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Dream story
167 pages
A shadowy, erotic descent into the subconscious desires and hidden depravity lurking beneath civilized society.
What it feels like
Reading this work feels like wandering through a fever dream in a decadent, shadowy metropolis. The narrative moves at a steady, hypnotic pace, peeling back the polite veneer of civilized society to expose the tangled, erotic roots of human psychology. The mood is deeply unsettling yet alluring, steeped in the atmosphere of seedy cafés, red-light districts, and morgues. It offers a probing, unflinching look at marital trauma and the blurred lines between fantasy and reality. The prose acts as a bold psychological excavation, guiding the reader through dark confessions and might-have-beens. It is a perfect fit for readers who are captivated by early psychoanalytic exploration and the hidden, often depraved desires that pulse beneath the surface of everyday life.
- Mood
- dream-like
- erotic
- shadowy
- unsettling
- Tone
- probing
- unflinching
- decadent
- clinical
- Pace
- steady
- Themes
- human sexuality · hidden depravity · the subconscious · civilized facades · marital confession
- The writing
- Bold and probing, navigating the murky boundaries between conscious reality and subconscious desire with an unflinching eye.
- The arc
- Moves from the traumatizing shock of hidden desires to a profound, hard-won depth of mutual understanding.
- Who it's for
- Readers fascinated by early psychoanalytic thought and the dark, erotic underbelly of polite society.
Content notes
- sexual content
- violence
- trauma
About the book
Like his Viennese contemporary Sigmund Freud, the doctor and dramatist Arthur Schnitzler (1862-1931) was a bold pioneer in exploring the dark tangled roots of human sexuality.
Arthur Schnitzler is probably most famous for La Ronde, a play too scandalous to publish or perform in his own lifetime but whose daisy-chain of couplings inspired both Max Ophuls's classic film and David Hare's modernized version, The Blue Room, which played to sell-out audiences in the West End and on Broadway. Dream Story is an equally erotic work, in which a married couple are first traumatized and then achieve a new depth of understanding by confessing to each other their sexual fantasies, dream-like adventures and might-have-beens...
Taking us on a guided tour of Vienna's seedy cafés, red-light district, decadent villas, hospitals and morgue, Schnitzler brilliantly uncovers the violence and depravity lurking beneath the surface of civilized society.
Dream Story is the inspiration for Eyes Wide Shut, co-written by Stanley Kubrick and Frederic Raphael.
Penguin Twentieth Century Classics
Description from Open Library.
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