"A Dream Within a Dream" is a poem written by American poet Edgar Allan Poe, first published in 1849. The poem has 24 lines, divided into two stanzas.
| A Dream Within a Dream | |
|---|---|
| by Edgar Allan Poe | |
 First published appearance in The Flag of Our Union | |
| First published in | The Flag of Our Union |
| Publication date | March 1849 |
| Lines | 24 |
| Full text | |
 A Dream Within a Dream at Wikisource | |
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow—
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand—
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep—while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?
Analysis
The poem dramatizes the confusion felt by the narrator as he watches the important things in life slip away.[1] Realizing he cannot hold on to even one grain of sand, he is led to his final question whether all things are just a dream.[2]
It has been suggested that the "golden sand" referenced in the 15th line signifies that which is to be found in an hourglass, consequently time itself.[3] Another interpretation holds that the expression evokes an image derived from the 1848 finding of gold in California.[1] The latter interpretation seems unlikely, however, given the presence of the four, almost identical, lines describing the sand in another poem "To ——," which is regarded as a blueprint for "A Dream Within a Dream" and preceding its publication by two decades.[3]
Publication history
The poem was first published in the March 31, 1849, edition of the Boston-based story paper The Flag of Our Union.[2] The same publication had only two weeks before first published Poe's short story "Hop-Frog." The next month, owner Frederick Gleason announced it could no longer pay for whatever articles or poems it published.
Adaptations
 | This section needs additional citations for verification. (February 2019) |
- Picnic at Hanging Rock, a story about a group of girls disappearing while on a field trip to a rock formation in the early 20th century, begins with a voice over that states "What we see and what we seem is but a dream. A dream within a dream".
- The Alan Parsons Project's album Tales of Mystery and Imagination Edgar Allan Poe opens with an instrumental homage to the poem. Its 1987 re-release included a narration by Orson Welles.
- The Propaganda album A Secret Wish, released in 1985, opens with the track "Dream Within A Dream". The poem is recited in spoken-word form by vocalist Susanne Freytag.
- Biological Radio, the 1997 Dreadzone album, features the track "Dream Within A Dream" which quotes lines from the poem.
- The Yardbirds' recorded a musical adaptation for their 2003 album Birdland, adding a new verse of their own.[4]
- Elysian Fields recorded a musical adaptation of the song.
- Sopor Aeternus and The Ensemble of Shadows adapted the poem for their album Poetica - All Beauty Sleeps.
- Korean boy group NCT utilized the poem as a concept base, mentioning "Dream Within a Dream" several times throughout their discography. Examples include "Dream in a Dream" by TEN (NCT 2018 Empathy, 2018) and "INTERLUDE: Regular-Irregular" by NCT 127 (Regular-Irregular, 2018), with additional references in media.
- Polish singers Sanah and Grzegorz Turnau recorded a song, "Sen we śnie", which uses Poe's poem translated to Polish by poet and translator Włodzimierz Lewik as its lyrics.
References
External links
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