressed upon her in my sleep because I had no room in +bed. The reason that I as a small child pushed against my parents in bed +was simply the wish to be able to strike them once to my heart's desire, +and since this was impossible during the day, I did it while asleep, +when no one is responsible for what one does. Striking my sister then +actually in my sleep, when I was seven years old, was again the wish to +be able to excite myself pleasurably by the blows as when a smaller +child." Here her sadism again breaks through in this desire to strike +mother and sister according to her heart's desire and it especially +excited her because of her constitutionally exaggerated muscle erotic. I +have discussed this sadism at length elsewhere.[7] + + [7] Cf. note 6, p. 163. + +It can be affirmed, if we examine her behavior in sleep, that without +exception sexual wishes lay at the bottom of it, just as the dream also, +as is well known, always represents the fulfilment of infantile wishes. +The plainly erotic character is never wanting in an apparently asexual +action, if we penetrate it more deeply. So for example this patient +repeated the sermon at her mother's bidding in order to receive her love +and praise. Saying her lessons at night arose from her strong attachment +to her teacher, which again in turn was a stage of her love for her +mother. Naturally this was all concerned with wishes, which, strictly +tabooed when awake, could only be gratified in unconsciousness, somehow +carried out in sleep, or, as with the simulated convulsions, only in the +mother's bed. The behavior during sleep served especially well to grant +sexual pleasure but without guilt or liability to punishment. + +It was quite in order further that a conscious activity preceded the +unconscious activity in sleep, that is, that for a time the patient +while awake, but with closed eyes and therefore apparently asleep, did +the very thing which later was done in actual unconsciousness. What then +impressed itself as an unconscious performance during sleep, had been +earlier done consciously, almost I might say as "a studied action." Only +in special cases is there any need for playing such a comedy, for the +direct demand of a beloved individual--"You must tell everything," "You +must learn diligently," "Repeat the sermon accurately,"--when the +eroticism is well concealed, permits of open action without more +hindrance. It may be noted further that the patient never betrayed in +the least in her sleep what she must have been at pains carefully to +conceal, as, for example, the sexual play with her brother. Finally the +striking participation of the muscle erotic at times in sleep must be +emphasized. + +We have found already as roots and motives of her sleep activity sexual, +strongly forbidden wishes, which particularly could often be gratified +only in bed; the striving that she might commit misdemeanor without +being held guilty or answerable; further the practicing of these things +first while awake; and finally, as an organic root, at least the +pleasure in blows in sleep, the undeniably exaggerated muscle erotic. +Nearly everything takes place in bed, only occasionally outside it, and +then always near it. Complicated actions are completely wanting. +Likewise nothing was said of the influence of the light or of the moon. +Only in passing was it mentioned that the patient arose in the moonlight +for her first nightly recitation of lessons. + +The group of phenomena which we will now take up displays complicated +performances and stands above all under the evident influence of the +light of the moon. "In my fourth year," the patient relates, "I was put +for the first time into a little bed of my own, so that my mother, who +the day before had begun to cough up blood, should have more rest. She +had closed the net of my crib and that I should not be frightened moved +the crib up to her large bed. I pretended to be asleep and as soon as my +parents had fallen asleep I climbed over the side but was so unfortunate +as to fall into my mother's bed. I was quickly laid back in my own bed, +without having seen the blood, which was my special longing. Often after +this, almost every night, I tried again to climb into Mother's bed, so +that finally she placed my bed by the wall in order to prevent my +climbing over to her. For some months I slept alone in my little bed. +She caught me one night, however, this time actually in my sleep, trying +to climb over the side but entangled in the net. Fortunately I did not +fall out but back into bed. At that time I produced also my pretended +convulsive attacks that I might be taken by Mother into her bed and be +able to excite myself upon her. + +"Mother began raising blood again when I was ten years old and we had +already moved into the new home. That year she was seized twice with +such severe hemorrhages that for weeks she hovered between life and +death. Then in my eleventh year I began my sleep walking. What urged me +to it was again Mother's coughing of blood as well as the desire to see +her blood, both reasons why I had already at four years old pretended +sleep so that I could climb into Mother's bed." + +The patient proved herself such an ideal nurse on the occasion of the +mother's severe hemorrhage that the mother would have no one else. She +watched tirelessly day and night together with her sisters, changing +every few minutes the icebags which had been ordered. "Scarcely a moment +did I tear myself away from my mother's bedside and, if one of my +sisters relieved me, I often could hardly move, undress myself and lie +down for an hour. If I did lie down, I threw myself about restlessly, +torn with anxiety, and was only happy again when I sat by my mother's +bed." This fearful anxiety was not however merely fear for the precious +life of the mother, but still more, repressed libido. In spite of all +her concern for the mother's suffering she could not prevent the +strongest sexual pleasurable sensations at the sight of the mother's +snow white breast in putting on the applications or when she raised +blood. This intensive nursing lasted four weeks until finally a nursing +Sister came to assist. + +"As I now for the first time could enjoy a full night's rest, I fell +into a deep sleep, as from this time on I always did before every sleep +walking. Near my bed stood the table with Mother's medicine and on the +window ledge, behind the curtain, a lamp, which threw its light upon my +bed. Suddenly I arose in my sleep, went to my mother's bed, bent over +her. Mother opened her eyes but did not rouse herself. Then the Sister, +who was dozing on the sofa near Mother's bed, awoke and rushed forward +frightened as she saw me there in my nightgown. She thought something +had happened to Mother, but the latter motioned with her hand to leave +me alone and to keep still. I kissed Mother and changed the icebag, +apparently in order to see her breast. I could see no blood this time, +so without a sound I moved away and went to the table, where I put all +the medicines carefully together to make a place and then went out into +the pitch dark kitchen without stumbling against anything. There I took +from the kitchen dresser a bowl with a saucer and a spoon and came back +again to the room. Next I seized a glass of water which stood there and +poured the water carefully into the bowl without spilling more than a +drop. With this I spoke out half aloud to myself: 'Now Emil (my +brother-in-law, who had for a long time taken his breakfast with us) can +come to his breakfast without disturbing Mother, who had always prepared +it for him.' Then I went to bed and slept soundly for some hours, as I +sleep only at my periods of sleep walking, without crying out. All that +I have described the Sister of Charity told me afterward. Naturally I +did everything with closed eyes, without knowing it, and moved about as +securely in the darkness as if it had been bright day. The next morning +they told me about it and laughed over it." + +This is what she has to say of the influence of the light upon her sleep +walking. "Here also Mother's coughing was the external cause as it had +been when I was four years old. When Mother was ill, the lamp was left +upon the window sill behind the curtain, burning brightly so that she +would not be afraid. Now also, at the time of my first complicated sleep +walking, such a light was burning behind the curtain throwing its light +upon my bed and the wall. Mother had always left the light burning in +order to see me at once, after I had sometimes climbed over the side of +my crib at the age of four, when she was ill. The light however made me +climb over to her, because in the dark no blood could be seen. Also when +I began to moan, during my convulsive attacks, she made a light and came +to my bed. Or she said, when my bed was pushed close to hers: 'Wait a +moment; I will make a light and take you or you can climb over to me.' +Next day I laughed with my parents over my visit at night, without +suspecting that I would soon be repeating it actually in my sleep. And +it was only for this, that I might, as at the very first time, enjoy the +sight of Mother's blood. Now, when she had a light burning during her +illness, this allured me in my sleep to climb out to her, as at that +first time when she had made a light especially for me to climb over to +her." + +The following memory leads still deeper into the etiology: "Mother +always had the habit of going from bed to bed, when we children were +asleep, and lighting us with her lamp to make sure that we were asleep. +I perceived the light in my sleep, which called me to Mother. She had +lighted me that first time so that I might climb into bed with her. Now +I thought in my sleep, when I saw the light, that she was calling me +again and she found me often at the very point of climbing over to her. +I see myself yet today with one foot over the bars, almost in a riding +position. Yet nothing ever happened to me. A complete change took place +within me when the light of a candle or a lamp fell upon my face. I +might almost say that I experienced a great feeling of pleasure. I +seemed to myself in my sleep to be a supernatural being. I immediately +perceived the light even when I lay in deepest sleep. There was however +no sign of waking. This must represent a second form of consciousness, +which possessed me at such times. I often asked my mother all sorts of +things while wandering about, always knew to whom I spoke although I did +not see the person and before I heard anyone speak I already mentioned +the person's name. My orientation in sleep walking was so exact that I +never once stubbed my toe against anything. It was just so with +urination, which was probably connected with the moon or with a night +light accidentally falling upon me. As soon as I pressed out secretion +or the urine came, I found myself in a half sleep without being able to +prevent an excessive feeling of pleasure. Then first I came to myself. +This seems to me to go back to the fact that Mother often awoke me on +special occasions in the night, holding a lamp or a candle in her hand +to set me on the chamber, especially when she heard me moaning in my +sleep and suspected a convulsive attack." + +In what follows a complete identification with the mother is reported in +detail. That has come in part to our notice in the first sleep walking, +when our patient prepares the breakfast for her brother-in-law. "After +that first sleep walking when Mother was having hemorrhages, they took +place now rather frequently, when the least glimmer of light fell upon +me, when Mother, for instance, lighted a candle at night to take some +drops for her cough. Thus it happened that almost every night, as long +as our beds stood together, I acted this little part. Often my family +did not awaken and yet we knew the next day, when something was missing, +that I had been the culprit in my sleep, as the next little example will +show. + +"My greatest wish at that time, at ten years old, was to be 'Mother' and +have a child that I might bring up as I pleased. One morning when Mother +got up and wished to dress herself she did not find her underclothing. +We sisters were still fast asleep and Mother did not wish to waken us. +She could remember exactly that she had laid her clothing as she always +did on the chair near her bed. When she saw that search was in vain she +put on fresh linen. Fully an hour later I awoke and was completely +astonished to find myself dressed and in Mother's clothing. The puzzle +was now solved. The putting on of Mother's clothing during the sleep +walking had plainly been merely my wish to put myself into the mother's +place and also to play mother, as I did with the children day after day. +It was just at this time that I was always seeking to trail around all +day with children, whom I tormented, treated cruelly, often even struck +them for no cause whatever, always with a great feeling of pleasure, as +I myself fared at my mother's hands. It was very frequently the case +that I spread the table for a meal, in Mother's place, or put on her +linen or outer clothing. This happened most often when she was ill again +with her cough or the light shone upon me in my sleep. The light of the +candle was sufficient for this." + +At thirteen years she began to be directly affected by the moonlight. +"At that time I had to sleep in a small room which my brother had +occupied before this. This room looked out upon the court and was, +especially on the nights when the moon was full, as bright as if a lamp +were burning in the room. I was very much afraid to sleep alone in a +room. This was the first time in my life that it had happened. I feared +that in every corner some one might be standing and suddenly step forth +or might lie hidden behind the bed and although I first let the candle +light shine over everything, I had no rest but was in continual fear. I +slept here perhaps only fourteen days in all, but it was full moon just +at this time and rather bright in the small room. + +"Before going to sleep I always barred the door of the room, which near +the other door of our house opened upon a small passage. On account of +the shop we lived on an upper floor. When I lay in bed I was always +thinking that I had not bolted the door well and every night I arose +three or four times before going to sleep in order to make sure whether +I had actually bolted the door carefully. This I did while awake. +Finally I fell asleep. I knew nothing in the morning of what happened in +the night. Yet for several days, when I arose in the morning, I found +the door which led out of my room upon the passage standing open. I must +also have gone about the house during the night, at least have been in +the passage. It alarmed Mother and, when early the next day the door was +once more open, she said that I need never sleep alone again. I had not +had the remotest thought that she would watch me the next night. As +usual she could, when I talked in my sleep, ask me about everything and +obtain correct answers without wakening me. If however she called my +name in fright, when I was walking, as in the scene about to be +described, then I awoke. Some nights apparently I roamed about in the +house, God knows where, in the moonlight, without any one noticing it. +Now it was the window in the passage, which looked into the court and +was always closed at night, that was left open. What took place there I +cannot say, since no one observed me. I can however describe clearly +what my mother saw happen and which she told me afterward. + +"Before I lay down I tried the door several times to see if it were +securely bolted, then slept until about twelve o'clock. Between twelve +and one o'clock, when I as a child had always been most afraid because +this was a ghostly hour, my mother, who compelled herself this night to +remain awake, heard my door creak slightly. She watched and saw the +following: I went out in my nightgown softly to the door and to the +window on the passage, which I opened. I swung myself upon that rather +high window and remained there a while without moving, sitting there +while I gazed straight at the moon. Then--it seemed to my mother like an +eternity--I climbed down softly and went quietly along the passage into +the first story. Half way along however I considered, turned back and +went into my room. Having reached the door I turned once again and went +along the passage to the door of the court. This was fastened. Again I +turned and now went to the house gate. There I remained standing. I even +tried to open it, as if I heard my name called. Then I was frightened, +looked about me and was awake. Shaking with cold, for I was there half +naked, I could scarcely orient myself. Then I crept to my bed and slept +without waking. + +"This happened in the second week. Every morning my door was open so +that I had to sleep again in Mother's room. The moon never shone in +there and the night light was covered. Nevertheless the sleep walking +began also in this room in two weeks, if only the light of the candle +fell upon me in my sleep. More often I lighted the candle myself in my +sleep and went around in the room and the kitchen. Sometimes Mother +found me standing by the door of the shop apparently about to open it +and walk out. Now I have frequently, when I am lying in bed, the desire +to spring out of the window, or to open both casements to get air for I +am often afraid of choking. Mother had often felt this way in her +illness. It also happened that Mother found me sitting by my chest, +where I was looking for something which I had needed the day before and +intended looking for the next day. I had laid out all my possessions +about me. If Mother called me by name, I awoke; if she did not call me +but only spoke in a certain way to me, I answered her everything without +waking. I got up in my sleep, put on my mother's clothes, put on a cape +and a nightcap, bade farewell to the children, to whom I wanted to be +the mother, charged them to be brave and promised to bring them +something. Then I took a piece of wood in my hand for an umbrella and +walked about the room as if holding it opened out over my head because +the sun shone. In reality it was the shining of the lamp. Mother's +clothes were long and yet I wore the train beautifully and gracefully, +without stepping on the skirt. My mother doubled herself with laughter +when she saw such a caricature. Mostly I played the mother. Often I +carried a small piece of wood wrapped in a cloth as a child in my arm +and laid it on my breast. I sang songs, hushed at the same time other +children--and knew nothing at all of it next day. Mother laughed most +over this, that when I dressed myself, I first turned everything wrong +side out. This goes back to the fact that Mother sometimes, when she had +to get up in the night on my account and was half asleep, slipped her +robe on twisted and wrong side out. These things lasted until my +seventeenth year, when Mother was sick and I, as related above, made +coffee in the presence of the Sister of Mercy.[8] + + [8] I have here given word for word what the patient wrote down. When + I then pointed out to her the evident contradiction, that she had + misplaced something into the seventeenth year, which according to an + earlier statement must have happened in the eleventh year, she + answered that here was in fact an earlier mistake, since her + brother-in-law Emil had first taken breakfast with her mother in her + seventeenth year. The facts were these: She had walked a great deal in + her sleep from her eleventh to her seventeenth year, for her mother + had always suffered from hemoptysis, with occasional intermissions, + and on this account had a nurse at various times. She had in fact + at eleven years done everything which she has described above, only + the making of the coffee for the brother-in-law happened in the + seventeenth year. Besides, all the other actions performed in sleep + are correctly given. On being questioned, she stated that her menses + occurred first between her thirteenth and fourteenth years and at the + time of menstruation particularly she had walked a great deal. She + was always very much excited sexually before her period, slept very + restlessly and had always at that time arisen in her sleep. Blood + always excited her excessively sexually, as has been already mentioned + in the text. I will add just at this place that her exact dates, when + an event appears in the very first years of her life, must be taken + with a grain of salt, because falsification of memory is always to be + found there. This, however, is not of great importance because the + facts are authentically correct and at least agree approximately with + the times specified, as I have convinced myself through questioning + her relatives. + +"Mother was rather often ill, so that beside the care of her, in which +later a nurse assisted us, the shop had also to be looked after, which +always demanded one person during the day. If I lay down upon my bed +after two or three weeks of nursing, I fell into a deep sleep. This +never hindered me however from being in my place to the minute, when my +mother's medicine was to be taken. My mother could have anything from +me, although I lay in a deep sleep. She did not need to speak, and if +she wanted anything, she spoke it half aloud. The Sister, over weary +from night watching, slept lightly, but if Mother needed anything, it +was sufficient for her to breathe my name and I was awake, although +otherwise I did not hear well and must always be aroused for some time +before I was fully awake. + +"In reality I merely imitated my mother in my sleep walking. In the +first place it was my wish to hold some object in my arms during the +night, or lay it near me, as if it were my child, to have one that I +might play with it sexually. In the second place this went back to my +early childhood when I lay near my mother and she played thus with me. +In the third place it referred to a later time when I felt as a mother +toward my doll, and never allowed it out of my lap by day nor out of my +arms at night. When Mother wished to quiet me if I was suddenly afraid +of ugly creatures at night, she had to make a light as quickly as +possible. Then she took me upon her arm or laid me close to her. The +light must however remain burning until I had fallen asleep so that the +horrible faces could not torture me. As a child I often cried only for +the light; it was the light that first completely quieted me. I longed +indeed for the light that I might see the blood, and at the same time +excite myself upon my mother." + +The patient proceeds in her story: "This continued until the seventeenth +year. At eighteen I had to go into the country because of a nervous +trouble. There I was quite alone and also had to sleep alone in a room. +I always went to sleep very late and once--my small room was bright with +moonlight--I arose, went into the small passageway, which opened into +the court, and was going out of the courtyard gate. I was obliged to +turn back, however, because this was fastened. Yet instead of going back +to my room, I went into the sleeping room of my landlady, who was +sleeping there with her daughter, a girl of about twenty-six years. The +moon was also shining into this room and I slowly opened the door. Both +of them then awoke and were, as they told me next day, frightened to +death. It affected the daughter especially, so that she was terrified +and at once sought refuge in her mother's bed. I went back. What +happened further I cannot say, for the daughter had immediately bolted +the door behind me. I had made it impossible for me to stay longer in +the little country village, and although I had paid for my room for a +month I preferred to go away two days later. All the people avoided me +and looked at me askance. Most of all the people with whom I was +stopping! I saw that a stone rolled from their hearts when I departed." +At my question, whether she perhaps had been especially attracted by her +landlady, she answered: "No, but in fact with another woman of the +village. And it seems that I at that time wished to go to this woman in +my sleep walking. At least the landlady's room, into which I went, after +I found the gate of the courtyard fastened, lay in the direction of the +house where she lived. + +"From this time nothing is known of my walking in my sleep even on +moonlight nights. Only I have sometimes since that time put on my +underclothes in the night, but always my own. That is I have often +discovered in the morning, up till quite recently, that I had on my +linen or my stockings. Besides I often dressed my hair during the night, +and if I had had my hair, for example, braided or loose when I went to +sleep, I would awaken in the morning with my hair put upon my head. This +unconscious hair dressing happened most frequently before menstruation +and was then an absolute sign that this would take place very soon. This +has the following connection. Mother never went to sleep with her hair +done up, but when in bed had it always hanging down in a braid. Only, +when she was suffering from the hemorrhages--at the time of menstruation +I also lost a good deal of blood--she did not have the braid hanging +down but put up upon her head. Before the appearance of menstruation +this braid hanging down annoyed me very much. Furthermore, the doing of +my hair in my sleep, which occurred a few days before, is only the wish +again to see blood, for which reason it appears only usually before +menstruation." I will add to complete this that the ceasing of her sleep +walking at her eighteenth year was contemporaneous with her taking up +regular sexual relations with different men. + +The patient gives still other important illustrations of her awaking at +the calling of her name by her mother, and of staring into the light, +particularly the moon. "In school my thoughts were always on the sexual +and therefore I heard nothing when an example was explained. I often +resolved to listen attentively, but in a few minutes I was again +occupied with sexual phantasies. Then if I heard my name called I woke +up suddenly but had first to orient myself and think where I was. This +awaking at the calling of my name at school was exactly like that when +my mother called me by name during my sleep walking. Both times I was +startled and awoke as if from a heavy dream. That excessive dreaming +while awake goes back however to my earliest childhood, when I sat +evenings on my mother's lap, while my parents were talking together, and +excited myself with her. Oh, what wonderful things I dreamed! I always +revelled then in sexual phantasies, and, completely lost in them, forgot +entirely where I was until I suddenly heard my name called, when I +started up frightened and had first to orient myself. Mother always +called my name softly and usually added, when I began to yawn, 'the +pillow is calling you,' and imitating a wee voice, 'You ought to come to +it in bed.'" + +Once more: "When evenings I began to dream on mother's lap, I was +compelled to look directly into the flame of the lamp. I looked +straight into it and was as if hypnotized. I laid both hands upon my +mother's breasts and traced their form. Besides I had my braid lying +upon her left breast, which I liked very much, because it lay as softly +as upon a pillow. I was also compelled to look into the light, gazed +steadily at the flame until my eyes were closed. Then I lay in a half +sleep, in which I heard the voices of the family without understanding +what was said. Thus I could dream best, until my mother called my name +and I awoke. + +"Every day I took delight in this sleep by the light of the lamp and the +pleasure experienced upon my mother's lap. I lay quietly and with eyes +closed so that they all thought I was fast asleep. Yet I knew indeed +that it was no ordinary sleep, but merely a 'daydream,' from which I +only awoke when Mother called me by name. When she did not do this, but +quietly undressed me and put me into bed, I began to be restless. I +stood up in bed, lay down at their feet and took care to cry out and +throw myself about until Mother, quite alarmed, called me by name and +quieted me. I believe that in these experiences lies another root for my +staring at the moon when sleep walking, as well as for the dreamy state +occasioned by the fixed gazing at the light." + +In conclusion there are still some less important psychic +overdeterminations. "I often had the desire, when looking at the moon at +the age of four or five, to climb over the houses into the moon. I knew +nothing at that time of sleep walkers. About the same time my sisters +often sang the well-known song: 'What sort of a wry face are you making, +oh Moon?' I stared immovably also at the moon, when I had the +opportunity to look at it once from my window, in order that I might +discover its face and eyes. Then, too, my eyes grew weary and began to +close. Later, when nine or ten years old, I heard other children say +that people dwelt in the moon. I would have given anything to know how +these people looked, and whenever it was full moon, I gazed fixedly at +it. I had understood that another people dwelt there of a different +race. I wished to have another race of men. Perhaps they had other +customs, thought differently, ran about naked as in Paradise and there I +wished to go, and lead a free life with boys as with girls. Even as a +child I seemed to myself quite different from the rest of humankind on +account of my sexual concerns and sexual phantasies in school. I always +believed that I was something peculiar and for that reason belonged not +on the earth but upon the moon. Once when I heard the word 'mooncalf' +and asked what it meant, some one at home told me that mooncalves were +deformed children. + +"I thought however that they did not understand; the children were quite +differently formed, just as were all the people in the moon, so that +their feelings were altogether different and they led a sexual life of a +quite different kind. I thought they were kind to both sexes, because +Mother always said, 'You must not be alone with boys!' and that in the +moon this was permitted, for there no distinction was made between the +sexes in play." + +I asked her more particularly in conclusion whether her explanation for +staring at the moon, that she identified moon and lamplight, was all +there was of it. She answered immediately that another explanation had +pressed itself upon her earlier, which she had rejected as "too +foolish." "The moon's shining disk reminded me in fact of a woman's +smooth body, the abdomen and most of all the buttocks. It excited me +very greatly if I saw a woman from behind. Whenever I am fondling any +one erotically and have my hand on the buttocks--I always think then of +a woman--the moon always occurs to me but in the thought of a woman's +body." + +According to this explanation the sleep walker would have also stared at +the planet, because the round sphere awoke sexual childhood memories of +the woman's body, or, as I learned from another source, of the woman's +breast, most frequently however of her buttocks. It is moreover +noteworthy that it was always only the full moon that worked thus +attractively, not by chance the half moon or the sickle. An everyday +experience agrees very well with this. Children, when they see the full +moon or their attention is called to it, begin to snigger. Every one +familiar with the child psyche knows that such giggling is based on +sexual meaning, because the little ones usually think of the nates. Not +infrequently will children, when they are placed on the chamber, pull +away their nightclothes with the words, "Now the full moon is up," +likewise when a child accidentally or intentionally bares himself at +that spot. + +We have now the explanation, if we put together that which has just been +told us, why our sleep walker wakes up on the spot and comes to herself +as soon as she is called by name. This corresponds to her starting awake +when in school she was recalled from her sexual daydreams and the +earlier being startled when the mother called her out of similar sexual +phantasies to go to sleep. The inference may be drawn from this however +that one is startled from sexual dreaming also when the name is called +during sleep walking, or going a step further, that sexual phantasies +are at the bottom of sleep walking in the moonlight and first find their +fulfilment here. + +Could the interpretation of our patient be generalized, it might be said +that the sleep walker climbs upon the roofs as a fulfilment of a +childish wish to climb up into the very moon. It is of significance also +how far we may consider universal her infantile belief that everything +sexual is permitted upon the moon, that what was strongly forbidden her +upon earth was there allowed to other children, and further the opinion +that she was quite different because of her sexual phantasying and did +not after all belong upon the earth but on the moon. At any rate the two +motives introduced for staring at the moon's disk may be frequently met, +are perhaps constantly present, that is the similarity of the moonlight +and lamplight and the comparison of the moon's disk to the human body, +especially the nates. + +Let us attempt to realize now what this case before us may have to +teach, the first and so far the only one of its kind to be submitted to +a careful analysis. It must naturally be candidly confessed from the +start that from a single case history, be it ever so clearly and fully +set forth, no general conclusions may be drawn. Moreover certain factors +resist generalization because they are of a more specialized character +and at most will only occasionally reappear, as for example, the strong +sadistic note, the desire for blood, the hemoptysis of the beloved +mother. More frequently, also with the female sex, there may be the wish +to climb into bed with the parents or their substitutes, to play the +rôle of mother or father, out of love for them, and finally in general +homosexuality may be a driving factor. + +It is the sexual coloring and motivation of the sleep walking, +especially by the light of the moon, which gives throughout the +strongest tone to our case. This is something which the scientific +authors have so far as good as completely overlooked, even where it has +forced itself into view, as in a series of cases cited by +Krafft-Ebing.[9] We shall hear, in discussing the works of the poets, +that they and the folk place this very motive before all others, indeed +often take it as the only one. We have here once more before us, if this +opinion be correct, a scientific erotophobia, that is the dread--mostly +among physicians and psychologists--of sexuality, although this is at +least one of the chief driving instincts of human life. + + [9] _E. g._, "A monk of a melancholy disposition and known to be a + sleep walker, betook himself one evening to the room of his prior, + who, as it happened, had not yet gone to bed, but sat at his work + table. The monk had a knife in his hand, his eyes were open and + without swerving he made straight at the bed of the prior without + looking at him or the light burning in the room. He felt in the bed + for the body, stuck it three times with the knife and turned with a + satisfied countenance back to his cell, the door of which he closed. + In the morning he told the horrified prior that he had dreamed that + the latter had murdered his mother, and that her bloody shadow had + appeared to him to summon him to avenge her. He had hastened to arise + and had stabbed the prior. Immediately he had awakened in his bed, + bathed in perspiration, and had thanked God that it had been only a + frightful dream. The monk was horrified when the prior told him what + had taken place." The following cases besides: "A shoemaker's + apprentice, tortured for a long time with jealousy, climbed in his + sleep over the roof to his beloved, stabbed her and went back to bed." + Another, "A sleep walker in Naples stabbed his wife because of an idea + in a dream that she was untrue to him!" We may conclude, on the ground + of our analytical experiences, that the untrue maiden always + represents the mother of the sleep walker, who has been faithless to + him with the father. The hatred thoughts toward this rival lead in the + first dream to the reverse Hamlet motive, the mother has demanded that + the son take revenge upon the father. Finally Krafft-Ebing gives still + other cases: "A pastor, who would have been removed from his post on + account of the pregnancy of a girl, was acquitted because he proved + that he was a sleep walker and made it appear that in this condition (?) + the forbidden relationship had taken place." Also, "The case of a girl + who was sexually mishandled in the somnambulistic condition. Only in + the attacks had she consciousness of having submitted to sexual + relations, but not in the free intervals." + +There exists a better agreement of opinion over the relationship between +sleep walking and the dream. Sleep walking, analogously to the latter, +fulfills also wishes of the day, behind which stand always wishes from +childhood. Only it must also be emphasized that the old, like the recent +wishes, are exclusively or predominantly of a sexual nature. Because +however that sexual desire is forbidden in the waking life, it must even +as in the dream take refuge in the sleeping state, where it can be +gratified unconsciously and therefore without guilt or punishment. Most +of the sleep activities of our patient were performed originally in a +state of apparent sleep, that is actually practiced in the conscious +state until later they were carried out quite unconsciously. She would +never then betray what when feigning sleep she had to conceal as causes. +Finally the directly precipitating causes in her erotic nature for the +sleep walking and moon walking seem especially to have been light and +the shining of the moon, her puberty and her mother's sickness. + +All of our patient's sleep walking, in accordance with the etiology and +interpretation, since it goes back to infantile sexuality, is half +sexual, half outspokenly infantile. It reaches the greatest degree, +indeed the moon walking sets in just at the time of sexual maturity and +leads to the most complicated actions before the menses, that is at the +time of the greatest sexual excitement. And this activity in sleep and +the moon walking too almost cease when the patient enters upon regular +sexual intercourse. The shining of every light stimulates her sexually, +especially that of the moon. The wandering about in her nightgown or in +the scantiest clothing is plainly erotically conditioned (exhibition), +but also the going about in the ghostly hours (see later), finally the +being wakened through the softest calling of her name by the mother, +with whom alone she stands in a contact like that of hypnotic +somnambulism. + +Purely childish moreover is the clever technique of disguise. First she +simulates illness or fear in order to be taken into the mother's bed. +Then she pretends to be asleep, talks in her sleep, throws herself about +in her sleep, that she may be able to do everything without punishment +and without being blamed, finally plays the mother in a manner which +corresponds completely to child's play. Also later, before and after +wandering in the bright moonlight, she produces specially deep sleep and +first as if in an obsession tries the door repeatedly to see if it is +closed. I see in this, naturally apart from possible organic causes of +profound sleep, an unconscious purpose, which plainly insists: "Just +see, how sound-asleep I am (we are reminded of the earlier pretending to +be asleep) and how afraid I am that the door might be left open! Whoever +has to walk about in spite of such sound sleep and such precaution, and +even perhaps do certain things which might be sexually interpreted, he +plainly is not to blame for it!" + +We might add from knowledge of the neuroses that the fear that some one +might be hiding in the room signifies the wish that this might be so in +order that the subject might be sexually gratified. There was one +circumstance most convincing in regard to this, which I will now add. +Even during the time of her psychoanalytic treatment, when she did not +wander at night any more nor perform complicated acts in her sleep, she +had a number of times in the country carefully locked the door of her +room in the evening, only to find it open again in the morning. To be +sure, her lover of that period slept under the same roof, though at some +distance from her. + +Before I go more closely into the question as to what share the light +had upon the sleep walking of our patient, I will recall once more that +her actions during sleep were at first but few and had nothing to do +with the light. As the years went by they became more complicated and +finally took place only under the influence of the light, whether it was +artificial or natural, that is of the moon. More extended walks were in +general possible only in the light of the moon, which as a heavenly body +shining everywhere threw its brightness over every thing, in the court, +garden and over the street, while candles or lamps at the best lighted +one or two rooms. The patient, given to sleep walking or moon walking, +went after the light, which meanwhile represented to her from childhood +on a symbol of the parents' love and gave hope of sexual enjoyment. + +It was also bound inseparably within with motor activities of an erotic +nature. When her mother approached her bed with the light it was a +reminder to the child, Now you must go upon the chamber and you can pass +"the good," or, when she sat on the mother's lap and gazed into the +lamplight, Now you may stimulate yourself according to your heart's +desire. Then the lamp was shining when the little one wished to climb +into bed with the mother in order that, while exhibiting herself, she +might see her as scantily covered as possible. And finally the striking +of the light announced, "the mother is sick, in nursing her you will +have the opportunity to see her bared breasts and her blood." Evidently +the light thus led, when she climbed after it, to the greatest +experience of sexual pleasure of her earliest childhood. On account of +this strong libido possession the memory of the light was kept alive in +the unconscious and it needed only that the light of the lamp or the +candle should fall upon the face of the wanderer to permit her to +experience in the most profound sleep the same pleasure, the unconscious +was set into activity and everything was accomplished most manifestly +according to the purpose that served her strong libido. + +It is remarkable that our patient distinguished immediately a strong +feeling of pleasure by the shining of every light, that moreover she +seemed to herself as a supernatural being (glorification through the +sexual feeling of pleasure[10]), that she herself imagined it must +represent a second sort of consciousness, and finally that she stood in +such contact with the beloved person as that of a hypnotized +subject--somnambulist--with her hypnotist. For she perceived also the +mother's lightest word when most soundly asleep, in spite of her +difficulty in hearing at other times. + + [10] One thinks of the halo in religious pictures, which indeed is + nothing else than the shining of the light about the head. + +What was the patient's intention in her longer walks under the moon's +influence, that she, for instance, climbed to the first story, reflected +for a moment and then started to go out at the gate? That becomes +comprehensible when it is remembered that she once opened the door in +her sleep for her lover in the country and furthermore in her first +complicated sleep walking. The purpose of the latter has been stated, to +climb into her mother's bed in order to obtain the greatest sexual +pleasure. I do not believe I am far astray when I assume that this +erotic desire of the child lies also essentially at the basis of her +more extensive wandering in the moonlight. She simply wishes each time +to go to the bed of some beloved one, which, as we shall hear later, is +accepted by poets and the folk mind as a chief motive, and a fundamental +one for many instances of sleep walking, especially with maidens. + +It becomes clear now, likewise, why the patient climbs into the first +story, then recollects herself and seeks to go out at the gate. In her +seventh year she and her family had changed their abode and this had +been before in the first story but was now on an upper floor. She is +trying yet to climb into the mother's bed, this still remaining as a +fundamental motive. Only she is not seeking the bed where it stands at +the present time but where it stood in childhood, in the first story and +in another house. She goes, therefore, downstairs but remembers, +unconsciously of course, that this is not the right floor and wants now +to go out at the gate to find the home of her childhood. Later in the +country when she so thoroughly frightens her landlady and her daughter, +there she is also going to a woman she loves and she leaves the house +for this purpose and goes at least into the room that lies in the +direction of the house where the beloved lies. Later still she opens the +door wide in her sleep so that her lover can have free entrance. + +We might also explain now in great part the sleep walking of the mother. +As far as I can discover, the mother also as a very small child lived in +another home than the one in which her sleep walking began. She ran +about her room at night and could not find her bed and felt around in +distress without coming upon the chamber, both of which stood in the +usual places. This may be explained by the fact that in phantasy she was +seeking the bed and chamber of her earliest childhood, which of course +stood elsewhere. Moreover she attained by her moaning the fulfilment of +her unconscious wish to be set by her mother upon the chamber and then +lifted into bed. The wanderings in the moonlight, after which likewise +she could not find her way back to bed, may be similarly explained, +though I learned only this much about her dancing in the moonlight, +that in her childhood she was very fond of dancing, which is also the +case with our patient. Perhaps she wished also to play elves in the +moonlight, according to poems or fairy tales or had, like her daughter, +earned the special love of her parents through her skill in dancing. + +We are now at the chief problem. How is it then that the night's rest, +the guarding of which is always the goal of the dream, is motorially +broken through in sleep walking? There is first a special organic +disposition, which is absent from no sleep walker, a heightened motor +stimulability[11]. This appears clearly with children, and so for +example with our patient as a tendency to convulsive attacks, pavor +nocturnus and terrifying dreams, from which she starts up. + + [11] Cf. with this Krafft-Ebing, _l. c._ "Slight convulsions or + cataleptic muscular rigidity sometimes precede the attacks." + +As far as my observations go, it seems to me that there is a special +disposition to sleep walking in the descendants of alcoholics and +epileptics, of individuals with a distinctively sadistic character, +finally of hysterics, whose motor activity is strongly affected, who +also suffer with convulsions, tremor, paralyses or contractures. It +should be merely briefly mentioned that the heightened motor +excitability also establishes a disposition to a special muscle erotic, +which in fact was easily demonstrable in every one of the cases of sleep +walking and moon walking which have become known to me. The disturbance +of the night's rest was made desirable through the satisfaction of the +muscle erotic to every one for whom the excessive muscular activity +offered an entirely specialized pleasure, even sexual enjoyment. + +Moreover in our case a series of features besides those already +mentioned bear undoubted testimony to the abnormally increased muscle +erotic. I have already elsewhere discussed them in detail[12] and will +here merely name briefly the chief factors. The patient had an epileptic +alcoholic grandfather on the mother's side, who was notorious when under +the influence of alcohol for his cruelty and pleasure in whipping. She +had, besides a strongly sadistic mother, two older brothers, of whom the +elder was frightfully violent and brutal, often choking his brothers and +sisters, while the other found an actually diabolical pleasure in +destroying and demolishing everything. Our patient exhibited already at +two years old as well as through her whole life a pleasure in striking +blows, and also conversely a special pleasure in receiving them, +further at four years old an intensive delight in dancing, an enjoyment +that was unmistakably sexual. We have learned above how she delighted to +press herself upon her mother's body or twine herself about her legs. +Moreover, finally, one of her very earliest hysterical symptoms was a +paralysis of the arm. + + [12] Cf. note 6, p. 163. + +More difficult seems to me the answer to the second main question: What +influence does the moon exercise upon the sleeper? It was earlier +discussed, along with the various psychical overdeterminations, that the +moonlight awoke first the infantile pleasure memories, among other +things that that light shining everywhere lighted the way which led to +the house and the dwelling of the earliest childhood. Mention was made +of the infantile comparison of the moon's disk with the childish nates +and perhaps the gazing upon the nightly orb, which seems besides most +like a hypnotic fixation, may be also referred back to the same. Since +we know today that the love transference constitutes the essential +character of hypnotism, that symptom brings us once more to the +eroticism. Beside there was not wanting with our patient a grossly +sensual relationship. Finally there is also the infantile desire to +climb over the houses into the moon, realizing itself in part at least +in the moon-inspired climbing upon the roof. + +Yet the second leading problem appears to me, in spite of all this, not +completely exhausted. It might not thus be absolutely ruled out that +more than a mere superstition lurks behind the folk belief which +conceives of a "magnetic" influence by which the moon attracts the +sleeper. Such a relationship is indeed conceivable when we consider the +motor overexcitability of all sleep walkers and the effecting of ebb and +flow through the influence of the moon. Furthermore no one, in an epoch +which brings fresh knowledge each year of known and unknown rays, can +deny without question any influence to the rays of moonlight. Perhaps in +time the physicist and the astronomer will clear up the matter for us. +Meanwhile the question is raised and can be answered only with an +hypothesis. + +In conclusion I have in mind a last final connection which the spell of +the moon bears to belief in spirits and ghosts. It is established +through many analyses that the visits of the mother by night form the +basis of the latter, when she comes with the light in her hand and +scantily clothed in white garments, nightgown, or chemise and petticoat, +to see if the children are asleep or, if they are, to set a child upon +the chamber. The so often mentioned "woman in white" may also be the +maiden in her nightgown, who thus exhibits herself in her night garment +to her parents as she climbs into their bed, later also eventually to +her lover. The choice of the hour between twelve and one, which came to +be called the ghostly hour, may perhaps be referred to the fact that at +this time sleep was most profound and therefore there was least danger +of discovery. + +CASE 2. I introduce here a second case, in which to be sure the +influence of the moon represented only an episode and therefore received +also but a brief analysis. It is that of a twenty-eight year old +forester, who came under psychoanalytic treatment on account of severe +hysterical cardiac distress. The cause of this was a damming up of his +feelings toward his mother, for whom he longed in the unconscious. His +condition of anxiety broke out when he went to live with his mother +after the death of his father and slept in the next room. He admitted +that his father drank. Every Sunday he was somewhat drunk. Likewise the +mother, who kept a public house, was in no way disinclined toward +alcohol. He himself had consumed more beer especially in his high school +days than was good for him. I would emphasize in his sexual life, as +belonging to our theme, his strong urethral erotic, which made him a bed +wetter in childhood, led in later years to frequent micturition at night +and caused a serious dysuria psychica. His muscle erotic finally drove +him to the calling of a forester. + +Only the portions of his psychoanalysis, which lasted for eight weeks, +which have to do with his sleep activities and his response to the moon +will be brought forward. Thus he relates at one time: "At thirteen years +old, when I was in a lodging house kept by a woman, I arose one morning +with the dark suspicion that I had done something in the night. What I +did not remember. I merely felt stupefied. Suddenly the boys who slept +with me began to laugh, for from under my bed ran a stream of urine. In +the night the full moon had shone upon my bed. We fellows had no vessel +there but had to go outside, which with my frequent need for urination +during the night was very unpleasant. Now there stood under my bed a +square box for hats and neckties, which I, as I got up in the night half +intoxicated with sleep, had taken for a chamber and I had urinated in +it. This was repeated. Another time, also at full moon, I wet a +colleague's shoe. They all said that I must be a little loony. When the +full moon came, I was always afraid that I might do this again, an +anxiety which remained long with me. I never dared sleep, for example, +so that the full moon could shine directly upon me. Yes; still +something else. Two or three years later the following happened, only I +do not know whether there was moonlight. I was sleeping with several +colleagues in a room adjoining that of the lodging house keepers, the +man and his wife. I must have gone into them at night and done something +sexual. Either I wished to climb into bed with the wife or I had +masturbated, I do not know which. I had at any rate the next day the +suspicion that something of the kind had happened. The landlord and +landlady laughed so oddly, but they said nothing to me." + +"Did your mother perhaps in your childhood come to look after you with +the light?"--"Yes; that is so. My mother always stayed up for a long +time and came in regularly late at night with the light to go to bed. My +father was obliged to go early to bed because of his work and had to get +up at midnight, when he always made a light." Here he suddenly broke +off: "Perhaps it is for this reason that I have an anxiety in an +entirely dark room. If there is not at least a bit of light I can not +perform coitus."--"How is that?"--"I have remonstrated rather seriously +with myself that the sexual act could be performed only with a +light."--Then at a later hour of analysis: "When my father went away at +night, I came repeatedly into my mother's bed. I lay down in my father's +bed, also in a certain measure put myself into his place."--"Did your +mother call you, or did you come of yourself?"--"I believe that my +mother invited me to her. Now something occurs to me: The moonlight +awoke me as my father woke me when he struck a light as he was going +out. Then it was time to go into bed with my mother, for the father was +gone, which always gave me a feeling of reassurance."--"Yes, when he was +gone he could do nothing more to the mother. And then you could take his +place with her." + +Two months later came the following to supplement this: "Already in the +grammar school I was always afraid someone might attack me in the night, +because of which I always double locked the room and looked under the +bed and in every chest. In childhood Mother came in fact to look after +me and set me on the chamber."--"Then your neurotic anxiety presumably +signifies the opposite, the wish that your mother shall come to you +again."--"Or rather, I bolt the door so that my father cannot come to my +mother. I followed in this also a command of my mother, 'Lock yourself +in well!' She always had a fear of burglars. Now even since I have been +living with my mother she has said to me more than once, that I should +lock myself in well. But I thought to myself, 'What, bolt myself +in!'"--"That would mean also that if the mother wants to come, only she +should come."--"That is just what I thought to myself, when Mother woke +me early, that she need not knock but come right in. In the daytime I +lay in my mother's bed because her room was warmer than mine. I was +feeling very wretchedly at that time and my mother said in the evening, +'Stay there where you are; I will sleep in the little room next. Leave +the door open.' In the night I know I was very restless."--"Did you not +perhaps have the wish that your mother should look at her sick child in +the night, as she once did when you were younger?"--"Yes, to be sure. +This wish pursued me and therefore I slept badly. I would have carried +the thing out further if my dysuria had not hindered me. If I had arisen +in the night or the morning, then Mother would at once have heard me in +her light sleep and I would not have been able to urinate. One time I +crept out of bed very quietly so that she did not hear me, and yet it +held back a long time until I couldn't stand it any longer. It was just +the same at the time when I was in the grammar and the high school, if +Mother asked me to sleep near her and Father was not there. Then also I +could urinate only with great difficulty. And now when I was living with +my mother, I had the most severe excited attacks. There was no other +reason for I was neither a loafer nor a drunkard. I have laid myself +down in my mother's bed and been unwilling to get out. That is very +significant. And if at any time I went away from home I at once felt so +miserable that I must go back. I was immediately better when once +there." + +This case, when we consider it, is plain in its relationships. The +excessive love for the mother is a decisive factor as well as the desire +to play the rôle of the father with her. Therefore the fear of burglars +at night, behind which hides in part the anxiety that the father would +have sexual relations with the mother and in part the wish that the +latter might herself come to him. Joined to this is the desire for all +sorts of infantile experiences, such as the mother's placing him every +night upon the chamber because of his bed wetting. In the later +repression the pleasure in the enuresis as well as in the being taken up +by the mother becomes a dysuria psychica. Naturally to the urethral +eroticist in childhood, and also later unconsciously, micturition is +analogous to the sexual act. In puberty the moonlight awakens him as in +childhood the mother's light or that of the father. So on the one hand +the memory of the former is awakened, who with the light in her hand +reminded him to go to the chamber,[13] and on the other hand the memory +of the going out of the father, which was a signal to him to go to his +mother. He arises and carries out with her symbolically the sexual act, +for he urinates into a vaginal symbol (box or shoe-vagina). Also the +fact that he got up once by the light of the full moon and wanted to +climb into the bed of the landlady, likewise a mother substitute, is all +of a piece. This case here before us, as may be seen, confirms what the +first has already taught us. + + [13] In Rumania the folk belief prevails that children readily wet + themselves in full moonlight. (Told by a patient.) + +CASES 3, 4, and 5.--I wish to give further a brief report of three cases +of walking by moonlight, which I regret to say I could only briefly +outline in passing, not being able to submit them to an exhaustive +analysis. In everything they confirm every detail of our previous +conclusions. + +The first case is that of an unmarried woman of twenty-eight, who walked +in her sleep first in her sixth year and the second time when she was +nine years old. "I got up when the full moon was shining, climbed over a +chair upon the piano and intended to go to the window to unfasten it. +Just then my father awoke and struck me hard on my buttocks, upon which +I went back and again fell asleep. I often arose, went to each bed, that +of the parents and those of the brothers and sisters, looked at them and +went back again. Between sixteen and seventeen years old, when my +periods first occurred, the sleep walking stopped." She adds later: "I +frequently as a child spoke out in my sleep. My nose began to bleed when +I was walking on the street and the sun shone upon me. After this the +sleep walking improved. I always clung affectionately to my parents and +brothers and sisters, and never received a blow except in that one +instance by my father."--"Which you took rather as a caress, than as a +blow for punishment." + +In this case also the sleep walker plays sometimes the rôle of the +mother, who satisfies herself that her dear ones are asleep. Moreover a +period of talking in the sleep precedes the wandering by moonlight. It +is noteworthy that the sleep walking is intercepted by a caressing blow +from the father and ceases altogether when menstruation sets in. Also +earlier nosebleed had a beneficial effect. + +The second case is that of a forty-year-old hysteric, who in her +marriage remained completely anesthetic sexually, although her husband +was thoroughly sympathetic to her and very potent. Her father's favorite +child, she strove in vain in early childhood for the affection of the +mother, who on her part also suffered severely from hysteria, with +screaming fits, incessant tremor of the head and hands and a host of +nervous afflictions. This mother's daughters had all of them always an +extraordinary passion for muscular activity with apparently great +satisfaction in it. They were among other things distinguished swimmers +and enthusiastic dancers. My patient besides could never tire of walking +for hours at a time. + +In our discussion she related the following to me concerning her sleep +walking: "I got up once in the night when I was about ten years old. I +had dreamed that I was playing the piano. I found myself however not in +bed but standing between a chest and a desk scratching upon the latter +with my nails, as if playing the piano, which finally awoke me. There +was also a paper basket there which either I had stepped over or there +was a space through which I could slip, at any rate the way there was +not quite free. I stood in this narrow space and dreamed I was playing +the piano. Suddenly I heard my mother's voice, 'Mizzi, where are you?' +She called me several times before I finally awoke. Without it was not +yet growing daylight, but the moon shone brightly within. I recollected +myself immediately, realizing where I was, and went back to bed. I told +my mother, as an excuse, that I had to go to the chamber." "Had you at +that time a great desire to play the piano?"--"Three years later it made +me sick that I had not had to learn, but then I had as yet no desire for +music. We had no piano at that time. Yet among my earliest memories is +that of the way in which my mother played the piano. As a woman I wished +that I could express my joy and sorrow in music. I would mention further +that my brother and my uncle on the mother's side[14] are both sleep +walkers. The former always wants to come into my bed in the night when +he walks in his sleep. I must emphasize that he is especially fond of +me. + + [14] They are both passionately devoted to sports, thus also endowed + with a heightened muscle erotic. + +"The following often happened to me after I was married but never in my +maidenhood. I awoke in the night, sat up in bed and did not know what +was the matter with me. I could not think consciously, I was quite +incapable of thought. I knew neither where I was nor what was happening +to me; I could remember nothing. I did not know whether I was Jew or +Christian, man or woman, a human being or a beast, only stared straight +ahead into the next room, at a point of light. That was the only thing +that appeared clear to me. I held myself to it to regain clearness. I +always said to myself: 'What, what then? Where, how and why?' My powers +of thought went no further. I was like a newborn child. I stared fixedly +at this point of light because I unconsciously thought I would obtain +clearness there for everywhere else it was dark. This lasted for a long +time until through the light I could distinguish what it was that caused +the light. It was from a street lamp, so apparently before midnight, and +the lamp lighted a bit of the wall in the next room. After I had said to +myself for a long time 'What, what?' and stared straight at that light, +I learned gradually to distinguish what made the light, that is to +recognize, That there above, is a bit of lamplight; again after some +time; That is my lamp. Upon this I recollected my home and then for the +first time everything else. When I had made out the outlines of things +around me, then returned the consciousness that I was a human being and +was married. Of all that I had not before been aware. I do not remember +that I had dreamed anything before this came on, or that anything had +excited me, nor that anything special had happened beforehand. Beside +nothing like it has ever happened to me when I have been greatly +excited. At the most, after my marriage I led a life of strain. I was +tied to a shop which was damp, unwholesome and full of bad air, and I am +a friend of fresh air. I suffered very much mentally under these +conditions, because I love light and air."--"Did you think that you were +indeed not a human being?"--"No; only that with God's help I would +endure this life." I will add here that her second sister also +manifested similar disturbances of consciousness. + +We find first in the foreground a family disposition to sleep walking +and moon influence. The brother significantly always wants in his +wanderings to get into the sister's bed, while our patient herself +openly plays the part of mother, especially the mother of the earliest +childhood. It is interesting also that when in her married life she had +to give up her pleasure in light and air, the disturbances of +consciousness set in, from which she could free herself only through +fixing her attention upon a point of light. She had the distinct feeling +that from this point of light things would become clear to her. One can +easily think of occasions of being dazed by sleep when perhaps the +mother came with the candle in her hand to see whether her child was +asleep and the child awoke. The whole remarkable occurrence would then +be simply a desire for the mother's love, which she all her life long so +sorely missed. + +Now for the last case, a twenty-three year old married woman suffering +from a severe hysteria, who clung with great tenderness to her parents, +but received a reciprocal love only from her father, while the mother +preferred her sister. The patient told me of her moon walking: "I always +wanted to sleep by the open blinds so that the moon could shine upon me. +My oldest brother walked about in the night, drank water, went to the +window and looked out, all of course in his sleep, then he went back to +bed and slept on. At the same time he spoke very loudly, but quite +unintelligible things and one could actually observe that the moon +exercised an attraction over him. My younger healthy brother said that +it was frightful, the many things that he uttered in the night. I also +climbed out of bed one night when sixteen or seventeen years old, +because I could not find the moon, and sought it and met my moon haunted +brother. I immediately disappeared again going back to my bed and he did +not see me. + +"I was ill once, about the same time, with influenza, and continually +repeated in my feverish phantasies that they should take down some one +who was hanged and not punish him; he could not help it. There was +moonlight at that time and moreover a light burned in the room. I took +this for the moon, which I could not see but wanted to see. I strove +only all the time to see the moon. The windows must be closed because I +was afraid, but the blinds must remain open so that I could see the +moon. Some one roused me then from my phantasies and there I saw that my +cousin sat near me. He was not however the one hanged, it was some one +who was first dragged out by another man, a warden in the prison. The +face of the one who was hanging I did not see, only his body."--"Of whom +did he remind you?"--"I do not know definitely and yet it was the cousin +who sat near me. And as I awoke, apparently I called his name for +he answered me, 'Yes, here I am!'"--"What about the warden of the +prison?"--"A man is first locked up before he is hanged."--"Do you see +also in phantasy something that hangs down?"--"Yes; when with my cousin +I always had the desire to see his membrum stiff, as it could be felt +and noticed outlined through his clothing." I will add likewise that +behind the cousin and her sexual wishes toward him analogous phantasies +toward the father were hidden. That which hangs down (pendens, penis) is +also the phallus. Her adjuration that the hanged person should not be +punished, he could not help it, is a demand for mercy for sexual sins +(see also later). + +"Upon the wedding journey my husband did not want to sleep by the open +blinds, and I wanted to sleep nowhere else so that the moon could shine +upon me. I could never sleep otherwise, was very restless and it was +always as if I wanted to creep into the moon. I wanted, so to speak, to +creep into the moon out of sight.[15] Recently I was out in the country +with my sister and slept by the open blinds. The light from the heavens, +to be sure not the moonlight, forced its way in and I had the feeling as +if something pierced me,[16] in fact it pierced me somehow in the small +of my back, and I arose with my eyes closed and changed the position of +the bed, upon which I slept well. I knew nothing of it that I had +arisen, but something must have happened because I now could lie +comfortably. + + [15] Phantasy of the mother's body? The moon's disk = the woman's + body? + + [16] A clear coitus phantasy. + +"Something else still. About two years ago I observed the moon in the +country, as it was reflected in the water, and I could not tear myself +from this spectacle until I was suddenly awakened by my husband and +cried out. Five or six years ago I went out in a boat upon the Wolfgang +lake. The moon was reflected in the water and I sat there very still. +Suddenly my brother, the one who is well, with whom I do not have much +to do, asked, 'What are you thinking of?'--'Nothing at all.'--'It must +be something.'--'No, nothing!' As we climbed out, I was still quite +absent minded. Also at night I always had the moon before me and spoke +with it."--"Consciously or in a dream?"--"I believe I was more asleep +than awake. For if any one had come upon me then I should have felt it +very painfully. I have incidentally noted the words: 'Oh moon with thy +white face, thou knowest I am in love only with thee. Come down to me. I +languish in torture, let me only comfort myself upon thy face. Thou +enticing, beautiful, lovely spirit, thou torturest me to death, my +suffering rends me, thou beautiful Moon, thou sweet one, mine, I implore +thee, release me from this pain, I can bear it no longer. Ah, what avail +my words and my complainings! Be thou my happiness, take me with thee, +_only pleasure of the senses do I desire for myself_. Thou Moon, most +beautiful and best, _save me, take my maidenhood, I am not evil to +thee_. Draw me mightily to thyself, do not leave off, thy kisses have +been so good to me.'" As may be seen, she loved the moon like a lover to +whom she would yield herself entirely. The grossly sexual relationship +is evident. It is after this fragment doubly regrettable that a +penetrating psychoanalysis was not here possible. + +The early sexual content of the moon desire and its connection with the +parent complex is shown by her further statement: "Last summer in the +country I had only my mother-in-law with whom I could talk. It was the +time of the new moon and I could not bear complete darkness in my room. +It was frightfully lonely to me thus and I could not sleep. I had the +idea that in the lonely darkness someone was coming to me and I was +afraid." + +It soon came to light that she and her sister in their early childhood +and again between the ages of eight and thirteen shared the parents' +sleeping room and had repeatedly spied upon their sexual intercourse. +Her present fear is also evidently the wish to put herself in the place +of the mother, to whom the father comes. She recalls yet one more +episode: "When I was nine or ten years old, the healthy brother was ill +with typhoid and the parents were up nights on his account. We sisters +were sent to stay elsewhere, where we had opportunity to play with a boy +who carried on a number of sexual things with us. I then dreamed of him +at night and phantasied the sexual things which I had done with him in +the daytime. Apparently I had also at that time played underneath with +my genitals. At the same time, while my brother had typhoid, I was +unwilling to go to sleep and could not, because I could have no rest +while my brother was ill." It is clear without further discussion to one +who understands these things that it was not anxiety for the brother but +secret, yet insistent sexual wishes which caused the sleeplessness. It +is finally significant that, when later she dreamed of a burglar, he +always came after her with a knife, or choked her, as her cousin and +mother had often done to her. + +As we consider this third case of moon affectivity we find again +familiar phenomena, connections with early sexual dreams and the parent +complex. Especially noteworthy is further her direct falling in love +with the moon, to which she addresses her adoration in verses and to +which she even offers her virginity. It is as if she saw in it a man, +who should free her from her sexual need. One is reminded how in the +first case, the one cured by psychoanalysis, the four-year-old girl +sought continually the moon's face on the ground of a students' song. It +could not, we regret to say, be ascertained, in the absence of a +psychoanalysis, whether in this case the heavenly body represented to +the moon walker some definite person or not. + +CASE 6.--I add here three autobiographical reports, which I have +gathered from literature. The first originates with the famous anatomist +and physiologist Karl Friedrich Burdach, who from his tenth to his +thirtieth year had occasional attacks of moon walking, although he +apparently "enjoyed the most perfect health." "I have during these +periods," he himself relates, "undertaken actions which I had to +recognize as mine, merely because they could have been carried out by no +one else. Thus one day it was incomprehensible to me why I had on no +shirt when I awoke, and it remained so in spite of my utmost efforts to +recollect myself, until the shirt was found in another room rolled +together under a press. In my twenty-ninth year I was awakened from a +night wandering by the question, What did I want? and then the +consciousness of the somnambulistic state passed over in part to the +awaking. First I found the question strange, but since I thought the +reason for it would become plain, I need not betray it. Immediately, +however, as I began to waken, I asked myself in what that consisted and, +now that the somnambulistic state was over, the answer must be due me." + +One cannot help finding this self revelation exceedingly interesting. +The hiding of the shirt, although the affair is so incompletely +reported, especially in its motivation, points unmistakably at least to +exhibitionism. The second sleep walking appears much more difficult of +explanation. In this Burdach sought plainly a definite goal, which +seemed so clear and transparent to him that he could not at all +understand why anyone should question him about it. If we consider that +his first thought on waking was that he need not betray this purpose, +that moreover there enters at once a repression and causes him +completely to forget it, there remains then no other possibility than +that we have to do with a strongly forbidden wish, which the conscious +censor will not allow to pass. It is easy to conceive a sexual +motivation in this second instance if we remember that in the first +sleep walking something sexual surely took place. + +Still more probable is the strongly forbidden sexual goal, if we take +into consideration the circumstances of his life. In his autobiography +"Rückblick auf mein Leben" Burdach tells us how extraordinarily his +mother depended upon him. "Having already lost four children in their +first year, she had longed to bear another child and especially since +the setting in of the illness of my father had compelled her to think of +losing him, she had wished for a son as a sure object for her +love-thirsty heart. Her wish was fulfilled when she bore me." Eleven +months later the father died, leaving his wife and his little son not +yet a year old unprovided for. Nevertheless she, the widow, rejected the +proposal to return to her parents' home and preferred rather "trouble, +need and a thousand cares upon herself in order that I might be better +educated; for I was the object of her deepest love. About nine o'clock +in the evening she went with me to bed and twined her arm about me; in +the morning she stole from my side and permitted me an hour or two more +of rest (p. 14). + +"Women had a particular influence upon me; but it was also natural to me +to attach myself to them. As my mother related, I never as a child went +for a ride on my hobby horse without having at parting and on my return +kissed my hand to my lady represented by a doll" (p. 24). It is +superfluous to add that this lady was no other than his mother. Also the +following passage I think is significant: "I was by nature endowed with +as great a sensitiveness to womanly charm as to womanly dignity and this +inclination toward the other sex grounded in my psychical constitution +was nurtured by circumstances from my earliest youth on. I could but +recognize very soon the high intellectual and moral quality of my good +mother, who in her struggle with poverty kept herself fresh and free +from vulgarity and shunned no sacrifice for me. Likewise the matrons to +whose well wishing I owe my gratitude, inspired me with high respect for +their character. In my former nurse there seemed to me a pattern of +tireless and sagacious activity of a high order and breeding.... Thus a +high respect for true womanhood was implanted in me. On the other hand I +was as a boy made so accustomed to this rôle by several young women, who +entertained themselves with me and considered me as their lover to while +away their time, that I later retained the inclination to play this part +and considered a friendly advance as an invitation which I in turn held +as a sacred claim of honor and an agreeable duty" (pp. 69 ff.). + +When later the mother took a young widow into lodgings, the young man, +then twenty-one years old, had "the exalted feeling of being her +protector. Then it was all up with my heart" (p. 71). The death of the +dearest one to him on earth, his mother, followed close upon this and +brought an end to it. "I became convinced that happiness would be found +for me only where I shared it with another being, and that I could be +satisfied only by a relationship similar to that in which I had stood +toward my mother; an inner bond where only a single mutual interest +controlled, where one soul found its happiness only in the other. +Without such an absolute love, penetrating the whole being, life seemed +to me worthless and stale. My mother, whose unbounded love I had +enjoyed, was torn from me; my excellent uncle, heartily devoted to me, I +saw in the enjoyment of his own family happiness. And an unconquerable +desire for the same happiness tortured me as I felt my utter loneliness" +(p. 79). So he concluded to marry although he had only limited prospects +for supporting a family. + +"The first intimation that my wife was pregnant filled me with delight. +I took it for granted that Heaven would send me a daughter. With my idea +of the value of woman all my wishes tended thither, to possess a +daughter and to be able to watch over her while she unfolded to a noble +womanhood. She should have my mother for her pattern and therefore also +be named Caroline after her.[16a] I spoke so confidently, after I had +left Vienna, of 'our daughter Caroline' in my letters to my wife that +she was finally quite concerned and sought to prepare me for the birth +of a son. I had not however made a mistake and my confidence was in the +end justified" (pp. 83 ff.). His wife was confined at some distance from +him and then as soon as possible journeyed to him with the little one. +He relates as follows: "I went in Borsdorf with a beating heart to the +carriage which brought her to me, kissed her hastily, took my child out +of her arms and carried it hastily into the inn, laid it upon the table, +loosed the bindings which bound it to its tiny bed and was lost in happy +contemplation of the beautifully formed, lovely, vigorous and lively +little girl and then first threw myself into the arms of my wife, who in +her mother's pride and joy was feasting her eyes upon us, and then I had +again to observe the lovely child. What cared I for mankind! What cared +I for the whole world! I was more than happy" (pp. 85 ff.). + + [16a] Cf. Barrie: "Dear Brutus," Act. II. for the dream daughter, who + bears the name of the author's mother. See also "Margaret Ogilvy." The + dream daughter's apostrophe to the moon is also interesting in + connection with the present study. Tr. + +The manner also in which he brought up his child is highly significant: +"Our hearts clung mostly to our daughter.... I enjoyed the pleasure of +possessing her with full consciousness of her worth, gazed upon her with +rapture and was delighted when I observed in her a new trait of +beautiful womanly character. She recognized by my serious treatment of +her the entire depth of my love, repaid it with inner devotion and +challenged it with merry playfulness. From her first year I delighted to +lift her from her bed in the morning and even when she was eight years +old she often got up of herself, knocked on the window of the alcove +door leading into my work room and whisked back to her bed, so that when +I came she could throw herself with hearty laughter into my arms and +let me take her up. Or she slipped behind my chair and climbed up behind +my back, while I was deep in my work, so that she could fall +triumphantly upon my neck. + +"I must refrain from mentioning more of her winsome childhood. She was +the most beautiful ornament of my life and in the possession of her I +felt myself, in spite of all pecuniary need, immeasurably happy." It +will not surprise any one with knowledge of these things that a child so +insatiable for love should become hysterical. "Her sensitiveness was +unnaturally exaggerated," also she was seized once with a hysterical +convulsion, as Burdach relates. She died young and "the flower of my +life was past. The fairest, purest joy was extinguished for me. I had +wished her for myself and Heaven had heard me. Finding in her the +fulfilment of my warmest wishes, I had never thought it would be +possible that I should outlive this daughter. Nevertheless I bore the +pain ... confident of being reunited with her.... For thirty years +scarcely a day has passed on which I have not at least once thought in +my inmost soul of my Caroline" (pp. 142-147). + +I will cite in conclusion still one more fragment of self +characterization: "A chief trait in my character was the need for love, +not that everyday love which limits itself to a personal pleasure and +delight, but that unbounded, overflowing love which feels itself +completely one with the beloved.... The ideal of marriage was before me +in youth, for this need for love has been mine all my life.... I +remember as a student having written in my diary that I would rather +forego life itself than the happiness of family life" (pp. 53 ff.). + +The center of this interesting life is Burdach's deep oneness with his +mother. She on her part took him from the beginning unconsciously as a +sexual object, as a substitute for her husband, who was failing in +health and soon after died. She lay in bed near her little one, her arm +twined about his body and slept with him until morning. No wonder that +the boy was so sensitive to womanly charm and likewise that later +different women looked upon him as their lover. The thought early +established itself with Burdach that only such a relationship could +satisfy him as that in which he had stood toward his mother. And as he +stood for the father it seemed to him a certain fact that now a little +girl should come to be the surrogate for his mother. Noteworthy also is +his attitude toward the mother who had just been confined and the child. +The former is to him almost incidental, while in the contemplation of +his child, in whom he secures his mother again, he can scarcely get his +fill, and he overwhelms her later with such passionate love as he had +once obtained from his mother. When the girl was torn from him, he was +consoled only by the thought of being united again with her in heaven. + +We may see finally in the fond play in bed with his daughter a +repetition of that which he carried on with his mother, and we may +remember also that as a child he always slept with his mother. From all +this it seems to me a light falls upon the unexplained purpose of +Burdach's sleep walking. If this seems completely clear to him but so +objectionable that he not only concludes to keep it secret, but, more +than that, forgets it on the spot, then the probability is, that he +desired that night to climb into bed with his beloved mother. + +CASE 7. A second autobiographical account of repeated sleep walking I +find in the "Buch der Kindheit," the first volume of Ludwig Ganghofer's +"Lebenslauf eines Optimisten." When the boy had to go away to school his +mother gave him four balls of yarn to take with him, so that he might +mend his own clothing and underwear. She had hidden a gulden deep within +each ball, a proof of mother love, which he later discovered. In the +course of time while at the school the impulses of puberty began to stir +in him and pressed upon him so strongly at first that frequent +pollutions occurred. He thought he must surely be ill, until finally a +colleague explained to him that this was on the contrary a special sign +of health. This calmed him and now he could sleep splendidly. + +"One night I awoke suddenly as if roused by a burning heat. I +experienced a horrible suffering and believed I felt a hand on my body. +I cried out and pushed with my feet, and as I lay there in a half +consciousness it was as if many of my dormitory companions were awake +and I heard them ask, 'What is it? Who has called out this way?' A +voice, 'Some one has been dreaming!' And another voice, 'Silence in the +dormitory!' And all was gone from me as if under a heavy veil. Once +again quiet. Am I asleep or am I awake? A wild beating in the arteries +of my neck, a roaring in my ears. Yet in the dormitory all is quiet. The +lamp is burning, I see the white beds. I see the copper of the washstand +glimmer like red gold. Must I have dreamed--an oppressive, frightful +dream? Drops of sweat stood out on my forehead. Then came a heavy sleep. +What was this? I rarely had days of depression or restless, disturbed +nights. And yet in these weeks I entered upon this uncomfortable +experience. + +"One night I awoke. Darkness was round about me. And I was cold. And I +saw no lamp, no bed, no shining copper. Was this also a dream? Yet my +hands felt plainly the hard wood in front of me. Slowly I recognized a +number of vaguely outlined squares, the great windows. Clad only in my +shirt, I sat in the study room before my desk. Such a horror fell upon +me as I cannot describe. I ran wildly up the stairs, threw myself into +my bed and shook. Another night I awoke. Darkness was about me. Again I +was cold. And I believed that I was again sitting at my desk. No; I was +standing. My hands however felt no wood, my eyes found not the gray +windows. As I moved, my head struck against something hard. I became +aware of a feeble light shining. As I went towards it, I came from some +dark room upon the dimly lighted stair landing. + +"I awoke again in the night. I was cold. A semi-darkness was about me +and over me many stars twinkled. I sat upon the shingle roof of the +bowling alley. It was not a far leap to the ground below. But the pebble +stones of the seminary garden pricked my bare feet. Moreover, when I +wanted to get into the house, I found the gate closed. My God! how had I +then come out? Somewhere I found an open window and climbed into the +house and noiselessly up to the dormitory. The window near my bed stood +open--and there outside, I believe, was a lightning rod. + +"All day I racked my brains to find a way to escape from the fear of +this dreadful thing. I dared not confide in anyone, for fear of the +ridicule of the others, for fear--I never knew just what I feared. In +the evening I took one of Mother's balls of yarn to bed with me, bound +two double strands about my wrists and tied the ends around the knobs of +the bedstead. In the night, as I was about to wander again, I felt the +pull of Mother's threads and awoke. It never came again. I was cured." + +This appears at the first glance a non-sexual sleep walking. This is +only however in its first appearance, although it is to be regretted +that the full explanation can scarcely be given in the absence of any +analysis. It is first to be noted that sleep walking sets in at puberty +and is ushered in by anxiety dreams, pollutions and various anxiety +equivalents. The hammering in the arteries, the roaring in the ears, the +restless, disturbed nights, as well as the unusually disturbed days, we +know these all as manifestations of an unsatisfied libido. The first +"frightful" anxiety dream seems to lead deeper, as well, as the +"horrible suffering" started by a hand, which he felt upon his body. +Must not this hand, which causes this "horrible suffering" to the youth +who had never yet known trouble, have touched his genitals?[17] Behind +this perhaps, moreover, are very early memories of the care bestowed +upon the nursing infant and the child. + + [17] One may also think of the fear of castration, associated with the + threats of parents so very frequently made when children practice + masturbation. + +The terror which fell upon him every time that he walked in his sleep is +worthy of note, for he was not otherwise easily frightened. "A terror +which I could not describe," "fear of that dreadful thing" and fear not +merely of the ridicule of his fellows but of something, what, he never +knew, which is a far more violent reaction than we have been accustomed +to find with sleep walkers. This excessive reaction may be very well +understood, however, if behind it a particularly inacceptable sexual +factor hides itself. Finally the cure by means of the mother's balls of +yarn, homely proof of her love, doubtless has to do with the erotic. It +must be admitted to be sure that we have to confine ourselves to mere +conjectures. Only one may well maintain that even an apparently +non-sexual case soon reveals its sexual grounding. Moreover, a strong +muscle erotic is demonstrated further throughout Ganghofer's +autobiography. + +CASE 8. I will now, especially upon the subject of moon walking, cite an +author who shows a very unusual preference for this heavenly body. In +many a description and in many of the speeches which he has put into the +mouths of his heroes, has Ludwig Tieck, who also has sung of the +"moon-lustered magic night," given artistic expression to this quite +remarkable love mania--this is the correct designation for it. Ricarda +Huch in her "Blütezeit der Romantik" makes the striking statement that +from this poet's figures one must "tear away the labels stuck upon them +and name them altogether Ludwig Tieck, for in truth they are only +refractions of this one beam." One may hear for example how Sternbald +felt: "The orb of the moon stood exactly opposite the window of his +room." He watched it with longing eyes, he sought upon the shining disk +and in the spots upon it mountains and forests, wonderful castles and +enchanted flowers and fragrant trees. He believed that he saw lakes with +shining swans which were drawing boats, a skiff which carried him and +his beloved, while about them charming mermaids blew upon their twisted +conchs and stretched their arms filled with water lilies over into the +bark. + +"Ah, there, there!" he would call out, "is perchance the home of all +desire, all wishes; therefore there falls upon us so sweet a melancholy, +so soft a charm, when that still light, full and golden, floats upon the +heavens and pours down its silver light upon us. Yes, it awaits us and +prepares for us our happiness, and for this reason its sorrowful look +toward us, that we must still remain in this earthly twilight." The +similarity here with the phantasies of the psychoanalytic patient at the +beginning is indeed unmistakable. + +Yet one or two extracts from the novel "Der Mondsüchtige,"[18] the title +of which is misleading since it in no way treats of one afflicted with +lunacy but of a veritable moon lover, presumably our poet himself. There +the nephew, Ludwig Licht(!), writes to his uncle: "It is now three +months since I had a very serious quarrel with my friend, a quarrel +which almost separated us, for he mocked at an entire world which is to +me so immeasurably precious. In a word, he railed at the moon and would +not admit that the magic light with which it shines was anything +beautiful or exalting. From Ossian to Siegwart he reviled a +susceptibility toward the moon although the poets express it, and he +almost had declared in plain words that if there were a hell, it +certainly would be located in the moon. At any rate he thought that the +entire sphere of the moon consists of burned out craters, water could +not be found upon it, and hardly any plant life, and the wan, +unwholesome reflection of a borrowed light would bring us sickness, +madness, ruin of fruits and grains, and he who is already foolish will +without doubt behave himself worst at the time of full moon.... What +concern is it of mine what the astronomers have discovered in the moon +or what they will yet discover?... It may be ludicrous and vexatious to +devote oneself exclusively and unreservedly to this or that, any +observation, any favorite object. Upon my earlier wanderings I met a +rich Englishman who traveled only to waterfalls and battlefields. +Ridiculously enough, though I have not journeyed only in the moonlight, +yet I have from my earliest youth forever taken note of the influence of +its light, have never in any region missed the light of the full moon +and I dream of being, not quite an Endymion, but yet a favorite of the +moon. When it returns, its orb little by little growing full, I cannot +suppress a feeling of longing while I gaze upon it, whether in meadow +and woodland, on the mountains or in the city itself and in my own +room." + + [18] Literally, "Moonsick." [Tr.] + +And the uncle answers him: "It is true, you are moon sick, as we have +always called you, and to such a one much must be forgiven which would +have to be reckoned differently to a well man. I have myself however +always inclined to this disease." In fact the entire action, loving and +losing, the development and solution of the plot, takes place almost +exclusively under the light of the moon. At the conclusion, when the +hero finds the beloved given up for lost, he cannot refrain from the +outcry: "Yes, the moonlight has given her and led her to me, he, the +moon has so rewarded me, his true friend and inspired panegyrist!" I +regret that I find nothing in the biographies which would explain +Tieck's exquisite amorousness toward the moon. + + + + +PART II + +Literary Section + + +It is my purpose to bring also our beautiful literature to the solution +of the exceedingly difficult and obscure problem of sleep walking and +moon walking. Our poets, for all our psychiatrists and psychologists, +possess the finest knowledge of the psyche and during the centuries +before science was able to throw light upon the puzzles of the mind, +they solved them prophetically with discerning spirit. Thus they knew +how to bring to light various elements of our problem. Their creations +directed to that end arose from their own inner nature, through analogy, +or because sleep walking was not foreign to them themselves. And even if +neither were the case, they still had the ability of those who have a +real true knowledge of men, quite intuitively to see clearly into the +unconscious of others. We will come to know what profound interest many +of the great poets, like Otto Ludwig and Heinrich von Kleist took in +night wandering and moon walking and how they have first introduced +these dark problems into other traditional material. A striking +similarity is revealed if one compares that which the poet has in mind +with that which I have been able to report in the medical section. I +shall be able satisfactorily to verify the statement that science and +art have reached exactly the same result. First however I will present +the examples from the poets according to their comprehensibility and +their transparency. I begin with + + +"AEBELÖ," by Sophus Michaelis. + +Twice had Soelver drawn near to the maiden Gro, daughter of his +neighbor, Sten Basse. The first time was when in the spring he visited +the island Aebeloe, which belonged to him but was quite uninhabited. So +bright the day and so warm the kiss of the sun upon him, yet suddenly it +was "as if his bare neck were flooded by a still warmer wave of light." +A maiden stood before him, "who was like pure light. The eyes were as if +without pupils, without a glance; as she looked it was as if white +clouds floated forth out of a heavenly blue background. Soelver sprang +up and stood face to face before her. Her cheeks grew red. Although +unknown to each other, they smiled one at the other like two seraphim. +Her hands opened toward his and before her, as out of her lap, fell the +flowers which she had gathered. Soelver believed for a moment that it +was all a dream. He swung his hands into the air and a hand waved toward +him. He closed his eyes that he might enjoy to the full the soft, +fleeting impression. It floated over his hand like an incorporeal +breath. Was it then a ghostly vision, that wandered there at his side!" +When however he knew that the maiden near him was a living being, then +"his lips sank toward her trembling with desire, unintentionally and yet +irrevocably." At this moment a "cloud passed over the sun and the light +became at once dulled as if a mist had fallen upon all the flowers. Of +all this he did not become so quickly aware, as that his own cheeks +resounded from a whizzing blow." Her face glowed bright with anger and +the delicate blue veins were swollen on her forehead, while with a +scornful look she turned her back to him. His blood was however aflame +with desire for revenge. + +A second time had the young nobleman Soelver sought to satisfy his +masculine passion, when he surprised Gro bathing upon Aebeloe. She +however had defended her maidenhood and struck him about the head with +an old, rusty sword, which she found on the shore, so that he sank upon +the grass covered with blood. "He felt the pain of his wounds with a +strange glow of pleasure. The blow had fallen upon the hard flint stone +within him so that the sparks of passion had sprung forth. He loved the +maiden Gro. A consuming passion raged in his blood. In his thoughts he +knelt always before that ineffaceable image, which struck him to the +earth with a flame of divine wrath in her eyes." In revenge for the +trespass committed Sten Basse fell upon Soelver's castle and took the +young nobleman himself prisoner. + +Wild violence of this sort was indeed familiar to Sten Basse. He himself +had once taken his wife thus by force. Just as he was flattering himself +that he had broken her will once for all, she bit him in his chin so +that the blood gushed forth and she spit his own blood into his eyes. He +was struck with admiration at such strength. He had thought to desert +her at once. Now he lifted her in his arms, carried her from her +father's castle into the stable, bound her to his horse and rode +forth--to his own home. Their marriage had been at first a long series +of repetitions of the first encounter. In the end she loved him as the +horse loves the iron bit between his teeth and the spur in his flank. +She did not allow herself to be subdued by the blows which he gave her, +but she was the weaker and she loved him because he was strong enough to +be the stronger. An evil fate had taken his sons from him one after the +other. Therefore he wished to call forth in his only daughter the traits +of his own blood, his pride, disdainfulness and stiff-neckedness. "She +must know neither fear nor weakness; her will must be hardened and her +courage steeled like that of a man. When he heard that his daughter had +been in danger but had saved herself, he swore revenge to the +perpetrator of the outrage, yet at the same time his heart laughed with +pride at Gro's fearlessness. He took the young nobleman prisoner and +rewarded him with heavy and tedious torture as penance for his +insolence. Yet at the same time he delighted himself with the thought of +putting his daughter to a still more dangerous proof. He wished to see +the young-blooded, inexperienced birds reach out swinging and scratching +in attack and defense." + +As if in mockery he gave to the imprisoned youth the passionately +desired Gro to be with him in the dungeon. "She stood there as if she +had glided into his prison by the flood of light entering in and he +trembled lest the light would again absorb her into itself." He knew not +what power forced him to his knees and threw him at her feet with a +prayer for forgiveness. She had however merely a scornful laugh for the +man humbling himself in his love and the cruelly abusive word, "Creeping +worm!" Then in his sense of affront there comes the thought that Gro was +given into his power. While he tried the walls of his dungeon to +ascertain if he was perhaps watched, Gro stood and stared out by the +aperture through which the light entered, now paler than before. Soelver +stepped near her, drew the single gold ring from his finger, which had +come down to him through many generations of his forefathers, and +extended it to her as a bridal gift. But she threw it unhesitatingly out +through the peephole. + +Now bitterness raged in Soelver's blood. "He bowed himself before her +face in order to intercept her gaze, but he did not meet it though her +eyes were directed toward his. It was indeed no glance but a depth into +which the whole light of day, which was blue now without overhead, was +drawn down into a deep well. Soelver became intoxicated with this light, +which, as it were, appeared to seek her alone and threw an aureole of +intangible beauty about her form." He crept up and pushed forward the +wooden shutter, then carried Gro to his cot. "She had let herself go +without resistance and fell lifelessly with her arms hanging down. +Soelver laid his face close to hers. His breath was eager, his blood was +on fire and in his fierce wrath he intended to yield himself to the +boiling heat of sensual passion. Her cheeks however, her skin, her lips +were cold as those of death. He began nevertheless wildly to kiss her +face, once and again, as if to waken warmth and life in the cold skin. +Yet with every kiss it was as if she grew more fixed, as if the lips +shriveled and grew cold and damp as ice over the teeth. The cold from +this embrace crept over Soelver, and drew the heat and fervor from his +nerves, until he shook suddenly with the cold and shuddered with the +thought that he had a corpse under him. Yet in that selfsame moment he +marked the rising of her breast as she drew in her breath, full of +strength with all its coldness, so full of strength that it pushed +Soelver away and he slipped down to the hard flags of the floor. + +"Soelver lay upon the floor, congealed with a coldness which was +stronger than that of the hard tiles. It was as dark as in a walled-in +grave. He dared not move however for fear that he would again feel that +ice cold body. 'Hear me,' sounded suddenly a strangely shrill whisper, +'hear me, if you are a man, let me get out! Call my father! I want to +get out--make light--give me air--I am almost choking--I want to get +out!'" As Soelver opened the shutter again so that the dim shadowy glow +of the night could enter, he saw Gro "tall and slender in the pale +light." "Let me out, let me out!" she begged. "I am afraid here +below--not of you--but of myself and of the dark--let me out!" "For the +first time Soelver heard a soft rhythm in this voice smooth as steel. A +soft breath breathed itself in her entreaty. He became a man, a +protector and felt his power grow through her supplication." + +Yet though he exerted himself to the utmost to open the door of his +dungeon, it was all in vain. It must have been fastened on the outside +with massive oak or iron bars. "So finally he gave up entirely and +turned back to the opening where the light came in. Gro had sunk down +under the last bit of light, without complaint, without sound. Her eyes +were closed, she leaned her head against the sharp edge of the aperture +and her arms hung down lifelessly. Soelver bent over her; her breath was +almost inaudible, but irregular and did not suggest sleep. Like a +thirsty plant she stretched herself out of the single airhole of the +dungeon that she might seize the last drop of light before the darkness +extinguished everything. Soelver divined that she could not be brought +away from this aperture for light." He brought all the skins from the +couch, spread them over her, pushed them under her body and "solicitously, +with infinite carefulness he protected her from the damp floor, while he +shoved his arm under her for support without ever touching her with his +hand. All his brutality was gone, all his burning passion. Here she lay +before him like a delicate sick flower, which must be covered over from +the cold of night." + +When Soelver awoke the next morning he noticed that one of his hands was +seized by her, grasped in the unconsciousness of sleep and held fast by +her long, slender fingers, which clasped themselves about his hand. It +was as if her soul clung to him in sleep as helper and savior from him +himself, from his own brutal savagery. When Gro however opened her eyes +and stared into Soelver's face, lit up by the sun, she broke out into +weeping which could not be stilled. "She was terrified at awaking in a +cellar hole, into the close damp darkness of which she looked, while the +face of her vanquisher blazed strong in the sunlight before her; she +wept without understanding or comprehending anything of what had +happened about her." Perplexed, Soelver bent over her hand and kissed +it. Then came Sten Basse and saw how uncontrollably Gro sobbed. "If you +have gone near my daughter," he hissed at the young nobleman, "there +will be no punishment strong enough for you." At this there shot up in +Soelver a wild lust for revenge and he answered his enemy with +irritating coldness: "Yes, I took what you gave. You brought her +yourself into my presence, you laid her yourself in my arms. Now you may +take her back again. I spurn your daughter for I have not desired her +for the honor and keeping of my house, but only for the entertainment of +a night. Take her back now! Take her back!" + +Nevertheless better treatment was from this time on accorded Soelver, +which he never for a moment doubted he owed to Gro. As he dwelt in his +cell upon his phantasies, he suddenly heard her voice singing that +melancholy song of Sir Tidemand, who tried to lure the maiden Blidelille +into his boat by vigorous runes written upon roses. Blidelille awoke at +midnight and knew not what it was that compelled her. + + "It drew me along to Sir Tidemand + Whom never mine eyes had seen." + +In vain the foster mother bids them spread velvets and satins over her +that she might sleep. Notwithstanding she arises suddenly, dresses +herself and goes down to the strand to Sir Tidemand, who meets her +scornfully. Then she goes into the lake, whither Tidemand follows her, +seized with heartfelt remorse. + + "For evil the rune on the rose leaf traced + And evil the work it had wrought, + That two so noble, of royal grace, + To ruin and death were brought." + +The woful song trailed itself through Soelver's mind like an indistinct +dream. Then he believed that he distinguished Gro's step, until it was +lost in her sleeping room. With his mental vision he saw the maiden, as +she looked out upon the lake toward Aebeloe. She looked away from him, +of whose fate she took no thought, but gazed fixedly over the sea, which +bore upon its bosom a ship with silken sails, on whose deck Sir Tidemand +stood. "Then Soelver was conscious of an infinite weakness in his love +toward this pure maiden, whom his coarseness had taken into his arms, +his desire had scorched with its hot breath but who had nevertheless +left him benumbed in his baseness, cowardliness and weakness. Now he +understood that love, in order to triumph, must first humble its own +power, still its own movement and soften its brutal will. Now he +comprehended that he must carve mystic runes of passion upon his own +heart as upon a glowing rose and fling it into the mighty sea of +feeling, praying it to bring the maiden Gro into his hands." + +Day and night Soelver's thoughts tarried only with Gro. In his +phantasies "he forced himself through the bolted door, climbed sharp +angled passage ways and winding staircases and lifted oaken beams from +barred doors. Without once making a mistake, driven by a magic sense of +direction, he finally reached Gro's couch, at which he saw himself +staring with great white eyes, whose pupils in the darkness of sleep had +as it were glided over to the side. And upon the cover of her couch lay +her two gleaming arms and the fingers of the right hand trembled as if +they grasped another invisible hand. In this room Soelver remained until +her sleep drew him to itself, until the heaving of her breasts drew him +down, until her fingers entwined themselves with his, until their breath +mingled and his lids closed before her pure gaze." + +Another time he dreamed that he was upon a vessel, evidently in the rôle +of Sir Tidemand. And Gro actually came over the water to him like the +maiden Blidelille, "with roses like two blood spots upon her breast. She +had crossed her hands beneath them and fastened her pure gaze upon +Soelver, so that he was seized with terror and, without escaping her +look, fled to the lee of the vessel to the edge of the ship. Yet Gro +steadily drew nearer. Now she reached the ship's border and Soelver +retreated. Step by step she followed him, the painful gaze of her +deathly white face absorbed by his own. And he withdrew over to the +other border, drew back until he felt the railing hard behind him. Gro +stepped forward alone and it was not possible to stop her; he felt as if +she wished to press within him like the sped arrow to its goal. Finally, +in an instant, as her garment fluttered against him, he threw himself +with a loud cry to one side and saw, with a great horror, that Gro went +forward, through the railing as through air and disappeared on the other +side in the sea, while Soelver lay moaning upon the deck and saw before +him only the red roses, which fallen from her breast crept like living +blood over the ship's planks." + +Was it dream or reality, which he saw when he opened his eyes? "The +sun's rays burst forth through a crack in a long, radiant arrow, which +bored itself into the floor and transfixed as it were something red that +began to glow." And as Soelver crept nearer his astonishment grew +deeper. "For hard by the vision of red were footprints breathed so to +speak upon the floor, fine, slender prints, directed toward him, no more +distinct than if a warm breeze had blown away the dampness from the +surface of a stone, leaving the outline of a foot fixed there." As he +now stooped down and with his hand felt for the blood red spot, his +fingers actually touched "a heavy full-blown rose, whose sweet strong +odor he drank as if in an intoxication of reality." No one had forced +his way in through the hatchway, of this he soon convinced himself. Gro +must have dropped it here while he was spinning dreams about her. + +In the nights which followed "he slept in a kind of hunger to feel her +physically and tangibly in his arms." Then when it was again full moon, +he found on awaking, in a spot upon which fell the rays of moonlight, a +little gold cross, "whose six polished stones seemed to radiate +moonlight from themselves. It was as if the moonlight lay within his +hand. He watched the small cross sparkle--it was the same that he had +seen in dreams upon her rose wreath. Gro had been also within his +prison." + +He was led out soon after this to be shown to the monk, who had come to +obtain news of his imprisonment. "In the doorway the young nobleman met +Gro and drew back, so strong a power seemed to irradiate from her living +form. She stood in the half twilight, with her white hands and her +white neck and forehead, which shone as with their own light from out +her coal black velvet robe. There was a blinding, marvelous reality +about her, which drew him like a great fragrant flower." As the monk +expressed his compassion for him, that imprisonment had befallen him, +his pride of nobility awoke. "What do you say of imprisonment and ill +foreboding? Know you not then that I am of my free will Sten Basse's +guest?" This reply astonished even Sten Basse. "He admired the young, +undaunted spirit, who found in himself no occasion for pity. Soelver +stood before Gro, his arms firm at his sides, and breathed deep and +strong. His eyes drank in the clear light from her hands and face." When +however Sten Basse sought to approach him in a friendly manner, Soelver +motioned him back: "As prisoner was I led forth, as prisoner I return of +my free will. If you wish to make any apology to me, you know where my +dungeon is to be found." Then he went quickly, without turning toward +Gro, out of the hall and down into his prison. His senses nevertheless +had seized that warm, radiant picture of the beautiful Gro and +transplanted it to the midst of his cell. He saw it streaming before his +eyes in the shimmering light of the cross of moonlight and longed for +the clear light of the night, that he might go on and make the dream +face live. When the darkness advanced "he stripped himself naked and +allowed the air of the summer night to cool his limbs and purify them, +before he betook himself to his cot. The small cross he laid upon his +naked breast and watched the moonlight glimmer green and blue from every +stone" and kissed it thinking of Gro. Then he fell asleep in blissful +happiness. + +Suddenly however he awoke without any apparent reason, from no dream or +thought. "He was awake, collected and yet at the same time strangely +under the control of something that lay outside himself, a strange +unknown power, which might be either mystical or natural. It appeared to +him as if the moonlight had been loosed from the moon and now floated +about in the room like a living being. So real seemed this fancy to him +that he turned his head to one side and was not astonished actually to +see a form standing in the center of the darkness. A feeling of +reverence and awe swept over Soelver as little by little he +distinguished in the floating folds of the moon white garment, the firm +outlines of a woman's arms, which were crossed beneath a half bared +breast, the line of the teeth in the open mouth, a flash of white light +from Gro's eyes gazing with a certain fixed power. + + "Holy Mother of God--it was Gro herself! + +"Soelver started upright, frightened at his own movement, for he +scarcely dared breathe, much less go towards her. He felt his nakedness +as a crime, even his being awake as a transgression. The form glided +forward out of the moonlight, the crossed hands separated themselves +from the breast and Gro pursued her way with outstretched hands, feeling +her way and yet mechanically sure like a sleep walker. + +"Yes, she was walking in her sleep. Soelver recognized it by the staring +look in her eyes, which gazed through the night as through miles of +space. Soelver slid noiselessly to the floor in front of her, afraid +that he would be seen, in deadly terror lest she should awaken. For he +knew how dreadful it might be to awaken a sleep walker and in his +excited phantasy he heard already the cry of horror and madness which +would issue from Gro's mouth if she awoke and saw herself in this dark, +subterranean depth alone with a naked man as with a demon. It was as if +everything in Soelver cried out in protective anxiety that Gro should +not awaken. He crouched beseechingly upon the ground, his whole soul was +a sobbing prayer for grace, for instant means of deliverance, now that +Gro had come to him as if by fate. + +"There came a whispered sound from her open mouth, as her lips for a +moment sought each other. It was as if she breathed out the one word +'Soelver.' This, however, to hear his name spoken, made Soelver strong +at once. It compelled him to arise from the floor, it banished fear from +his soul, it made him rejoice in every fiber of his being. The next +moment her outstretched arm reached his hand--he felt the firm, cool +skin under his trembling finger tips and his face felt the warm +breathing of her voice, 'Soelver, Soelver!' And driven by some mystic +power of will, he forced himself under the same hypnotic influence which +surrounded her. He compelled himself to leave the clear broad way of +reason and to enter the ecstatic, perilous, paths of the sleep walker. +He was no longer awake. He sought, he touched, he stood before that +after which he had groped. He was himself driven by a magic power, by a +marvelous single purpose, which must be attained. This whole +transformation took place in him merely because he felt that this was +the only means of saving her from awaking to consciousness and madness. + +"'Soelver--Soelver!'--'Yes.'--'Soelver--are you--are +you--there?'--'Yes--I--am--here.'--'Yes--that is you--that is you--I +feel you.'--'And you see me?'--'Yes, I see you.'--'And you will stay +with me?'--'Yes--I will--I will stay with you.' + +"Soelver answered her in the same whisperings in which she breathed out +her words. His hands passed over hers with infinite carefulness. But +finally his arms closed about her neck and he felt a marvelous tingling +in his finger tips as he touched her soft silken hair. His mouth +approached hers and mingled his warm breath with the breath which +escaped cold from her lips. He drew in the air with her own rhythm, it +was as if his naked heart bowed toward hers so that they all at once +touched one another. Then the blood flamed out of her cheeks and +streamed over into his, although they lay not upon each other. The blood +burned in all her skin and Soelver trembled for a moment lest this +transport was the beginning of the awakening. + +"His heart stood still with fear. However the blood continued to surge +through Gro's body. She pressed Soelver close to herself and through her +soft clothing he felt her breast swell and throb, as if she would bore +herself into his flesh. 'Soelver--I love you.'--'Gro--I love you.' Then +a strange giddiness seized him as if he were rushing into her arms on a +tower miles high. He breathed upon her ethereal kisses, which closed her +lips, moistened her forehead and descended thence like a refreshing +spring rain so that her lids drooped. When her eyes were closed Soelver +felt for the first time quite secure. He fastened them with a real kiss +and now, since her sleep wandering had reached its goal in his arms and +Soelver was sure that her love dream was too deep to be disturbed, he +whispered louder than before, 'Gro--I love you!'--'Soelver--I love +you!'--'How long have you loved me?'--'Longer than I have known you, +Soelver.'--'Why have you not said so, Gro?'--'That, Soelver, I will +never tell!' + +"So Soelver carried his wonderful burden to his couch and inhaled her +youthful fragrance and lifted his mouth to hers and all his blood at +once leaped forth. Every fiber of his being was stirred to kisses, every +blood drop became a yearning mouth to meet the thousand mouths of her +blood. And lost to sense--vehemently, seized by the divine power of +nature, unafraid that she might awaken, without control over himself and +yet proud as a master of worlds, he was impelled as the sunbeam to its +goal, when it forces open the flower and buries itself in its fragrant +depths. Soelver united himself with Gro. She on her part slumbered on, +quiet as the sea which has closed over its sacrifice. + +"But Soelver felt his senses reawakening. What now? Should he let Gro +sleep until day woke her and she saw herself in his arms? He bent over +his beloved in deepest distress. She must not awaken in terror, not +again weep as on that first morning when she was with him. The most +delicate chords in her soul had trembled and sung to him in the night, +to him whom she unconsciously loved with all the indefinable conviction +of her heart. This love must not be rudely plucked and allowed to fade +like a plant whose tender shoot is torn asunder. She must go back to her +maiden's couch until the flower of the day had burst forth from its +leafy covering. Then he discovered that the panel at the foot of his cot +was opened, while some planking had been pushed back. Gro must have come +this way and by this way he carried her back. Led by an unerring +instinct, as if he knew from his nightly phantasied visits all the +turnings of the way, he went without deliberation into the secret room +behind the panel, found the passage to the main stairway, passed +straight up, turned through corridors, passed under the heavy tapestry +curtains, opened the last door and noticed first that he bore a burden +when he laid it down. The moon threw its faint silver light round about +in the little room. With a sweet wonder Soelver gazed upon the prayer +stool and the brown rosary--without its cross." + +I may pass briefly over the remainder. In the first place Soelver was +given his liberty and he went back to his castle. The death of Sten +Basse occurred soon after. Soelver whispered to his daughter at his +death bed, "Gro, whatever may happen, know now that we belong to one +another." She "turned her head slowly toward him and looked at him with +her large eyes swollen with tears. Her look was that of a stranger and +quite uncomprehending, so that Soelver understood that she did not +simply deny everything but she had no recollection at all." So Soelver +turned and went. For the first time when bathing in the lake "he found +again his youth and his freedom, his radiant hope and the jubilant +certainty of his love. Gro loved him! Only the thought of love had not +yet arisen from the depths of her soul like pearls to the light. +Nevertheless the wonderful flower of her affection was growing in the +golden light of dreams. He longed after Gro as after his bride, although +he was only the bridegroom of her dreams, who dared to kiss her only +when her eyes were closed. By day he was her foe, as the bear in the +fairy tale, who by night alone is changed into a beautiful young man." + +They met therefore first again at Sten's bier, at the side of which they +both kneeled. "Gro's eyes were directed upon him as upon a stranger, +staring with wonder, burning with a mystic light. Why was this stranger +here near her, the man whom her dead father had tortured and derided? +And yet her eyes were wet with tears of pity and she felt that this man +only desired to take her hand. Soelver observed her with his inmost +soul. He pressed the small cross of moonshine between his hands, he bent +over it and kissed it and a gleam from its blazing stones smote Gro's +eyes. She stretched out her arms and took the cross from him and gazed +into the stones as into well-known eyes. She knew not how this had come +into Soelver's hands but she also bent over it and kissed it and her +soul went out toward Soelver as toward a soul far, far away, whom she +once had known, whom however she could scarcely remember." + +After this Soelver came and went at Egenaes, Sten Basse's castle, as if +he were lord and heir of the estate. "It was rumored also among the +tenants and the servants that he was betrothed to the maiden Gro. Yet no +word of it was exchanged between them. Soelver stood by Gro in small +things and great, and she allowed herself to be guided by his strength +and cleverness. Since that night when he had kneeled with her at her +father's lifeless body, she was bound to him by a nameless bond of +gratitude, of mutual feeling, and by an inner apprehension that their +fate was interwoven. Still no consciousness of love colored Gro's +attitude. She longed for Soelver's strong handclasp because it made her +will strong to withstand her sorrow. She could think of herself lying +upon his broad, deep breast, only however because there slumber would +come in sure forgetfulness. There was moreover a tenderness in her look, +when in a fleeting moment she let her glance rest upon his, such as the +realization of another's goodness awakens in us, especially when the +goodness is undeserved and disinterested. Yet there was never any of +love's surrender. Only she was glad to know herself observed by these +quiet, steadfast, clear eyes, from which the red specter of passion, +which had so frightened her that day upon Aebeloe, had long been +banished. She believed that she had in Soelver a friend given her for +life and death, a friend who could not desire her in love nor be +desired, a brother whom one might trust with infinitely more serenity +than any lover. + +"Soelver was ever watchful of Gro. His eyes were on the lookout whether +he might not once surprise in hers the brightness of the dream, and make +the hidden rose of love break through the green covering and bloom in +reality. He longed thus within himself once to see the day and night +aspects of her soul melt into a wonderful golden twilight. But Gro made +no response to the gaze from his eyes. She turned her head aside so +that her silken lashes concealed her glance. 'Gro, why do you never look +at me?'--'I do look at you.'--'Do you see me with your cheek, Gro?'--'I +see you, though, Soelver. I see you with the outermost corner of my +eye.' Soelver bent his face beneath hers. 'Are you looking at me?' But +Gro pressed her lids together as before a bright light and shook her +head, 'No, Soelver, not so! You look too sharply, you look too deeply. +You look so deeply that it hurts me very much. No, stand so Soelver, +turn your eyes away!'--'Are you afraid of me?'--'No, no--why should I be +afraid? But I do not feel comfortable to have you all the time wanting +to read my heart, to have your eyes searching for some writing that does +not stand written there. My friend and beloved brother, I fear what your +look would draw from me--what would you drag out from my soul?'--'The +spring day, Gro, when we first met.'--'Ah! Soelver, I scarcely remember +it. It seems to me that I have always known you, that all your days you +have been good and kind to me. Lately I have felt it in my heart and +upon my cheek, as when my mother caressed me and that is long, long +ago.'--'Gro, only say it, you are afraid of the word, but not +truly--just say it--you love me.--You are silent because it is true.' +'No, Soelver, I have never felt that.'--'So you have dreamed it, +Gro.'--'Dreamed!' Gro became fiery red. 'Dreamed--dreamed--oh Soelver, +what have I dreamed? What do you know of my dreams? To have dreamed is +to have dreamed, and my dreams belong to me, to me alone!' For a moment +she turned to him a shy, quivering look, then tears trickled down from +under her drooping lids. But Soelver observed that he had hit upon the +truth. Immediately however he regretted that he had cast this look into +the sanctuary of her soul. It was like the curious peeping of which the +knight had been guilty, spying through the keyhole upon his wife, +Undine. + +"A long time they sat silent. At last Gro was herself again, quiet and +controlled. Then she spoke in a soft but firm voice, 'Soelver, if you +remain with me to awaken me to love, then I beg of you, go and never +return. I can never look upon you with the eyes of love. Passion seems +to me like a glowing sword, which burns out one's eyes as it goes by. +There was a day when you made the flaming sword of your desire pass by +my face--since that time it is burned out. I have been blinded, Soelver, +I am blind to the desire of your eyes, and all your fervent prayers. I +have hated you, despised you, defied you, yet you have repaid evil with +good and now I return good for good. Look not upon me with love's eyes, +seek not to awaken the dead in me to life. You are to me more precious +than if the proud brother of my childhood had returned in you, your +spirit is his, I did not believe that in the will of a man so much +kindness could dwell. Leave it so, stay with me as my brother, or leave +me like my brother, but never speak to me of love, neither in words nor +in looks for I know no reply.'" + +The young nobleman knew finally, for all his eager power, no other way +of escape than to go with the king to the war. He saw quite clearly that +"Gro struggled against the force deep in her heart. And yet the day's +flaming sun could cause the weak chrysalis of the dream to shrivel so +that no butterfly would break through the covering and rejoice in the +strong light of midday. But with Soelver away, the longing for him would +support the invisible growth of the dream and prepare the way for it +into consciousness. Ah! it was worth his departure." Then he took leave +of his beloved. "Goodbye; forget me not on our island. Bid me return +when you will. The wind will find me, wherever I am. Tell the wild +birds, when you want me and would call me home." + +Gro, remaining behind alone, first became aware what she had lost in him +and in his "strong will, which was her source of light." She began to +long more and more for him who was far away. "Ah, if he would only come +again!" And when a bird flew by, she "flushed red at her own thought; +was that a message sent forth by her desire? This took place contrary to +her wish and will--she wished not to long for him, not to call him back, +not to love him! Angrily she roused herself and sought to recall the +burning gaze with which Soelver had wounded her modesty. So with a vexed +and hard stroke of the oars she pushed the boat away from Aebeloe." + +When the war was ended, Soelver went to serve the king of France. For, +as he wrote in a letter sent by carrier pigeon, "he who is not summoned, +comes not." Meanwhile love towards the young nobleman had begun to grow +in her bosom. "Night after night she dreamed of Soelver and at last one +night she suddenly awoke and found herself cold and naked, wandering +around in her room and heard the last note of her heart's unconscious +avowal, 'Soelver, I love you.' There was a change within her. Hour after +hour would she sit inactive and half asleep, listening to the irregular +beating of her heart--something was drawing upon her very depths, +sucking her strength from her, from her proud will, something that +paralyzed her thought and bound her always to the same name, the same +memory." As she listened to her own depths, "she caught a momentary +something like a weak, quickly beating echo of her own slow heart, a +busily living little heart, that ticked louder and louder until at last +it deafened hers. A trembling joy seized her at that moment through all +her senses as she knew that she bore a life within her life, that she +enclosed in her body the germ of a new life that was not growing from +her alone and of her life alone." + +Suddenly a crushing terror overcame her. Who was her child's father? "So +abruptly came this question over her naïve soul that she fancied for a +moment that this might be the punishment of fate for her longing for +Soelver. This longing was desire, and desire was sin no less than the +love itself. Her wish for him had grown to a fire in her blood and now +she was stained by her own passion, pregnant from her own sin. God's +punishment had visited her and soon would be visible to all the world. +Gro saw however immediately the foolishness of her thought. For one +moment she lingered at the thought of the one woman of all the earth, +who had immaculately conceived. Then she uttered an inward prayer that +the Mother of God would lighten her understanding and give her clearness +of vision that she should not go astray in her brooding over this +mystery." + +When she questioned her nurse and the latter finally put it to her, +"Have you spent no night under the same roof with Soelver?" then there +occurred to her the many nights "when she had dreamed of the lonely +imprisoned man, who was being punished because of her. When she lay in +her bed in the dark, a strange curiosity had overcome her to imagine his +lot there below and, when sleep seized her and dreams chased away the +bitter, hard thoughts, her heart had become softer and the sun had shone +over the visions of her dreams as the spring day over the woods +blossoming with the green May bells. Many a night and many a morning was +she awakened by a strange burning desire in her thoughts, and her mouth +was as though touched with fresh dream kisses, and she had entered into +judgment with her own weak heart and had so inflamed herself to scorn +and hatred that she had done nothing to soften the fate of the prisoner. +But how could Soelver have been the guest of her dreams? And how had he +been able to command the virgin love fed by her slumber? Then came the +nurse to her aid and made it clear to her. She knew that the maiden Gro +had walked in her sleep; the servants had told of a white ghost on the +stairs and once she herself had seen it and recognized Gro, who had +disappeared upon a secret stairway, which led down into the dungeon. She +had kept still about it, for she thought it was a voluntary sleep +walking to the young nobleman." + +Thus was Gro enlightened as to the source of her pregnancy. "She +quivered with shame that the desire in her dreams had the power to drive +her down to the lonely prisoner and she shook in her inmost soul at the +memory of that happy dream, which she had had the night before her +father's death. Now her love suddenly burst into the light like a +wonderful flower, which suddenly springs up with a thousand fragrant +buds. Now it was impossible to stem it or to conceal it. She had wanted +to suppress every germ, with her father's coldness and the day's +dispassionately proud haughtiness she had been willing to stifle every +impulse toward love, every longing for self avowal. Now she found her +pride was dead and buried and her being within and without was permeated +by love. + +"For she had loved Soelver from the first springtime kiss, which he had +imprinted upon her cheek as she wandered among the fresh May bells, +loved him in the blow which she had inflicted upon his head when he had +touched her chaste nakedness, loved him in those nights when he had +slept uncomplaining in the cellar dungeon, loved him in those bitter +moments of his humbling when he, in spite of scorn and insult, +maintained his pride, loved him that evening when he kneeled at her +father's bier and kissed the hand of his enemy now dead, loved him day +by day all the time they were together, loved him in that hour when she +saw his banner disappear among the hundred others, and today upon +Aebeloe when she heard that new life singing within hers. And now she +rejoiced; for she bore him always within her, she could never again lose +her Soelver." + +As we glance over the material of this tale, we find as the nucleus of +the night wandering and moon walking the strong repression of every +conscious love impulse and the breaking through of the unconscious in +sleep and dream wherever the censor's rule is relaxed. For the maiden +Gro had loved Soelver from the first moment, yet this love was confessed +only in moments of occasional self forgetfulness, as by the first +meeting with the young nobleman, when her hand met his, yes, even +pressed it for the moment. Only Gro should not have been frightened out +of her half unconscious action by a kiss or a passionate desire, for at +once there arose to life within her the coldness and haughtiness of her +father and the highhanded reaction which her mother had manifested to +her conqueror. The determining factor, to speak in psychoanalytic +language, is the struggle between the strong sexual rejection and the +equally compelling sexual desire. At first the former held the upper +hand with our heroine in her waking and conscious action, the latter in +the unconscious. Through the force of her will Gro seemed cold, even as +she had learned of her father. She defended herself from her lover's +craving by force and blow; even when conquered finally through the noble +spirit of her enemy, she would see in him only the friend for life and +death. She directly refused to think of love and displaced it to +external things, she even bade the young man go rather than desire her +as his wife. Soelver's devotion reminded her most significantly of her +mother's tenderness, his pride, of the brother of her childhood. "It is +as if in you the proud brother of my childhood had returned. Your spirit +is his. Leave it so, stay with me as my brother or leave me like my +brother, but never speak to me of love, neither in words nor in looks, +for I know no reply!" + +Yet she avoided Soelver's searching eye and as he reminded her of her +dreams, she was smitten in the depths of her soul. For her dreams, she +well knew, chased away the bitter and hard thoughts, the repressed +unconscious broke through and the true feeling of her loving heart. This +already appeared clear to her when her beloved languished in captivity +at her father's hands. The strange desire to work out the fate of the +young nobleman, who suffered on her account, had overcome her lying +there in her bed in the dark. And in the morning she awoke with a +strange burning desire in her thoughts and her mouth was flecked with +his fresh dream kisses. Still she consciously kept back every outer +manifestation of love and met the young man while her father was alive +with coldness and suspicion and later even merely as a brother. The +great distance separating her beloved from her and above all the child +which she bore from him under her heart for the first time conquer her +haughty pride and her conscious aversion. And as she dreams one night +again of the loved one far away she finds herself suddenly awake, going +about cold and naked in her room and perceives as the lingering sound of +her heart's unconscious avowal, "Soelver, I love you!" + +So severe is this struggle between conscious sexual denial and +unconscious desire, that it even forces itself through in her sleep and +her night wandering. Her dreams had indeed, as she later acknowledged +with shame, the force and the power to compel her below into the young +nobleman's dungeon. She had clasped Soelver's hand in her sleep, she +had told him everything in the moonlight, with eyes closed, everything +which she secretly felt, and had pressed him to herself. Yet when he +asked her why she could never confess to him that she had always loved +him so deeply, she repulsed him: "That I will never tell!" Even when he +had united himself to his beloved, she had slumbered on as if nothing +had happened and the next day knew nothing of it all. + +This leads now to that which, according to folk belief, constitutes the +very core, the chief ground for sleep walking and moon walking in a +maiden. It is easy to understand the wish, on the part of the female sex +with their strongly demanded sexual repression, to come to the beloved +one and taste all the delights of satisfaction but without guilt. This +is possible only through wandering in unconscious sleep. For, as my +first patient explained, one is not accountable for anything that +happens in this state, and thus can enjoy without sin and without +consciousness of what is not permitted. Convention demands that the +maiden wait until the lover approaches her, but in that unconscious +state she may surrender herself. The need for repression explains then +the subsequent amnesia. Yet wandering by night is not concerned merely +with sexual enjoyment, over and above that it fulfills a second desire +that arises out of childhood, as we know from psychoanalysis. Every +small maiden has, that is, the wish to have a child by her father, her +first love, which is often in later years defined thus, one might have a +child, but without a husband. The night wandering fulfills this desire +to have a child yet without sin. Therefore has that motive of an +unconscious, not to say immaculate, conception inspired not a few poets, +as it has already, as is well known, been active in the creation of the +drama. + +Less transparent than that chief motive is the action of the light, +sunlight as well as moonlight. The heroine of the story stands toward +both in a special relationship. Her body is almost illuminated by its +own light, her hair sparkles electrically when it is touched, "warm +waves of light" emanate from her, which Soelver noticed at their first +meeting, the sun seems expressly to seek her, a halo of impalpable +beauty surrounds her and above all glows from the depths of her eyes. +Not only so, Gro seems to dwell chiefly in the light, whose last drops +she greedily absorbs within herself. When the light fades, her body +becomes cold as ice like a corpse. In similar manner the shining of the +full moon affects her, the light of which the stones of her gold cross +have absorbed. The first time that the slumbering youth saw Gro +wandering, it seemed to him as if the moonlight had been loosed from the +planet and floated only in his room like a living being. The poet, to be +sure, has offered no explanation of this mystical effect of light and +what the reader may think for himself would be merely drawn from other +sources. For this reason I will not pursue this point further. + +The narrative affords somewhat further means for an understanding in +another direction. It is not explained more fully just why Gro follows +the sunlight and moonlight or why both exercise upon her a peculiar +attraction, yet the tendency to a motor breaking through of the +unconscious may be derived from an inherited disposition. The father is +a rough, violent robber knight while the mother shows distinctly +sadistic traits and a truly ready hand at fighting. That confirms what I +explained in the first part, a heightened muscular excitability and +muscle eroticism, which strives to break through again on the sexual +side in sleep walking. Finally it may be affirmed without doubt that the +ghostly white figure upon the stairs was no other than the maiden in her +shift. + + +"JÖRN UHL," by Gustav Frenssen. + +I can deal more briefly with "Jörn Uhl," the well-known rural romance of +Frenssen, in which the sketch of a moon walker constitutes merely an +episode. Joern Uhl, who, returned from the war, takes over the farm of +his unfortunate father, discovers Lena Tarn as the head maid-servant. +She pleased him at first sight. "She was large and strong and stately in +her walk. Besides her face was fresh with color, white and red, her hair +golden and slightly wavy. He thought he had never seen so fresh and at +the same time so goodly appearing a girl. He was pleased also at the way +she nodded to him and said 'good evening' and looked him over from head +to foot with such open curiosity and sincere friendliness." She sings +too much to please the old housekeeper! "She is so pert and too +straightforward with her speech." It is noteworthy too that she talks to +herself in unquiet sleep. + +Lena Tarn can soon make observations also upon her side. Joern was very +short with the old graybeard, who advised him to an early marriage: "The +housekeeper is with me, I do not need a wife." Lena, entering just then, +heard what the unmannerly countryman said and assumed a proud look, +thinking to herself, "What is the sly old man saying!" Since however the +old man began to talk and compelled her and Joern Uhl to listen, she was +concerned almost entirely for the latter, whose "long, quiet face with +its deep discerning eyes she observed with a silent wonder, without +shyness, but with confident curiosity." Not alone in the kitchen, which +is under her control, can Lena show what is in her. When a young bull +broke loose and came after the women, she met him with sparkling eyes, +"Stop you wretch!" When he would not allow himself to be turned aside, +she threw a swift look flashing with anger upon the men, who were idly +looking on, then swung the three-legged milking stool which she had +taken along and hit the bull so forcibly on the head with it that +frightened, he lunged off sideways. "Lena Tarn had however all afternoon +a red glow coming and going in her cheeks because the farmer had looked +upon her with the eyes of a high and mighty young man. That caused her +secretly both joy and concern." Immediately after this she experienced +one satisfaction. Joern Uhl was dragged into the water by a mischievous +calf and was much worse cut up by it than she, the weaker one, the woman +had been. + +"Lena saw always before her the face which Joern Uhl had made when she +had gone forward against the bull. She was otherwise in the best of +humors, but when, as in the last few days, she was not quite well +physically she was inclined to be angry. She preserved a gloomy +countenance as well and as long as she could. Soon though, as she went +here and there about her work and felt the new fresh health streaming +through her limbs, she altered her looks.... Joern Uhl moreover could +not be quiet that day. The sudden plunge in the water had brought his +blood to boiling. The spring sunshine did its part. A holiday spirit +came over him and he thought that he would go into the village and pay +his taxes, which were due. On the way he thought of Lena Tarn. Her hair +is coiled upon her head like a helmet of burnished brass, which slips +into her neck. When she 'does things,' as she says, her eyes are stern +and directed eagerly upon her work. When on the other hand she is spoken +to and speaks with any one she is quick to laugh. Work seems to her the +only field where quiet earnestness is in place. 'That must be so,' she +says. Toward everything else she is angry or in a good humor, mostly the +latter. Only toward me is she short and often spiteful. It has been a +great joke for her that I had the ill luck to have to go into the water +with that stupid beast. If she only dared she would spread it three +times a day on my bread and butter and say 'There you have it.'" + +Now he meets old Dreier who gives him good advice: "How old are you? +Twenty-four? Don't you marry, Joern. On no account. That would be the +stupidest thing that you could do. I bet you $50.000 you don't dare do +it. Time will tell, I say." "Take it for granted that I will wait yet +ten years," he answered. And he went on thinking to himself, "It is +pleasanter to go thus alone and let one's thoughts run on. Marry? Marry +now? I will be on my guard. After I am thirty!" Then his thought came +back to Lena. "She looked well as she flung the stool at the bull. +Prancing like a three-year-old horse. Yesterday she did not look so +well, her eyes were not so bright, she spoke harshly to Wieten (the old +housekeeper) and said to her afterwards, 'Do not mind it, Wieten, I +slept badly,' and laughed. Funny thing, slept badly? When one is on the +go as she must be all day, one should sleep like a log. But that is all +right in the May days. It is well that men understand this, otherwise +every spring the world would go all to pieces." Then he rejoiced that he +was so young and could point out on the farm what was his. "Later, when +the years have gone by and I am well established I will take to myself a +fine wife with money and golden hair. There are also rich girls who are +as merry and fresh and as desirable and have as stately forms. It need +not be just this one." + +Then he came to the parish clerk who had just been notified that day of +six children to be baptized and who was complaining of the increase in +births. Joern agreed with him: "What will we come to, if the folk +increase like that? Marrying before twenty-five must simply be +forbidden." "With these words he departed, filled with a proud +consciousness that he was of the same opinion with so intelligent, +experienced an old man as the parish clerk." At home he met Lena Tarn +with an old farmer, who came to inquire after the fate of his son who +had been with Joern in the war. Then for the first time the girl heard +of the frightful misery and the suffering of the soldiers which cried to +heaven, so that her face was drawn with pain. "Deep in her soul however +thrilled and laughed a secret joy, that you have come back whole, Joern +Uhl." + +Later, when she was making out the butter account with the farmer, "she +had to bend her glowing head over the book, which he held in his hand. +There came such a glistening in his eyes that he wrinkled his forehead +and did not conceal his displeasure at such an unsteady flashing." In +the evening she came to get back the book. Then Joern spoke to her, "You +have not been in a good humor these last days. Is anything the matter?" +She threw her head back and said shortly, "Something is the matter +sometimes with one; but it soon passes over."--"As I came through the +passage yesterday evening I heard you call out in your sleep in your +room." "Oh, well!... I have not been well."--"What ... you not well? The +moon has done that. It has been shining into your room."--"I say, +though, there may be some other cause for that."--"I say that comes from +the moon." She looked at him angrily, "As if you knew everything! I did +not call out in my sleep at all but was wide awake. Three calves had +broken out and were frisking around in the grass. I saw them clearly in +the moonlight. I called them." He laughed mockingly, "Those certainly +were moon calves." "So? I believe not. For I brought them in myself this +morning and then I saw that the stable door stood open. I thought to +myself, the boy has gone courting tonight. Your eyes always sweep over +everything and light upon everything and you [du] worry so over +everything out of order, I wonder that you [du] have not seen it."--"You +say 'thou' [du] to me?"--"Yes, you say it to me. I am almost as great as +you and you are not a count, and I am as intelligent as you." She +carried her head pretty high and as she snatched the book from the +window seat as if it lay there in the fire, he saw the splendid scorn in +her eyes. "Take care of yourself when the moon is shining," he said, +"otherwise again tonight you will have to guard the calves." + +"He had arisen, but dared not touch her. They looked at one another +however and each knew how it stood with the other. He had again the look +which he had revealed once in the morning, a presuming look, confident +of victory, such a look as if he would say, 'I know well enough how such +a maidenly scorn is to be interpreted.' But her eyes said, 'I am too +proud to love you.' She went slowly into the darkness of her room as if +she would give him time yet to say something or to long after her. He +was however too slow for that and laughed in confusion." + +The night fell upon them, a wonderful still night. "I will take one more +look at the moon," thought Joern Uhl and took his telescope. He went +through the middle door with as little noise as possible, but the door +of Lena's room stood open and she appeared upon the threshold and leaned +against the side post. "Are you still awake?" he asked anxiously. "It is +not yet late."--"The sky is so clear. I want to look at the stars once +more. If you wish you may come with me." At first she remained standing, +then he heard her coming after him. When he had directed his telescope +to a nebulous star he invited her to look in. She placed herself so +awkwardly that he laid his hand on her shoulder and asked her, "What do +you see?"--"Oh!" she said, "I see--I see--a large farmhouse, which is +burning. It has a thatched roof. Oh!--Everything is burning; the roof is +all in flames. Sparks are flying about. It is really an old Ditmarsh +farmhouse."--"No, my girl, you have too much imagination, which is bad +for science.--What else do you see?"--"I see--I see--at one side of the +farmhouse a plank which is dark; for the burning house is behind it. But +I can look deep into the burning hall. Three, four sheaves have fallen +from the loft and lie burning on the blazing floor. Oh, how frightful +that is! Show me another house which is not burning.--Show me a house, +you know, show me a farmyard just where they are who hunt up the +calves." He laughed merrily. "You huzzy," said he, "you might well see +your three-legged stool in the sky, not? So, high overhead!"--"You +should have had the three-legged stool. I do not forget you that day, +you ... and how you looked at me. That you may believe." + +He had never yet let anyone share in his observations. Now he marveled +and was pleased at her astonishment and joy. And then he showed her the +moon. He placed her and held her again by the arm as if she were an +awkward child. She was astonished at the masses on it: "What are those? +Boiling things, like in our copper kettles? Exactly. What if it hung +brightly scoured over our fireplace and tomorrow morning the fire shone +up upon it."--"The boiling things are mountains and valleys.--And now +you have seen enough and spoken wisely enough. Go inside. You will be +cold and then you will dream again and see in the dream I do not know +what. Will you be able to sleep?"--"I will try." He wanted again to +reach out his hand to her but his high respect for her held him back. He +thought he should not grasp her thus, along the way as it were. "Make +haste," he said, "to get away." + +She went and he remained to pursue his studies. So the time passed. He +had grown eager and busied himself noiselessly with his telescope. "And +he thrust aside once more that young life, which an hour ago had +breathed so very near him and came again to the old beaten track of +thought that the old Dreier was right. 'Don't do anything foolish, +Joern.'--And yet, 'Fine she is and good. Happy the man about whose neck +her arms lie.--What precious treasure must those eyes hold, when they +can look with such frank confidence at a man.'" + +About him now were only the customary sounds of night. Suddenly it was +as if near by over the house roof and then at the side at the wall of +the house he heard the soft cry of a goose and the weak flapping of +wings. And "as he looked, there stood under the house roof in the bright +moonlight a white human form, with one hand over the eyes and with the +other feeling along the wall, as if it would enter the house where there +was however no door. It spoke in excited hurried words, 'The calves are +in the garden; you must be more on the watch. Get up Joern and help me.' +Joern Uhl came in three long strides over the turf and softly called her +name: 'I am here.--Here I stand.--It is I.--So! so!--Now be still.--It +is I.--No one else is here.' She was speechless and began to rub her +eyes with the back of her hand, as a child rubs the sleep out of its +eyes, and she fretted also in childish fashion. Then he embraced her and +told her again where she was, and led her to the stable door seeking to +comfort her. 'Look, here is the door of the stable. Here you have gone +through, you dreamer; you have gone all through the stable in your +sleep. Have you been seeking the moon calves? Ah you foolish child!--So, +here you need not be anxious. You will straightway be back in your +room.' When she finally clearly recognized her situation, she was +frightened, flung her hands against her face and uttered mournful cries. +'Oh, oh, how frightful this is!' But he caressed her, took her hands +from her face and said to her feelingly, 'Now stop that complaining. Let +it be as it is.' So they came to the open door, which led to her room. +It must have been a remarkable night, for not only had half the calves +in the pasture broken out and in the morning were actually standing in +the garden and the court, but the boy this night of all nights had not +come home, but only returned in the early morning twilight." + +The next morning Joern Uhl went to the parish clerk that the banns might +be published for him and the nineteen year old Lena Tarn. He was almost +embarrassed when he came again before her, "I should merely like to know +what you think of me." As she remained speechless, he came nearer. "You +have always been a great heroine, especially to me. Hold your head high +and make it known that I am right." She was still silent, merely pressed +both hands to her temples and stared into the glowing hearth. Then he +drew one of her hands down softly from her hair, seized it and went with +her over the vestibule, through the door communicating with the front of +the house. She followed him passively, her eyes upon the ground and the +other hand still on her hair. In the living room he led her to the +large chair which stood by the window and forced her into it. "So," said +he softly, "here we are all alone, Lena. Here in this chair has Mother +sat many a Sunday afternoon. You now belong in it." Still she said +nothing. "I have been to the parish clerk and arranged everything and +the wedding will be in June. Have you nothing to say yet?" Then she +seized his hands and said softly, "As you think, it is all good so." And +she covered her face with her hands and wept. Then he began to stroke +her and kiss her. "Child, only cease your weeping. You are my fair +little bride. Only be happy again." And in his distress he said, "I will +never do it again. Only laugh again." At last when he could think of no +more cajoling names, he called her "Redhead." Then she had to laugh, for +that was the name of the best cow, which stood first in the stalls. Now +she lifted her head and gazed long at him without moving. Thus Joern Uhl +came rightly to that tenderness and comfort which he thought he +deserved. + +I have only a little to add that is important for our theme. As a young +wife also Lena Tarn was busy the whole day, working from early to late +without rest. The work flew from her hand. And when her confinement was +over, she got up the sixth day, against the earnest warning of the +housekeeper, cared for her boy alone the whole day, went even to the +kitchen and carried water for his bath. Joern Uhl allowed it. For he was +proud to have such a strong wife, "not so affected as the others." It +led however to her death. Somehow she must have become infected, for +soon after a severe childbed fever broke out. + +Even as a young wife she, the poor humble cottager's daughter whose +childhood was pinched by bitterest need, shed a wealth of love and joy +upon all who dwelt about her. Yet now, "she, the friendly one, who had +never caused suffering to any one, went in her fever delirium to every +one in the house, even the smallest servant boy and to every neighbor +and begged their forgiveness, 'if I have done anything to hurt you in +any way.' Towards morning she became quieter but it was the exhaustion +of death and she spoke with great difficulty. Her husband must 'tell +Father that she had loved him.' Joern Uhl sobbed violently: 'Who has +never spoken a kind word to you, poor child.' She tried to smile. 'You +have had nothing but toil and work,' he said. Then she made him +understand in labored speech that she had been very happy." The last +fever phantasies finally put her back into her childhood. Her love went +out to the old teacher Karstensen, then again to Joern Uhl, until she +was finally led through angels to a further father-incarnation, to the +dear God. "It came to her like peace and strength. Clasped by many hands +and led forward, she came to an earnest, holy form who leaned forward +and looked kindly upon her. Then she stretched her hand out and suddenly +she had a great bunch of glowing red flowers in her hand. She gave them +to him saying, 'That is all that I have. I pray you let me remain with +you. I am fearfully weary. Afterwards I will work as hard as I can. If +you would like to hear it, I will gladly sing at my work.'" + +Scarcely in any other tale is the fierce strife between the clearly +active sexual longing, and the conscious sexual denial present at the +same time, as well as the final victory which the unconscious attains, +so plainly shown as in Gustav Frenssen's romance, where the moon +walking, exhibitionistic woman completely overthrows the reasoning of +the man. The poet expresses it clearly and decisively: They each knew +the desire of the other. Joern Uhl saw through the meaning of a maiden's +scorn and Lena's eyes said, I am too proud to love you, but I do love +you. Yet opportunity must be given to the unconscious to break through +victoriously so that the inhibiting reason shall be deprived of its +power. Therefore the powerful increase of libido with the woman during +the occurrence of menstruation and through the wooing of the boy, who +lets the calves break out, in the man through the cold bath and +furthermore in both through the seductive May air. Finally the moon acts +directly with its light as a precipitating cause. + +The night before she had spoken out loud in her sleep just as Joern Uhl +went by to his room. He had spoken of it directly as the action of the +moonlight, which she of course contradicted; she had been lying awake +and heard the calves break out.[19] Then she takes the following night, +when the housekeeper, with whom she slept, was sitting up nursing an old +farmer and the boy had gone courting again, to approach Joern Uhl on her +part as a moon walker, who knew nothing of what she did and could not be +held responsible. More than this her unconscious had a fitting speech +ready, the calves had broken out again. + + [19] Has not the bringing in of these animals and of the word + mooncalves a hidden closeness of meaning? The repetition twice of the + same motive, the analogy with the case at the beginning which I + analyzed, and at last the fact that Lena, when she looked at the + stars, wanted to see a farmhouse where some one was just driving out + the calves, all this gives food for thought. + +The breaking through of the motor impulse is also well grounded. +Everything with Lena Tarn is joy in muscular activity, the restless, +almost unappeasable desire for work and pleasurable "getting things +done," "exerting herself," the constant singing, the easy giving way to +anger. Work is the only thing which she can carry on earnestly because +in that she lives out in part her sexuality, she meets every one else +smilingly or angrily according to her mood. It is noteworthy too that +her unquiet libido transforms itself toward Joern Uhl into anger and +animosity and so much so that once in anger she addresses him as "thou" +and acts as if she were his beloved. + +One thing is especially evident in this example of sleep walking and +moon walking, the invariably infantile bearing of these phenomena. When +Lena, walking in her sleep, was called by her lover, she rubbed her eyes +with the back of her hand as a child rubs the sleep from its eyelids and +fretted also in childish fashion. Then again there is her strange +behavior when Joern announces that he has arranged for the publishing of +the banns. The farmer had in a significant way put her literally into +the mother's place and then in the same manner shown tenderness toward +her, stroking and caressing her, as he himself had once been treated by +his mother. Still Lena, who already in the night responded to the sudden +realization of her position with the cry, "Oh, oh, how frightful this +is!" cannot yet quiet herself. It is hardly to be believed that a farm +maiden would so lose control of herself at the thought of an +illegitimate relationship, which furthermore was to be immediately +legalized by marriage. Many things however point to this--I mention only +her later fever phantasies--that she always felt inwardly guilty because +she had been untrue to some one else, the first beloved of her +childhood, her own father. Only when Joern Uhl on his part becomes a +child and in his way solemnly declares, "I will never do it again," and +in the end names her "Redhead," apparently a pet name of her parent, +then she has to laugh and looks long at him without moving, wondering +perhaps if he is the real father. After this everything falls into +proper place. I can now somewhat extend the statement at the beginning +of this section. Night wandering and moon walking have not only inner +connections with the infantile but more exactly with the infantile +erotic. + +I will briefly mention still one circumstance in conclusion. The +influence of the moonlight is but little touched upon in our tale. Joern +Uhl speaks of it only once. There is on the contrary a connection with +actual occurrences, a recent cause for Lena's moon walking. She has +looked at the moon through the lover's telescope and received +instruction in regard to it. That wakens the memory of the instruction +of the old Karstensen, her teacher when she attended the folk school, +from which we understand that he appears in the place of her father. + + +"MARIA," by Otto Ludwig. + +Perhaps no poet has felt so deeply and expressed so clearly what +constitutes the fundamental problem of sleep walking and moon walking as +Otto Ludwig in his youthful novel "Maria." This novel has, according to +a letter from the poet, "sprung from the anecdote of the rich young +linen draper, who was passionately roused to commit an unnatural offence +at sight of the landlord's daughter laid out apparently dead in the room +through which he was conducted to his own. As a result of this, when he +put up there years after, he found her, whom he supposed to have been +buried, a mother, who had no knowledge as to who was her child's +father." + +This anecdote, which he learned from a friend, took such a hold upon him +that he immediately wrote down not only what he had heard but the first +plan, although upon the insistent protestation of that friend he did not +work out the story as it had been first conceived nor so glaringly. "I +saw," writes our poet, "at first only the psychological interest in this +material. The problem was to present the story as well as possible and +this was indeed a significant one for the narrator. A distinctly +esthetic interest would not be possible in conjunction with that." + +There is no doubt in the mind of the experienced psychoanalyst that, +when a poet is laid hold of in this manner by an anecdote, this only +happens because his own significant infantile complexes are roused out +of the unconscious. Also the transformations, not unworthy of +consideration, which the poet makes with the story are highly +indicative. The seemingly dead maiden becomes a moon walker, the +landlord's daughter is changed to the attractive daughter of a pastor. +"Out of the linen draper there is finally made a cultivated, +artistically sensitive youth, who has in him much of Ludwig's own +personality" (Borcherdt). The finished romance the poet considered the +best which he had so far created, it came nearest to his ideal of a +story. Although his attempts always failed to find a publisher for the +"Maria," the poet retained his love for this work all his life and it +was one of the few productions of his youth which he occasionally still +shared with his friends in his last years. + +The theme of "Maria" is, as indeed the significant title represents, the +unconscious, not to say, the immaculate conception. It is unconscious +because the heroine, drawn by the moon and walking in her sleep, comes +to her beloved and becomes pregnant by him without a conscious memory of +the experience. Furthermore the analogy with the Mother of God becomes +emphasized by the fact that in a picture "Mary and Magdalene" described +at the beginning, the Queen of Heaven bears quite unmistakably the +features of the heroine of the title. The main event, with its results +and discovery, is developed out of the character of both hero and +heroine with extraordinary psychical keenness. + +Eisener like Maria is the only child of rich parents. For both love +manifests itself for the most part rather unfortunately. Apparently +neither gets on well with the father and both have early lost their +mothers. Only Eisener even yet clings with deepest veneration to the +mother who taught him to revere all women and, judging from his words, +her influence upon her husband and the son's desire still appears. +"Whatever of good there is in me, I owe to women. The thought of my +excellent mother restrained me from many an indiscretion, as also the +teaching and the example of the wisest and best of men (the father). +This gentle power which is so sweet to obey and at the same time so full +of reward! In loving surrender it obeys the man, while its divine power +rules the man without his knowing it. The imperceptible but mighty +influence of her gentle presence has determined his decision before he +has comprehended it. It has fallen upon him in his anger like an angel +before his own strength could arm itself, it has turned him to what is +right and proper before he is conscious of the choice. Before her clear +look confusion cannot exist, the coarse word of insolence sinks back +unspoken into the shame filled breast. The brightness of a lost paradise +shines from her eyes upon the fallen bringing pain and warning, the +consolation of eternal pity smiles upon the penitent. These are the suns +about which the planets of greatness, honor and beauty revolve, lighted +and warmed by them." Maria's mother on the other hand is not praised by +a single syllable. We do not discover when she died nor how old the +little one was when she lost her natural protectress. Only indirectly +can one make conjectures in regard to this peculiarly important point. + +Maria was from an early age a marvelous child. "She spoke a language of +her own, which only the initiated or a very poetic person could +understand. All lifeless things lived for her; she transferred to +flowers, trees, buildings, yes, even furniture and clothing the feelings +of a human soul. She mixed sense impressions in her speech in the +strangest fashion, so that she asserted of tones that they looked red or +blue, and inversely of the colors that they sounded cheerful or sad. A +girl a few years older than she named her the blue song." Both +phenomena, the attributing of life to inanimate things, to which one +speaks as to beloved human beings, as well as the phenomenon of +synesthesia, color audition and seeing of tone colors, are as we know +positively today, to be referred back to erotic motives.[20] + + [20] According to my psychoanalytic experience children who cling so + to inanimate things see in them either sexual symbols or those things + were once objects of their secret sexual enjoyment. It may happen, for + example, that such a child falls in love with the furniture, the walls + of the room, yes, even a closet, stays there by the hour, kisses the + walls, tells them its joys and sorrows and hangs them with all sorts + of pictures. One very often sees children talking with inanimate + things. They are embarrassed and break off at once if surprised by + their elders. If there were not something forbidden behind this, there + would be no ground for denying what they are doing, the more so since + in fairy tales beasts, plants and also inanimate things speak with + mankind and with one another without the child taking offense at it. + The latter first becomes confused by the same action when he is + pilfering from the tree of knowledge and has something sexual to hide. + Hug-Hellmuth has convincingly demonstrated the erotic connection + of the child's enthusiasm for plants as well as the different + synesthesias. (See her study, "Über Farbenhören," Imago, Vol. I, + pp. 218 ff. Abstracted in Psa. Rev., Vol. II, No. 1, January, 1915.) + +"With Maria's seventh year perhaps, the tendency to play and purposeless +dreaming, which is always bound with such lively, mobile phantasy, gave +place, to the astonishment of all, to an exactly opposite tendency. From +this time she began to take root in life with all the intensity of her +nature. Already in her twelfth or thirteenth year she looked after the +father's household, to the admiration of all who beheld her. A divine +blessing seemed to accompany everything which she undertook; everything +increased under her hands. She could in passing enjoy herself well in +the idealistic dreams of the poets and of her acquaintances, but her own +peculiar element was reality." + +What had produced this sudden turn about? I cannot escape the conjecture +that here the death of her mother had a decisive influence and with it +the necessity to take the place with her father of his wife. Her +housewifely activity is noted first to be sure from her twelfth or +thirteenth year. Yet I am of the opinion that she had already in her +seventh year begun to play this rôle--in which year the death of her +mother would be placed--only because she was too small it had been under +the eye of a maid or housekeeper. My analyses of hysterics has taught me +that so profound and sudden a transformation of the whole character +always takes place upon definite erotic grounds and for a quite definite +erotic purpose. + +The earliest love of the tiny maiden belongs almost always to her own +father, who is in truth her first beloved. One can often hear it from +the child's lips, "You know, Papa, when Mama dies then I will marry +you." That is in the childish sense meant quite properly and literally. +The early, premature death of the mother gives reality to such infantile +wishes, at least as far as concerns the care of the house. As soon then +as Maria may begin to play this part, she fills it in a striking and +inimitable fashion, although in years she is yet a mere child. She is +altogether the mother in the care of a boy outside the family and this, +as he quite rightly remarked, laughing boisterously and heartily, even +where it is not necessary. Thus her first thought, when she spends her +first night banished from home, is of "the poor father, who must go to +bed without the little services to which he is so accustomed." + +She possesses a maturity in the management of the household which few +elders have. Everything goes on and is done without any one noticing +that it is being done. "Is there anything more charming than this +sixteen year old little house mother in her housekeeping activities?" +says one of her admirers. "Just look, let her do what she will, she +accomplishes it in the best way and at the same time most beautifully." +She is quite contented in the position which she has made. Her eroticism +seems completely satisfied. "She is psychically yet so little a woman +that there is not the least sexual inclination in the charm that infuses +her and therefore her bodily development is overlooked. There is also no +trace yet of that entrancing shyness which springs from the mere +suspicion that there must be something else about the man." A friend of +the family expresses it thus: "When one considers the repose, the self +possession of her nature, the freedom from constraint and the +spirituality of it, one might almost believe that _she was not +originally of this earth but perhaps a native of the moon, which seems +to exercise more influence upon her than the earth_." Every trace of +dreamy maiden phantasies, which represent nothing but unconscious love +desires, was wanting in her. What she formerly possessed of these was +now completely bound with her care of the father. + +Her erotic nature is for the time satisfied and needs nothing more to +veil it and has nothing to wish for. Therefore she has on the one hand +kept childhood's clearness of vision, before which there can be no +deceit, on the other hand unbroken contentment with herself and all the +world as well as the capacity to forgive immediately every wrong +suffered. According to the picture drawn by the poet of the passionate +nature of the father, which is capable of hurrying him, the pastor, into +reviling God, it seems to me plain why Maria, if she suffered wrong, "is +distressed merely over the remorse which the other one, she knows, must +feel, when he has finally come to an insight and to reflection." This is +nothing else than the father's voice, who had once done wrong to his +child and had in a later searching of heart repented of it. Maria, with +such early satisfaction of her feelings of love begged "even as a child +for nothing which the parents had to refuse her. If she had any need it +was to be busy, to take care of the order and the nourishment of the +house, the satisfaction and welfare of the inmates. Where she could +love, she was happy and at home. Yet even the love for her father never +proclaimed itself passionately but always rather in unwearied attention +and concern for his smallest need, which only she might suspect as well +as for that which manifested itself actively." For herself she scarcely +had any wants. A piece of bread and two apples satisfied her as her +day's nourishment, which is typical for the hysteric anorexia and +perhaps merely signifies the unconscious wish to cost the father as +little as possible. Just one single characteristic was wanting for her +perfection, the soft, clinging, typically feminine characteristic. This +also becomes understandable when one considers that all eroticism toward +the father is inhibited in its sexual goal, and may manifest itself only +intellectually on account of the incest barrier, at least as far as it +comes into consciousness. + +The womanly within her shall nevertheless find release through the young +Eisener. I have mentioned above how he hung upon his mother. As the +early inclination of the small maiden is generally toward the father, so +the first love of the boy is for the mother. It is she who teaches him +to love and to seek the woman of his heart according to her own image. +Later, just before puberty we might say, the boy becomes acquainted with +the secrets of sexual life, then, clinging to certain impulses of his +childhood, he begins to desire the mother also in the newly acquired +sense, while he begins to hate the father as a favored rival, who stands +in the way of this wish, and develops a conscious antagonism toward him. +He falls, as we say, under the domination of the Oedipus complex. Yet +the wishes toward the mother go as a rule no further, since meanwhile +the incest barrier has already for a long time been erected. Through +this the boy is compelled to submit the mother complex to a splitting. +For a moment the phantasy may come to him that the mother shall conduct +him into the sexual life--a feature not wanting in any youth--but it is +now decidedly rejected or more typically displaced upon those women who +make of love a profession and actually take care to initiate the youth +into the sexual life. For this reason the remainder of the mother +complex is idealized and the mother transformed to a pure virgin woman, +toward whom no man dares direct his desire. Similarly is it with the +loved one, whom one chooses after the pattern of the mother. + +So Eisener expresses himself warmly. "Maria is not made for love, only +for reverence." + +Yet without the child's craving for the mother[21] he would not have +become a compulsive neurotic,[22] with all the hypermorality of the +latter, pride in his moral purity and extravagant self reproaches, even +a lustful self laceration after he had at one single time been +overpowered by sensuality. Furthermore his lack of resoluteness, +decisiveness and courage is not, as he mentions, the result of his +myopia but of his neurosis. He has developed himself, out of an +unconscious rivalry, in direct contrast to his intensely narrow-minded +father. The latter was only a tradesman, who set his comfort above +everything, for whom art had value only in so far as it increased his +own enjoyment of life. So painting becomes the son's chief delight in +spite of his exaggerated myopia or perhaps just on account of it. He +bore his father's tyranny with difficulty[23] and with inner protest. +His tendency toward the free kingdom of art stood in contrast to him, +and in the same way he sought on the other hand a substitute for the +mother in every woman. He offered up for his sin the dreams of his youth +when he first believed that his moral nature was stained and became as a +result, as even the elder feels uneasily, an over obedient son. + + [21] One thinks of Eisener's panegyric: "Before her clear look + confusion cannot exist, the coarse word of insolence sinks back + unspoken into the shame filled breast. The brightness of a lost + paradise shines from her eyes upon the fallen bringing pain and + warning, the consolation of eternal pity smiles upon the penitent." + + [22] Like Otto Ludwig himself. + + [23] The well-known psychic overcompensation in congenital organic + inferiority. + +How had this so easily befallen him with a mother so deeply honored! +Around her spun all the boy's love desire and twined itself about her, +and all that lava heated feeling belonging so peculiarly to the child +alone. He had hung upon that idol the longing of his heart, the +phantasies of a power of imagination lustfully excited, which is not +indeed wanting in the best of children, although commonly these are +inhibited, and later even completely forgotten because of restraining +moral impulses. Therefore the memory of the highly honored mother is +awakened not only through Maria, the pure one, but also through Julie, +who comes into contact with his sensual desire and the unclean childish +phantasies slumbering in the last analysis behind this. It is +interesting how strikingly the poet is able to point out that double +emotion in Eisener's soul. + +There the moral restraining impulses were first crowded back by the wine +plentifully pressed upon him, which he, accustomed from his early years +to moderation, could tolerate in only the smallest amount. Now "the sly +Julie seemed to him ever more charming. A play of glances began between +the two, which appeared to make the young hunter jealous. On the other +hand Eisener himself felt something similar when his neighbor on the +left addressed to the earnest Maria words which did not conceal the +liking she had inspired. He listened to her replies almost with fear and +was delighted that there was not audible in them the least response to +this inclination, and then he wondered at himself over this same +division in his nature. In Julie's dark eyes glowed a flame, of which he +felt how it kindled him and that its fire must attract more and more to +itself without his being able to defend himself from it, yes, without +his wishing to be able to do it." To be sure when "the slender Maria +stood like a holy picture behind Julie, the alluring child of the world +with all her seductive graces sank low in value in contrast to the +former. He felt the need to be open with himself." Transparency was a +necessity to him from his youth, as an inheritance from his wise mother. +"Then Breitung thrust with his glass against Eisener's refilled one. +Laughing and drinking he found the motley interchange of the liveliest +ideas outwardly, which already had taken the place of quiet thought, +soon becoming less and less menacing and finally even agreeable and +desirable." + +His sexual excitement, heightened besides through the plentiful +indulgence in alcohol and the general boisterousness, was brought to a +high pitch by an episode with the passionate Julie. Eisener had to leave +the room with her during a social game. "A strange thing happened to +him, for as he bent down in the adjoining room in the dark to the quick +breathing Julie, instead of her ear her burning mouth met his mouth, and +the soft pulsating form fell as if fainting into his arms. Wrestling +with himself, striving to keep his senses, he seized her arm +involuntarily and stood again with her in the assembly room before he +was conscious what it was all about." + +Is not this behavior of the youth burning with desire peculiarly +strange? What if behind it there is fixed a memory perhaps of a scene +with the mother, who brought him to his senses by seizing his arm? Yet, +it might always be so for him, he had found the power once more to +withstand the hot temptation. Not to be sure without subsequent regret. +For when he later sought his room he could not go to sleep and "his +phantasy conjured up again, as often as he resisted it, that dark room +about him and the bewitching Julie in his arms. He regretted a thousand +times, so much did he distress himself, his joy at his instinctive +flight, that he had not drunk that sweet poison to the full, whose mere +touch had brought his whole being to this feverish pulsation." + +He sought now to find cooling for his heated blood in the garden, and in +fact the fragrance of the flowers and the rustling of the leaves so +soothed his excited mind that gradually the sense of a pleasant languor +came over him. In a half unconsciousness he went upstairs again and back +to bed. He was just falling asleep when he saw a white form enter, whose +features he could not make out because of his shortsightedness. As it +disrobed and came toward him, he first, as if seeking for help, reached +with his hands toward the side where his friend should be sleeping. He +did not however find him, he apparently had been put into another room. +"The thought of being alone for the first time with a womanly being in +the security of night crept over him at first like icecold drops, then +like the glow of fire over all his nerves. His heart pounded audibly as +the figure climbed into his bed. The strangeness and adventure of the +situation was not fitted to work rationally upon the intoxicated man, +whose excitement throbbed into his finger tips. The power of the warning +inner voice disappeared with his reason and the strife was brief before +nature came off conqueror." + +I have before this sketched Maria's character development up to the time +when Eisener came into her life. Yet one point may be added. She had +retained one single influence from her childhood in spite of all change +in her seventh year, which "with the beginning of maturity appeared only +occasionally and as it were in secret. The moon had been her dearly +beloved and her desire; as a small child she had been able to look at +the moon for hours without intermission. If she was sick her mother or +nurse must carry her to the window through which she might look upon the +friend of her small soul." About half a year before her acquaintance +with Eisener "the moon had made its influence felt upon her sleep, as it +had before affected her waking. At the time of the full moon she often +left her couch, dressed herself and went up into the corner room in the +pavilion. Here she stood for some time and turned her closed eyes toward +the moon. Then she dropped the curtain, undressed and lay down in the +bed, which stood in the spot where she had been used to sleep as a +child. As soon as the moon had left the windows of this room or shone +through the windows of her present sleeping room, she arose again, +dressed herself and returned. She herself knew nothing of these +wanderings, and whatever was done to awaken her during them was in vain. +The physician thought that these attacks of moon walking would disappear +finally when maturity was established, or at least at her first +confinement." + +In this picture from a layman are some new and striking features. First +is the love--one can call it nothing else--which the child bestows upon +the planet. Why is the moon her beloved and her desire from childhood +up, why can she stand by the hour looking at it, why does she long when +sick to be laid so that she can look at it all the time? He who observes +children knows that such extreme love, which endures for years without +wearying of it, and finally that ability to stare steadily at the moon, +must have a sexual content, although naturally no one will admit this. +Only when the object, in our case the heavenly body, is sexually +stimulating is the love for it enduring for all time, undergoing no +change, no abatement of feeling for it. As Maria's erotism later found +satisfaction in her father, her love toward the moon steadily receded. +But at the entrance upon puberty her sexual impulse increased and she +began to wander in the moonlight. The love finally which Eisener +inspires in her, together with the strong sexual excitement, which the +fête the day before had called forth in her, occasions again an attack, +in which she surrenders herself willingly to the beloved. + +The folk, like the family physician, have not a doubt of the sexual +basis of the moon mania with her as with individuals in general. When +puberty is established or she has a child of her own the attacks will +cease, is the opinion of the latter. The servant maid Grete also, a +living book of fairy tales among her people, explains the moon +wandering as nothing else than the result of an unsatisfied sense +desire. There was a young knight who had wooed a rich woman of gentle +birth. Shortly before midnight they were both led into the bridal +chamber. "Yet hardly were they alone together when a strange voice +outside before the castle called, 'Conrad, come down here! Conrad, come +down here!' And again it called, 'Conrad, come down here!' The voice +sounded so plaintive and at the same time so threatening. The bridegroom +said, 'That is my best friend; he is in need and calls me.' The maiden +said however, 'The voice belongs to my cousin, who was found dead two +years ago.' Then she shuddered so that the gooseflesh stood up over her +whole body," and she implored her bridegroom not to follow the evil +spirit or at least to remain with her until the ghostly hour was past +and the full moon was up. But he would not be restrained: "Be it an evil +spirit or a good, no one shall call me in vain!" "And he went out. The +lady went to the window but could see nothing for the darkness outside +and for the tears in her eyes. Then the haunted hour was over and the +full moon arose and she waited and waited, but the knight never +returned. Thereupon she swore to take no rest on a night when the moon +was full until she had gone to bed with her bridegroom. And as her first +bridegroom never and nevermore came back, so she waited for another, but +there was no one who knew her story who would woo her, because each one +thought it would fare with him as it had fared with that other. Thus she +died; her oath is however still unfulfilled. Whenever it is full moon, +she is looking out to see if any bridegroom comes and she laments +sorely, and holds her hands weeping toward the moon." + +In this folk tale the exclusively sexual foundation of the wandering is +quite plainly expressed. The ghost makes use of a voice, complaining and +threatening at the same time, which the bridegroom believes to be the +call for help of his best friend, and the bride on the other hand +imagines it the voice of her cousin, who had been found dead two years +before, perhaps after she had taken her own life because unhappy in +love. Both may be driven by sexual jealousy--I offer this as a +hypothesis--which would not permit the other sexual gratification which +is denied to himself or herself, the friend perhaps meaning jealousy +from a homosexual tendency. The ghost having accomplished its purpose at +the hour of midnight and in the light of the full moon, the lady swore +"to take no rest on a night when the moon was full until she had gone to +bed with her bridegroom." That is the kernel of the entire myth, the +naïve and yet apparently conclusive folk interpretation of the riddle +of moon walking, at least in its most frequent form. + +I have above taken it for granted that Maria's erotism was satisfied +through her care for her father. That must of course be understood with +some qualification. For she could play the rôle of mother only as +housekeeper, not as wife. The former is satisfying therefore only so +long, until stronger sexual impulses awaken through external stimuli or, +according to rule, through the natural development of a maiden. When +once that has come to pass, one so disposed to it as Maria was, begins +to wander in the moonlight. Why then, it may further be asked, does +Maria seek for her childhood bed, if the goal and the aim of the +wandering is the sexual satisfaction of the maiden? In the case analyzed +at the beginning the compelling motive was a sexual self stimulation +upon the mother, in later years in the loved object whoever it was, male +or female. In most cases, since normal sexual feeling predominates, the +aim of the sleep walking is that of the folk tale, to go to bed with the +lover. That would explain without difficulty the scene of the union in +Maria's case, as soon as she had come to know Eisener. + +But what lay specially at the foundation of her earlier wandering, when +no man had yet made an impression upon her? Or was there perhaps one, in +relation to whom sexuality is most strongly forbidden, her own father? +What if her erotic desire toward him was repressed and the indifference +which she had attained was transferred over to all men? Much that is +apparently harmless is permitted to a child, which would be regarded +with horror in the adult. Many parents like to take their children into +bed early in the morning and play with them without any consciously +sexual thoughts and without suspecting how very often they in this way +stimulate sexual desire in their children. Frequently also the mother or +father visit the child before going to sleep, lean over the bed, allow +themselves often to press the child passionately to themselves and count +this asexual love toward the child. The case analyzed at the beginning +teaches us how much of the grossly sexual erotic is concealed behind +this, even if well hidden. Maria likewise sought presumably in her sleep +walking for the bed of her childhood because her earliest erotism was +bound with it. + +This had already happened under the instigation of puberty, before her +heart had spoken. How is it now since she loves Eisener? We must keep in +mind her unconscious wish, to climb into the bed of the man she loves, +and on the other hand that Maria as housemother knew well that he was +not sleeping alone, but with his friend, so only a compromise form of +action would be possible. So she goes up again to her childhood room, +which lies in the same direction as Eisener's sleeping room. There she +first draws the curtain aside that she may gaze at the moon, which +increases the sexual excitement with her, as I have earlier discussed. +Then she undresses before the mirror as she probably had done as a +child, and moves forward toward the beloved one, who after a brief +struggle with himself embraces her passionately. She nevertheless +submits to his caresses without response but also without resistance. +For thus alone can the fiction be maintained that she has loved without +consciousness of it and therefore also without culpability. It is not +difficult, according to the analysis of the first case, to understand +how she finally at the withdrawal of the moonlight gets up again, +dresses herself before the mirror and leaves the room as noiselessly as +she had entered it. + +The later portions of the narrative must confirm my assumptions if they +are correct, that Eisener merely embraces the mother in Maria and that +she on the other hand knows well enough in the unconscious both as child +and as maiden that she wishes for that which is sexually forbidden and +knows whom she desires. Let us see what the poet tells us. As Eisener +awakes after the bridal night, he is not at all invigorated and uplifted +as otherwise a man in like case, but psychically and physically cast +down, as if he had to atone for some great wrong. "He strove to consider +the strange adventure of this night as the delusion of a fevered dream. +Yet that adventure painted itself before him, in spite of all his effort +to forget it, in ever more vivid colors," because indeed a wish of his +heart had been fulfilled through it. His inner unrest drove him forth +and, as walking about he met his beloved, he marveled "that Maria seemed +taller to him today than yesterday, or rather that he believed that he +first noticed today that she was tall." What could this mean except that +Maria now seemed big to him as once the mother had seemed to the small +boy? Only he had first to embrace his beloved, before he could perceive +such a thing and give heed to it. Maria herself, who apparently had +enjoyed her pleasure only in her sleep and unconsciously, and therefore +knew nothing of it all, had lost her frank manner with him, which she +still possessed the day before. She grew red at his look and drew the +hand which she gave him "quickly back again in confused fear," without +consciously knowing why. "The flower of womanhood which had slumbered +in her too serene, too cold image, appeared in this one night to have +come with magic swiftness to bud and immediately to have unfolded in all +its fragrance." Maria herself pictures her condition: "That morning I +can never forget. Everything was so still, so solemn; the guests were +all yet asleep. I had never been so strong of heart. I felt that morning +as if all my life before had been only a dream and life was now just +beginning. It seemed to me that I had suddenly become grown up and was +now for the first time a child no more." Maria thus felt herself through +the bridal night to have grown up from the child to the mother, only, +now, it was for the lover who had taken the father's place. + +Both Eisener and Maria conducted themselves further entirely in +accordance with their earlier unconscious wishes. The former for example +"found a growing pleasure in representing his own action, when it was +really the effect of many circumstances acting one upon the other, as +the result of a cold, calm calculation on his part." And was it not at +bottom actually something like a calculation, since he in his earliest +childhood phantasies imagined something similar for himself from the +mother? It is only natural that he now greatly exaggerated in +consciousness the sin which he had desired. Never for a moment did it +occur to him "to throw any part of the burden of guilt upon that being +who so closely participated in it. His rightful feeling remained in +regard to it that he had this night given to a woman a right to himself, +which he, if she should demand it, could not dispute. It was a source of +calmness to him to look upon himself as punished, as it were, in this +manner." Only all too evident! This punishment was in reality a +disguised reward, fulfilment of the infantile wish to win the +mother.[24] For this reason he had not been able earlier to withstand +Julie although Maria attracted him far more. For the former was the +indulgent mother of his power of imagination, the latter on the contrary +the proud, unapproachable mother of his real childhood. Moreover, though +he did not conceal from himself that his heart belonged to the chaste +Maria, yet he resolved, if Julie should convince him that she had been +the ghostly visitor, to offer her his hand immediately. "The doubt, +whether she deserved it, which was near enough at hand, he put from him +as an excuse which he wished to make so that he could believe that he +might release himself from that which he had to recognize as his duty." +Maria however "he had in these days accustomed himself to think of as a +being so high above him that his love must profane her." Again the well +known splitting of the mother into the holy and the yielding one. + + [24] Cf. with this also the interesting passage ... "the passionate + self accusations, in torturing himself with which he found comfort a + short time before." + +How did it appear at this time to her, herself? The first weeks after +that moonlight night the woman in her bloomed forth more and more, in +spite of the fact that her lover tarried at a distance. Yet when in her +body a new life began to develop and Eisener still did not appear, she +was seized suddenly with a hysterical convulsion--she was wearing +significantly the same rose-colored dress in which he had seen her that +morning--which lasted twelve hours so that every one looked upon her as +dead. The despairing father threw himself across her feet and lay +there--a situation which will occupy us later--and Eisener, who was just +now returning, was driven by the bitterest self reproaches across the +ocean. After waking from her catalepsy Maria did not regain her former +blooming health but grew more and more ill, which the family physician +finally discovered as the result of her pregnancy. + +"The good girl herself believed at first that what she felt and what +they told her was a vivid troubled dream." This idea will not appear +strange to us who know so much about moon walking and that one does +everything merely "in sleep" in order to remain blameless. "That she +should become a mother seemed to her so strange and wonderful that she +appeared to herself as some one else (this might well read, as her own +mother dead at so early an age) or as suddenly transplanted into another +world with strange people, animals and trees. The sound of her own +voice, the tone of the bells seemed to her as other and strange sounds." +We may bring forward in explanation in this place the case analyzed at +the beginning, where a moon walker had abandoned herself to all sorts of +dreams. In the moon must be living men of another sort with other +feelings, customs and manners, and the sexual, strongly forbidden upon +earth, must be freely permitted upon this planet. She seemed to herself +on account of her sexual phantasies already as a child quite different +from other people, as if she belonged not upon this earth but upon the +moon. Could not a similar thought process have taken place with Maria? + +I said of her father, that he had been her first beloved. And it comes +almost as an unconscious recognition of this when he, filled with anger, +calls out to her mockingly, "Why do you not say that the whole affair +has come to pass out of love to me, to prepare for me an unexpected +joy?" Breitung also enjoyed since her earliest childhood her unlimited +confidence only on this account because he loved her as his own child. +Therefore she looks up with all her anxiety so trustfully and self +confidently to this friend of her father. But when Breitung also no +longer believed in her and her father turned from her with scorn it was +"as if all her blood streamed into her eyes that, pressing out as tears, +it might relieve her. Yet here it remained and pressed upon her brain as +if threatening its fibers. With a strangely fearful haste she pressed +her eyes with her fingers; they remained dry; a cry of pain would +unburden her soul--no sound accompanied the trembling, convulsive +breathing. The old servant, who entered after a while, found her lying +with her breast upon the sofa pillow, her head thrown violently back," +in hysterical opisthotonos. "The old man had loved Maria from her +earliest childhood" and stood accordingly in the place of a father. "He +clasped his hands together in distress. She recognized him and suffered +him patiently to bring her head to a less forced position. She looked at +him sharply as if she would convince herself that he was the one she +took him to be. His Kalmuck features seemed to her as beautiful as the +soul which they hid and seemed to want to disown. + +"The friendliness, the affectionate regard, which spoke so unmistakably +out of the familiar old graybearded, sunburnt face, did her no end of +good." Since she could not yet entirely believe she asked, "Is it indeed +you, Justin? And you will still recognize me? And you do not flee from +me?" At first the deplorable commission which the old man had to carry +out threw her back again. When she had to understand that her father +would not again set foot in the pastor's house until she had departed, +her countenance became deathly pale and convulsive movements trembled in +quick succession over her delicate body so that the old man wept aloud, +for he believed that she had gone mad. His signs of distress, the +faithfulness and love which spoke through them, touched her so +effectually that at last the hysterical convulsion relaxed and she sank +down. "The old man caught her up. He placed her on the sofa. She lay +across his lap; her head lay upon his left hand, with the other he held +her body fast that it should not slip to the floor. It seemed as if she +would weep her whole weary self away. The old servant held her with +trembling hand and heavy heart." Now the scene of childhood is complete, +except that the old man plays the rôle of her father. So had Maria +presumably done as a child when she felt too unhappy and so also the +pastor's throwing himself down, as we saw above, over his daughter whom +he believed dead, is not strange. + +When Maria had left the parsonage her first thought and silent concern +was how her father must now live without her care, even that perhaps he +would not be there any more, when everything had later turned out well. +Then she thought again of the time when she would be a mother and "her +life seemed to her as a tale that is told." On her journey to her new +home there came over her ever more strongly "the feeling of her complete +abandonment. All the dear childhood memories, into whose protection she +would flee, turned in anger from her. With tears she cried to God for a +heart that she might love, some one for whom she might really care. For +it seemed as if a curse lay upon her, which estranged all hearts from +her. She thought with fear at her heart that the being to whom she would +give life might likewise turn from her, as everything had done that she +loved." Then a good fate brings to her the unfortunate Johannes whom his +crazy father wished to throw into the water in order to preserve him for +eternal happiness. At once Maria assumes the rôle of mother toward the +boy and now "that once more she had to care for some one, she was again +the calm and serene being." + +What had so thrown her out of her course? It was not so much the +banishment from the father's house, not the contempt of all the world, +nor even of her very oldest and truest friend. She would have been able +to look beyond both of these, because her consciousness felt itself +entirely blameless. But she took so to herself the truth that she was no +more the loving, caretaking house mother nor might play that part, that +for a brief while she planned to take her life. She prayed to God with +tears for one heart only that she might love, that she might actually +care for. Since the care of her father is taken from her she feels +herself at first truly and utterly forlorn, all the dear memories of +childhood turn in anger from her and a curse seems to rest upon her +soul. + +Why do all the memories of her childhood turn from her, if she actually +knows herself guiltless? Is this merely because the father is +indissolubly bound with them? If she still consciously feels entirely +blameless toward him, and if he openly did her wrong from a false +assumption, then should not the childhood memories return to her? I +think the solution must be sought elsewhere, in this, that Maria knew +nothing in clear consciousness of the happenings of that moonlight night +and could honestly swear to that, but everything was known in the +unconscious. Here is the sense of guilt engendered, of which +consciousness may know nothing, here she knows well enough that the +youthful Eisener has embraced her and she has together with him deceived +the father whom she first loved. The goal of all moon walking is none +other than to be able to enjoy and still be blameless, it is +blamelessness because without accompanying consciousness. + +The poet's words must confirm this, if this assumption is correct. We +will test them. The first night of her banishment Maria, while going to +sleep, thought first of her father "who must go to bed without the +little services which he was accustomed to receive from her." Then she +thought of Breitung and the apothecary's daughter, who had turned from +her full of scorn. "The young Eisener occurred to her in the midst of +this, she knew not how, and a sort of curiosity whether Eisener also +would have turned from her in so unfriendly a fashion as Breitung. She +pictured to herself how he might have looked upon her now with contempt, +now with friendliness, as on that morning which she so gladly +remembered." Also an evident identification of the young Eisener with +the father and the father's friend, and flight from the loved ones who +had cast her off to him who had inclined to her as a friend. + +Yet more convincing is a passage which follows. Maria had born a son and +"the more she looked with joy upon the small infant contemplating his +sound and beautiful body, the more grew the need within her, only +instinctively felt at first, to have some one who could rejoice in the +child with her, not out of mere sympathy with her, but because he had +the same right to it and so that she could rejoice again in his joy, as +he might in hers. Without knowing how and why, she thought again of the +friendly and true hearted Eisener. Her dreams brought his picture before +her eyes in most vivid colors. It seemed as if it were Eisener who +should enjoy the child with her. She hastened to him with tears of joy +to lay the beautiful boy in his arms, and when she now stood by him, she +had scarcely the heart to show him the boy. Then she cast down her eyes +and said confusedly, 'See this beautiful child, Eisener, Sir!'" Maria +knew quite well in the unconscious that she had conceived her child from +Eisener and the sudden restraint when she laid the boy in his arms is +only a compromise with consciousness, which must not know the facts, +otherwise she could not be spared her feeling of guilt. Yes, when Julie +then came with her love child, which she had conceived that same +moonlight night from the hunter, although she really loved Eisener, then +"Maria experienced, she knew not why, a gentle aversion toward her. She +said quietly, 'That in which one has done no wrong and cannot change, +one must bear patiently.'" + +Soon however there awoke a desire in her "for something new, still +unknown to her, which she nevertheless felt must come now. It was the +strange, fearfully sweet condition of the ripeness of love, which had +not yet found the object on which she could open her heart. That night a +need awakened, formerly repressed into the background by greater pain, +but which threatened now to outgrow other desires and feelings in the +undisputed possession of him." Often she sat knitting and dreaming at +the boy's cradle. "There was a fair at Marklinde. She went early in her +rose-colored dress into the garden and plucked wild hedge roses. She was +startled for she heard a noise behind her and she knew that it was +Eisener who was coming after her. She turned into another path; she was +afraid to meet him, and yet she wished that he would follow her. As she +bent low behind some flowers, she threw a hasty look behind her. She +grew rosy because he might have noticed the look, and still it would +have made her glad if he had noticed it. 'Yet if he knew everything,' +she whispered to herself; 'but I could not tell him, nor could I let him +perceive it. I would have to say No, although he understood it as Yes!' +Suddenly he stood near her; he had seized her hand and was looking into +her eyes. She bowed her head, he bent toward her. It seemed so strange +to her--their lips touched--Maria frightened and blushing, sprang +involuntarily from her chair, as if what she was dreaming were real. + +"A strangely mingled feeling drove her from her chair to the window and +from the window back to the chair. She felt herself stirred in her very +depths by something which wounded her sensibility as much as it excited +her longing. She fled to her child. She strove to think of something +else; in vain. That thought continually returned and gradually lost its +frightful character. Soon she felt it only as a sweet dread and so the +idea received a double stimulation while it woke the curious question, +why and for what reason she must really be afraid. And as she looked now +upon the child, it seemed to her so marvellous that she, mother and yet +maiden, knew nothing of the happiness of which this little life must be +the fruit. Julie's words were continually ringing in her ears, 'The +happiness which is granted him, has to be reckoned too dear.' It gave +her unending satisfaction, to think of herself actually in such a +situation to the young Eisener that all her unhappiness was the result +of a joy which she had granted him, without knowing what joy this must +have been." I consider it superfluous to add a word to complete the +interpretation of these phantasies, which speak for themselves. They +confirm everything that I have said above, better than any labored +explanation. Later Maria came to know that what had sustained her in the +hours of her sorrow was nothing else than that mysterious but certain +premonition of a happy life with Eisener and her George. + +And now back to the purpose of the analysis of all these tales. What +does it teach us for the understanding of moon walking? First of all it +confirms many of our earlier conclusions. The most important thing, in +the first place, is that sexual impulses lie at the foundation, desire +for sexual gratification, and that one apparently acts in sleep in order +to escape all culpability, while the unconscious still knows all about +it. The sleep walking begins, in accordance with the sexual basic +motive, at the time of puberty and lasts until it is inhibited by the +close of that period or in women with the birth of the first child. It +is further established that at the beginning the bed of childhood is +sought, the place of earlier sexual pleasures, later however the bed of +the loved object, who appears in the place of the originally loved +object, the parent. Finally, moreover, when the night wanderer fixes his +closed eyes upon the moon before starting out on his wandering, erotic +thoughts hide behind this, which in turn go back to earliest childhood. +The heavenly body effects a sexual excitement not only through its +light, but indeed also through sexual phantasies which are bound with +it. Lastly folk myth knows likewise that the woman in white represents +nothing else than the maiden in her night shift with all her sexual +longings. + +One thing more this novel also confirms, which our earlier discoveries +have already taught us, the abnormal muscle excitability and muscle +erotic. For Maria was seized with a hysterical convulsion when her +father's unkindness pressed itself upon her. It is interesting that this +abnormal muscle excitability, which manifested itself in various +muscular convulsions, was present with Otto Ludwig throughout his +earthly career. Already as a boy he often suffered convulsive muscular +twitchings, when he had exceptional tasks to perform or hard thinking +was required of him, and "nervous twitchings of the head" are recorded +of him when twenty-three years old, also presumably a tic had won for +him the nickname of "the shaker." Later moreover our poet suffered +chronically from convulsive manifestations of a lesser degree, +repeatedly however in a stronger, special form although only in +temporary attacks.[25] + + [25] Cf. with this especially Ernst Jentsch, "Das Pathologische bei + Otto Ludwig," "Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens," published by + L. Löwenfeld, No. 90. + +In other words, it may be said that Ludwig assigns to Maria +and the young Eisener a series of his own personal characteristics. +That is to say, not only was the tendency to convulsive attacks +peculiar to him, but also to fainting, and a compulsive neurotic and +hysterical tendency, the high grade myopia, a fondness for discussing +painting, talking with inanimate things,[26] colored audition, +as well as other synesthesias, and finally a special reverence for his +mother. + + [26] Cf. here the poet's words: "It is strange that nature is + personified for me, that I not only live in her, but as one human + being with another, exchanging, not merely receiving, thoughts and + feelings, and even so, that different places become as individual to + me, distinct from others and, as it were, transformed in + consciousness, so that I not only feel that they effect an influence + upon me but it seems to me as if I work upon them, and the forms, as + they appear to me, show the traces of this influence." Further: "I ... + who stood even in a wonderful mutual understanding with mountain and + flora, because the kingdom of love was not to be restrained...." + + +"BUSCHNOVELLE," by Otto Ludwig. + +The moon plays an important part in the romance just discussed, even +apart from Maria's night wandering, and a number of significant events +take place under its very light. We find this relationship still +stronger in Otto Ludwig's "Buschnovelle," briefly referred to earlier, +which I add here, though it really does not directly treat of our +problems. The heroine Pauline passed with many as moon struck and her +blue eyes "have a strange expression of their own. They gaze as aliens +upon this world, as angels, which, transplanted to our marvelous earth, +belong to the heavenly home and cannot find themselves amid this +confused and agitated humanity." Likewise his bride asserts of the count +that he knows no other recreation "than to climb about in the night over +the rocks and worship the moon." This perhaps gave occasion to the rumor +of a ghost or at least breathed new life into an old tale. + +A prince was banished under an enchantment to the rocks of the gods. He +had "a face as of a person twenty years old or so, but pale and quite +transparent like moonlight, and he could be rescued only through a +maiden eighteen years old and as innocent as when she came from the +mother's womb." The count, whom his bride deceived, became very +melancholy over it and trusted no woman after this. He learned to know +and love Pauline upon the rocks of the gods, where he was accustomed to +wander in the moonlight. When she believed she saw in him the enchanted +prince and declared her intention of voluntarily rescuing him, he +stipulated that she must climb down from off the rocks, down from the +cross, without touching them with her hands but holding her arms toward +the full moon. "And that must take place tomorrow night when the moon is +sailing overhead, otherwise I must remain enchanted. When you shall have +climbed down the rocks, I shall be saved and then I will make you my +princess." One may read afterward from the poet how Pauline then carried +out her resolve--her determination alone, sprung evidently from a great +love, had already cured the count of his sadness--how the count saved +her and later wooed her. + +Emphasis will be laid here merely upon two facts, first that not only +all important events happen in the light of the full moon, but that also +no other novel shows so many autobiographical features. The most recent +publisher of this tale, Heinrich Borcherdt, gives this explanation: "One +can recognize without much trouble in the portrait of the count with his +well-trimmed beard the poet himself, who at that time tended to great +seriousness and to melancholy. For this very reason the cheerfulness, +gaiety and unrestrained naturalness of his bride Emilie worked most +refreshingly upon him. Pauline in the tale exercised a similar influence +upon the count. What we know of Emilie Ludwig from without agrees +likewise with the picture of Pauline. Pauline's father suggests Emilie's +father.... The greatest weight will be laid upon the fact that we +possess in this work a poetic glorification of Otto Ludwig's love +happiness in Triebischtal. The rural life is reproduced in every +detail." Nothing unfortunately is reported in the different sketches of +his life whether and how far the poet and his bride allowed themselves +to be influenced by the light of the full moon. The striking fact +remains at any rate that twice in the course of two years he spun out +this theme and each time moreover with a strongly autobiographical note. +That cannot be sufficiently explained merely through the influence of +Tieck, whom he, to be sure, read diligently in his youth. + + +"LEBENSMAGIE, WIRKLICHKEIT UND TRAUM," by Theodor Mundt ("Life's Magic, +Reality and Dream"). + +In the seventh volume of the "Euphorion" Richard M. Meyer has exhumed a +probable source of Ludwig's "Maria." It is a fictitious tale of the +"young German" Theodor Mundt, which appeared in his collection +"Charaktere und Situationen" in 1837, five years before the "Maria," and +shows in fact some external similarities with this. Still Otto Ludwig +expressly acknowledges a tale told by a friend as the source, but gives +no syllable of mention to Mundt. I must say that it seems at least very +questionable that the latter's story was the model, although the Berlin +literary historian comes to the conclusion, "A direct utilization would +be here difficult to dispute." I will reproduce the contents of this +story, as far as it touches our problems, as closely as possible in the +words of Mundt, although this story, which is contained in the +collection mentioned under the separate title of "Lebensmagie, +Wirklichkeit und Traum," hardly possesses an artistic value. + +The theological student Emil Hahn had, as one of his friends states, +"lost life itself over his books and before his merry companions, who +would have initiated him into the true enjoyment of existence, crowed +many a moral cock-a-doodle-doo of virtue and self restraint." On the +ride home to his father and foster sister Rosalinde he was urged by two +student acquaintances to a little drinking bout, at which he partook of +more wine than was good for him. The two comrades sang the praises of +Rosalinde, whom Hahn had left as a fourteen year old girl and who in the +two years of separation had blossomed out in full beauty. As Hahn +returned to the father's house in a half intoxicated state and met +Rosalinde in an adjacent room, he found at once, in contrast to his +shyness of former times, the courage to approach her. "Ardently and +daringly he embraced her and the passionate kiss which he impressed upon +her maidenly lips was followed, as one lightning flash succeeds another, +by a second more lingering one, which was reluctant to leave off." After +he had for some time, again quite contrary to his custom, held his own +place at the large party which his father was giving that very evening, +"he felt himself gradually seized with weariness and the lively and +excited mood, to which the wine he had enjoyed had awakened him, began +little by little to disappear with the intoxication. He made his adieus +in a dejected tone and betook himself with heavy, hanging head to his +room, there to recover himself through sleep, which he could no longer +withstand because of his painful state. + +"It was late in the night when Emil sprang from his bed. A vivid dream +seemed to have confused and frightened him. He stood half clothed in +the middle of his room and stared straight ahead as if trying to +recollect himself. Above in the night sky glowed the full round moon +with a sharp ray seldom seen and its white silver light pierced directly +over the head of the youth walking in his sleep. The room gleamed +brightly in the moonbeams trembling with mystery, which had spun +themselves out in long, glimmering threads over floor and ceiling. Emil +had fastened his eyes upon the great disk of the moon and staggered with +uncertain steps to the window to open it." While he stood thus there +came a small snow white cat--the cat is well known as a favorite animal +of the romantic writers--and spoke to him: "I am come to congratulate +you on your bridal night. Yes, yes, I know well that you are married. +This is a beautiful night to be married. The moon shoots down right +warmly, and its strong shining stings the blood and we cats also feel +the impulses stirring in the whispering May night. Happy one, you who +are married! Married to Rosalinde!" + +"Emil, distracted, clasped his forehead. Everything which he saw about +him appeared to him changed and even the inanimate things in his +vicinity seemed in this moment to have been drawn into a magic alliance. +Everything, the very table, chair, press looked at him, rocking +themselves saucily in the bright moonlight, personally and familiarly, +and had to his eyes, arms and feet to move about, mouths to speak with, +senses for communication. At the same time a fair picture rose before +the youth deep out of the bottom of his heart, at which he smiled +longingly. It was the recollection of Rosalinde and her matured beauty. +She passed like a burning, ominous dream through his soul and he felt +himself drunken, trembling, exultingly united with the proud but now +subdued maiden in a love thrilled bridal night. While he was thus lost +in thought his look was held chained by a painting, which hung on the +wall opposite him. Strange, it was Rosa's portrait and he knew not +whether this picture had just now arisen warm with life merely out of +the force of the idea which was kindling him, or whether it had actually +been formed over there in its golden frame by a painter's hand." Then +the cat mewed again: "That is your young wife Rosalinde. The moonbeam +chases her; see how its brightness kisses her temples unceasingly. The +young woman is queen on her bridal night. We will crown her, all we who +are here in this room and owe our life to the brightness of the +moonlight night, we will crown her. I present her for her bridal crown +burning, tender desires." Then the May blossoms in the room bestirred +themselves and conferred upon her the bloom of fond innocence for her +bridal crown. Also the bird in the cage made himself understood: "I give +her for her bridal crown the score of my latest melody. Harmony and +melody should be the dower of all young brides." Finally a cockchafer +also which flew in offered her for her bridal crown "a pair of lovely +crickets." + +"The dreaming Emil, surrounded by these fairy treasures of the May +night, stood in sweet intoxication opposite the glowing picture, bathed +in moonlight, of the maiden to whom all this homage belonged. The longer +and the more vividly he pictured to himself and leaned toward all the +maidenly charms, which had allowed the first passionate wish in the +young man's phantasy to blaze up, the more an impatience, almost +consuming, pounding, benumbing his heart, seized him, which he did not +know how to explain and had never felt before in his life. Like a +seductively sweet poison the delusion imparted itself secretly to him +that Rosalinde was his bride, his wife, and that this wondrously +beautiful spring night, bright with moonlight, was his wedding night. +His heart swelled with mighty, growing desire, youthful passion breathed +high in him. Trembling, fearful, wavering, longing, he still felt +himself strangely happy. + +"Then it seemed to him that Rosalinde's picture began to move, as if the +gleaming shoulders lifted themselves gradually and gently at first from +it. Then the delicate outline of the bosom rose as the lovely form came +forth, the face streaming with love bowed itself in modest shame before +him. The form grew larger, rose to full beauty, stretched itself to life +size. Smiling, beckoning, gazing at him full of mystery, promising favor +and happiness, she took some steps toward him, then fled back again +ashamed and as if frightened, floated away with sylphlike movements to +the door and remained hidden behind it, yet peeping and looking out at +the youth. + +"He did not know if he should, if he might follow her. He was drawn +powerfully after her and yet he stood still and hesitated. The bright +moonlight seemed, like a fairy toward one enchanted, to make merry at +the loud anxious beating of his heart. He restrained himself no longer; +with a passionate movement he hastened with open arms to the beloved +apparition, desiring to embrace her, throw himself upon her bosom, +breathe out upon her his burning desire. She fled, he followed her. She +fled before him, but softly and alluringly and he, intoxicated, rushed +after her from room to room unable to overtake the form flitting on +with ghostly swiftness. Like a star drawing him onward she floated there +before him, his footsteps were as if bewitched by her running, and thus +she led him after her, on and on, through a succession of rooms, so that +he marveled and thought himself wandering about in a great, unfamiliar +enchanted palace. + +"At last he saw her no more, the lovely picture had suddenly disappeared +from him. He must however still hasten and hasten, there was no rest for +him. He no longer knew himself what he was seeking and what he hoped to +find. But now he ran upon a door; it opened and he entered a small, cosy +room in which stood a white bed. Seized with a strange apprehension the +youth drew back the curtains with bold hand, and looked, astonished, +smiling, burning with bliss. There lay a beautiful maiden asleep and +dreaming--ah! it was Rosalinde herself. In the sweet forgetfulness of +sleep, unveiling herself like the outblown petals of a rosebud, she +revealed her most secret charms in lovely fulness to the eye of night. +Emil stood before her in the dear delusion of aroused passion and bent +over her. 'Is not tonight my bridal night?', thought he. He reflected +and the hot tumult of exulting senses tore him irresistibly. Then he +flung himself passionately into her arms, pressed his mouth to her mouth +in yearning kisses and clung closer and closer to the warm, living +delight of her charming form. He dared the boldest work of love. The +sleeper did not oppose the daring beginning; in the power of a dream, +like him, according to the myth, whom the chaste Luna had seized, she +seemed at first to yield softly to the seductive moment. Only a glowing +color suffused the tender cheek, a gentle halting exclamation breathed +through the half open lips. The bright light of the full moon shone on +high with its trembling beams directly over the couch of the maiden. + +"Now, now however she awakes from the strange troubled dream. She opens +her eyes, she shakes her beautiful head as if she would free herself +from the fetters of a dark enchantment. With a loud outcry she beholds +herself actually in the young man's arms and sees alas! that she has not +dreamed it. Wildly with all the strength of horror she pushes him from +her, springs up and stands wringing her hands distracted before him, her +fluttering hair only half disclosing her frightened countenance. Then +she calls him by name in a tone indescribably piercing, painfully +questioning, 'Emil!' He in turn, hearing himself called by name, falls +at the same moment with a faint sigh swooning to the floor. After a +pause he raises himself up, rubs his eyes and looks wonderingly about +him. He cannot comprehend how he has come here. The influence of the +moon has permitted the poor night wanderer to experience this adventure. +When he was completely awake and had come to himself, he stood up and +began to think over his situation. Then his eye fell astonished upon +Rosalinde, who continued to stare at him speechless and immovable. Shame +and anger adorned with a deep glowing color the injured maiden, whose +virgin whiteness had been sullied by the strange events of this night. A +dark, frightening recollection of what had taken place flashed now like +a remote, faded dream into Emil's consciousness. The alluring spirits of +the night, which had buzzed around him, now mockingly stripped from him +the deceitful mask. + +"'Go, go, go!' called Rosalinde finally, who could no longer bear his +look. 'Go!' she called and stretched out her hand with a passionate +movement toward him, as if she would with it jerk a reeking dagger from +her breast. 'Go, go!' she repeated, sobbing and beseeching. Then she hid +her aching head with a loud outbreak of tears. Emil slipped away +heartbroken and in despair. He was in such a state, when he reached his +own room, that he would have put a ball through his head, had there been +at that moment a pistol at hand." How Rosalinde then became pregnant and +in spite of her resistance toward Emil, still married him to reëstablish +her honor, how though after the wedding feast two acquaintances of the +young husband, whom he had not invited, played him so mischievous a +trick that he lost his reason in consequence, that deserves no further +rendering. + +We find here also as the nucleus of moon walking, when we strip from the +foregoing all its mystical setting, the longing to approach the love +object and there to be able to indulge oneself without punishment +because it is done unconsciously. The literary historian Richard M. +Meyer regards it quite correctly: "Theodor Mundt believed that he had +emphasized something new in his way of presenting it. 'The influence of +the moon had caused the night wanderer to undergo this adventure.'" To +be sure Mundt attributes all sorts of mystical-romantic rubbish to the +action of the heavenly body. + + +"DER PRINZ VON HOMBURG," by Heinrich von Kleist. + +Heinrich von Kleist also like Ludwig carried night wandering and moon +walking into material at hand. We know that Kleist not long before the +origin of the "Prinz von Homburg" under Schubert's influence occupied +himself very much with the "night side of the natural sciences" and +Wukadinovic has made it also apparent that the poet went still deeper, +back to one of Schubert's sources, to Reil's "Rhapsodien über die +Anwendung der psychischen Kurmethode auf Geisteszerrüttungen."[27] There +he found a number of features which he then interwove into his drama, +although by no means all that he permitted his moonstruck hero to do. +The matter of the drama is presumably so well known that I content +myself here with giving the mystical setting and the beginning and end +of the action. + + [27] "Rhapsodies over the Employment of the Psychical Method of + Treatment for Mental Disturbances." See Critical Historical Review by + W. A. White, Journ. Nerv. and Ment. Dis., Vol. 43, No. 1. [Tr.] + +Wearied with a long ride, the Prince von Homburg throws himself down to +sleep that he may obtain a little rest before the great battle in which +he is about to engage. In the morning when they seek the leader they +find him sitting on a bench in the castle park of Fehrbellin, whither +the moonlight had enticed the sleep walker. He sits absorbed with bared +head and open breast, "Both for himself and his posterity, he dreams the +splendid crown of fame to win." Still further, the laurel for this crown +he himself must have obtained during the night from the electoral +greenhouse. The electress thinks, "As true as I'm alive, this man is +ill!" an opinion in which the princess Natalie concurs. "He needs the +doctor." But Hohenzollern, his best friend, answers coolly, "He is +perfectly well. It is nothing but a mere trick of his mind." + +Meanwhile the prince has finished winding the wreath and regards it +idly. Then the elector is moved to see how far the former would carry +the matter and he takes the laurel wreath out of his hand. "The prince +grows red and looks at him. The elector throws his necklace about the +wreath and gives it to the princess; the prince stands up roused. The +elector withdraws with the princess, who holds up the wreath; the prince +follows her with outstretched arms." And now he betrays his inmost wish, +"Natalie! my girl, my bride!" In vain the astonished elector, "Go, away +with you!" for the prince turns also to him, "Friedrich, my prince, my +father!" And then to the electress, "O my mother!" She thinks +wonderingly, "Whom is it he thus names?" Yet the prince reaches after +the laurel wreath, saying, "Dearest Natalie! Why run away from me?" and +really seizes her gloves rather than the wreath. The elector however +disappearing with his retinue behind the gates calls to him: + + "Away, thou prince of Homburg, get thee back, + Naught here for thee, away! The battle's field + Will be our meeting place, when't pleases thee! + No man obtains such favors in his dreams!" + +"The prince remains standing a moment with an expression of wonder +before the door, then pondering descends from the terrace, laying his +hand, in which he holds the glove, before his forehead, turns as soon as +he is below and looks again toward the door." Out of this state the +Hohenzollern returning awakens him. At the word "Arthur" the moonstruck +prince collapses. "No better could a bullet have been aimed." Afterward +of course he makes up some story in regard to his sleep walking, that he +had slipped into the garden on account of the great heat. Only the +princess's glove recalls to him what has happened in his sleep: + + "What is this dream so strange that I have dreamed? + For all at once, with gold and silver gleaming, + A royal castle flung its portals wide. + While from the marble terraced heights above + Thronged down to me the happy dancers all; + Among them those my love has held most dear. + Elector and electress, and--who is the third? + --What name to call her?" + +For the name of the princess there is amnesia, as well as for the reason +for his moon walking. Then he continues: + + "And he, the elector, with brow of mighty Zeus, + A wreath of laurel holds within his hand. + And pressing close before my very face + Plucks from his neck the chain that's pendant there. + His hand outstretched he sets it on my locks, + My soul meanwhile enkindled high." + +Now again the complete forgetting of the loved one's name. He can only +say: + + "High up, as though to deck the brow of fame, + She lifts the wreath, on which the necklace swings, + To crown a hero, so her purpose seems. + With eager movement I my hands outstretch, + No word, mere haste to seize it in my grasp. + Down would I sink before her very feet. + Yet, as the fragrance over valleys spread + Is scattered by the wind's fresh blowing breath, + Along the sloping terrace flees the throng. + I tread the ramp--unending, far away + It stretches up to heaven's very gate, + I clutch to right, I clutch to left, and fear + No one of all the treasures to secure, + No one of all the dear ones to retain. + In vain--the castle's door is rudely closed; + A flash of brightness from within, then dark, + The doors once more swing clatteringly together. + And I awaking hold within my hand + Naught but a glove, alas! as my reward, + Torn from the arm of that sweet dream caught form + A glove, ye Gods of power, only this!" + +It is evident that there is complete memory of the latter part of his +night wandering up to the name of the beloved maiden, although he +thinks, "One dumb from birth to name her would be able!" Only once, when +he was dreaming by himself, he was on the way toward recollecting the +repressed name. He turns even to the Hohenzollern: + + "I fain would ask you, my dear friend, + The electress, her fair niece, are they still here + The lovely princess of the House of Orange, + Who lately had arrived at our encampment?" + +But he was cut off briefly by his friend, "Eh, what! this long while +they've been gone." The same friend had however to explain in detail +later, when he appeared before the elector in behalf of the prince +condemned to death: + + "When I awoke him and his wits he gathered, + A flood of joy the memory roused in him; + In truth, no sight more touching could you find! + At once the whole occurrence, like a dream + He spread before me, drawn with finest touch. + So vivid, thought he, have I never dreamed.-- + And firmer still within him grew belief + On him had Heaven a favoring sign bestowed; + With all, yes all his inner eye had seen, + The maiden, laurel crown and noble jewels, + Would God reward him on the battle's day." + +We see here plainly that the kernel of the supposed dream belonging to +the night wandering is wish fulfilment, desire for glory and the hand +of the beloved. It agrees very well with this conception that the prince +himself takes the laurel from the gardener's forcing house to wind a +wreath of honor for himself. He looks at it with admiring eyes and puts +it upon himself, playing the rôle of being beloved, only the elector and +Natalie come in to interfere. The princess and the laurel, also love and +fame really hypnotize him and draw him magnetically. The prince follows +them both with outstretched arms until the elector and Natalie disappear +behind the gates. It seems to me very significant that not long before +the creation of this drama a crowning with laurel at the hands of a +loved one had actually taken place in the life of the poet and that, as +it is now generally admitted, Kleist himself stood as the model of the +prince. "Two of the smallest, daintiest hands in Dresden," as Kleist +relates, crowned him with laurel at a soirée in the house of the +Austrian ambassador after the preliminary reading of the "Zerbrochenen +Kruges." ("The Broken Pitcher.") These daintiest hands belonged to his +beloved Julie Kunze, to whom Dame Rumor said he was engaged. Wukadinovic +defines quite correctly the connection of the drama with its +autobiographical meaning: "As the poet sees the ideal of love arising +next to that of poetic fame, so he grants to the ambitious prince, who +exhibits so many of his own traits, a loving woman standing at his side, +who rewards him at the close with the wreath." + +The matter goes yet much deeper. The prince says of the elector: "Plucks +from his neck the chain that's pendant there.... My soul meanwhile +enkindled high." The laurel attains a further value for the prince, +because the elector binds his own necklace about it. The latter is +continually taken by Homburg as the father, to which a number of verses +testify. Since the prince unmistakably stands for the poet, it cannot be +denied that Kleist had desired the reward not only from the beloved one, +but this still more with the express concurrence of the father. In the +beginning to be sure he is repulsed by him, "Naught here for thee, +away!" and later on account of his disobedience is even condemned to +death.[28] He was not only pardoned, however, after he had acknowledged +his wrong and recognized the father's judgment as correct, but when he +believed his last hour had struck, he was bedecked with the wreath which +he desired and on which moreover his elector's chain hangs. Still +further, the latter, the father himself, extends the laurel to Natalie +and leads the beloved to him. It is beyond question that love is the +chief motive of the moon walking of the prince von Homburg, love to a +woman as well as a homosexual tendency otherwise authenticated in the +case of Kleist. Only it appears here closely amalgamated with desire for +fame, something completely unerotic, and with the sexual, as we have +found it so far regularly in night wandering and moon walking, quite +excluded. + + [28] It is significant to compare here the Consul Brutus, who + permitted the execution of his sons. + +We will attempt to get more light on the last two points. The striving +after poetic fame does not remain with our poet within the usual, normal +limits but becomes much more a peculiar neurotic characteristic. No less +a hope for instance had Heinrich von Kleist than with an unheard of +creation to strike at Sophocles, Shakespeare and Goethe and concerning +the last named he uttered this audacious sentiment, "I will rend the +crown from his brow!" Since he fails to attain this goal in spite of +repeated most earnest onslaughts, he rushes away to die upon the +battlefield. He writes to his sister, however, "Heaven denies me fame, +the greatest of earthly possessions; I fling back to it all else like a +self willed child!" + +What lay in truth behind that unattainable goal that Kleist tried again +and again to carry by force? He himself confesses that it was not the +highest poetic art or at least not exclusively so. Otherwise Kleist +would have been able to content himself with his so commanding talent +and with that which he was able to accomplish with it, like so many +other great poets. Let us not forget that he sought to outdo especially +the three greatest. Therefore I think, in accordance with all my +psychoanalytic experience, that Sophocles, Shakespeare and Goethe are +together only father incarnations, that Kleist thus wanted to remove the +father from the field. One has a right to definite surmisings on the +basis of various works of Kleist, although nothing is known to us of the +poet's relations to his parents. The incest motive is one of the chief +determining factors of artistic creation, as Rank has outlined in his +beautiful book.[29] It is in the first place the desired and striven for +incest with the mother herself, in the way of which the father naturally +stands. The poet realizes in the freer land of poetry what is impossible +in life, by displacing it over a discovered or given material. + + [29] Otto Rank, "Das Inzest-Motiv in Dichtung und Sage," 1912, Franz + Deuticke. + +I discussed in a larger work,[30] previous to Rank's book, how Heinrich +von Kleist made the incest phantasies of his childhood the foundation of +many poems. So for instance the Marquise von O., assaulted in a fainting +fit, is protected from the foe pressing upon her by some one who loves +her and will subsequently surely marry her. I need hardly explain that +the evil one who will positively force himself upon her is the father, +from whom the son defends the mother, that he may subsequently woo her. +It is again only the poet himself who sets himself as a youthful ideal +god in place of the aging father, as Jupiter descended from his throne +renewed in beauty and youth according to his divine power, to visit +Alcmene in the form of her spouse Amphitryon. In the "Zerbrochenen Krug" +(Broken Pitcher) the judge breaks violently into the room of the beloved +one--a typical symbol for one's own father who is also in fact the +child's first judge--and is driven out by the rightful lover. + + [30] "Heinrich von Kleist. Eine pathographisch-psychologische Studie," + 1910, J. F. Bergmann. + +The objection need not be made that the poet has simply held to his +pattern. The choice of material betrays the purpose, which frequently +remains unconscious. What, we may say, impelled the poet although he +wished to translate it wholly, to take up Molière's Amphitryon, one of +his weakest productions too, and then change it in so striking a +fashion? Quite unlike the French version, Jupiter becomes for Kleist the +advocate with the wife-mother: + + "What I now feel for thee, Alcmene dearest, + Ah, see! it soars far, far beyond the sun, + Which even a husband owes thee. + Depart, beloved, flee from this thy spouse, + And choose between us, either him or me. + I suffer with this shameful interchange, + The thought to me is all unbearable, + That this vain fellow's been received by thee, + Whose cold heart thinks he holds a right o'er thee. + Oh! might I now to thee, my sweetest light, + A being of another sort appear, + Thy conqueror since the art to conquer thee + Was taught me by the mighty gods." + +In truth Kleist, like every other poet, chose the most of his material +in accordance with unconscious wishes, where beyond all else the mother +complex presses for poetic expression. + +Let us apply once more that which has been so far discovered to the +"Prinz von Homburg." This is rendered yet more easy from the fact that +the electress is repeatedly designated by the hero as "Mother." His real +mother had indeed at her death delivered him over to the friend of her +youth with the words: "Be a mother to him when I am no longer here." And +the electress had answered in similar strain, "He shall be mine as if my +own in birth!" But since on the other hand Natalie also addresses her +repeatedly as Mother as she does the elector as Father, so Natalie is +Kleist's beloved sister in disguise. The poet would desire the laurel +wreath thus from his own sister. Why then the father's acquiescence? If +we now appeal to our psychoanalytic experience, this teaches us that +regularly the sister incest represents a later form of the older and +more serious mother incest. The boy, who first desires the mother, +satisfies himself later with the less forbidden and more easily +accessible sister. All poets follow very significantly this +psychoanalytically established relationship, as Rank[31] has recently +convincingly shown. The poets often represent this, that the phantasies +and wishes are displaced from the mother to the sister or they are split +up between mother and sister, which then makes their origin especially +clear. + + [31] _L. c._ + +The latter is also the case with Kleist in the "Prinz von Homburg." He +takes for the mother he desires, at one time the electress, at another +time Natalie, "his girl, his bride."[32] It agrees strikingly also that +the prince in the fear of death expects to be saved only by the +electress, that is the mother, from the punishment with which the +elector father threatens him. So a child who knows no way out for +himself, no help any more, flees to his mother. Such an unusual, +shocking fear of death on the part of a field officer needs explanation. +It is nothing else than the child's fear in face of the stern parent. It +is further overdetermined in an infantile way. In the drama the prince +for a long time does not believe in the grim seriousness of his +position. The elector father will only put him to the test. The sudden +transition to frantic fear follows first when the friend informs him +that Natalie has sent back the addresses carried by the ambassador, +because she is betrothed to the latter. This would have so roused the +elector against him. From this time on the prince--and the poet--holds +everything as possible and is ready to sacrifice even the hand of the +beloved for his life. + + [32] It is now plainly understood that the prince can name among the + dear ones who appear to him the elector and the electress, that is his + mother, but not the third, who is merely a split-off from the latter, + at bottom identical with her. + +A second determination likewise is not wanting, which is also infantile. +Freud has shown in the "Interpretation of Dreams" that the child does +not at all connect the ideas of older people with the words "death" and +"to die." He knows neither the terror nor the shuddering fear of the +eternal nothingness. To be dead means to him merely to be away, gone +away, no longer to be disturbed in his wishes. For his slight experience +has already taught him one thing, dead people, as perhaps the +grandparents, do not come back. From this it is only a step that the +child sometimes wishes death to his father, when the latter disturbs +him. Psychoanalysis tells us that this is not perhaps a shocking +exception but a matter of everyday occurrence. Such thoughts are touched +upon in the "Prinz von Homburg." The false report has come that the +elector father has been shot and Natalie laments, "Who will protect us +from this world of foes?" Then is the prince ready on the spot to offer +his hand to the orphaned girl, also apparently to her mother. A child +wish comes to fulfilment, the setting aside of the father who interferes +with his plans for the mother. When the man believed to be dead +nevertheless returns, he pronounces, as we can understand, the sentence +of death upon his treacherous son. Only when the latter had acknowledged +the justice of the sentence--I might almost have said, after he had asked +forgiveness, is he not only pardoned but more than that recompensed, +while now the father voluntarily grants him his wish. + +It seems to me significant that Kleist freely introduced into his drama +the complete condemnation to death as well as night wandering and moon +walking. In the first point he had turned tradition quite to its +opposite. In the original the great Friedrich relates that on the +triumphant battle field the elector has already forgiven the prince that +he had so lightly risked the welfare of the whole state: "If I had +judged you according to the stern martial law, you would have forfeited +your life. But God forbid that I should sully the brightness of this day +by shedding the blood of a prince, who was once the foremost instrument +of my victory." Personal reasons, and, as we know from psychoanalysis, +these are always infantile reasons, must have been involved when Kleist +incorporated this directly into his poetry and yet in so striking a +fashion. Some of these reasons I have been able to set forth above. + +It is now clear that the apparently asexual desire for fame does not +lack its erotic foundation. The desire for fame is so greatly +exaggerated in Heinrich von Kleist that he will do no less than tear the +laurel from Goethe's forehead, because in his infantile attitude he +hopes through an unheard of poetic activity to supplant the father with +the mother. After the shipwreck of his masterpiece, the Guiskard +material, he longed for death because life had no more value for him, +but he finds later in the "Prinz von Homburg" a happier solution. For +not only does the mother herself now crown him but does it with the +father's affectionate blessing. And the old theme of night wandering and +moon walking, that is climbing into bed with the loved one, finds its +place here although in an opposite form and under a certain sexual +repression. The child does not come to the mother but she to him and +places the longed for crown upon his head even with the concurrence of +the father. Also the fact that the prince transgresses the elector's +commands as the result of his moon walking, to which the prince is +subject, must somehow, at least by analogy, have been created from the +poet's own breast. Nothing is said about this in regard to Kleist, of +whose inner life we know so little. Yet his very great interest in +noctambulism and similar "night sides of the human soul," as well as his +exceptional understanding of the same, show that he at least must have +possessed a disposition toward it. It should be emphasized once more in +conclusion that the moon walking in the "Prinz von Homburg" does not +lack the infantile sexual root, nor is the corresponding erotic purpose +wanting, which we have always found, heretofore, to come to the loved +one without being held responsible. + + +"DAS SÜNDKIND," by Ludwig Anzengruber. + +"Das Sündkind" ("The Sin Child") by Anzengruber (in the first volume of +his "Dorfgänge") tells of an apparently non-sexually colored wandering +by moonlight. There a 45-year-old pitch worker, the mother of twelve +children, who had all died except the narrator, and for three years a +widow, had become pregnant with a "sin child" whose father no one would +acknowledge himself. She had always been a discreet woman, and was +almost equal to her son in her work, although he at thirty years old was +at the height of his manly strength. She had always been as exemplary in +love as in her work, a combination, as we know, not rare to find. Having +matured early she was with her first child at the age of fifteen and +when she was a widow "the people could not wonder enough how long it +would be before she showed her age." Not rarely "love" suddenly overcame +her and even toward her grown son she could occasionally make quite "God +forbidden" eyes. One might almost draw the conclusion from the following +circumstance that he also was more deeply dependent on the mother than +he might acknowledge to himself. Left alone with her during her +confinement, he was not able to look at her but drummed on the window +pane and became more and more confused although "God knows, there was no +call for it." Then he turned around with his face burning red and said, +"You ought to be ashamed, Mother, you ought to be ashamed!" Soon however +not only remorse seized him but he began to curse at the folk, who see +in the infant not his brother but only the "child of sin." "Do you think +for a moment that I would bear a grudge against the little innocent +worm? Curse you, anyone who would separate the children of one mother +from each other!" After he had lost the love of his youth in earlier +years, he had no more interest in women but dwelt with his mother alone +on the land which belonged to the family. Later Martin toiled early and +late for the illegitimate child Poldl, as if he were its true father, +for whom moreover he never might make inquiry. + +When Poldl was perhaps sixteen years old, his mother's health began to +fail and with her anxiety at approaching death she began to be concerned +for her soul, which she, according to human custom, expressed as care +for her illegitimate child. He should dedicate himself to the Lord, +should become a clergyman, by which he would remain spotless. Martin, +with keen insight, thought thus, "That is indeed the easiest way to get +rid of one's own sin, to let some one else atone for it" and feared it +might go hard with Poldl, hot blooded by inheritance, but he had no +effect upon the mother, who was supported by the boy's guardian. Poldl +also did not permit himself simply to be talked of by her, but applied +himself ever more deeply to his future sacred calling, especially since +all the people of the place already paid court to him as if he were even +now an ordained clergyman. "Soon he had no other thought than of his +future holy office and he might stay or go where he would, for nothing +was for him too good or too bad to remind him of it." "He strolled about +one entire summer," Martin tells us, "and did not condescend to the +least bit of work but when I was out with the farm hands making hay in +the meadows or reaping in the field, it very often happened that he +rushed unexpectedly out of the bushes and began preaching to them. This +seemed quite right to the lazy folk, they would let their work lie and +would stand gathered about him and listen devoutly to him and I could +not take ill their so excessive piety. The mother thought as they did +and found that his absurd preaching there went straight to her heart." + +We will stop here a moment. What drove Poldl so to the priestly +calling, what made him so intent upon it? We might mention in passing +the vanity and the high sense of importance, which is created by the +desire in the sixteen year old boy after the most reverend calling. Yet, +though I would in no way undervalue his ambition or the satisfaction of +a so pleasantly tickled vanity, yet decisive and determining these can +scarcely be. Strong motives must govern in order to explain more +completely such an impulsion. When Poldl strode over the fields and +began to preach, "At that time the Lord Jesus spoke to the disciples ...," +then he was indeed not far from conceiving himself as the Holy One and +his mother as the Virgin Mary. Jesus had offered himself for the sins +of man, as he now for the sin of his mother. According to this it is +nothing else than his love to the mother which drives him to the sacred +office, in which it is not to be forgotten that such a love, which leads +to a thought obsession, is in the light of experience never without the +erotic. + +This mingling of sensuality and love to the mother, and to an older +woman who could be his mother, shows itself still more clearly two years +later, when he has a holiday from the seminary for a few days. He finds +at home a buxom picture of a woman, a relative on a visit, almost twice +as old as he, the very essence of cheeriness and health. "The boy clung +closest to her. In spite of his eighteen years he still seemed childish +enough and this he turned to account, and 'played the calf with her,'" +to use the excellent word of the writer. + +Six years later Poldl was appointed to assist an invalid vicar, in whose +home a regular vicar's cook kept house with her sixteen year old girl, +whom she had from the old vicar. In the same year Poldl's mother was +laid to rest and her son appeared at her funeral, where the robust +peasant girls and maidens pressed themselves upon him. But he "withdrew +shyly from every one of them and gave his hand to no one, as he +obligingly might have done. He has always before this appeared like milk +and blood," thought Martin, the anxious one, "now he has an unhealthy +look, no color, sunken cheeks, and his eyes are deep within, he stares +at the ground and cannot bear to have a stranger look at him. It does +not please me." + +All this is clear and transparent to the physician. In the young man now +twenty-four years old the inherited blood began to make itself felt, and +at the same time the cook and her daughter let no stimulus be wanting. +He suffered under his self restraint, grew pale and hollow and because +only his actions remained chaste but not his thought, he could no more +look freely upon a woman. When he now preached in the pulpit, he spoke +of the devil as the tempter and of all his evil suggestions. He could +declare what evil thoughts come to a man and in closing he threatened +his flock most earnestly that the devil would carry them all away +together. We know well that no sins are more condemned than those which +one holds himself capable of committing or which one would himself most +gladly commit if only one dared. + +The young priest owed it to a great love which he felt for the miller's +daughter that he kept himself pure at least in body. So much the more +was the vicar's cook intent upon bringing about his downfall through her +girl. Then they could again rule at the vicarage, since the old vicar's +days were numbered, when Poldl came into the fat living left vacant. It +was at the burial of the old priest that Poldl delivered at the grave +the funeral oration for the dead, and endeavored to lay the good example +which the old man had given upon the hearts of his flock. As he lifted +his eyes once and caught those of the miller's Marie-Liese, who was +listening so devoutly, not taking her eyes from him, he suddenly +remained stuck in the midst of his speech and could find his place in +the text again only with difficulty. Was he not able to maintain before +her pure glance the fiction of a noble priest, did it come to his +consciousness that he was wandering in the same paths on which the other +had been most severely wounded? Something of this the miller's daughter +seems to have had in mind, for as she later begged his pardon for having +confused him by staring at him, at the same time she advised him not to +have anything to do with those at the vicarage. The vicar's daughter, +who had stolen up unobserved, shook her fist at them both, while her +mother drew Poldl later into a corner to give vent to her feelings, "You +cannot have the miller's daughter and do not for a moment believe that +she would be willing to have you." + +On his death bed in the lesser parish, which he held later, he +complained to Martin, "I should never have been a priest"--with his +inherited passionate blood, in spite of his mother's urging and his love +to her. "Martin, you have no idea how hard it is to run caught in a +sack; it costs a deal of trouble to keep oneself upright. If one does +not twist about one falls into it. The cowl was such a sack for me.... +Brother, I have unwittingly fallen into disgrace as a wild beast into a +trap, and I am more ashamed of it perhaps than the worst sinner of that +which he has done deliberately and maliciously. I would not have stayed +in the trap, could everything at first only have remained secret, so +that no one would have been afraid to extend a clean hand to me, by +which I might have found myself and might again belong to the world and +everything. But that the others knew right well and they wanted me for +themselves and therefore they have behaved without fear or shame so that +soon everything was free and open to all Rodenstein from the forest +house at one end to the mill at the other. From that time on I have seen +no friendly eye, and the blue, yes, the blue eyes (of the miller's +daughter) were always turned defiantly away from me. And because she was +unkind to me she became all at once kind to some one whom she formerly +could not bear. The folk shook their heads and prophesied little good +for her. So the time came when I must come here to this parish. There +lay upon me what can soon crush one to the ground, for peace and honor +were squandered and those who had won them from me hung like chains upon +me and the bit of sunshine that I had had in life I had to leave behind +in Rodenstein. When however there was added to this concern for her to +whom I owed the bit of happiness, I broke under it and then they took me +and brought me here and I let myself be brought." + +So had he truly become a child of sin with the feeling of lost purity +and a great consciousness of guilt upon his soul. And that he had not +merely squandered his own honor and peace but had also dragged the +beloved to harm, so that she must have doubts of her purity, this does +the rest for him and makes him the willing play ball of the parish folk. +From the first day when he took over his new charge, he began to wander +in the full moonlight up to the ghostly hour of midnight. At the stroke +of twelve he went to the pulpit, over which a bright moonbeam lay, which +also lighted up his face as bright as day. With closed eyes he knelt in +the pulpit, "his folded hands before him on the upholstered border, the +head bowed upon it as if in quiet prayer to collect himself as usual +before the sermon. All at once he raised himself, bent forward a little +as if the pews were full of people and he wished first to look them +over, then he threw his arms to either side and stood there like one who +would say, 'Strike me dead, if I have offended you, but I cannot do +otherwise!' He did not say this but in a voice as of one speaking in a +dream he uttered the words, 'I know of nothing!' And then once more--his +hands extended toward heaven and spread open, as if he would show +everything to all within or about the church--'I know of nothing!' +Afterward he turned and went." + +In this classic picture of the brother are some features of a new sort. +Above all, sexuality appears only incidentally to play a part, in so far +as it awakens the latent tendency to moon walking. Poldl begins to +wander at midnight after the miller's daughter is lost to him and he is +tortured by anxiety for her future. Otherwise he does what so frequently +is done by the moon walker, he carries out the apparently harmless +activity of the day as he prays in the church before an imaginary +audience. At least he truly imitates the formalities with which prayer +begins, though the conclusion does not accord with the beginning. It +sounds like a justification before the folk of Rodenstein, who have +taken offence at his action, that he stands there in Luther's place as +one who cannot do otherwise though one strike him dead. At the same time +the repeated outcry at the end, "I know of nothing, I know of nothing!" +smacks not only of a denial that he did not know perhaps why Marie had +fallen into distress, but suggests the directly infantile. Thus a child +insists, when it is reproached, that it has done nothing. + +Let us take up again the threads of our narrative. Poldl faded day by +day under the pressure of his heavy burden of soul. At last there +remained nothing else for him but to let them write to his brother that +he lay sick and wished to see him. As Martin entered the sickroom Poldl +stretched his lean arms toward him, breathed a heartfelt cry and began +to weep aloud like a child. "You are like a father to me, Martin, you +are like a father to me!" And from time to time he added, "Forgive me!" +Then he stroked Martin's rough hands, "the hands which had toiled for +his daily bread when he was a boy." And now he poured forth his +confession. He should not have become a priest, then the people of the +parish would have remained strangers to him and he perhaps would have +succeeded to the Rodenstein mill. His entire concern centered itself +about this, that he had not only lost Marie-Liese but was also to blame +for the overthrow of her happiness. He related to his brother how the +parish folk had apprehended him, so that he was covered with shame, how +they all hung about the great bell of Rodenstein until finally the +miller's daughter turned from him and to another. After the confession +was made Poldl fell asleep contentedly, yet only to wander that very +midnight. The invalid was very ill, when Martin talked with him again +the next day. And suddenly he began to speak of the days of his +childhood and it was remarkable to the brother "how he had remembered +the most trivial thing in regard to it and it seemed to me as if he +himself often wondered at it in the midst of his speech. Bit by bit +thus he took up his life and we talked together of the time when he ran +about the sitting-room and the court in his little child's frock, until +the time when he went to school, to the seminary, to Rodenstein.... The +sun had set when with our prattle we had come to the place where we +were, at Weissenhofen. 'That's the end,' I said, 'and there remains +nothing else to tell.'--'Yes, yes,' said my brother reflectively, +'that's the end, and there remains nothing more to tell.'" Soon he +noticed how truly Martin had spoken in every respect, for the end had +come for him now physically. With a blessing on his lips for the newly +won brother of his heart, he laid himself down to sleep. "It had become +still as a mouse in the room. After perhaps a quarter of an hour I heard +him say, 'Yes, yes, were we now together, only you must not hold me so +tightly to your breast.' With this he threw himself suddenly over to the +right, drew a deep breath, and it was over." + +Let us consider once more the circumstances of the moon walking which +accompanied this. He begins with this after his removal from Rodenstein +and from his heart's beloved. There had preceded the grief over his +wasted honor and his forfeited peace, the pain at the loss of the +miller's daughter and, which is rather conclusive, the torturing regard +for her future, which completely paralyzed his will power. The latter +point is somewhat remarkable. For at bottom it was never said that her +marriage was unhappy. The people had shaken their heads before it, only, +and prophesied nothing good. When Martin fourteen years after the death +of his brother meets Marie-Liese at his grave, she has become a handsome +woman and has been a widow for eight years but is well poised mentally +and lives for her boy. In Poldl's concern the wish must indeed have been +father of the thought. If he could not have his treasure, then she +should not be happy at the side of another man. Yet apparently this does +not refer alone to the miller's daughter. Psychoanalytic experience +teaches that where the reaction manifests itself all too strongly this +happens because it is not merely a reaction to a present, but above all +to a long past experience, which stands behind the other and offers +first the original actual tonal background. Only apparently is the +effect too strong, if we measure it merely by the actual cause, in truth +however the action corresponds to all the causes, that is the new added +to the old. + +We can say further, if we apply this experience to the poet's narrative, +Poldl had not merely lost the miller's daughter forever by entangling +himself with the vicar's daughter, but far more another, the one for +whom he had entered orders. The mother had said to Martin, "There is +only one way, one single way by which my boy can be saved from ruin and +I can obtain peace and forgiveness from my sin." This task, to atone for +the mother by a holy life, had not prevented him from a passionate love +for Marie-Liese or from an intrigue with the pastor's daughter, yet, +since he had on the latter's account lost his purity, something else was +also laid waste thereby, that which had given peace to him and a purpose +to his muddled life, the love for his mother. As he tarried already half +in the other world, his last words were, "Yes, yes, were we now +together, only you must not hold me so tightly to your breast." This had +the mother in her tenderness done to her little boy. We see here the +regression to the infantile, to a primitive child libido. + +The matter can be followed still further. The walking by moonlight +itself did not begin, in spite of every predisposing cause, until Poldl +was connected with the new parish and no longer shared the same locality +with his beloved. It is not revealed whether the pulpit of the +Weissenhofen church looked perhaps in the direction of Rodenstein or +not. It seems to me significant that the pastor's daughter crept after +Poldl all night long, not perhaps merely the first time, as if she +suspected his hidden erotic or feared even that he might go out toward +Rodenstein. He must also every midnight establish the fact that, in +spite of his sins of the flesh, he considered himself still worthy to be +a priest. For the same reason he himself read the mass every day until +near the end. Indeed he read this not merely in the daytime but also at +midnight when other priests sought rest. And by his behavior in sleep +walking it was as if he wished each time anew to justify himself before +his Rodenstein parish, and especially before his beloved. The Luther +attitude referred to the former, "Though you slay me, I cannot do +otherwise!" the outspoken infantile expression, the only words which he +actually speaks, "I know of nothing!" is for the latter. Thus a small +boy protests his innocence when any one faces him with a misdeed. It was +as if he wanted to go back to his beloved, to Marie-Liese, as if to his +own mother. + +Again we find libidinous and infantile causes as the starting point of +moonlight walking and sleep walking. Only the erotic no longer appears +so openly as with the other poets but receives a certain disguise. Yet +brother Martin, the philosopher of life, recognizes clearly the kernel +of the matter: "So I had also to witness the end with him, as with so +many of my brothers and sisters. But I still think today this need not +have happened, if the mother had permitted him his life as it would have +been lived out freely by himself. First she should not have counted it +so great as sin, for otherwise there would have been no pitch worker +Poldl in the world. Although she thought of it within herself that it +was a sin, she should have so looked upon it that she could have settled +it with the Lord God. Ah yes! he had to go about in the cowl, which had +become a greater sack than a farmer's jumper and there all the sins of +others enter, but if no one shall commit one in his own right, how would +one find shelter for all these? If I had only at that time been +obstinate about the planning of this thing, I would have foreseen the +wrong of it and have known that the mother was an old woman, and with +many conscience grows when reason is going to sleep. Faith, honor and +peace he would never have squandered, for the farmer's position does not +play with so high a stake. Still today the little fellow runs gaily +about the yard under my eyes.... Ah, you poor sin child, how wantonly +was the joy of living destroyed for you!" + + +"MACBETH," by Shakespeare. + +As I now undertake the analysis of the case of Lady Macbeth, I stand not +only before the last but the most difficult portion of my work. Here +indeed everything sexual and the erotic itself seem to be quite +excluded; and my attempt appears to fail in both directions, in the +sexual as well as in the infantile, to apply to Shakespeare's heroine +what my psychoanalytically treated cases, as well as all those others +from literature have furnished. The poet has devoted no more than one +single scene to this entire sleep walking including the grounds for it, +and he has said as little of Lady Macbeth's childhood as of her sexual +erotic life. Our knowledge of Shakespeare's life is above all so meager, +if we turn from the case to the poet himself, that the difficulties +tower in our way almost mountain high. The reader will in this case, +which presents itself so unfavorably, have to expect neither that +certainty nor even that high degree of probability of results, which the +earlier examples gave us. Here through no fault of mine all aids to +interpretation are wanting. I should consider it as something +accomplished if the reader did not say at the close, "The case of Lady +Macbeth contradicts all that has been heretofore discovered," as it will +appear at first. + +We will begin with the literary source for Macbeth, Holinshed's "History +of Scotland."[33] Shakespeare confined himself so closely to this that +he took over accurately, even to the dialogue, whole scenes into his +tragedy. The deviations are for this reason so much the more +interesting. In the chronicle Macbeth is simply the tyrant. At the very +beginning it is said of him, "he would certainly have been held as the +most worthy of rulers, if his nature had not had so strong a tendency to +cruelty." His cruelty is frequently emphasized, both at the bier of the +dead Macdowald and toward the dwellers in the western isles, who "called +him a bloodthirsty tyrant and the cruel murderer of those to whom the +king's grace had granted their lives." Finally also in the camp of the +Danes when they were overcome "he wrought such havoc upon all sides +without the least resistance that it was terrible to look upon." A +change seems however to have taken place in his character when, after +the murder of Duncan, he had seized the kingdom for himself. "He began +to reform the laws and to root out all the irregularities and abuses in +the administration." He freed the land for many years from all robbers, +guarded most carefully the church and clergy, and, to put it briefly, +was looked upon as the defender and shield of everything blameless. He +established also many good laws and ruled the kingdom for ten years with +the greatest wisdom and justice. + + [33] I cite this according to "Die Quellen des Shakespeare," by Karl + Simrock, 2d edition, 1870. + +"This apparent equity and zeal for all that is best was however merely +hypocrisy; he wished only to win the favor of the people. Tyrants are +always distrustful, they are always afraid that others will rob them of +their power by the same unrighteous means by which they themselves have +succeeded. As soon as Macbeth discovered any plans against himself, he +no longer concealed his intentions but practised and permitted every +kind of cruelty." At first the words of the three sisters of fate lay +always in his thoughts. In order to attain to what they had prophesied +he was willing to have Banquo and his son murdered. Yet the murderers +hired for the purpose killed only the former while Fleance succeeded in +escaping. "Luck seems to have deserted Macbeth after the murder of +Banquo. None of his undertakings were successful, every one feared for +his life and scarcely dared appear before the king. He feared every one +and every one feared him, so that he was always seeking opportunity for +the execution of suspected persons. His distrust and his cruelty +increased day by day, his bloodthirstiness was not to be appeased.... He +gave himself over recklessly to his natural ferocity, oppressed his +subjects even to the poorest and permitted himself every shameful deed." +Shakespeare has represented the rest fairly truly according to +Holinshed, only that in actuality this lasted for seven years, until +Macbeth fell at the hands of Macduff. + +It is also worthy of note what Holinshed has made the ground of the +murder of Duncan. There preceded in the chronicle the promise of the +three witches, further Malcolm's appointment as prince of Cumberland +and, as a result of this, succession to the kingdom. Now Malcolm could +"ascend the throne directly after his father's death, while in the old +laws it was provided that the nearest relative would be placed upon the +throne, if, at the death of his predecessor, the prince who was called +to the succession was not yet capable of ruling." This latter had +happened to Macbeth, Duncan's cousin. "Then began Macbeth, from whom by +this arrangement of the king all hope of the throne was taken, to +consider the means whereby he could seize the crown by force for +himself. For he believed that Duncan had done him a great wrong, when he +named his infant son as successor to his throne and had so annulled all +other claims. Moreover the words of the witches encouraged him to his +purpose. But foremost of all his wife, a proud and haughty woman, who +longed with most burning desire after the name of queen, would not +desist until she had strengthened him to the uttermost in his +intention." This last sentence is the chronicler's only notice of Lady +Macbeth. + +We can now measure what Shakespeare has contributed himself to her +character as well as to that of her husband. At first the absolute +cruelty, which with Holinshed was the chief trait of his character, is +wanting in Macbeth, and therefore ambition is mentioned first. Macbeth +becomes the tyrant wading in blood first after the murder of Duncan and +then more from a necessity to defend himself. His own wife characterizes +best the earlier hero: + + "Yet I do fear thy nature; + It is too full o' the milk of human kindness, + To catch the nearest way; Thou would'st be great; + Art not without ambition; but without + The illness should attend it. What thou would'st highly + That would'st thou holily, would'st not play false, + And yet would'st wrongly win: thou'd'st have, great Glamis, + That which cries, _Thus thou must do, if thou have it_; + And that which rather thou dost fear to do, + Than wishest should be undone." + +Yet Macbeth at bottom dared not murder the king, he only toyed with the +thought. He must be instigated from without, if the deed is not to be +put off until the Greek calends. Lady Macbeth from the very beginning +feels it her task to strengthen her laggard and doubting husband in his +ambition. This Shakespeare had already found in Holinshed. As the +chronicle has pictured it: "Still more did his wife urge him on to +attack the king, for she was exorbitantly ambitious and burned with an +inextinguishable desire to bear the name of queen."[34] While she thus +incited her husband, she fulfilled yet more the longing of her own +heart: + + "Hie thee hither, + That I may pour my spirits in thine ear; + And chastise with the valour of my tongue + All that impedes thee from the golden round." + + [34] The words of Holinshed's chronicle. + +She summons herself also to the task, calls the evil spirits of the air +to her aid and will become a man, since her husband is no man: + + "Come, come, you spirits + That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here; + And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full + Of direst cruelty! Make thick my blood, + Stop up the access and passage to remorse; + That no compunctious visitings of nature + Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between + The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts, + And take my milk for gall, you murd'ring ministers!" + +When Macbeth announces, "Duncan comes here to-night," she asks +sinisterly, "And when goes hence?"--Macbeth: "To-morrow--as he +purposes."--Lady Macbeth: + + "O, never + Shall sun that morrow see! + . . . . . . . + . . . . . He that's coming + Must be provided for; and you shall put + This night's great business into my despatch; + Which shall to all our nights and days to come + Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom." + +It may be seen that the really cruel one is here first Lady Macbeth and +not her husband. He on the contrary must always torture himself with +scruples and doubts. He constantly holds before himself the outward +results of his deed, brings everything together which should protect +Duncan from his dagger and can only say in regard to the opposite +course: + + "I have no spur + To prick the sides of my intent, but only + Vaulting ambition, which o'er-leaps itself, + And falls on the other." + +And he explains to his wife, "We will proceed no further in this +business." Then must Lady Macbeth rebuke him as a coward, no longer +trust his love, if he, when time and place so wait upon him, retract +from his purpose. She lays on the strongest accent, yes, uses the "word +of fury": + + "I have given suck; and know + How tender 'tis to love the babe that milks me; + I would, while it was smiling in my face, + Have plucked my nipple from his boneless gums, + And dashed the brains out, had I so sworn, as you + Have done to this."-- + +and finally develops the entire plan and promises her assistance, before +she can persuade her husband to the murder. + +She has stupefied the two chamberlains, upon whom the guilt shall be +rolled, with spiced wine and drunk herself full of courage for the deed, +as so many criminals. + + "That which hath made them drunk, hath made me bold; + What hath quenched them, hath given me fire." + +Then she hears Macbeth within at his gruesome work uttering a terrified +question, and continues: + + "Alack! I am afraid they have awaked, + And 'tis not done:--the attempt, and not the deed, + Confounds us;--Hark!--I laid their daggers ready, + He could not miss them.--Had he not resembled + My father as he slept, I had done't." + +Then her husband appears with the daggers. As he looks at his bloody +hands a cry is wrung from him, "This is a sorry sight." Yet the Lady +repulses him harshly, "A foolish thought, to say a sorry sight." + +Macbeth: + + "Methought, I heard a voice cry, _Sleep no more! + Macbeth doth murder sleep . . . . + . . . . . . . . . . . + And therefore ... Macbeth shall sleep no more!_" + +Lady Macbeth quiets him but he weakens his high courage by brooding over +the deed. + + "Go, get some water, + And wash this filthy witness from your hand.-- + Why did you bring these daggers from the place? + They must lie there. Go, carry them; and smear + The sleepy grooms with blood." + +Then however as her husband refuses to look again upon his deed Lady +Macbeth herself seizes the daggers: + + "The sleeping and the dead + Are but as pictures; 'tis the eye of childhood, + That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed, + I'll gild the faces of the grooms withal." + +Macbeth (alone): + + "Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood + Clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather + The multitudinous seas incarnadine, + Making the green one red." + +Lady Macbeth (returning): + + "My hands are of your colour; but I shame + To wear a heart so white . . . . . + . . . . . . . retire we to our chamber: + A little water clears us of this deed; + How easy is it then! Your constancy + Hath left you unattended." + +But the horrid deed has not brought the expected good fortune. After +Duncan's murder Macbeth finds no rest and no sleep: "To be thus, is +nothing; But to be safely thus." So he first considers removing Banquo +and his son. But Lady Macbeth is little content: + + "Nought's had, all's spent, + Where our desire is got without content; + 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy, + Than, by destruction, dwell in doubtful joy." + +Then comes her husband. All night he has been so shaken with terrible +dreams that he would rather be in Duncan's place, "Than on the torture +of the mind to lie, In restless ecstasy." Lady Macbeth tries here to +comfort him with the only tender impulse in the drama: + + "Come on; + Gentle my lord, sleek o'er your rugged looks; + Be bright and jovial 'mong your guests to-night."[35] + +Macbeth promises to do as she asks and charges her to treat Banquo +especially with distinction. Nor does he conceal from her what now +tortures him most, "Dear wife, Thou knowest that Banquo, and his +Fleance, lives." And immediately the Lady is her old self: "But in them +nature's copy's not eterne." Though Lady Macbeth is represented as at +once prepared for a second murder, Macbeth has now no more need of her: +"Be innocent of the knowledge, dearest chuck, Till thou applaud the +deed." + + [35] One notes the emptiness of this passage. She could scarcely have + said much less, if she wished to comfort him. And yet this passage is + always quoted by those authors who accept love on the part of Lady + Macbeth for her husband as the driving motive for her action. Indeed, + Friedrich Theodor Vischer himself does not shrink from an + interpolation and translates the passage: Lady Macbeth + ("caressingly")--"Come, come, my noble lord, remove thy wrinkles, + smooth thy gloomy brow, be jovial this evening, well-disposed toward + thy guests." And although the original English text contains no word + for "caressingly," yet Vischer gives this commentary: "His wife's + answer to him must be spoken on the stage with an altogether tender + accent. She embraces him and strokes his forehead." + (Shakespeare-Vorträge, Vol. 2, pp. 36, 102.) + +Yet, although he shrinks back no longer from any sort of evil deed, he +does so before the horrible pictures of his phantasies, the +hallucinations of his unconscious. Here is where Shakespeare's genius +enters. The Macbeth of the Chronicle commits throughout all his acts of +horror apparently in cold blood. At least nothing to the contrary is +reported. With Shakespeare on the other hand Macbeth, who is represented +in the beginning as more ambitious than cruel, is pathologically +tainted. From his youth on he suffered from frequent visions, which, for +example, caused him to see before Duncan's murder an imaginary dagger. +This "strange infirmity, which is nothing To those that know me," comes +to light most vividly on the appearance of Banquo's ghost at the +banquet. Lady Macbeth must use all her presence of mind to save at least +the outward appearance. With friendly exhortation, yet with grim reproof +and scornful word, she attempts to bring her husband to himself. In this +last scene, when she interposes in Macbeth's behavior, she stands +completely at the height. Not until the guests have departed does she +grow slack in her replies. In truth neither her husband's resolution to +wade on in blood nor his word that strange things haunt his brain can +draw from her more than the response, "You lack the season of all +natures, sleep." It seems as if she had collapsed exhausted after her +tremendous psychical effort. + +Shakespeare has in strange fashion told us nothing of what goes on +further in her soul, though he overmotivates everything else, even +devotes whole scenes to this one purpose. We first see her again in the +last act in the famous sleep walking scene. She begins to walk in her +sleep, falls ill with it one might well say, just on that day when +Macbeth goes to war. Her lady in waiting saw her from this day on, at +night, "rise from her bed, throw her nightgown upon her, unlock her +closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon it, read it, afterwards +seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this while in a most fast +sleep."--"A great perturbation in nature! to receive at once the benefit +of sleep, and do the effects of watching," the evidently keen sighted +physician thinks. He soon has the opportunity to observe the Lady's +sleep walking for himself. She comes, in her hand a lighted candle, +which at her express command must be always burning near her bed. Her +eyes are open as she walks, but their sense is shut. Then she rubs her +hands together as if to wash them, which she does according to the +statement of the lady in waiting, often continuously for a quarter of an +hour. + +Now they hear her speaking: "Yet here's a spot. Out damned spot! out, I +say!--One, two, why, then 'tis time to do't.--Hell is murky!--Fie, my +lord! a soldier, and afear'd? What need we fear who knows it, when none +can call our power to account?--Yet who would have thought the old man +to have had so much blood in him?--The Thane of Fife had a wife; Where +is she now?--What, will these hands ne'er be clean?--No more o' that, my +lord, no more o' that; you mar all with this starting.--Here's the smell +of the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this +little hand. Oh! oh! oh!--Wash your hands, put on your nightgown; look +not so pale;--I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried; he cannot come out +of his grave.--To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come, come, +come, come, give me your hand. What's done cannot be undone. To bed, to +bed, to bed." After such appearances she always in fact goes promptly to +bed. The physician who observes her pronounces his opinion: "This +disease is beyond my practice. Yet have I known those which have walked +in their sleep, who have died holily in their beds." Here however there +seems to be something different: + + "Foul whisperings are abroad; unnatural deeds + Do breed unnatural troubles." + +And then as if he were a psychoanalyst: + + "Infected minds + To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets. + More needs she the divine, than the physician.-- + God, God forgive us all! Look after her; + Remove from her the means of all annoyance, + And still keep eyes upon her." + +Also he answers Macbeth, who inquires after the condition of the +patient. + + "Not so sick, my lord, + As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies, + That keep her from her rest.... + . . . . . . Therein the patient + Must minister to himself." + +Yet as the king's star declines neither the doctor's foresight nor his +skill prevents Lady Macbeth, the "diabolical queen" from laying hands +upon herself. + +This case of sleep walking, if we consider it, seems first to correspond +entirely to the popular view, that the wanderer carries over to the +nighttime the activities of the day, or to speak more correctly, of the +most important day of the last month. We saw in the first act how she +reproaches Macbeth for his cowardice, encourages him and controls his +actions. Only in two points, very significant ones to be sure, does it +appear that she has now taken over her husband's rôle upon herself; in +the disturbance of her sleep and the concern for the blood upon her +hands. How had she rebuffed Macbeth when he had called out in regard to +his bloody hands, "This is a sorry sight!" It was only a foolish +thought. "Go get some water, And wash this filthy witness from your +hand." But Macbeth was not to be shaken, the entire ocean would not +suffice. Rather would the king's blood, which he had shed, change its +green to glowing red. Yet when Lady Macbeth completes his work for him, +she remarks lightly, "My hands are of your color; but I shame To wear a +heart so white.... A little water clears us of this deed." In her sleep +walking itself she encourages her husband, "Wash your hands, put on your +nightgown." She seeks however in vain in this very sleep walking to +wipe the stains from her hands, they smell always of blood and not all +the perfumes of Arabia will sweeten her hands. Must not the inner +meaning of all her sleep walking lie exactly in these two points, in +which she has so completely turned about? + +It must be observed that in the tragedy as in the previously related +tale of the "Sin Child" the sleep walking does not begin in childhood +nor in puberty, but in both instances in somewhat more mature years, +and, what is significant, as an illness, more precisely a psychic +illness. The sin child fell ill because he had lost his pure beloved +one, who had taken the place of his mother, the original love object of +his earliest childhood; and Lady Macbeth, who had herself become queen +through a murder, falls ill just at that moment when her lord must go to +the battlefield to defend his life and his crown. For not without reason +the fate of Macduff's wife, who was slain when her husband had gone from +her, occurs to her also when she, while wandering, speaks of the much +blood which Duncan had. Therefore it seems likely, and is in fact +generally believed, that Lady Macbeth becomes ill because of her anxiety +for life and kingdom. Only the facts do not strictly agree with this. In +the first place her husband's campaign is by no means unpromising. On +the contrary he has heard from the witches that his end would be bound +with apparently unfulfillable conditions, so unfulfillable that the +prophecy at once frees him from all fear. + +Having hidden nothing from the "partner of his greatness" he would +scarcely conceal the promise of the witches, which increased his +confidence to the uttermost. Besides it cannot be fear and anxiety which +brings on her night wandering. Another current explanation also seems to +me to have little ground. As Brandes has recently interpreted it, "The +sleep walking scene shows in the most remarkable fashion how the +pricking of an evil conscience, when it is dulled by day, is more keen +at night and robs the guilty one of sleep and health." Now severe pangs +of conscience may well disturb sleep, but they would hardly create sleep +walking. Criminals are hardly noctambulists. Macbeth himself is an +example how far stings of conscience and remorse can lead a sensitive +man. He has no more rest after he has murdered the king and Banquo, yet +he does not become a sleep walker. There must be another cause here +which precipitates Lady Macbeth's sleep walking. + +We will first examine the relation of husband and wife to one another in +order to trace out this mystery. The character of Lady Macbeth has +caused many a one in Germany to rack his brains since the time of Tieck. +Up till that time she passed simply as Megaera, as an "arch witch," as +Goethe calls her. This opinion prevailed not only in Germany but in the +English motherland too. But this view went against the grain with the +German spirit. Therefore Ludwig Tieck first looked upon Lady Macbeth as +a tender, loving wife. From this time on there arose critics and even +poets, who in the same way wished to wash her clean. I will cite the two +most important, Friedrich Theodor Vischer and Rudolf Hans Bartsch. The +former, of whom I explained earlier, that he did not hesitate to make an +interpolation to prove his point, sums up his judgment in the following +sentences: "It is not ambition alone that moves her, but love which +would see her lord become great" (p. 78). And in a second place, "She +loved her husband and had sacrificed her conscience more for him than +for herself" (p. 124). R. H. Bartsch goes much further in his romance, +"Elisabeth Kött." Wigram says to the heroine, "Do you not feel how she +(Lady Macbeth) before everything that she says cannot hitch horses +enough to carry her slow and immovable lord along?" In the sleep walking +scene "the utter crushing of this poor, overburdened heart burst forth +in the torture of the dream wandering." At the close he pronounces his +opinion: "If there is a poor weak woman upon earth, so it is this arch +enchantress, who loves her husband so much that she has in admirable +fashion studied all his faults and weaknesses that she may cover over +the deficiencies with her trembling body. Seek the wife in her rôle!" + +What truth is there in these viewpoints? The poet himself has been dead +for three hundred years and has left behind him not a syllable +concerning Lady Macbeth except in the text of the tragedy. Therefore +according to my opinion nothing remains but to keep to this. At the most +we can draw upon Holinshed's chronicle, which Shakespeare so frequently +followed literally. According to this Lady Macbeth was extravagantly +ambitious and when she continually urged Macbeth to murder Duncan, this +was only because she "burned with an unquenchable desire to bear the +name of queen." There is never a syllable of a feeling of love for her +husband, or that she desired the crown only for his sake. This objection +might be made here, that as Shakespeare has often gone beyond his +source, as in creating the sleep walking scene without a model for it, +so he might just as well have given characters to Lady Macbeth of which +the source said nothing. Certainly that would be a priori conceivable. +Only that must appear clearly from the text of the tragedy. Yet what +does this say? Carefully as I have read its lines, I have not been able +to find a single, actual uninterpolated word of love from Lady Macbeth. +That is of double significance from the poet of "Romeo and Juliet." He +who could give such language to love would not have completely denied it +in "Macbeth," if Lady Macbeth was to have been a loving wife. One can +find everything in her words, warning, entreaty and adjuration, +upbraidings and threatenings, anger, yes, almost abuse, yet not one +natural note of love. + +This has a so much harsher effect since her husband approaches her +usually as an actual lover, or more accurately stated up to the murder +of Banquo. She is warm only where it concerns the attainment of her +goal; it is her ambition which demands satisfaction. She is always to +her husband "my dearest partner of my greatness" as he once +appropriately writes her. It is not to be considered that Shakespeare, +who always overmotivates his situations, should have at the height of +his power so obscured from recognition all the love impulses, which +would have seemed to be decisive for her whole character. The truth is +simply that Lady Macbeth is no loving wife, but merely greedy of fame, +as already represented in the Chronicle. I suspect that the authors who +all the way through see in her the loving spouse are expressing their +own complexes, their own unconscious wishes. Such an one as Bartsch for +example cannot think otherwise of a woman than as unfolding lovingly to +the man. + +Lady Macbeth makes upon me, in her relation toward her frequently wooing +husband as it were, the impression of a _natura frigida_, that is a +sexually cold woman. If one takes her own frightful word for it, that +she could tear the breast from her own sucking child and dash its brains +out, then the mother love seems never to have been strong within her, +but rather whatever feeling she has possessed has been changed to +passionate ambition. Now psychoanalytic experience teaches that when a +woman remains sexually cold toward a sympathetic and potent man, this +goes back to an early sealing up of affect with a forbidden, because an +incest object. Such women have almost always from their tenderest +infancy on loved father or brother above all and never through all their +lives freed themselves from this early loved object. Though at puberty +compelled to cut them off as sexual objects, yet they have held fast to +them in the unconscious and become incapable of transferring to another +man. It is possible also in the case of Lady Macbeth to think of such +an indissoluble bond. Moreover certain features in the sleep walking +scene seem to speak directly of a repressed sexual life. + +Lady Macbeth wanders at night, since her husband has left her and +marital intercourse has been broken off.[36] In her hand is a lighted +candle, which according to her express command must burn near her bed, +and only now for the first time, otherwise the lady in waiting would not +have laid such stress upon the fact. The candle in her hand, that is a +feature which up till now we have met in none of our cases, but which, +as a glance into literature teaches me, is by no means infrequently +found with sleep walkers. It can hardly be considered a mere accident +that Shakespeare discovered just this characteristic, which is really +atypical. One would be much more inclined to suspect in it a secret, +hidden meaning. Then at once a connection forces itself. We know from +the infantile history of so many people that a tenderly solicitous +parent, the father or the mother, likes to convince himself or herself, +with a candle in the hand, that the child is asleep.[37] Then we would +have on one side a motive for sleep walking in general, that one is +playing the part of the loving parent, as on the other hand a motive for +the lighted candle. The latter has however a symbolic sexual sense which +is quite typical and is repeatedly and regularly found. The burning +candle always stands for one thing and signifies in dreams as in fairy +tales, folklore, and sagas without exception the same thing, an erect +phallus. Now it becomes clear why Lady Macbeth, after her husband had +gone to the war, has a lighted candle always burning near her bed, and +why then she wanders around like a ghost with it at night. + + [36] This is not without significance as a direct precipitating cause, + although naturally not the true source of her night wandering. + + [37] A second still more important motivation for the nightly visit I + will discuss later. + +The conclusion of the words she utters during her sleep walking contains +a second unmistakably sexual relationship. Here she repeats not less +than five times the demand upon her husband, "To bed," while in the +corresponding murder scene (II, 2) it simply reads, "Retire we to our +chamber; A little water clears us of this deed." The further repetition, +"Come, come, come, come, give me your hand," sounds again infantile +through and through. So one speaks to a child, scarcely to an adult. It +seems as if she takes the father or the mother by the hand and bids them +go to bed. One recognizes already in this passage that this atypical +sleep walking of Lady Macbeth also leads naturally into the sexual and +the infantile. + +It will not be difficult to determine now toward whom the repressed, +because strongly forbidden, sexual wishes of Lady Macbeth are directed. +Who else could it be but her own father, the original love object of +every little girl; what other person of her childhood, who later becomes +an unsuitable sexual object, but yet hinders for all the future the +transference of love over to the husband? This is the one who summons +her to walk in her sleep, the lighted candle in her hand. It is quite an +everyday experience, which holds for everyone, for the well as for every +one who later becomes ill, that in reality the first love, which bears +quite clearly features of sense pleasure, belongs to the earliest years +of childhood, and that its objects are none other than the child's own +parents and in the second place the brothers and sisters. Here the polar +attraction of the sexes holds in the relation of the elder to the +younger and vice versa, that is the attraction of the man to the woman +and the woman to the man. It is "a natural tendency," says Freud[38] in +the "Interpretation of Dreams," "for the father to indulge the little +daughter, and for the mother to take the part of the sons, while both +work earnestly for the education of the little ones when the magic of +sex does not prejudice their judgment. The child is very well aware of +any partiality, and resists that member of the parental couple who +discourages it.... Thus the child obeys its own sexual impulse, and at +the same time reinforces the feeling which proceeds from the parents, if +it makes a selection among the parents that corresponds to theirs." + + [38] Freud: The Interpretation of Dreams, translated by A. A. Brill. + The Macmillan Company, London, New York, 4th edition, p. 218. + +We will stop here at two factors which will occupy us again later, the +being in love with the parent of the opposite sex, and then the +resistance against the one of the same sex. Corresponding to the love, +every child in the period of innocence wants to "marry" the former. I +recall what a colleague told me of a dialogue between him and his little +five year old daughter. She began, "I want to get married."--"To +whom?"--"To you, Papa."--"I already have a wife."--"Then you would have +two wives."--"That won't do."--"Very well, then I will choose a man who +is as nice as you." And Freud relates (p. 219), "An eight year old girl +of my acquaintance, when her mother is called from the table, takes +advantage of the opportunity to proclaim herself her successor. 'Now I +shall be Mamma; Charles, do you want some more vegetables? Have some, I +beg you,' and so on. A particularly gifted and vivacious girl, not yet +four years old, ... says outright: 'Now mother can go away; then father +must marry me and I shall be his wife.'" + +We will add just one more little experience to give us a broader point +of view. The interpretation of dreams, fairy tales and myths teaches us +regularly that the phantasies of the child, like those of all peoples in +their period, identify father with king or emperor. Naturally then the +father's wife becomes the queen. This fact of experience, which is +always to be substantiated, can be applied to Lady Macbeth and makes her +ambition at once transparent to us. I affirmed above that her lack of +sexual feeling toward her husband had its origin in the fact that she +had loved her father too much and could not therefore free herself from +him. Her sexuality had transformed itself into ambition and that, the +ambition to be queen,[39] in other words, the father's wife. So could +she hold fast to the infantile ideal and realize the forbidden incest. +The intensity with which she pursues the ambition of her life is +explained then by the glowing intensity of her sexual wishes. + + [39] Holinshed's chronicle lays emphasis upon this: "She ... burned + with an inextinguishable desire to bear the name of queen." + +With Shakespeare also king and father come together. A remark of Lady +Macbeth shows that when she addresses herself to the murder of Duncan. +"Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done't." This +physical likeness signifies identity of individuals, as we know from +many analogous examples. The king therefore resembles the father because +he stands for her parent. Still one more point may be well explained +from her father complex. The Chronicle speaks of the overweening +ambition of Lady Macbeth. Now we know from neuropsychology that burning +ambition in later years represents a reaction formation to infantile bed +wetting. It is the rule with such children that they are placed upon the +chamber at night by father or mother. Thus we comprehend from another +side, with the so frequent identification with beloved persons, +precisely why the lady wanders at night with a candle in her hand. Here +again appears plainly the return to the infantile erotic. + +Now for the grounds of her collapse. As long as Lady Macbeth is fighting +only for the childish goal, she is an unshakeable rock amid the storms +of danger. She shrinks from no wrong and no crime that she may be queen +at her husband's side. But she must gradually perceive that her husband +will never win satisfaction, he will never recover from the king-father +murder, her hopes will never be fulfilled and she will never live in +quiet satisfaction at the side of her father. Then her power of +endurance gives way until her very soul fails utterly. As she says on +the occasion of the first disappointment after Duncan's death: + + "Nought's had, all's spent, + Where our desire is got without content; + 'Tis safer to be that which we destroy, + Than, by destruction, dwell in doubtful joy." + +Now the unconscious, hitherto successfully repressed, avenges itself, +now conscience awakes and as the husband leaves her completely alone she +begins to wander, that is to seek to return to the infantile ideal. In +her wandering she herself plays the rôle of father, who once approached +her with the lighted candle and then called to her, "Come, come, come, +come, give me your hand!" and bade her go to bed. + +Why however does not the ruthless Macbeth live down the murder of the +king as he does in the history? I believe that we must here go still +further back than to the Chronicle, even to the creator of the tragedy +himself. There is a certain important crisis in Shakespeare's life, +where according to the biography by George Brandes "cheerfulness, the +very joy of life, was extinguished in his soul. Heavy clouds gathered +over his horizon, we now do not know just what their source. Gnawing +griefs and disappointments gathered within him. We see his melancholy +grow and extend itself; we can observe the changing effects of this +melancholy without clearly recognizing its cause. Only we feel this, +that the scene of action which he sees with the inner eye of the soul +has now become as black as the external scene of which he makes use. A +veil of phantasy has sunk down over both. He writes no more comedies but +puts a succession of dark tragedies upon the stage, which lately +reëchoed to the laughter of his Rosalinds and Beatrices." + +This crisis came in the year 1601, when the earl of Essex and Lord +Southampton, Shakespeare's special patron, were condemned to death +because of treason against the life of the king. According to Brandes +the depression over their fate must have been one of the original causes +for the poet's beginning melancholy. Perhaps the death of Shakespeare's +father, which followed some months later, made a more lasting impression +with all the memories which it recalled. The dramas which the poet +published about that time, Julius Cæsar, Hamlet and Macbeth, have a +common theme, they all revolve about a father murder. In "Julius +Cæsar," Brutus murders his fatherly friend, his mother's beloved ("And +thou too, my son Brutus?"). Hamlet comes to shipwreck in his undertaking +to avenge upon his uncle the father's murder, because the uncle, as +Freud explains in his "Interpretation of Dreams," had at bottom done +nothing else than Hamlet had wished in his childhood but had not had the +self confidence to carry out. And Macbeth in the last analysis is ruined +by the king and father murder, the results of which he can never +overcome. We may consider this theme of the father murder, always +presented in some new form, in the light of its direct precipitating +causes, the actual death of Shakespeare's father and Southampton's +treason against the ruling power of the state. It is not difficult to +accept that at that time the infantile death wishes against his father +were newly awakened in our poet himself and were then projected +externally in a series of powerful dramas. + +Perhaps the reader, who has followed me more or less up to this point, +will stop here indignant: "How could any one maintain that a genius like +Shakespeare could have wished to murder his father, even if only in the +phantasies of childhood?" I can only reply to this apparently justified +indignation that the assumption I here make concerning Shakespeare is +fundamentally and universally human and is true with every male child. +We go for proof to what we have earlier discovered, that the first +inclination of every child, also already erotically colored, belongs to +the parent of the opposite sex, the love of the girl to the father, the +leaning of the boy to his mother, while the child sets himself against +the parent of the same sex, who may be only justly concerned in his +education without over indulging him. The child would be most delighted +to "marry" the tender parent, as we heard above, and therefore feels +that the other parent stands in the way as a disturbing rival. "If the +little boy," says Freud in the "Interpretation of Dreams,"[40] "is +allowed to sleep at his mother's side whenever his father goes on a +journey, and if after his father's return he must go back to the nursery +to a person whom he likes far less, the wish may be easily actuated that +his father may always be absent, in order that he may keep his place +next to his dear, beautiful mamma; and the father's death is obviously a +means for the attainment of this wish; for the child's experience has +taught him that 'dead' folks, like grandpa, for example, are always +absent; they never return." + + [40] Freud, _l. c._, p. 219. + +Yet how does the child reach such a depth of depravity as to wish his +parents dead? We may answer "that the childish idea of 'being dead' has +little else but the words in common with our own. The child knows +nothing of the horrors of decay, of shivering in the cold grave, of the +terror of the infinite Nothing.... Fear of death is strange to the +child, therefore it plays with the horrible word.... Being dead means +for the child, which has been spared the scenes of suffering previous to +dying, the same as 'being gone,' not disturbing the survivors any more. +The child does not distinguish the manner and means by which this +absence is brought about, whether by traveling, estrangement or +death.... If, then, the child has motives for wishing the absence of +another child, every restraint is lacking which would prevent it from +clothing this wish in the form that the child may die."[41] It may be +conjectured, if we apply this to Shakespeare, that also this greatest of +all dramatists repeatedly during his childhood wished his father dead +and that this appeared in consciousness agitating him afresh at the +actual decease of the father and impelled him to those dramas which had +the father murder as their theme. Moreover the father's calling, for he +was not only a tanner but also a butcher, who stuck animals with a +knife, may have influenced the form of his death wishes as well as of +their later reappearances in the great dramas. + + [41] Freud, _l. c._, pp. 215, 216. + +The evil thoughts against the father in the child psyche by no means +exclude the fact that at the same time there are present with them +tender impulses, feelings of warmest love. This is indeed the rule +according to all experience and can be proved also with Shakespeare. +This other side of his childish impulse leads for example to the +powerful ambition which we find as a chief characteristic of Macbeth and +Lady Macbeth, as in truth of the poet himself. We know that when the +latter was a boy his father became bankrupt. He had not only lost +everything which he himself possessed, his wife's dowry and his position +as alderman, but was also so deeply in debt at this time that he had to +guard himself against arrest. Once more I let Brandes express it: "The +object of Shakespeare's desire was not in the first place either the +calling of a poet or fame as an actor, but wealth and that chiefly as a +means for social advance. He took very much to heart his father's +decline in material fortune and official respect. He held passionately +from his youth up to the purpose to reëstablish the name and the +position of his family.... His father had not dared to go along the +streets, fearing to be arrested for debt. He himself as a young man had +been whipped at the command of the landowner and thrown into jail. The +small town which had been the witness of these humiliations should be +witness of the restoration of his honor. Where he had been spoken of as +the actor and playwright of doubtful fame, there would he be seen again +as the honored possessor of house and land. There and elsewhere should +the people, who had counted him among the proletariat, learn to know him +as a gentleman, that is as a member of the lesser nobility.... In the +year 1596 his father, apparently at his instigation and with his +support, entered a petition at Heralds College for the bestowal of a +coat of arms. The granting of the coat of arms signified the ceremonial +entry into the gentry." The ambition of the small child is to become as +great as the father, and so later that of the man is to exalt the father +himself, to make him king. One sees how close and how very personal the +theme of ambition was to Shakespeare. + +Before I go on to analyze further what the poet has woven into his +treatment of "Macbeth" from his own purely personal experience, we must +first consider a technical factor which is common to all dramatists. It +has been discovered that Shakespeare projected his own complexes into +his tragedies, complexes which are in no way simple, but which show, for +example, close to the hatred even as great a love as well as other +contrary elements. He is fond of separating his dramatic projection into +two personalities wherever his feeling is an ambivalent one, these two +forms standing in contrast to one another. He splits his ego into two +persons, each of which corresponds to only one single emotional impulse. +That is a discovery which of course was not made for the first time by +psychoanalysis. Minor, for instance, writes in his book on Schiller: +"Only in conjunction with Carlos does Posa represent Schiller's whole +nature, the wild passion of the one is the expression of the sensual +side, the noble exaltation of the other the stoical side of his +nature.... Schiller has not drawn this figure from external nature; it +has not come to him from without but he has taken it deep from his inner +being." Otto Ludwig expresses himself similarly: "Goethe often separates +a man into two poetic forms, Faust-Mephisto, Clavigo-Carlos." + +It is plainly to be seen, if we apply our recognition of this fact to +Shakespeare, that he has projected his ego affect into Macbeth as well +as his wife, which gives numerous advantages. So far we have considered +Lady Macbeth merely as a complete dramatic character, which she is +first of all. Besides this nevertheless she surely corresponds to a +splitting of Shakespeare's affect, for the poet incorporates in her his +instincts for ruthless ambition. He has worked over the character +already given her by the Chronicle for his own exculpation. It was +stated previously that Macbeth in the first two acts is by no means the +bloodthirsty tyrant of Holinshed and really stands far behind his wife +in ambition. It is as if our poet, who plainly stands behind his hero, +wished thereby to say, I am not capable of a father murder and would +surely have put it off or not have accomplished it at all, if I had not +been compelled by a woman's influence. Macbeth will go no further in the +affair in spite of all favorable outward circumstances, but it is Lady +Macbeth who forces the deed to completion. The final cause of every +father hatred is rivalry in regard to the mother and so it was she, +represented by Lady Macbeth, who in his phantasy would have urged the +infantile Shakespeare to put his father out of the way. Here branches +out another path for the sleep walking. We have so far spoken only of +the father who comes at night to the child, but now Lady Macbeth walking +in her sleep, seems also to represent Shakespeare's mother, who with the +candle in her hand convinces herself that her darling child is sleeping +soundly.[42] + + [42] Going back into Shakespeare's own life gives further illumination + and foundation for Lady Macbeth's behavior in the sleep walking scene. + The reader may already have secretly thought that those little + tendernesses on the part of ordinary parents hardly enter into + consideration in the case of a thane's daughter. It may be said in + answer to this that Shakespeare often, as in the presentation of + ancient scenes, put without scruple the environment of his own time in + place of the historical setting. And according to the above he would + be quite likely to utilize with Lady Macbeth recollections from the + Stratford childhood. + +It need not seem strange that I give a number of interpretations +apparently so fundamentally different for one and the same thing. There +is nothing on earth more complicated than psychic things, among which +poetic creation belongs. Psychic phenomena are according to all +experience never simply built up nor simply grounded but always brought +together in manifold form. Whoever presses deeply into them discovers +behind every psychic manifestation without exception an abundance of +relationships and overdeterminations. We are accustomed in the natural +sciences to simple motivation, on the one side cause, on the other +effect. In the psychic life it is quite otherwise. Only a superficial +psychology is satisfied with single causes. So manifold a chain of +circumstances, those that lie near at hand and those more remotely +connected, come into play in most, yes, apparently in all cases, that +one scarcely has the right to assert that a psychic phenomenon has been +completely explained. Dream analysis at once proves this. One can almost +always rightfully take it for granted that several, indeed manifold +interpretations are correct. It is best to think of a stratified +structure. In the most superficial layer lies the most obvious +explanation, in the second a somewhat more hidden one, and in yet deeper +strata broader and more remote relationships and all have their part +more or less in the manifested phenomenon. This latter is more or less +well motivated. + +We now turn back to Shakespeare and observe the great depression under +which he labored just at the time when he created his greatest +tragedies. Does it seem too presumptuous to conceive that one so shaken +and dejected psychically should have slept badly and even possibly--we +know so little of his life--walked in his sleep? The poet always +hastened to repress[43] whatever personal revelations threatened to +press through too plainly, as we know from many proofs. The poverty of +motivation quite unusual with Shakespeare, just at the critical point of +the sleep walking, seems to me to score for such a repression. We might +perhaps say that the fact that the poet has introduced to such slight +extent the wandering of Lady Macbeth, has given it so little connection +with what went before, is due simply to this, that all sorts of most +personal relationships were too much involved to allow him to be more +explicit. See how Lady Macbeth comforted Macbeth directly after the +frightful deed, the king and father murder: + + "Consider it not so deeply. + . . . . . . . . . + These deeds must not be thought + After these ways; so, it will make us mad." + + [43] Otto Rank in his book, "Das Inzest-Motiv in Dichtung und Sage," + furnishes a beautiful and convincing example of such repression: It + comes from a second drama based on a king's murder, "Julius Cæsar." I + quote from the author's words: "A heightened significance and at the + same time an incontrovertible conclusiveness is given to our whole + conception and interpretation of the son relationship of Brutus to + Cæsar by the circumstance that in the historical source, which + Shakespeare evidently used and which he followed almost word for word, + namely in Plutarch, it is shown that Cæsar considered Brutus his + illegitimate son. In this sense Cæsar's outcry, which has become a + catch-word, may be understood, which he may have uttered again and + again when he saw Brutus pressing upon his body with drawn sword, 'And + you too my son Brutus?' With Shakespeare the wounded Cæsar merely + calls out, 'Et tu Brute! Then fall, Cæsar!' Shakespeare has set aside + this son relationship of Brutus to Cæsar, though doubtless known to + the poet, in his working out of the traditional sources. Not only is + there deep psychic ground for the modifications to which the poet + subjects the historical and traditional circumstances and characters + or the conceptions of his predecessor, but also for the omissions from + the sources. These originate from the repressive tendency toward the + exposure of impulses which work painfully and which are restrained as + a result of the repression, and this was doubtless the case with + Shakespeare in regard to his strongly affective father complex." Rank + has in the same work demonstrated that this father complex runs + through all of Shakespeare's dramatic work, from his first work, + "Titus Andronicus," down to his very last tragedy. I cannot go into + detail on this important point for my task here is merely to explain + Lady Macbeth's sleep walking, but any one who is interested may find + overwhelming abundance of evidence in Rank's book on incest (Chapter 6). + It is not only that I have introduced Shakespeare's strong father + complex here to make comprehensible Lady Macbeth's sleep walking, but + his own chief complex stood affectively in the foreground, and was + worked out, at the same time, as Macbeth. + +This must have referred to Shakespeare as much as to his hero. Moreover +the writing and sealing of the letter at the beginning of the sleep +walking described by the lady in waiting seems as if Lady Macbeth had a +secret, a confession to make--in the name of the poet. I think also at +the end, when the everlasting brooding over her deed drives her to +suicide, she dies as a substitute for her intellectual creator, for his +own self punishment.[44] + + [44] I also recall that it is in fact she who expresses Duncan's + character as father, "Had he not so resembled my father...." + +There remain yet only one or two points to be touched upon and +explained. No discussion is needed for the fact that an outspoken +sadistic nature in Lady Macbeth leads her to walk in her sleep, indeed, +disposes her to it. We can easily understand also that this breaks forth +just at the moment when her husband sets out, that is, translated into +the infantile, when Macbeth, or in the deeper layer her own father, +dies. It is much more necessary to explain why immediately after the +deed she has no scruples in staining the chamberlains with Duncan's +blood and takes the affair so lightly, while later she is never rid of +the fear of the blood and is always striving in vain to wash her hands +clean. Here it must be again recalled that Lady Macbeth on the one hand +represents the actual wife of Macbeth, on the other hand the poet +himself and in two epochs of his life; Shakespeare first in his +unrestrained striving and then when he is brought low, shaken in his +very depths by the death of his father. Murder phantasies toward his +father came to him as a boy and then as a youth at the beginning of +puberty, and yet at neither time was he ill. The more mature man +however, borne down more heavily by life, met by the actual death of his +father, broke down under the weight of things. This explains in the last +analysis the change in the attitude of Lady Macbeth. + +I do not know how far the reader is willing to follow me. Yet one thing +I believe I have proved, that also in Lady Macbeth's sleep walking the +erotic is not wanting nor the regression into the infantile. + + + + +CONCLUSION AND RÉSUMÉ + + +If now at the close of this book we bring together all our material, we +may with certainty or with the highest probability speak of sleep +walking and moon walking as follows: + +1. Sleep walking under or without the influence of the moon represents +a motor outbreak of the unconscious and serves, like the dream, the +fulfilment of secret, forbidden wishes, first of the present, behind +which however infantile wishes regularly hide. Both prove themselves in +all the cases analyzed more or less completely as of a sexual erotic +nature. + +2. Those wishes also which present themselves without disguise are +mostly of the same nature. The leading wish may be claimed to be that +the sleep walker, male or female, would climb into bed with the loved +object as in childhood, which both the folk and the poet well know. The +love object need not belong necessarily to the present, it can much more +likely be one of earliest childhood. + +3. Not infrequently the sleep walker identifies himself with the beloved +person, sometimes even puts on his clothes, linen or outer garments, or +imitates his manner to the life. + +4. Sleep walking can also have an infantile prototype, when the child +pretends to be asleep in order that it may be able, without fear of +punishment, to experience all sorts of forbidden things, that is of a +sexual nature, because it cannot be held accountable for that which it +does "unconsciously, in its sleep." The same motive of not being held +accountable actuates the adult sleep walker, who will satisfy his sexual +desires, yet without incurring guilt in so doing. The same cause works +also psychically, when sleep walking occurs mostly in the very deepest +sleep, even if organic causes are likewise responsible for it. + +5. The motor outbreak during sleep, which drives one from rest in bed +and results in sleep walking and wandering under the light of the moon, +may be referred to this, that all sleep walkers exhibit a heightened +muscular irritability and muscle erotic, the endogenous excitement of +which can compensate for the giving up of the rest in bed. In accordance +with this these phenomena are especially frequent in the offspring of +alcoholics, epileptics, sadists and hysterics with preponderating +involvement of the motor apparatus. + +6. Sleep walking and moon walking are in themselves as little symptoms +of hysteria as of epilepsy. Yet they are found frequently in conjunction +with the former. + +7. The influence of the moon in this moon affectivity is very little +known, especially in its psychic overdetermination. Yet there is little +doubt that the moon's light is reminiscent of the light in the hand of a +beloved parent, who every night came in loving solicitude to assure +himself or herself of the child's sleep. Nothing so promptly wakes the +sleep walker as the calling of his name, which accords with his being +spoken to as a child by the parent. Fixed gazing upon the planet also +has probably an erotic coloring like the staring of the hypnotizer to +secure hypnosis. Other psychic overdeterminations appear merely to fit +individual cases. It is possible finally that there actually exists a +special power of attraction in the moon, which may expressly force the +moon walker out of his bed and entice him to longer walks, but on this +point we have no scientific hypotheses. + +8. Furthermore it seems possible that sleep walking and moon walking may +be permanently cured through Freud's psychoanalytic method. + +I know very well that this explanation which I give here, offers only +the first beginning of an understanding. It will be the task of a +future, which we hope is not too far distant, to comprehend fully these +puzzling phenomena. + + + + +INDEX + + + "Aebelö," ix, 45 + + Alcoholics, 137 + descendants of, 25 + + Alcoholism, 1 + + Anorexia, hysteric, 76 + + Anxiety dreams, 41 + + Anzengruber, Ludwig, ix, 106 + + Audition, color, 91 + + + Blood, 3, 15, 17, 20 + + Burdach, Karl Friedrich, 35 + + "Buschnovelle," 91 + + Buttocks, 7 + moon as, 19 + + + Cataleptic muscular rigidity, 25 + + Color audition, 74, 91 + + Compulsion, 6 + + Compulsive neurotic, 77, 91 + + Conception, Immaculate, 62, 73 + unconscious, 62, 73 + + Concussion of the brain, 2 + + Consciousness, disturbances of, 32 + + Contractures, 25 + + Convulsion, hysterical, 85, 90 + + Convulsions, 25 + muscular, 90 + + Convulsive attacks, 2, 7, 25 + + Cruelty, 25 + + + Dream, Function of, x + relationship between sleep-walking and, 21 + + Dreams, anxiety, 41 + frightful, 7 + of Gro, 61 + terrifying, 25 + + Dysuria psychica, 27 + + + Eclamptic attacks, 2 + + Enuresis nocturna, 2 + pleasure in, 29 + + Enuretic, 1 + + Epilepsy, viii, 1, 138 + + Epileptics, 137 + descendants of, 25 + + Eroticism, muscle, 63 + urethral, 2 + vaginal, 3 + + Erotic, muscle, 8, 25, 31, 42, 90, 137 + nature, 23 + urethral, 27 + + Exhibition, 22 + + Exhibitionism, 36 + + Exhibitionistic, 70 + + + Folk belief, 62 + interpretation, 82 + mind, 24 + tale, 81 + + Frenssen, Gustav, ix, 63 + + Freud, 104, 127, 130, 131 + + Freud's psychoanalytic method, 138 + + + Ganghofer, Ludwig, ix, 40 + + Ghostly hour, 27, 81 + + Ghosts, belief in, 26 + + + Hemoptysis, 3, 15, 20 + + Holinshed's "History of Scotland," 115 + + Homosexual, 2 + + Homosexuality, 20 + + Hypnosis, 138 + + Hypnotic fixation, 26 + somnambulism, viii, 22 + + Hypnotism, love transference in, 26 + + Hypnotist, 23 + + Hypnotized subject, 23 + + Hysteria, viii, 33, 138 + + Hysteric, 30 + + Hysteric anorexia, 76 + + Hysterical cardiac distress, 27 + convulsion, 85, 90 + opisthotonos, 86 + somnambulism, viii + tendency, 91 + + Hysterics, 25, 75, 137 + + + Immaculate conception, 62, 73 + + Infantile causes, 113 + erotic, 71 + regression, 136 + sexuality, 21 + + "Interpretation of Dreams," 127, 130, 131 + + + "Jörn Uhl," 63 + + + Kleist, Heinrich von, ix, 46, 97 + + Krafft-Ebing, viii, 20, 25 + + + "Lebensmagie, Wirklichkeit und Traum," 92 + + Libido, 23 + repressed, 10 + + Ludwig, Otto, ix, 45, 72, 91 + + + "Macbeth," 114 + + Macbeth, Lady, 114 + + "Maria," 72 + + Masochistic, sadistic, 7 + + Menstruation, 3, 15, 17, 30, 70 + + Michaelis, Sophus, ix, 45 + + Moonstruck, vii + + Motor activities, 23 + impulse, 70 + overexcitability, 26 + phenomena of dreams, viii, ix + stimulability, 25 + + Mundt, Theodor, 92 + + Muscular activity, 31, 70 + convulsions, 90 + excitability, 63, 90 + irritability, heightened, 137 + rigidity, cataleptic, 25 + sense, viii + + Muscle erotic, 8, 25, 27, 31, 42, 90, 137 + eroticism, 63 + + Myopia, 77, 91 + + + Nates, 26 + + Neurotic, compulsive, 77 + + Neuroses, 22 + + Night wandering, vii + + Noctambulism, vii + + Nosebleed, 30 + + + Organic disposition, 25 + + Orgasm, 2 + + + Paralysis of arm, 26 + + Paralyses, 25 + + Pavor nocturnus, 25 + + Phantasies, sexual, 17, 19 + + Poets, 24, 45 + + "Prinz von Homburg, Der," 97 + + Psychoanalysis for moon walking, ix + + Puberty, 21, 41, 80, 82 + + + Rank, Otto, 102, 134 + + Regression, 113, 136 + + Repressed libido, 10 + + Repression, 60 + + + Sadistic, 20, 25 + + Sadistic-masochistic, 2, 7 + + Sadism, 8 + blood, 2 + + Sadists, 137 + + Shakespeare, ix, 114 + + Sleep, normal, vii, viii + + Somnambulism, vii, 22 + hysterical and hypnotic, viii + + Somnambulist, 23 + + Spirits, belief in, 26 + + Splitting of mother complex, 77 + + "Sündkind, Das," 106 + + Synesthesia, 74, 91 + + + Talking in sleep, 7, 33 + + Tic, 90 + + Tieck, Ludwig, ix, 42, 124 + + Transference in hypnotism, 26 + + + Unconscious conception, 62, 73 + + Urethral erotic, 27 + eroticism, 2 + + + Vaginal eroticism, 3 + + + "Woman in white," 26 + + + + + Publishers of + The Psychoanalytic Review + + A Journal Devoted to the Understanding of Human Conduct + + Edited by + WILLIAM A. WHITE, M.D., and SMITH ELY JELLIFFE, M.D. + + Leading Articles Which Have Appeared in Previous Volumes + + +VOL. I. (Beginning November, 1913.) + + The Theory of Psychoanalysis. C. G. Jung. + + Psychoanalysis of Self-Mutilation. L. E. Emerson. + + Blindness as a Wish. T. H. Ames. + + The Technique of Psychoanalysis. S. E. Jelliffe. + + Wishfulfillment and Symbolism in Fairy Tales. Riklin. + + Character and the Neuroses. Trigant Burrow. + + The Wildisbush Crucified Saint. Theodore Schroeder. + + The Pragmatic Advantage of Freudo-Analysis. Knight Dunlap. + + Moon Myth in Medicine. William A. White. + + The Sadism of Oscar Wilde's "Salome." Isador H. Coriat. + + Psychoanalysis and Hospitals. L. E. Emerson. + + The Dream as a Simple Wishfulfillment in the Negro. John E. Lind. + + +VOL. II. (Beginning January, 1915.) + + The Principles of Pain-Pleasure and Reality. Paul Federn. + + The Unconscious. William A. White. + + A Plea for a Broader Standpoint in Psychoanalysis. Meyer Solomon. + + Contributions to the Pathology of Everyday Life; Their Relation to + Abnormal Mental Phenomena. Robert Stewart Miller. + + The Integrative Functions of the Nervous System Applied to Some + Reactions in Human Behavior and their Attending Psychic Functions. + Edward J. Kempf. + + A Manic-Depressive Upset Presenting Frank Wish-Realization + Construction. Ralph Reed. + + Psychoanalytic Parallels. William A. White. + + Rôle of Sexual Complex in Dementia Præcox. James C. Hassall. + + Psycho-Genetics of Androcratic Evolution. Theodore Schroeder. + + Significance of Psychoanalysis for the Mental Sciences. Otto Rank and + Hans Sachs. + + Some Studies in the Psychopathology of Acute Dissociation of the + Personality. Edward J. Kempf. + + Psychoanalysis. Arthur H. Ring. + + A Philosophy for Psychoanalysis. L. E. Emerson. + + +VOL. III. (Beginning January, 1916.) + + Symbolism. William A. White. + + The Work of Alfred Adler, Considered with Especial Reference to that + of Freud. James J. Putnam. + + Art in the Insane. L. Grimberg. + + Retaliation Dreams. Hansell Crenshaw. + + History of the Psychoanalytic Movement. Sigmund Freud. + + Clinical Cases Exhibiting Unconscious Defence Reactions. Francis H. + Shockley. + + Processes of Recovery in Schizophrenics. H. Bertschinger. + + Freud and Sociology. Ernest R. Groves. + + The Ontogenetic Against the Phylogenetic Elements in the Psychoses of + the Colored Race. Arrah B. Evarts. + + Discomfiture and Evil Spirits. Elsie Clews Parsons. + + Two Very Definite Wish-Fulfillment Dreams. C. B. Burr. + + +VOL. IV. (Beginning January, 1917.) + + Individuality and Introversion. William A. White. + + A Study of a Severe Case of Compulsion Neurosis. H. W. Frink. + + A Summary of Material on the Topical Community of Primitive and + Pathological Symbols ("Archeopathic" Symbols). F. L. Wells. + + A Literary Forerunner of Freud. Helen Williston Brown. + + The Technique of Dream Interpretation. Wilhelm Steckel. + + The Social and Sexual Behavior of Infrahuman Primates with some + Comparable Facts in Human Behavior. Edw. J. Kempf. + + Pain as a Reaction of Defence. H. B. Moyle. + + Some Statistical Results of the Psychoanalytic Treatment of + Psychoneuroses. Isador H. Coriat. + + The Rôle of Animals in the Unconscious. S. E. Jelliffe and L. Brink. + + The Genesis and Meaning of Homosexuality. Trigant Burrow. + + Phylogenetic Elements in the Psychoses of the Negro. John E. Lind. + + Freudian Elements in the Animism of the Niger Delta. E. R. Groves. + + The Mechanism of Transference. William A. White. + + The Future of Psychoanalysis. Isador H. Coriat. + + Hermaphroditic Dreams. Isador H. Coriat. + + The Psychology of "The Yellow Jacket." E. J. Kempf. + + Heredity and Self-Conceit. Mabel Stevens. + + The Long Handicap. Helen R. Hull. + + +VOL. V. (Beginning January, 1918.) + + Analysis of a Case of Manic-Depressive Psychosis Showing well-marked + Regressive Stages. Lucile Dooley. + + Reactions to Personal Names. C. P. Oberndorf. + + A Study of the Mental Life of the Child. H. von Hug-Hellmuth. + + An Interpretation of Certain Symbolisms. J. J. Putnam. + + Charles Darwin--The Affective Source of His Inspiration and Anxiety + Neurosis. Edw. J. Kempf. + + The Origin of the Incest-Awe. Trigant Burrow. + + Compulsion and Freedom: The Fantasy of the Willow Tree. S. E. Jelliffe + and L. Brink. + + A Case of Childhood Conflicts with Prominent Reference to the Urinary + System: with some General Considerations on Urinary Symptoms in the + Psychoneuroses and Psychoses. C. Macfie Campbell. + + The Hound of Heaven. Thomas Vernon Moore. + + A Lace Creation Revealing an Incest Fantasy. Arrah B. Evarts. + + Nephew and Maternal Uncle: A Motive of Early Literature in the Light + of Freudian Psychology. Albert K. Weinberg. + +All the leading foreign psychoanalytic journals are regularly +abstracted, and all books dealing with psychoanalysis are reviewed. + + Issued Quarterly: $5.00 per Volume. + + Single Copies: $1.50 Foreign, $5.60. + + + Nervous and Mental Disease Publishing Company + + 3617 Tenth Street, N. W. WASHINGTON, D. C. + + + + + [ Transcriber's Note: + + The following is a list of corrections made to the original. The first + line is the original line, the second the corrected one. + + 29. A Study of the Mental Life of the Child. $2.00. By Dr. H. Von + 29. A Study of the Mental Life of the Child. $2.00. By Dr. H. von + + Conclusion and Resumé 137 + Conclusion and Résumé 137 + + of importance to medical pschology. The author of this book has pursued + of importance to medical psychology. The author of this book has pursued + + writers of these preceding science have made in regard to sleep walking + writers of the preceding science have made in regard to sleep walking + + [1] Über Nachtwandeln und Mondsucht. Eine medizinish-literarische + [1] Über Nachtwandeln und Mondsucht. Eine medizinisch-literarische + + Sechzentes Heft, Leipzig und Wien, Franz Deuticke, 1914. + Sechzehntes Heft, Leipzig und Wien, Franz Deuticke, 1914. + + [6] "Über den sado-masochistichen Komplex," Jahr. f. psychoanal. + [6] "Über den sado-masochistischen Komplex," Jahrb. f. psychoanal. + + sleep. In the same way similar erotic motives and analagous behavior may + sleep. In the same way similar erotic motives and analogous behavior may + + it for him. Then I went to bed and slept soundly for some hours, as I + it for him.' Then I went to bed and slept soundly for some hours, as I + + no sign of waking. This must represent a second form of consciounsess, + no sign of waking. This must represent a second form of consciousness, + + "At that time I had to sleep in a small room which by brother had + "At that time I had to sleep in a small room which my brother had + + Before going to sleep I always barred the door of the room, which near + "Before going to sleep I always barred the door of the room, which near + + brothr-in-law Emil had first taken breakfast with her mother in her + brother-in-law Emil had first taken breakfast with her mother in her + + maiden in her nightgown, who thus exhibits hereself in her night garment + maiden in her nightgown, who thus exhibits herself in her night garment + + perform coitus."--How is that?"--"I have remonstrated rather seriously + perform coitus."--"How is that?"--"I have remonstrated rather seriously + + mother call you, or did you come of yourself?"--I believe that my + mother call you, or did you come of yourself?"--"I believe that my + + gone he could do nothing more to the mother. And they you could take his + gone he could do nothing more to the mother. And then you could take his + + again"--"Or rather, I bolt the door so that my father cannot come to my + again."--"Or rather, I bolt the door so that my father cannot come to my + + in!'--"That would mean also that if the mother wants to come, only she + in!'"--"That would mean also that if the mother wants to come, only she + + he answered me, 'Yes, here I am!'--"What about the warden of the + he answered me, 'Yes, here I am!'"--"What about the warden of the + + myself immediately, realizing where I was, and went beck to bed. I told + myself immediately, realizing where I was, and went back to bed. I told + + episode: 'When I was nine or ten years old, the healthy brother was ill + episode: "When I was nine or ten years old, the healthy brother was ill + + lunacy but of a vertable moon lover, presumably our poet himself. There + lunacy but of a veritable moon lover, presumably our poet himself. There + + all this he did not become so quickly aware, as that his own checks + all this he did not become so quickly aware, as that his own cheeks + + with massive oak or iron bars. So finally he gave up entirely and + with massive oak or iron bars. "So finally he gave up entirely and + + surrounded her. He compelled himeslf to leave the clear broad way of + surrounded her. He compelled himself to leave the clear broad way of + + look would draw from me--what would you drag out from my soul?--'The + look would draw from me--what would you drag out from my soul?'--'The + + occurred to her the many nights when she had dreamed of the lonely + occurred to her the many nights "when she had dreamed of the lonely + + his fresh dream kissees. Still she consciously kept back every outer + his fresh dream kisses. Still she consciously kept back every outer + + I can deal more briefly with Jörn Uhl," the well-known rural romance of + I can deal more briefly with "Jörn Uhl," the well-known rural romance of + + not yet late"--"The sky is so clear. I want to look at the stars once + not yet late."--"The sky is so clear. I want to look at the stars once + + child and in his way solemnly declares "I will never do it again," and + child and in his way solemnly declares, "I will never do it again," and + + for reverence.'" + for reverence." + + is the love--one can call it nothing else--which the child betows upon + is the love--one can call it nothing else--which the child bestows upon + + now for the first time a child no more. Maria thus felt herself through + now for the first time a child no more." Maria thus felt herself through + + manner." Only all to evident! This punishment was in reality a + manner." Only all too evident! This punishment was in reality a + + The friendliness, the affectionate regard, which spoke so unmistakably + "The friendliness, the affectionate regard, which spoke so unmistakably + + good. Since she could not yet entirely believe she asked, "Is it indeed + good." Since she could not yet entirely believe she asked, "Is it indeed + + and said confusedly, "See this beautiful child, Eisener, Sir!" Maria + and said confusedly, 'See this beautiful child, Eisener, Sir!'" Maria + + premonition of a happy life with Eisener and her George." + premonition of a happy life with Eisener and her George. + + [25] Cf. with this especially Ernest Jentsch, "Das Pathologische bei + [25] Cf. with this especially Ernst Jentsch, "Das Pathologische bei + + [27] Rhapsodies over the Employment of the Psychical Method of + [27] "Rhapsodies over the Employment of the Psychical Method of + + the laurel wreath, saying, "Dearest Natalie, Why run away from me?" and + the laurel wreath, saying, "Dearest Natalie! Why run away from me?" and + + Who lately had arrived at our encampment?' + Who lately had arrived at our encampment?" + + Kruges," ("The Broken Pitcher.") These daintiest hands belonged to his + Kruges." ("The Broken Pitcher.") These daintiest hands belonged to his + + limits but becomes much more a peculiar neurotic charactertistic. No less + limits but becomes much more a peculiar neurotic characteristic. No less + + in life, by displacing it over upon a discovered or given material. + in life, by displacing it over a discovered or given material. + + everything as possible and is ready to sacrifiee even the hand of the + everything as possible and is ready to sacrifice even the hand of the + + the justice of the sentence--I might almost has said, after he had asked + the justice of the sentence--I might almost have said, after he had asked + + not only remorse seized him but be began to curse at the folk, who see + not only remorse seized him but he began to curse at the folk, who see + + 'that's the end,' and there remains nothing more to tell." Soon he + 'that's the end, and there remains nothing more to tell.'" Soon he + + The multitudinous seas incarnardine, + The multitudinous seas incarnadine, + + his bloody hands, "This is a sorry sight"! It was only a foolish + his bloody hands, "This is a sorry sight!" It was only a foolish + + come, give me your hand!' and bade her go to bed. + come, give me your hand!" and bade her go to bed. + + phantasies of childhood? I can only reply to this apparently justified + phantasies of childhood?" I can only reply to this apparently justified + + their later reappearancess in the great dramas. + their later reappearances in the great dramas. + + apparently so fundamentally different for one and the same thing, There + apparently so fundamentally different for one and the same thing. There + + calls out, "Et tu Brute! Then fall, Cæsar!" Shakespeare has set aside + calls out, 'Et tu Brute! Then fall, Cæsar!' Shakespeare has set aside + + Conception, Immacuate, 62, 73 + Conception, Immaculate, 62, 73 + + Epilepsy, iv, 1, 138 + Epilepsy, viii, 1, 138 + ] + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Sleep Walking and Moon Walking, by +Isidor Isaak Sadger + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLEEP WALKING AND MOON WALKING *** + +***** This file should be named 30556-8.txt or 30556-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/5/5/30556/ + +Produced by Bryan Ness, Jana Srna and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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