The Cave of Trophonius: Myth and Reality in De Quincey

Abstract

WHEN THE Confessions of an English Opium Eater appeared in i82I, most readers regarded De Quincey's opium visions as only meaningless aberrations of the senses, caused by a powerful drug. De Quincey knew better. With insight far greater than that of any academic psychologist of his day, he realized that his dreams were meaningful, that they referred in some way to situations in real life, and that they drew their material largely from childhood memories. It was for these reasons that he documented his dreams so fully; the Confessions, the Autobiographic Sketches, and the Suspiria de Profundis are pieces of introspective analysis that in some ways anticipate modern psychology by almost a century. Especially striking to the modern reader is De Quincey's habit of using classical myths as parables of his own inner state. Scattered throughout his writings are a number of passages in which he identifies himself with heroes of pagan mythology. The references are brief, as though he feared to develop them into anything more weighty than elegant classical allusions, but they are important none the less, just as a tiny crack in the side of a mountain may, when penetrated, open into vast subterranean caverns. These caverns of his subconscious remain largely unexplored, but we can