ABSTRACT
Freud regarded it an undisputed fact that 'all the material making up the content of a dream is in some way derived from experience, that is to say, has been reproduced or remembered in the dream'. The distortion of memories in dreams is due to the censorship which remains active between the systems preconscious and unconscious and necessitates modifications according to the laws of the dream-work. This means that memories are first subjected to a topographical regression and are subsequently distorted by the primary process phenomena of displacement and condensation. Memories in dreams are thus basically of three types, namely recent memories, unrepressed past memories, and repressed past memories. Memories are thus treated in exactly the same way as any other unconscious or preconscious mental content which has retained some cathexis during sleep and contributed to the formation of dreams.
