dream touch

During the nineteenth century people were relatively uninhibited in recounting their dreams and dream material is prominent in many literary texts of the period. Touch is often described as being relatively rare in dreams because of the need to be alert to an actual touch. However, touch is explored in dreams in works by, for example, Emily Brontë, Charles Dickens, Christina Rossetti, Edwin Abbott, and Thomas Hardy. A frequent Victorian explanation for dream experiences was indigestion and this raises questions about the degree to which experiences of inner touch are particularly disquieting. The article analyses a number of diverse texts in which touch disturbs the threshold between sleep and waking. It examines Victorian arguments connecting evolutionary theory and tactile experience.