Dream reading

Recently I've had a couple of experiences in which my wife's clock radio--which she keeps tuned to the local NPR (National Public Radio) station--turned on early in the morning without waking me up. A lot of the content of the early-morning NPR programs ended up being incorporated into my dreams. My mind generated dream experiences closely related to what was being discussed on air.

I know this is a common phenomenon, which many people have experienced. But it gave me an idea for an experiment: What would happen if one were to listen to an entire audiobook while asleep? How would it affect one's dreams? How much of the content of the book would it be possible absorb? In what ways would the content of the book be distorted by one's dreaming mind?

To perform this experiment you'd first find an audiobook you think you'd enjoy, but that you've never actually read. It could be fiction, non-fiction, or even poetry. You'd arrange to have the book turn on automatically at times when you're likely to be dreaming. If you happen to wake up while it's on, you'd turn it off immediately to ensure that you didn't hear any of it while awake. You'd repeat this process every night until you've "read" the entire book. You might even "read" the book more than once. During this period you'd keep a dream journal. After "reading" the complete book while asleep, you'd read it again while awake and compare it with your dream journal to see how much information you absorbed from the book while asleep.

This might even provide a means of attaining lucidity. Your dreaming mind might begin to associate the contents of the audiobook with dreaming, which might make you realize you're dreaming. "Reading" an audiobook on lucid dreaming might be a particularly good induction method. In the past I've tried using short audio clips that repeat statements such as "You are dreaming" to induce lucidity, but have never gotten it to work. That could be because the brain tends to filter out repetitive stimuli. An audiobook wouldn't suffer from this drawback.

If this idea becomes popular, it might result in a new form of literature: books intended to be read by sleeping people. I wonder what writing styles would be most effective for that purpose.