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Dreams listed by date:
1950s

Dreams from 1950-59. Freudian still dominated popular thought on dreams, but the discovery of REM started to put dream research on a scientific basis; and Jack Kerouac made dreamwork cool in the growing counterculture.

NEXT: the 1960s -
RELATED TOPICS: Kerouac
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TRANSFUSION by a New York woman; 1950s? 3 predictive dreams over a 5-year span
I dreamt of the Du Pont lab where I'd work, and my neighbor's future coffin,
and the hospital where my sister-in-law would get a transfusion...
BILL: by Anonymous #32; c. 1950, a predictive warning dream
My mother begged me to stay in. I went out with Bill--who raped me. Mom later told me she'd dreamed...
CAUTION: DATE RAPE
THE LAST JUDGMENT: by Esther Raucher, c.1950; a childhood dream grows into a big sculpture group
I fled a snake by flying. I felt guilty, I knew it was cheating. Years passed. I made tiny clay figurines.
Years passed. I drew a chicken lady with a halo. Years passed. I sculpted a flock of BIG...
CAUTION: NUDE CHICKEN LADIES
WITH WILD AND TURQUOISE EYES: by Joan-lee Woehler; c.1950, a dream of a Jungian Shadow
I slay the beautiful dragon attacking us, despite my regret.
And then, as I sleep, glowing eyes advance on our keep AGAIN...
ALCOHOLIC CAT: by Montague Ullman's patient, 1950/2/24, an eavesdropping dream
PATIENT: I dreamt of a dangerous cat and a mixture of cream and booze called 'appealing nausea'...
THERAPIST: I heard a lecture on feeding alcohol to cats til they choose milk laced with booze...
CAUTION: WILL BOTHER E.S.P. SKEPTICS
DUCK HUNT: by Craig, age 4; 1950/11/18, an ignored predictive nightmare
"I dreamed you were in the water, Daddy. You kept trying to come out of the water to me..."
CREAM-COLOURED HORSES: by a friend of Carl Jung's; before 1951, a predictive dream
He dreamed of a street with a cathedral, and round the corner, two cream horses pulling a fancy carriage.
In Spain on vacation, he saw the street and the church. To test the dream, he turned the corner to see if...
CAUTION: CALLS E.S.P. & SYNCHRONICITY TWO PROBLEMS NOT ONE?
TEN YEARS AFTER: by Anonymous #31; before 1951, a predictive dream.
I dreamed I drove through snow to my parents' home where my mother lay dead. Ten years later...
DICK, HOW WONDERFUL: by Dick and his mother; 1951-54, shared telepathic hallucinations
As a man on shore patrol in Manila is attacked, he and his mother simultaneously see and hear each other...
BAYSHORE AND CHARTER: by a Redwood City man; July 1951, a lifesaving predictive urge
I burst into tears for no reason and for 15 minutes begged my brother-in-law not to go, then said...
CAUTION: GRUESOME
CLAIRAGONY: by a Philadelphia woman, Aug 1951, a sympathetic heart attack her mind misattributes
I had a heart attack--but it faded in minutes! The phone rang. I knew at once my dying mother was gone...
POLYGAPO: by a Washington woman, fall 1951, a detailed unlikely predictive dream
I sat thinking "Now that boy will jump the fence"--and he did; "that boy will chase the dog"--and he did...
PREEMIE; 1951/10/30 by an Oklahoma woman; a predictive dream
We were looking at our three-pound premature baby girl. Though tiny she was bright-eyed, active, perfect...
IN A STRANGE LIVINGROOM: by Jack Kerouac, late August 1952, an advisory dream.
June admired this forgotten philosopher Plipias or Snipias, who wrote 'Never go on strike against man'...
TREMENDOUS FAMILY SAGA: by Jack Kerouac, mid-September 1952, a tender violent dream.
I try to protect the kitten from being strangled and girl geniuses from the depth charges; ...
I GUESS IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY PARTY: by Jack Kerouac, early Oct.1952, a transcendent nightmare?
My party's a slow disaster. Talk, booze, pot, sex--nothing works out.
What will Mom think? At last, trapped in an office, I get the Message...
THAT GORGEOUS BLONDE DANCING BARE-BREASTED: by Jack Kerouac, mid-October 1952
A sex-fantasy dream that shifts backstage and gets real
In Charlotte they want to lynch her just for dancing. I protest. As she leaves town, she tells me...
THEN I REVISIT SELMA CALIFORNIA: by Jack Kerouac, late Oct. 1952, a predictive dream
I dream of strange wide brown houses on the tracks... A knock wakes me--our train's moving out.
As we pass through San Mateo, I see them on the rails, ready to roll--the first prefabricated homes...
I WANTED TO STEAL: by Jack Kerouac, early Nov. 1952, a class-envy dream.
I wanted to steal this pink woolen sweater. I didn't need it;
what I really wanted to steal was middle-class security...
LOUSY DREAM: by Jack Kerouac, early Dec? 1952, a rage-filled nightmare
In America the woman has the Police State Telephone in one hand and My Child swathed in
incredible bills in the other... Ah, Kafka, you never had it so good...
CAUTION: LANGUAGE, MISOGYNY
JOYOUS RIDE: by Janis Amatuzio, c. 1953; an ecstatic childhood dream of flight with a guardian angel
I was about three. A big, luminous figure said he would be my guardian always. We went horseback riding in the sky...
SPIRAL LAUGHTER: by Alder; 1953, a child's feverdream
The world is a whirlpool, a black and white spiral pulling me
down toward a black hole, and it's laughing...
RUNNING BIRD: by Alder; 1953, a kinetic nightmare with double selves.
I'm a flightless bird hopping down a line of marble columns rising from the sea, as they topple behind me...
FINALLY I'M AN OLD WHORE: by Jack Kerouac, Jan/Feb 1953, a burnout dream... or his fears for the future
Finally I've turned into an old whore... a silly Jack Kerouac whore with that same old tired old gasafaycagoo...
LIKE NOTRE DAME: by Jack Kerouac, early April? 1953, a bizarre dream
As the train pulled into the cathedral William Burroughs and I saw amid the pews
the Hound of the Baskervilles transform into a great black bird and fly...
MA HAS GONE TO FRISCO: by Jack Kerouac, late June? 1953, a back-in-school dream ending in revelation.
I walk the corridors smiling, realizing for the first time that I don't have to go to high school---because I'm a great writer...
FRANKLIN'S NECK: by a dying Kansas grandmother; 1953/7/5, an unheeded warning nightmare
"Oh no" she moaned. "I don't want Frankie to go to that camp. He must not go there." She began to cry...
IRENE'S DREAM: parallel (linked?) dreams by "Irene May" and Jack Kerouac, c. Aug 9 1953
IRENE tries to mold Francesca like clay to bring her back to life, and does--for a moment...
JACK finds his brother Gerard dead, and all Jack's words can't revive him...
GIGANTIC SAND MOUNTAINS: by Jack Kerouac, early Sept. 1953, a dream on fun versus work
Perched on a huge sandpile by the train track, I wrote. Then met a narcissistic
hipster chasing happiness and sex. But this globe's austere and full of hurt...
AT A BIG 'SWENSON' PARTY: by Jack Kerouac, mid-Sept? 1953, a nightmare on need
A lovely pecan pie, but the guests are cutting pieces, dropping them, hands trembling
in growing hunger desperate the dark voracious guests fighting now to freeload...
CAUTION: NOT ABOUT PIE
THEY'RE HANGING THE POLITICAL TRAITOR: by Jack Kerouac, late Sept. 1953, a sad dad dream
They're hanging the political traitor in my closet. I stand horrified.
The old man's resigned--no complaint. It's my father, I now realize...
WILDERNESS OF VIRGINIA: by Jack Kerouac; around Oct. 1, 1953; a capitalist nightmare
I feel horrified--how publishers will batten on the sufferings of junkey musicians... unbearable...
CLOCKS STOP, CLOCKS START: 1953/10/3 and pre-1961; two family reports of psychokinesis
Indiana: Father's favorite clock, a cuckoo clock, stopped at exactly the time he died...
Florida: an old clock silent for years started up at 10:20, the time of my husband's death the day before...
BIG FLAMING AIRPLANES TRYING TO LAND: by Jack Kerouac, late Oct. 1953, a double nightmare
Two DC-6s catch burn over New York. Me? I'm a naked child in a Babylonian temple in Jersey...
IN WATSONVILLE CALIFORNIA: by Jack Kerouac, early Nov. 1953, a dream warning of mooches
Green snakes fly over Elkhorn Marsh. My mom says "They're just cockroaches." She's not fooled by my... friends?
VAGUELY IN A SICK DREAM: by Jack Kerouac, late Nov. 1953, a dream of cooperative sacrifice
Us guys take turns getting pounded by this fist of cloud that must never hit
the world. It hammers my skull and retreats; we laugh and switch positions...
DREAM FLOWERS: by Kathleen Raine, between 1953 & '65; a dream florifying dreams
I dreamt I was given verbena sprigs--from my mother, I'm told. But am I me, Persephone, or all the daughters given love by all the mothers?
THE ELEMENTALS: by Kathleen Raine, between 1953 & '65; a shamanic dream of earth-spirits
Giant presences; rock, hill and crag are aspects worn. Shape-shifters they are; each in as many forms as eyes behold...
RONALD'S FORBIDDEN FIELD: by Ronald, patient of Jan Ehrenwald, before 1954, a telepathic dream?
DREAM: a distinctive house with a tempting green field by it. But the field's forbidden...
DAY: Ronald's analyst had rented that house--but the adjacent field was forbidden...
CAUTION: E.S.P. THEORIES
HEADLINES: by "Anonymous #21"; 1942/8/4, 1954/1/1, and 1958/8/16, a set of psychic newsflashes
All my life I've had sudden visions showing violent deaths accompanied by headlines naming the victims...
RAPA ITI: by Marc Liblin, 1954-1960s, recurring childhood dreams teaching him an unknown language
Only at age 33 did Marc Liblin at last meet someone who spoke his dream language.
He married her, and moved to Rapa Iti, the only place in the world it's spoken...
GABORS: by Jack Kerouac, late Jan. 1954, a dream of celebrity delusion
Starlets Zaza and Eva Gabor grow old shopping, smiling, covering their fears, until...
AIRPLANE DISASTERS: by Jack Kerouac, early Aug? 1954, a helpless-witness nightmare
An indestructible camera relentlessly shows me what passengers feel on every crashing plane...
CAUTION: PAINFUL READING
I'M AT MY RAINY MORNING WORKDESK: by Jack Kerouac, late Aug? 1954, a lucid dream-prompt missed
I look down by the dock and see the Navy vessels anchored in the bay and the crowds of sailors walking on the water towards the land...
FOR THE FIRST TIME: by Jack Kerouac, Nov? 1954, a lucid dream of escaping a rut
I've climbed a cliff and cower on the brink; but for for the first time I need not
fall or retrace my dangerous path down. I know I'm dreaming, and wake...
THE MIMI: by Robert Moss, 1955, a dream of another life
As a boy in Australia I briefly died on the operating table. I found myself living among the Mimi,
spirits living in rocks. I grew up, grew old, died--and woke up nine years old again...
AT A CALIFORNIA CAMP: by Jack Kerouac, spring 1955, a nuclear testing nightmare
My family and I are prisoners in a camp that will be H-bombed so our remains
can be studied. I write a Buddhist poem preparing for death...
CAUTION: GOVERNMENT ATROCITY
NINA'S RING: by Nina's clown, 1955/4/20, a lifesaving intuition
While rehearsing our circus act I mentally saw Nina's ladder breaking loose.
Next day, a supporting ring snapped. Being forewarned, I pulled hard...
LBJ OR WOODROW?: by Lyndon Baines Johnson; July-Sept 1955 and Feb-Mar 1968, recurring paralysis dreams
From the neck up I was me; from the neck down, Woodrow Wilson in his old age, paralyzed.
My presidential aides divided up my duties, and ignored me...
DESTRUCTION OF THE NIGHTMARE TOWERS: by Dustin Shuler; c.1955-1965, recurrent nightmare made performance art
As a kid, when I had a fever I always had the same nightmare: a high brick or stone wall
shaking apart, faster and faster. This scared me very much. Finally, in my teens, I...
I AM THREE: by Wayan; 1956-58, my three earliest dreams.
My first memory is of being a wild horse and waking up to find I was suddenly a human child...
HORSES OF THE AQUARIUS: by Wayan, recurring dream 1956-8, poem '72/6/24, art 82/12/11
My earliest memory's a recurring dream: I'm a wild horse near Shiprock, recurrently dreaming
that I'm a human child! The two lives alternated for years, each a dream to the other...
NO BLUE RIDER: by Wayan; 1956-8 recurring dreams; a 1987/6/22 dream brought them back; painted 1996/1/21
My first memory is of being a wild horse, and waking up to find I was now a human child.
Franz Marc's "Blue Rider" paintings felt like my dreams; but as I learned of his life...
MY DREAM NIGHTJOB: by Jack Kerouac, late 1956 or early '57, an outa-the-mouths-of-babes dream.
I commute to my dreamjob on a four-story bus; then my baby brother
(who I wouldn't let eat any chocolate pudding) utters a new poem by William Blake...
LIME FROST by Anonymous #53, Jan. 1957, a short psychic dream
I felt dread as I peered out my parents' window into the garden. My dad lay on the frosty grass, dead...
I HAD A WHITE BANDAGE: by Jack Kerouac, July 1957, a dream of triumph despite adversity
Wounded, bandaged, chased by cops, I end up heading a huge children's parade,
marching to Mongolia. No secret what it's about--On The Road was just published...
TO GET DOWN FROM OUR APARTMENT: by Jack Kerouac, ca. Halloween 1957, a telepathic nightmare?
My mom had to climb a ladder down the side of the Empire State Building; I'm told she fell and died...
THE FLYING HORSES OF MIEN MO: by Jack Kerouac, Nov/Dec? 1957, a persistent numinous image
I'm in Mexico. The mountain of the gods looms over Coyacan. Around it, silhouetted
on the rising moon, wheel terrifying griffinlike winged horses wearing capes...
BESS: by Forrest Bess, 1947, '57, '67 & '70; five hypnogogic dreams
Bess painted images that look like abstract symbols
but actually flashed in front of him when half asleep...
WIRES: by Wayan; 1957-1963, a recurrent childhood nightmare resolved by drawing, 1999/12/8
I was bodiless but trapped. All I could see were these moving wires. Whenever a knot drifted by...
CAUTION: MADNESS, TORMENT, TELEPATHY, SEXUAL REBELLION
THE DREAM: by Theodore Roethke; before 1958; a dream-poem? Or not?
A mysterious night-encounter with a shapeshifting spiritwoman as elusive as Roethke's poetry...
DEFENDING MYSELF BEFORE A JURY OF MEN: by Jack Kerouac, 1958?, a transcendent advisory dreamlet
I'm on trial. As I argue in my own defense, I float over the court! The jurors murmur
"Why does he even bother protesting? He's beyond this world"...
FLOCK WISDOM: by Alder; 1958, a magic comic frustration dream
My eighth grade class is a flock of birds migrating south for the winter, but we don't migrate the easy way...
ICE: by Doug Montgomery; c. 1958, a surreal childhood dream
Drops fall outside. But it's not rain! It's dripping from a
gray-purple block of ice floating fifty feet above me...
F.I.P: by Dr A (c.1947), a Cambridge man (1960?), a London girl (c.1916) and a Midlands mum (July 1958)
Examples of inexplicable moods that appear (after the fact) to be reactions to future events...
I ALSO DREAMED...: by Jack Kerouac, Summer 1958? an early dream of the world as a simulation.
I also dreamed the world was a mathematical abstract, like, by subtracting 740 from 1000
you got 260 which meant 'Egg' more or less, so if you wanted an egg you had the egg...
HEADLINES: by "Anonymous #21"; 1942/8/4, 1954/1/1, and 1958/8/16, a set of psychic newsflashes
All my life I've had sudden visions showing violent deaths accompanied by headlines naming the victims...
U.F.O. PROJECTION by Carl Jung, 1958/10; an ego-humbling dream
UFOs hover near enough so I can see they're truly lenses--lenses projecting images.
I judged UFOs to be projections from our minds, but now I see I am their projection!
A DREAM SESTINA: by Donald Justice, late 1950s? A nightmare-poem.
"But what is wrong with my friends' faces? Why have they changed that way to wood?"
BLUE HOLES: Wayan; 1958 or early 59. Visionary sculpture by 4-year-old.
This was my first sculpture. I was around four. The rest of the preschool class made bunnies and snowmen.
But I'd been peeking at Isamu Noguchi and Henry Moore in my mom's art books, so...
PAST PARTY, FUTURE HUSBAND: by a Georgia woman; before 1959, a psychic dream fusing past & future
I dream a stranger's observing a lawn party at a house I've never seen.
My beau recognizes the party from three years ago, but not the man. Two years later...
PICK ME!: by William Dement's daughter, 1959 or '60, a not-yet-two-year-old's dream
I went into her room one morning before she awoke and saw her eyes moving. Suddenly she said,
"Pick me! Pick me!" I woke her and she immediately said, "Oh, Daddy, I was a flower." ...
TO THE SNAKE: by Denise Levertov; 1959?; a short dream-poem
I loved the feel of the green snake, and reassured my friends it wasn't poisonous, but really...
BOY BODY: by Wayan; recurring dream 1959-62, a comic on body image. Or illus. text version
A recurring childhood dream on how weird a boy-body is when you've been a girl too many lifetimes.
CAUTION: PUBLIC HUMILIATION, NUDE MONSTERS, SILLY GENITALIA
MY EDUCATION: by William S. Burroughs, 1959-94, a recurrent dream theme or mantra.
At the airport, I'm told I can't take my flight; I must finish my education first. Decades have passed,
and I still dream of borders and officials who won't let me go until they decide I've finished my...
DEAD, ALIVE, DEAD: by a Minnesota teacher; well before 1960, a predictive... something.
Mrs Brown was dead; I recalled helping at her bedside. My mother swore she was alive and I'd never met her! Then...


NEXT: the 1960s

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