The Dutch psychotherapist Frederik van Eeden [recorded 352 lucid dreams from] January 20, 1898 to Decmber 26, 1912.

Perceptions in lucid dreams are particularly vivid. Colors are lifelike. Sounds, noises, tastes, odors, the feel of textures, temperatures, pain, kinesthetic sensations--all seem quite real. In fact, lucid dreamers appear to delight in experimenting to see how realistic they can make their dream sensations. Van Eeden, for example, reported:

On Sept. 9, 1904, I dreamt that I stood at a table before a window. On the table were different objects. I was perfectly well aware that I was dreaming and I considered what sorts of experiments I could make. I began by trying to break glass, by beating it with a stone. I put a small tablet of glass on two stones and struck it with another stone. Yet it would not break. Then I took a fine claret-glass from the table and struck it with my fist, with all my might, at the same time reflecting how dangerous it would be to do this in waking life; yet the glass remained whole. But lo! when I looked at it again after some time, it was broken.

It broke all right, but a little too late, like an actor who misses his cue. This gave me a very curious impression of being in a fake-world, cleverly imitated, but with small failures.

I took the broken glass and threw it out of the window, in order to observe whether I could hear the tinkling. I heard the noise all right and I even saw two dogs run away from it quite naturally. I thought what a good imitation this comedy-world was.

Then I saw a decanter with claret and tasted it, and noted with perfect clearness of mind: "Well, we can also have voluntary impressions of taste in this dreamworld; this has quite the taste of wine."

Note how early this is. Van Eeden pioneered lucid dream research--he coined the term 'lucidity' to mean 'awareness that you're dreaming'.

I don't really get what Eeden or Garfield mean by non-lucid dreams being less lifelike. Like what, then? Black and white movies? Drunk pantomime? Badly drawn comics? Fog? To me, all dreams (lucid or not) feel equally lifelike and detailed. It's probably why I don't work harder to have lucid dreams. Mine are already intense and magical.

That slow-to-shatter glass: if the dream managed all those other sensory details, even the taste of wine, this anomaly looks intentional--trying to draw his attention, to make some point. I'm skeptical that the dreamworld is "like an actor who misses his cue... a fake-world, cleverly imitated, but with small failures." How does he know it's an error, not a prank? Or a message. After all, in a non-lucid dream, oddities are often symbolic--can reveal the dream's meaning. Just because you go lucid, why should that suddenly fail?

The point matters. Stephen La Berge urges lucid dreamers to check clocks and written texts because dreams can't sustain such details consistently. Really? As a kid I once reread half a novel in my sleep. When I checked the actual text in the morning, the dream seemed to have recalled it (read years earlier) word-for-word.

So dreams can manage such details--if they choose. Discrepancies aren't noise but signal.

--Chris Wayan

SOURCE: Creative Dreaming by Patricia Garfield, 1995 ed. (orig.1974), p. 156-7

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