REVERIE

The term reverie refers to an imaginary representation created to help realize a desire. The term Phantasie was used by Freud to designate such mental activity collectively, whether conscious or unconscious. In French the term fantasme prevailed in psychoanalytic use, for it was felt that the term fantaisie was too marked by current usage, where it connotes the idea of capriciousness or gratuitousness. However, following Daniel Lagache (1964), the term fantaisie came to refer to imaginary conscious or preconscious creations, without ignoring their continuity with the unconscious fantasies they reflect.

Daydreams, which everyone experiences, are the clearest examples of conscious or preconscious reveries. In general they explicitly satisfy a desire, providing some form of imaginary satisfaction, whether it be erotic, aggressive, ambitious, self-aggrandizing, or uplifting. It is not even unusual for people to visualize painful or humiliating experiences to their own advantage. In all these cases the narcissistic dimension of the process is obvious.

There are references to such daydreams in the Studies on Hysteria (1895d), primarily in the case study of Anna O., written by Josef Breuer. Freud wrote about daydreams in The Interpretation of Dreams (1900a). For example, when analyzing his dream about the "botanical monograph," he relates a daydream during which he imagines that, afflicted by glaucoma, he travels incognito to Berlin for an operation and experiences considerable pleasure in listening to the surgeon extol the anesthetic qualities of cocaine (thus being compensated for the pain Freud experienced through being too late to be recognized as the one who discovered its properties). The "phantasies or day-dreams are the immediate forerunners of hysterical symptoms.... Like dreams they are wish-fulfilments; like dreams, they are based to a great extent on impressions of infantile experiences; like dreams, they benefit by a certain degree of relaxation of censorship" (p. 491-492)

According to Freud, a daydream is initially the expression of an unconscious fantasy; then, it is used as available material among the latent thoughts used by dreams. However, as he noted, there is an essential difference between night dreams and daydreams: the first is hallucinatory, the second is not, and the person remains more or less clearly aware that his daydream is an escape from a reality that is not completely suspended.

This distinction can be blurred or even disappear entirely. Freud analyzes this phenomenon in his detailed commentary on Wilhelm Jensen's Gradiva (1907a). In the same period, in "Creative Writers and Daydreaming" (1908e [1907]), he discusses the function of daydreaming in the genesis of the literary work, and later, in "Family Romances" (1909c [1908]), he foresees the situation where daydreams are used by the child to avoid the oedipal conflict by imagining himself to be adopted, to be really the child of a king and queen.

Robert Desoille (1961) developed an original method of psychotherapy based on the development and analysis of the patient's daydreams during therapy. For some patients and under certain circumstances, analytic psychodrama can create scenarios that are related to daydreams.

Roger Perron

See also: Amentia; Boredom; Censoring the lover in her; Compromise formation; "Creative Writers and Daydreaming"; Creativity; Directed daydream (Robert Desoille); Ego ideal; Family romance; Psychoanalysis of fire, the; Unconscious fantasy.

Bibliography

Anargyros-Klinger, Annie, Reiss-Schimmel, Ilana, and Wainrib, Steve. (1998). Création, psychanalyse. Paris:Presses Universitaires de France.

Desoille, Robert. (1961). Théorie et Pratique du Rêve-éveillédirigé. Geneva: Le Mont-Blanc.

Lagache, Daniel. (1964). Fantaisie, réalité, vérité. Revue française c de psychanalyse, 28 (4), 515-538.

rev·er·ie / ˈrevərē/ • n. a state of being pleasantly lost in one's thoughts; a daydream: a knock on the door broke her reverie | I slipped into reverie. ∎  Mus. an instrumental piece suggesting a dreamy or musing state. ∎ archaic a fanciful or impractical idea or theory.

reverie †wild delight, violent or riotous action XIV; †fanciful idea; abstracted musing XVII. In ME. — OF. reverie rejoicing, revelry, wildness, f. rever revel, act or speak wildly (mod. réver †talk in delirium, dream), of unkn. orig. In XVII–XVIII (often resverie) — later F. resverie, now rêverie; see -ERY.