DAY: Friends described JW Dunne's experiments with time. I decide to look for dream elements from the future.
DREAM: I meet Oscar Wilde & other writers I dislike. A nonsense word like TELPOE or PELTOE appears...
DAY: A letter arrives full of anagrams (based on my poetry) about Oscar Wilde & other writers I dislike...
Guan Xiu, a painter in the late Tang Dynasty, dreamt that sixteen arhats
or luohans (Buddhist sort-of-saints) asked him to paint their portraits--
not their earthly forms but their (rather peculiar) astral forms. He did...
Touring Bretagne, I lodged in a nunnery. At 1 AM I saw by moonlight an old woman at my table.
I later learned that old woman died at 1 AM that night; for many years, my room had been hers...
A certain intensity marks some dreams as predictive, whether they foresee a death or a crisis averted;
but I keep quiet about them, writing them only in a locked diary. Once I spoke up, and was shunned...
CAUTION: DISTURBING ANALOGY WITH SEX-ORIENTATION CLOSET
I'm lost in a labyrinth, trying to get to an appointment. What time is it? My watch is gone, and when
I ask a watchman he sneers. But clock faces glare down from every wall, saying 4:10. I wake. It's...
CAUTION: HOW DID I KNOW?
Night. Rain. A hansom cab. The horse slips on the wet pavement, toppling the cab with my husband inside.
I woke sure it happened. Next morning a postman tried to tell me of the crash, but I told him...
DREAM: Hunt's mother points at a tall figure in the shadows and shrieks "Death! Death!"
ONE YEAR LATER: in Jerusalem, his hostess finds her young son dead, and shrieks...
CAUTION: BEWARE THE IDES OF JANUARY?
Croesus dreamt his heir Atys was slain by an iron blade; he locked them all in the armory. But Atys went
hunting; his guard Adrastus's spear went astray. Did Fate kill Atys, or superstition rattling poor Adrastus?
A woman in Stockwith dreamt she'd drown going to market; but her friends talked her back into the trip.
When she fell in the water, they all stood by as she drowned; not one helping her till it was too late...
CAUTION: WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...
I'm in Hell. No fire, no guilt. Just endless forests under the moon. My mother paints
endlessly but never gets it right. A sunny day, but I can't go out to play. Cut off...
CAUTION: DEPRESSION
I had gone blind in one eye. I dreamt our Savior came to me, and when I woke, I could see...
Dunne dreamt of a fire with smoke so toxic it killed people on
a balcony in open air! Then came the evening newspaper...
Adele: alone & scared in a dark wood--but her friend John came & shook a tree; it burst into flame!
John, the same night: found Adele scared in a dark wood. Shook a bush & it burst into flame...
When I'm stressed, I build a set of luna-moth wings and fly invisibly. Though once a blind man caught me by ear...
Mrs Claughton moved into a house known as haunted. She dreamt multiple ghosts asked her for help.
She crossed England to pass messages to heirs, containing private details Claughton couldn't have known...
CAUTION: ENOUGH CORROBORATION TO MAKE SKEPTICS UNEASY
I dreamt of a surreal poker hand where one card changed to create a full house. Next weekend, I was losing when...
I grope for the name of an island. I dream I crash a car on a bridge; it hangs with one wheel over. I wake & recall a friend who moved to Canada.
Breakfast. That island's on the front page. Inside's a photo of that hanging car. A letter comes--the first from my Canadian friend in years.
Each might be coincidence, but what do we call it when coincidence goes on and on?
At 14, B. dreamt a stranger attacked her and hurt her badly. She said "but I'll hurt you worse." She did:
a week later that man attacked and nearly killed her. She survived to identify him--and get him hanged...
CAUTION: HARSH JUSTICE
My friend put an ad on her gown, so I try one on our house. I have big ideas for more, but a pickpocket...
I admire a baby, and talk the tired mother into washing it. I go get some
clean baby clothes and return to find she's roasting her baby in the oven...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE, DENIAL
Twice a condemned man's wife dreamt of a key lost in rubble below a wall. The second time she went out to find it...
Layanasha foresaw the British would bring a great snake spanning Maasai territory, then a plague killing
half the tribe, a second plague killing nearly all the cattle, and finally huge birds flying over the veldt...
I dreamt an epic poem on a sinister ruined city now home
only to reptiles. I woke with at least a hundred lines, but...
Bennet's daughter dreamt her husband drowned after wading too deep (he couldn't swim). He promised
he'd avoid deep water, but his best friend played a prank, treading water to make it seem shallow...
CAUTION: WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...
De Bray dreamed a speeding car nearly hit him; a month later, he abruptly recognized the street from his dream and paused...
A friend in Heaven promises Helen a lost ring would return to her. Three days later it did; but its path had been strange...
Each time, I'm a young Elizabethan man in a grand, new-built country house. In the main room,
I find a man in black by the fire. He comes at me, and as he shoots me point-blank, I wake...
We went to visit a well-known psychic. As an afterthought I asked about an upcoming race. The answer was firm: "Marco to win..."
We made a lot off her tip. But when I thanked her later, we were shocked to learn she'd never heard me! Then who had spoken?...
CAUTION: WEIRD EVEN FOR SPIRITUALISTS
Mary Queen of Scots' will (1556) was lost for centuries. In 1845, Major Buckley hypnotized
a fellow officer and had him 'read' a family heirloom. He said it was Mary's! Her lost will
was found in 1854 and published in 1863. Turned out the claim in the trance was right...
CAUTION: MARY'S LIFE WAS BRUTAL
Giant worms put me on trial for wearing a nameless hat, but I like their punishment so I taunt the judge...
Vespasian dreamed he and his family would rise only when Emperor Nero lost his teeth.
The next day, a surgeon happened to show Vespasian a tooth he'd just extracted from...
Two boys dream robed figures climb in the window to cut their hair--and find, awake, someone has. While Pliny...
I dreamt I stepped on my engagement ring and crushed its pearl. Next I dreamt ink stained it.
Then I dreamt it fell in the sea, and the brine dissolved it. Then the telegram came: my fiancé...
Thrice I saw the Chancellor of the Exchequer shot in the House of Commons. I nearly went to London...
On a cloud in space I met an ape molding a model of Earth, glancing at the original far below. We were much alike...
Our son woke in the night crying "Poor Mrs Timms; poor Mrs Timms!" We knew no
such woman, but it turned out she lived nearby. That day, her son had died in France...
CAUTION: IMPLIES WE'RE TRAINED OUT OF A 6TH SENSE
Samuel Savage dreamt he rode through a graveyard and saw a new monument--for himself!
His death-date was marked: two years in the future. He died September 1772, on that day...
As a boy, my family urged me to aim low and follow our trade: stonecarving. I dreamt two strong women fought
over me, a grubby sculptor and an elegant writer. I sided with the writer, and she let me ride in her flying chariot...
A friend scoffed at Biblical talk of the apocalypse, but as we spoke, the evening star came down and burned all our
cities. I knew it was no ordinary dream. Next day came the news: the Russians had burned the city of Sevastopol...
CAUTION: WAR CRIME
A man frames his big brother, til their sister makes him shoot his own reflection. Neither one expects...
I found myself upon a stone pillar in a valley. Invisible people sat on other stalagmites, but my voice couldn't reach them...
Dusk. A plain. A troop of swordsmen approach me, draw their weapons...
and toss their spinning, shining swords up to the stars...
DREAM: a stranger tells me "The Teacher" won the Handicap. AWAKE: At the track I meet the man in my dream! He
says The Teacher is now called Aldrich. But Aldrich's owner discourages me. A friend trusts my dream & wins £1,000...
Ethiopian records say Solomon and Makeda, the Queen of Sheba, had a son who stole
the Ark of the Covenant! Solomon dreamt of the theft but didn't check til it was too late...
I'm carried off by a crane to meet birdfish, singing sheep, fell-spirits, mad shopkeepers and devil-bulls...
She tells me there's a stream under the floor, upstairs. Peel back the carpet, pry up the boards. An icy creek.
Trout. She brings me a fishing rod. But the fish say they're too young to die. I feel such guilt and grief...
I dreamt I could clearly see the sun's corona, like a lion-mane of fire. But the
corona dwindled; then the very sun dimmed, shrank, and went out. I thought...
CAUTION: POLITICAL?
Wading a river at night, I fall in. I'm drowning! But my friend Edward pulls
me out. "But Eddie, you're dead!" "No" he says. "You'll grow out of that!"...