happy dreams.

This shows both Winston and the reader that the symbolism in his dreams is without practical significance. Any meaning he or we attempt to ascribe to the dreams is only too likely to be wrong. Winston dreams about the people who are most significant to him: his mother, Julia, and O'Brien. They symbolize all the things that are absent from his waking life: freedom, beauty, human connection, and intelligence. Most of all, these dreams stand for the idea that Winston can enjoy some freedom within his own mind. Yet in the Ministry of Love, the dreams increase in frequency and happiness, before being permanently altered. At the very end of the book, Winston is sitting in the Chestnut Tree cafe:

Winston, sitting in a blissful dream, paid no attention as his glass was filled up. He was not running or cheering any longer. He was back in the Ministry of Love, with everything forgiven, his soul white as snow.

Although he is not asleep during this dream, Winston is not fully awake either. He will never be wide awake again. The alteration in him has permeated his mind, and therefore his dreams, which now symbolize the absolute power of the Party over the individual.

Winston's dreams are indicative of his inner, even repressed, thoughts and feelings.  They represent parts of his character that he may not want to show others, or even himself.

First, Winston dreams of his mother, whom he has not seen since he was a child.  His last memory was her calling after him as he ran away with his sister's chocolate ration.  He never saw her again, but dreams about her.  Unfortunately, his dream is not a happy on as rats end up crawling all over her body.  This dream symbolizes Winston's guilt at losing his family, his guilt at his own selfishness.  It also foreshadows his future torture in the Ministry of Love.

Secondly, Winston dreams of the Golden Country.  The Golden Country is an imaginary place associated with hope, the hope of the rebellion's success and the hope of spending his life with Julia.  Here, the land is bright, beautiful and sunny - a contrast to the dark, dingy environment in which all citizens life.  This symbol of hope shows Winston's belief in success even in the face of obvious adversity.

In 1984, Winston dreams about a few things.  One of his dreams features a dark-haired woman running toward Winston.  Winston sees it as an act of freedom and Party defiance.  This is going to sound cliche, but I think it means that Winston is a lover, not a fighter. Bear with me. It's clear through the book that Winston does not like the Party and seeks to find ways to subvert its control.  One way is through his sexual relationship with Julia.  Hence the lover part. His other tactics are non-confrontational: writing secret thoughts in his journal, renting a room, etc.  None of that is a violent step against the party. Hence the not a fighter. Also, if Winston was more of an anti-party agent, then the dream might have been about him running naked and destroying the party. 

Along the "anti-party" dreams, Winston has a dream with a voice that tells him that they will "meet in a place where there is not darkness."  Winston thinks it's O'Brien's voice. 

The third dream sequence is about his mother and sister.  In the dream they are on some kind of ship, and Winston is not on the ship.  He is an outside observer to their plight.  The ship is sinking, and Winston knows that they are going to die on that ship. 

"He was out in the light and air while they were being sucked down to death, and they were down there because he was up here.  He knew it and they knew it, and he could see the knowledge in their faces."

The dream represents Winston's guilt. When Winston was still a boy, living at home, he would take extra food.  Taking extra food meant that someone in his family was getting less food. During one such event, his mother begged him to give back the food.  Instead Winston ran out of the house, and that was the last time that he saw his mom and sister. Winston feels guilty about it now, and believes that his selfishness played a part in their disappearance.  The dream is simply another rendition of those events. 

In 1984, Winston's dream function as an expression of repressed memories. In Part One, Chapter Three, for example, Winston dreams of her disappearance when he was a young boy. This dream reminds him of the tragedy of her death and makes him realise that such emotions no longer exist. This is because the Party has eroded private loyalty and replaced it with love and commitment to Big Brother:

Today there were fear, hatred and pain, but no dignity of emotion, no deep or complex sorrows.

In addition, Winston's dreams foreshadow some of the novel's key events. In this same chapter, for instance, Winston dreams of the girl with dark hair. This woman is a sexually-liberated and rebellious figure who foreshadows his relationship with Julia. Similarly, Winston's dream in which he hears O'Brien's voice foreshadows his rebellion against the Party and his incarceration in the Ministry of Love.

Winston's dreams are significant for a few reasons. His dreams of Golden Country are foreshadowing events to come, the time he spends with Julia in the country consummating their relationship and changing his hate for her into some form of love. When they go for a walk and he looks out of the woods over the horizon he recognizes the place immediately from is dream. His dreams of "we will meet in the place where there is no darkness"also foreshadow the time that Winston will spend in the Ministry of Love. When he meets with O'Brien he realizes that the whispers were coming from him. Winston believed at first that the place was some higher plane of understanding or a place in which he would truly be free. He comes to know that the place where there is no darkness is the Ministry of Love. Winston also dreams of his childhood and it gives us, the reader, some insight into the world before the year 1984. This is all the history that Winston knows for certain took place. Winston also dreams of his greatest fear, rats. At first it is simply a dark dream, but as the dreams progress he recognizes his fear in its most pure form. Winston's dreams are the only place in which he feels he is truly free and he learns that even Big Brother can touch his dreams when he is in the Ministry of Love and his dreams of the rats are fully realized and materialized.

Note: foreshadowing are the hints or clues in a literary work that suggest what might occur later

Winston Smith has several dreams that reflect his inherent emotions and desire to live in a different world. In Winston's first dream sequence, he hears one of his comrades say,

We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness. (Orwell, 32)

Winston later identifies the man as O'Brien, and the enigmatic dream foreshadows Winston's experience in the Ministry of Love. At the time, Winston believes that the dream is a positive omen and reflects his desire to alter his current mundane life.

In Winston's second dream sequence, he dreams about his mother and infant sister. He recalls seeing his mother beneath him in some subterranean place that resembles the bottom of a well or the saloon of a sinking ship. Winston understands that his mother sacrificed her life for him in some way, which is why he is not in the same subterranean place. He views his mother's death as a tragedy. His mother's death tears at his heart because she died loving him.

Winston's dream about his mother reveals his guilty conscience and shame. He feels guilty about his mother's death because he was too young and selfish to appreciate her sacrifices when he was a child.

Winston then dreams about Julia running towards him in the Golden Country. Julia proceeds to tear her red sash from her body with grace, and Winston wakes up with Shakespeare on his lips. Winston's dream about Julia in the Golden Country reflects his pent up sexual desires and feelings for Julia. He longs to live in a world where spontaneous romance and freedom are a possibility.