Editing Sleep paralysis (section)

=== Literature ===
Various forms of [[magic (paranormal)|magic]] and [[spiritual possession]] were also advanced as causes, in literature. In nineteenth-century [[Europe]], the vagaries of diet were thought to be responsible. For example, in [[Charles Dickens]]'s ''[[A Christmas Carol]]'', [[Ebenezer Scrooge]] attributes the [[ghost]] he sees to "... an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato..." In a similar vein, the ''[[Household Cyclopedia]]'' (1881) offers the following advice about nightmares:

<blockquote>Great attention is to be paid to regularity and choice of diet. Intemperance of every kind is hurtful, but nothing is more productive of this disease than drinking bad wine. Of eatables those which are most prejudicial are all fat and greasy meats and pastry. Moderate exercise contributes in a superior degree to promote the digestion of food and prevent flatulence; those, however, who are necessarily confined to a sedentary occupation, should particularly avoid applying themselves to study or bodily labor immediately after eating. Going to bed before the usual hour is a frequent cause of night-mare, as it either occasions the patient to sleep too long or to lie long awake in the night. Passing a whole night or part of a night without rest likewise gives birth to the disease, as it occasions the patient, on the succeeding night, to sleep too soundly. Indulging in sleep too late in the morning, is an almost certain method to bring on the paroxysm, and the more frequently it returns, the greater strength it acquires; the propensity to sleep at this time is almost irresistible.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mspong.org/cyclopedia/medicine.html#nightmare|title=The Household Cyclopedia – Medicine<!-- Bot generated title -->|website=mspong.org|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091202195226/http://www.mspong.org/cyclopedia/medicine.html#nightmare|archive-date=2009-12-02}}</ref></blockquote>

[[J. M. Barrie]], the author of the [[Peter Pan]] stories, may have had sleep paralysis. He said of himself "In my early boyhood it was a sheet that tried to choke me in the night."<ref>{{cite book|title=My Ghastly Dream.|last=Barrie|first=James|publisher=Edinburgh Evening Post|year=1887}}</ref> He also described several incidents in the Peter Pan stories that indicate that he was familiar with an awareness of a loss of muscle tone whilst in a dream-like state. For example, Maimie is asleep but calls out "What was that....It is coming nearer! It is feeling your bed with its horns-it is boring for [into] you",<ref>{{cite book|title=Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens|last=Barrie|first=James|publisher=Hodder and Stoughton|year=1906}}</ref> and when the Darling children were dreaming of flying, Barrie says "Nothing horrid was visible in the air, yet their progress had become slow and laboured, exactly as if they were pushing their way through hostile forces. Sometimes they hung in the air until Peter had beaten on it with his fists."<ref>{{cite book|title=Peter and Wendy|last=Barrie|first=James|publisher=Hodder and Stoughton|year=1911}}</ref> Barrie describes many [[parasomnia]]s and neurological symptoms in his books and uses them to explore the nature of consciousness from an experiential point of view.<ref>{{cite book|title=Peter Pan and the Mind of J. M. Barrie. An Exploration of Cognition and Consciousness.|last=Ridley|first=Rosalind|publisher=Cambridge Scholars Publishing|year=2016|isbn=978-1-4438-9107-3}}</ref>