Get here the summary, questions, answers, textbook solutions, extras, pdf of the story Dream Children: A Reverie by Charles Lamb. However, the given notes/solutions should only be used for references and should be modified/changed according to needs.
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Summary
The essay Dream Children: A Reverie begins by stating that children enjoy hearing stories about their elders as children because it allows them to imagine those elders whom they will never meet. Elia’s children huddle around him, listening to stories about their great-grandmother Field, who lived in a mansion that she looked after on behalf of a wealthy family who lived in a different mansion. Elia recalls that rich person removing a detailed wood carving portraying the story of the Children in the Wood to replace it with an ugly marble thing, which makes young Alice laugh.
Everyone praised Field’s goodness and religious faith at her funeral. According to Elia, she could recite Psalms and parts of the New Testament from memory. She was a fantastic dancer until she was diagnosed with cancer, but even then, she maintained her cheerful demeanour. She was convinced that two infant ghosts haunted her home, but she didn’t consider them dangerous, so it didn’t bother her too much. Even though he never saw them, the young Elia was terrified of them and needed help falling asleep every night.
The young Elia used to wander the grounds of that mansion, admiring all of the marble busts and fantasising about becoming one himself. He spent his days picking various fruits from the estate’s grounds. Elia takes a break from his recollection to observe his children, John and Alice, splitting a plate of grapes.
Field adored all of her grandchildren, but especially Elia’s elder brother John L. , a handsome and lively young man who grew up riding horses. When Elia became lame on his feet, John used to carry him around on his back.
When John became ill, Elia felt he couldn’t care for his brother as well as John could, and when John died, Elia was reserved in emotion but consumed by grief. At this point in the story, Elia’s children begin to cry, requesting to hear about their dead mother rather than their uncle.
So Elia begins by telling them about his seven-year courtship of their mother Alice, complete with difficulties and rejection. But when he goes to see his daughter Alice, she has vanished. Elia is told by a disembodied voice that they are not Alice’s children, that the real father of Alice’s children is a man named Bartrum, and that they are only dreams. With that, Elia awakens in his armchair, his sister Bridget by his side, and John L is gone for good.
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