Mythologist Joseph Campbell once said in an interview, "A dream is a personal experience of that deep, dark ground that is the support of our conscious lives, and a myth is the society's dream. The myth is the public dream, and the dream is the private myth." The following projects--representative of the various media used to convey our modern, public myths--explore the links between dreaming and art. Such varied artists from Shakespeare to Hitchcock have successfully depicted dreams in their work in order to convey the complexity of the human psyche through the mediums of film, anime, drama and literature. Through this variety of media, they focus on the instability of dreams, experimenting with methods for reflecting the lack of control we often experience in real life. Whether or not they would agree with Joseph Campbell about the relationship between dreams and myth, the widespread influence of their work suggests that dreams are a continued source of fascination for audiences.

To die,--to sleep;-- To sleep! Perchance to dream:--ay, there’s the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause” —William Shakespeare, Hamlet

This famous quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet introduces a terrifying thought about nightmares able to haunt, even after death. The only thing to do , is to cure oneself from them during waking life. According to the American Psychiatric Assocation's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM IV), “Nightmares typically occur in a lengthy elaborate dream sequence that is highly anxiety provoking or terrifying. Dream content most often focuses on imminent physical danger to the individual (e.g., pursuit, attack, injury). In other cases, the perceived danger may be more subtle, involving personal failure or embarrassment." Artists and writers throughout history—William Shakespeare, Charlotte Bronte, and Alfred Hitchcock, to name just a few—have used nightmares with varying effects, from sublime terror to slapstick. From film to psychadelic and existential literature, from biblical allusions to sleep paralysis, the portrayal of nightmares allows us to examine the inner struggles of fictional characters and explore one of the stranger and more terrifying aspects of the human mind. “To sleep! Perchance to dream": Dreaming is a wonderful thing; however, when it turns to terror, the heavenly feeling turns hellish.

"Religion was the original field of dream study. The earliest writings we have on dreams are primarily texts on their religious and spiritual significance."
-- Kelly Bulkeley "Why Study Dreams? A Religious Studies Perspective"

Dreams play integral roles in virtually all of the world's religious and cultural traditions . They shape and are shaped by the beliefs of the people who experience them, differing and changing according to the cultural and religious beliefs. Many people study dreams to gain valuable insights into the concerns of humankind, and that is true cross-culturally. Before dreams were studied by scientists, researchers, and analysts, they were used in a variety of ways: spiritual guidance, intellectual exploration, communication with the divine, and interpersonal negotiation. When dreams are interpreted through a cultural lens, their contents, imagery, and themes become clearer. The study of dreams must consider a their origin in religions and the cultures from which they spring.

A variety of literary dreams written in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries show us that writing about dreams opens up imagined worlds for writers and readers. Lord Byron, poet of "The Dream," wrote that

Sleep hath it's own world, And a wide realm of wild reality. And dreams in their development have breath, And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy. (lines 3 - 6)

From the scientific to the subjective, ideas about dreams permeate our lives and our literature. In this literary exhibit, we discuss dreamworlds that exude inspiration, imagination, and mystery. They cover a range of topics that explore the ways literary dreams describe sleep's "own world." While the inherent nature of dreams has remained constant, dreams and the unconscious mind have been examined and treated differently from one historical era to the next. Writers have often used dreams as a source of inspiration and a basis for formal experimeneation. In nineteenth- and twentieth- century literature, creative boundaries and literary forms are extended and illuminated by the modern dream.