The place of the dream in psychotherapy

The dream assumed an exceptional place in clinical practice beginning with Freud's extraordinary use of dream interpretation in his early presentations of psychoanalytic theory. Early students of analysis misconstrued this emphasis on the dream in theoretical exposition to apply to clinical practice as well. Eventually this difference was clarified, but there is still something exceptional about the dream in clinical practice that survives clarifications of this early misapprehension. The author reviews the historical issues, identifies the exceptional aspects of the dream in psychoanalytic practice, discusses some problems this phenomenon creates for the analyst, and describes several stereotypical attitudes toward the practice of dream interpretation.