Sherlock Holmes and the adventure of lucid dreaming: The place of oneirogenesis in the science of deduction

Chatterjee, Arup K. (2023) Sherlock Holmes and the adventure of lucid dreaming: The place of oneirogenesis in the science of deduction. Preternature, 12 (1). pp. 55-83. ISSN 2161-2188

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Abstract

This article examines a much-underrated aspect in the Holmesian canon: dreams and the potential for dream-rehearsals by virtue of the brain’s “dream drugstore” faculty. Frequently described as “dreamy-eyed” or the “dreamer” of Baker Street, Holmes possesses powers of visiting scenes of crime “in spirit,” exhibiting powers of oneirogenesis. This unorthodox criminological strategy marks him as a critic of Western rationality, placing him in a genealogy dating back to Thomas De Quincey (who recorded vivid hallucinogenic dreams) and The Moonstone’s character Ezra Jennings (practically the first sleuth in Victorian English literature). In the Holmesian canon, (lucid) dreaming plays a subliminal role, which calls to question what this repressed unorthodoxy in Holmesian investigations implies for the detective’s preeminent science of deduction. Representations and adaptations that do not account for Holmesian oneirogenesis, are incomplete projections of the, ultimately and absolutely, human and oneirically harnessed faculties of the Victorian detective.

Item Type: Article
Keywords: Sherlock Holmes | Lucid Dreaming | Problem Solving | Continuity Hypothesis | Social Simulation
Subjects: Social Sciences and humanities > Arts and Humanities > Arts and Humanities (General)
JGU School/Centre: Jindal Global Law School
Depositing User: Amees Mohammad
Date Deposited: 30 Jan 2023 11:07
Last Modified: 01 May 2023 06:23
Official URL: https://doi.org/10.5325/preternature.12.1.0055
URI: https://pure.jgu.edu.in/id/eprint/5527

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