What Does It Mean to Speak of ‘Dreams of Will’?
“Because reverie is nearly always associated in our minds with a state of relaxation we fail to appreciate those dreams of focused action which I will call dreams of will. And so, when the real stands before us in all its terrestrial materiality, we are easily persuaded that the reality principle must usurp the unreality principle, forgetting the unconscious impulses, the oneiric forces which flow unceasingly through our conscious life. Only by redoubling our attention may we then discover the predictive nature of images, the way that an image may precede perception, initiating an adventure in perception.“
Read by AM Oliver
Bachelard, Gaston. Preface to Earth and Reveries of Will. Dallas: Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 2002.
“Images carry out quite subtly the massive battle of wills that rages at the core of our being, using one essential ruse—the technique of revealing and concealing by turns.”
-Bachelard