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Library 0/ Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Intertextuality / edited by Heinrich F. Plett.
(Research in text theory = Untersuchungen zur Texttheorie,
ISSN 0179-4167; v. 15)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 0-89925-464-0 (U.S.: alk. paper)
1. Intertextuality. 2. Discourse analysis. 1. Plett, Heinrich F.
11. Series.
PN98.I58157 1991
401'.41--dc20 91-28154
CIP
Die Deutsche Bibliothek - Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Intertextuality / ed. by Heinrich F. Plett. - Berlin; New York: de
Gruyter, 1991
(Research in text theory; Vol. 15)
ISBN 3-11-011637-5
NE: Plett, Heinrich F. [Hrsg.]; GT
ISBN 3 11 0116375
ISSN 0179-4167
Copyright 1991 by Walter de Gruyter & Co., D-1000 Berlin 30
All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may
be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
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r
Preface
Since Julia Kristeva happened to invent the critical term "intertextualite" in
1967, an increasing number of studies seized upon it to propagate a new ideal of
literature and literary criticism. They regularly link up with such critical schools
as F rench poststructuralism and American theory and their re-
spective disciples, but also with a broad range of scholars who are fascinated by
the new term and the many hermeneutic possibilities it seems to promise. Quite
obviously the concept of intertextuality has received many different, if not con-
tradictory interpretations. For some it represents the critical equivalent of post-
modernism, for others the timeless constituent of any art; for some it marks the
textual process as such, for others it is restricted to certain exacdy defined
features in a text; for some it is an indispensible category, for others again it is
altogether superfluous - as a term to which the ancient proverb of new wine in
old botdes jusdy applies.
The present volume cannot disentangle the manifold logical and conceptual
controversies that emerged with the rise of this new critical category. On the
contrary, what it intends is to display the variegated facets of intertexuality and
their contribution to all kinds of texts, literary and non-literary. Thus no at-
tempt whatsoever ,was made by the editor to homogenize the contributions to
this book in order to achieve some kind of pretended harmony. In this respect it
differs from similar publications which either assemble articles of one certain
"school" or offer a preestablished design to which diverse authors endeavour,
with greater or lesser success, to adapt their individual contributions. Here the
purpose is to present a number of viewpoints, some more 'progressive' and some
more 'conservative' in bias (with that relativity which is inherent in these
nomenclatures), which prove essential to a better understanding of the intertex-
tual approach.
The structure of this book covers three successive stages which seem neces-
sary for a comprehensive treatment of the subject-matter. Stage I deals with the
foundations of intertextual theory and hence is concerned with its axioms, con-
cepts, and methods of analysis. Stage 11 presents various components of an in-
tertextual morphology which in its entirety forms a classificatory system al-
locating each intertextual constituent, ecriture or genre its exact structural posi-
tion. Stage 111 highlights selected aspects of a (yet unwritten) his tory of intertex-
tuality. The individual contributions to each of these stages attempt, each from
its specific point of view, to consider already known facts in a new light or to
open up innovative dimensions of critical insight. They thus provide stimuli for
further intertextual activities.
Essen,June 1991 H. F. P.
Table of Contents
Preface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. v
I. Fundamentals of Intertextuality
Heinrich F. Plett
Intertextualities .
Hans-Peter Mai
3
Bypassing Intertextuality. Hermeneutics, Textual Practice, Hypertext 30
Hans-George Ruprecht
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Gary A. Phillips
Sign/Text/Differance. The Contribution of Intertextual Theory to
Biblical Criticism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
11. Structures of Intertextuality
Wolfgang G. Mller
Interfigurality. A Study on the Interdependence of Literary Figures. 101
Wolfgang Karrer
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
UdoJ. Hebel
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Theodor Verweyen and Gunther Witting
The Cento. A Form of Intertextuality from Montage to Parody . 165
111. Historical Aspects of Intertextuality
Richard J. Schoeck
'In loco intertexantur'. Erasmus as Master of Intertextuality ........ 181
DerekN. C. Wood
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space. Intertextuality in Milton's
Samson Agonistes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
VIII Table of Contents
Manfred Pfister
How Postmodern is Intertextuality?
Linda Hutcheon
The Politics of Postmodern Parody ,
Hans-Peter Mai
Intertextual Theory - A Bibliography ,
Name Index,
Subject Index
207
225
, 237
,.251
, 261
I. Fundamentals of Intertextuality
HEINRICH F. PLETT
Intertextualities
1. Approaches to Intertextuality
inter-text. Using and repeating my own and
others' earlier texts. Pulling the old poems thru
the new, making the old lines a thread thru the eye
of the words I am sewing. Sound and sense. The
eeriness.
Erin Moure, "the Acts", Furious (Toronto:
Anansi, 1988)
Currently, 'intertextuality' is a fashionable term, but almost everybody who
uses it understands it somewhat differently. A host of publications has not suc-
ceeded in changing this situation. On the contrary: their increasing number has
only added to the confusion. A quarter of a century after the term was coined in
a rather casual manner (Kristeva 1967), it is actually starting to flourish. Origi-
nally conceived and used by a critical avantgarde as a form of protest against
establisIied cultural and social values, it today serves even conservative literary
scholars to exhibit their alleged modernity.
1.1. Attitudes
Two groups of intertextualists appear: the progressives and the traditionalists.
They are confronted by a phalanx of anti-intertextualists.
1.1.1. I ntertextualists
The progressives try to cultivate and develop the revolutionary heritage of the
originators of the new concept. Their representatives do not tire of quoting,
paraphrasing and interpreting the writings of Bakhtin, Barthes, Kristeva, Der-
rida and other authorities. The ideas they propagate consist of an elaborate mix-
ture ofMarxism and Freudianism, semiotics and philosophy. Therefore they are
comprehensible only to elitist circles which are devoted exclusively to the study
of the masters (Morson 1986; Worton & Still 1990). Although numericaBy
small, this group of French origin has succeeded in spreading its activities inter-
nationaByand in setting up branches in aB the countries of the Western hemi-
sphere. Regardless of whether they call themselves poststructuralists, decon-
4 H. F. Plett
structionists, or postmodernists their basic aim is identical: to dislodge academic
teaching from its traditional moorings. But the overthrow of the old orthodoxy,
paradoxically not without a logic of its own, has only led to the establishment of
a r:ew one. U niversities, publishing houses, and prestigious periodicals provide a
wlde forum for the progressive approach. Yet the intimate knowledge of this
intertextual discourse is limited to relatively few elitist circles. Presumably this is
due to its basically philosophical orientation, but esoteric terminology also
plays a role. This 'school' has never developed a comprehensible and teachable
method of textual analysis. Its publications are marked by a strangely abstract
quality, at a decided remove from reality. Such qualities not only impede their
understandability but also surround their critical enterprise with an aura of mys-
tery and exclusiveness.
The traditionalists belong almost exclusively to the group of conventional
literary scholars. They are not linguists or semioticians, let alone philosophers
or sociologists. Alerted by the public re action to the work of poststructuralists
and deconstructionists, these scholars asked themselves - after aperiod of cau-
tious hesitation - whether the insights of the intertextuality debate could be
applied profitably to their own concerns. Depending on their critical emphasis,
their answers differ. Analytically inclined researchers have rediscovered quota-
tion, allusion, and cento as intertextual forms. Genre theorists point out the
of parody, travesty, and collage. Translation and media special-
1StS hold that the new approach can be of advantage to their respective fields of
interest, too. Those scholars who are seriously concerned with theoretical ad-
vances in their discipline use 'intertextuality' as a general term to improve their
methodological and terminological instruments. Thus they have succeeded, at
least pardy, in making the new approach more applicable. Yet the pitfalls of such
an endeavour are easy to see. Systematic interest easily leads to narrow thinking,
en:phasis on termir:ology to batteries of scholastic nomenclatures, largely de-
vOld of content. ThlS obstructs the dynamism of intertextual sign processes. It is
replaced by a static phenomenological accountancy. It is even worse when
scholars use the term 'intertextuality' without having critically examined the
concept, only in order to appear up-to-date. 'Intertextuality' as a vogue word -
that is the negative side of the coin. ..
1.1.2. Anti-Intertextualists
Consequendy, a third group emerges: the opposition to the new approach.
Their basically negative attitude expresses itself in two different strategies of
argumentation. The progressive, speculative on es are simply not understood;
they are accused of subjectivity and irrationality and an utter lack of scientific-
ity. Yet even stronger is the opposition tothe traditionalist, pragmatic variant.
Anti-intertextualists do not tire of emphasizing that they themselves have
worked intertextually all along. They hold that every branch of serious literary
scholarship, especially comparative studies, which appear to be particularly weIl
Intertextualities 5
qualified, proceeds along these lines. Such a tradition, after all, harks back to the
imitatio auctorum of Greco-Roman antiquity and to the typological allegoresis
of Hellenism and patristicism, in short would appear to be a venerable practice
of more than two thousand years. The change in terminology, it is argued, did
not change anything substantially. Quite on the contrary: such a devious label-
ling only affects a progressiveness which does not actually exist. In this way,
intertextuality is put through the critical mills, accused of being incomprehen-
sible on the one hand and old wine in new botdes on the other. One opponent
asserts that he does not und erstand anything, the other insists on having known
it all the time. So many intertextualists, so many anti-intertextualists - that is the
result.
1.2. Concepts
What is an intertext? The answer to this question may be: a text between other
At least that is what an etymological view may suggest. Yet it depends
enurely on the interpretation of the preposition 'between' as to how the term is
explained. Several concepts are conceivable. It depends on their nature as to
which constituents are said to make up an intertext and which not. Great im-
portance must be accorded to the role of the author and the reader. Both (and
several other communicative factors) actually make the intertext visible and
The important questions a scholar has to put in this regard are:
WhlCh markers signalize an intertext ? - and: Which categories can help to de-
scribe it? Here a system of indicators and analytical categories becomes neces-
sary. Such a system presupposes the existence of a comprehensive intertextual
sign arsenal. As long as only a rudimentary understanding of such a repertoire
exists some relevant properties of the phenomenon can merely be tentatively
deduced.
1.2.1. Textvs.lntertext
All intertexts are texts - that is what the latter half of the term suggests. Yet the
revers al of this equation does not automatically imply that all texts are intertexts.
In such a case, text and intertext would be identical and there would be no need
for a distinguishing 'inter'. A text may be regarded as an autonomous sign struc-
ture, delimited and coherent. Its boundaries are indicated by its beginning, mid-
dIe and end, its coherence by the deliberately interrelated conjunction of its
constituents. An intertext, on the other hand, is characterized by attributes that
exceed it. It is not delimited, but de-limited, for its constituents refer to con-
stituents of one or several other texts. Therefore it has a twofold coherence: an
intratextual one which guarantees the immanent integrity of the text, and an
intertextual one wh ich creates structural relations between itself and other texts.
This twofld coherence makes for the richness and complexity of the intertext,
but also for its problematical status.
6 H. F. Plett
Two extreme forms are imaginable, which could be expressed in the paradox:
a text which is no intertext, and an intertext which is no text. Wh at does this
mean? The text which has no interrelations with other texts at all realizes its
autonomy perfectly. lt is self-sufficient, self-identical, a self-contained monad-
but it is no Ion ger communicable. On the other hand, the intertext runs the risk
of dissolving completely in its interrelations with other texts. In extreme cases it
exchanges its internal coherence completely for an external one. Its total dissolu-
tion makes it relinquish its beginning, middle and end. lt loses its identity and
disintegrates into numerous text particles which only bear an extrinsic reference.
lt is doubtful that such a radical intertext is communicable at all.
The examples mentioned are extremes. The assumed text per se and intertext
per se are hardly possible in the reality of sign communication. But according to
the premises of the definitions given above, the gradual participation of the text
in intertextuality and of the intertext in textuality is possible. Thus, a scale of
increasing and decreasing intertextuality can be postulated. In the case of ne-
gated intertextuality the idea of textual autonomy is dominant; in the case of
intended intertextuality the governing principle is: "Every text is intertext"
(Leitch 1983, 59). '
1.2.2. Reductionism vs. Totality
Given the fluctuations an intertext is subject to it seems almost hopeless to at-
tempt to describe it systematically. Such an enterprise would presuppose that
the intertextual flux can, at least intermittently, be arrested. Only then can a
scholar gain a fixed position from which to develop categories, classifications,
and methods to decode it. But such procedures fundamentally contravene the
intentions of the of the intertext; for they rigidly maintain the princi-
pIe that the intertext cannot be pinned down. In Roland Barthes's words (1986,
58):
[ ... ] the Text is experienced only in an activity, in a production. It follows that the Text cannot
stop(for example, at a library shelf); its constitutive moment is traversal (notably, it can traverse
the work, several works).
As far as the intertext only exists in the actual communicative process - as a
permanently oscillating indeterminabile - definite propositions ab out it cannot
be made. It appears as part of a pragmatics which recognizes only the individual
communicative act.
This very attitude, though, implies a distinct reduction of the intertext, which
cannot have been intended by its original proponents. For the intertext lends
itself to more approaches than a pragmatics which relies on singular instances of
reception. If one considers it as sign - analogous to those procedures which text
linguists employ to constitute their object - the intertext can be analyzed in a
threefold semiotic perspective (Morris 1938): syntactically, as based on relations
between texts; pragmatically, as the relation between sender/receiver and inter-
text; and semantically, with respect to the referentiality of the intertext. Not a
Intertextualities 7
single semiotic perspective but only their combination constitutes the intertext
as a whole. In this regard, the intertext is no different from any other sign,
linguistic or non-linguistic.
This means, on the other hand, that each semiotic perspective in isolation is an
abstraction of the intertext, even a distortion. A scientific procedure which tries
to avoid taking sides and following ideological imperatives must attempt to
grasp its object from all angles.
1.2.3. Material vs. Structural
Intertexts consist of signs. Signs are part of codes. Codes have two components:
signs and rules. The signs represent the material, the rules the structural aspect of
the code. There exist kinds of intertextuality analogous to the code components:
(1) material (particularizing) intertextuality - i.e. repetition of signs,
(2) structural (generalizing) intertextuality - i.e. repetition of rules,
(3) material-structural (particularizing-generalizing) intertextuality - i.e. repe-
tition of signs and rules in two or more texts.
Mostly, critics conceptualize intertextuality according to (1). The model case for
the transport of signs from one text to another is the quotation. Yet transtextual
factors are not only the code signs but also the code rules. The latter ones are the
precondition for the constitution of classes and sub-classes of texts. Signs with-
out rules have no structure, rules without signs remain abstract. Therefore the
third type of intertextuality is a very common occurrence, even if it is often
ignored.
One of many illustrative examples of the three types of intertextuality is the
elocutionary mode of Ciceronianism. The material aspect of this intertextuality
is based on the lexicon of Cicero's complete works, regardless of wh ether it
exists in primary form (the sources themselves) or as secondary derivations (dic-
tionaries, thesauri, computer-generated concordances). The structural intertex-
tuality of Ciceronianism is laid down in prescriptive stylistic gramm ars which
contain meticulous rules for the composition of specific cola, lexematic colloca-
tions, or clausulae. Yet it stands to reason that Cicero's inventory of material
signs cannot be employed without regard to the respective stylistic grammar,
and vice versa - the one depends on the other. That is why the mixed type of
intertextuality is most common in Ciceronianism. The reference to texts is sup-
plemented by a systematic reference and thus combines material and structural
intertextuality.
1.3. Decisions
An intertextual theory bent on clarity and precision has to make methodological
decisions which restrict the field of inquiry. A total semiosis of the intertext will
remain an ideal objective and hence fall short of ever being put into practice.
Thus, the exclusion of certain aspects will become necessary. One such exclu-
8 H. F. Plett
sion will have to concern the semantic dimension of intertextuality. Its specific-
ity is that the text referent is not external reality but only another text referent.
As complex as this semiotic dimension appears to be, it seems to be of secondary
importance to the problem of intertextuality as such. Another exclusion con-
cerns those subjective pragmatical aspects which cannot be scientifically con-
trolled. This implies the dismissal of an intertextual concept which recurs to
individual associations and vague deja lu impressions. Therefore two analytical
dimensions remain: syntactics and pragmatics. They can be equated with Saus-
sure's concepts of langue and parole and Chomsky's theorems of competence
and performance. Both enable the construction of models which constitute the
framework for intertextuality. The syntactical model prefigures the possibilities
of an intertextual grammar, the pragmatical one those of intertextual communi-
cation.
2. An Intertextual Case Study: the Quotation
The whole field of intertextual phenomena is so large that it is hard to choose one
which lends itself to a syntactical and a pragmatical semiosis. By choosing the
quotation we opt for an intertextual unit which is weIl known outside of schol-
arly discourse, too. Priests are said to 'quote' passages from the Bible, but also
composers from a symphony or painters from a picture. This indicates that the
quotation represents a material kind of intertextuality. Not a structural rule, but
a textual sign is being .. The material quality of this textual sign can be
verbal as weIl as non-verbal. As can be seen from these few remarks the quota-
tion is obviously made up of a rather specific cluster of features, which makes it
an almost ideal object for an intertextual case study (Plett 1988).
2.1. The Grammar of Quotation
A grammar of quotation must take into account the following basic structural
elements:
1. the quotation text (Tl), i.e. the text in which the quotation occurs (= target
text);
2. the pre-text (T
2
), i.e. the text from which the quotation is taken (= source
text);
3. the quotation proper (Q).
These elements require a detailed analysis, the guiding principles of which will
be the quantity, quality, distribution, frequency, interference, and markers of
quotations. The focus of the present investigation will be the verbal quotation
occurring in verbal texts.
A quotation reveals several unmistakable characteristics which distinguish it
as such. Its most obvious feature probably is intertextual repetition: apre-text is
j
Intertextualities 9
reproduced in a subsequent text. Another feature of the quotation is its segmen-
tal c?aracter, for, as a rule, the pre-text is not reproduced in its entirety, but only
partlally, as pars pro toto. It follows, thirdly, that the quotation is essentially
never self-sufficient, but represents a derivative textual segment. As such it,
fourthly, does not constitute an organic part of the text, but a removable alien
element, or, to put it differendy, an improprie-segment replacing a hypothetical
p.roprie-segment. To sum up these features in a provisio.nal definition: A quota-
tion repeats a segment derived from apre-text within a subsequent text, where it
replaces a proprie-segment.
2.1.1. Quantity
'Yith regard to quantity, quotations show a great variability. They usually con-
SISt of morphological or syntactic units, include more rarely larger sections of
texts, or, in an exceptional case, even the complete pre-text. Some tides of well-
known literary works contain word or sentence quotations: John Barth's The
Sot-Weed-Factor repeats the tide of a satirical poem by Ebenezer Cooke, AI-
dous Huxley's Eyeless in Gaza refers to a segment of a line fromJohn Milton's
Samson Agonistes (41), and Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are
Dead quotes a line from Hamlet (Y.2.376).
2.1.2. cQuality
So far we have tacidy assumed that while passing from the original to the target
text, qbotations remain unchanged. This assumption, however, requires some
modifications. It is true that scientific or judicial texts should quote as accurately
as possible, i.e. without altering the pre-text. Poetic texts, on the contrary, show
their specific nature in that they do not integrate prefabricated textual elements
without alterations, but rather reshape them and supply them with new mean-
ings .. For this reason, it is necessary to examine the quotation with respect to its
quahty. To do so requires the following distinction. The form we usually call
quotation possesses a twofold existence, on the one hand as a segment of the pre-
textT2 (=Q2)' on the other as a segment of the quotation text Tl (=QI)' QI = Q2
signifies intertextual identity, QI =l= Q2 intertextual deviation. Intertextual devi-
ations, like intratextual deviations, can be described in a secondary grammar.
Two levels have to be distinguished here: expression and content, or, to use a
different terminology, surface and deep structure.
The surface structure of citational deviations can be described in terms of
transformations. These are basically identical with the types of transformations
used in stylistic theory and generative transformational grammar, the only dif-
ference being that their present field of application is defined in intertextual
terms. The respective transformations are addition, subtraction, substitution,
permutation, and repetition (Plett 1979, 143-149). They refer to linguistic units
of varying length: phonological or morphological, syntactic or textual ones. An
example taken from Ezra Pound's Hugh Selwyn Mauberley may illustrate the
I -
10 H. F. Piett
transformational variations of a given pre-text. The quotation text in question
comprises the two lines
Died same, pro patria,
non "duke" non et "decor",
which split up and rearrange Horace's well-known pre-text line
Duke et decorum est pro patria mari (carm. III.2.12).
Pound's lines illustrate the following intertextual operations: subtraction of the
Latin verbal phrase "est [ ... ] mori" and its substitution by the English
"died", subtraction of the terminal morpheme {-um} in "decorum", syntacuc
permutation of the pre-text, addition and repetition .of the negation. "non"
sing in Horace. These operations involve morphological and syntacuc text umts.
An intersegmental graphemic addition is effected by the inverted commas. Re-
viewing these rather complex transformational procedures, one realizes that
their results - the quotations - may be designated by classical rhetorical
nomenclatures, e.g. ellipsis, apocope, anastrophe. These rhetorical figures, then,
do not indicate deviations within a text, but such as exist between texts Oenny
1976).
An approach to the aspects of the intertextual deep structure of quotations
allows a comparison to rhetoric as well. The procedure of quoting resembles
that of tropification, since the resulting text always lends itself to two interpreta-
tions, namely a literal and a non-literal one. For this reason a quotation text can
be regarded as a "dual sign" (Riffaterre 1980), since it admits of a proprie as well
as of one or more improprie readings. The title of G. B. Shaw's Arms and the
Man, for instance, refers in its literal (primary) sense directly to the events of the
play, whereas its additional (secondary) sense derives from the fact that it is also
a (translated) quotation of the initialline of Virgil's Aeneid. Thus, as a general
rule, a quotation does not only include a single (isotopic) but two or more (poly-
isotopic) levels of meaning that need to be interrelated by the recipient. This
interrelationship, or, to use Bakhtin's term (1981), this "dialogue" extends well
beyond the quoted element and covers its primary and secondary contexts
well. The more quotations are encoded in a poetical text, the more complex will
be its intertextual deep structure, the more polyphonic the textual dialogue.
2.1.3. Distribution
In addition to quantity and quality two further criteria are relevant for the struc-
ture of the quotation: distribution and frequency. These are characteristics of
the quotation which, when taken by themselves, seem relatively simple, but
develop a high degree of complexity, when correlated with other features. As
both distribution and frequency have often implicitly been referred to in the
present investigation, they will be treated only briefly here. The of
the quotation can be described with reference to the most promment posluons
of the quotation text: beginning, end, middle. The initial position is identical
In tertextuali ties 11
with the tide, the motto or the first sentence, the final position can be a conclud-
ing aphorism. That these structural positions, when furnished with quotations,
are important for the understanding of the entire work, is illustrated by T. S.
Eliot's The Waste Land, where tide, motto and concluding formula represent
quotations (pre-texts: Malory, Petronius, the Upanishads). The middle position
in a text (whatever this may be) allows of such a broad range of quotational
variants that it is pointless here to go into further details.
2.1.4. Frequency
If only few quotations occur within a text, their impact on its structure and
meaning may be comparatively insignificant. In this case the determining influ-
ence of the quotational conte1xt proves stronger than that of the quotations
themselves. The situation, however, changes, when the pre-text interpolations
increase in frequency. In that case the influence of the context diminishes in
proportion. The final stage in such a development is reached with a text com-
pletely compounded of quotations. At this point a context in the sense of an
original creation no longer exists. Its part is taken over by the quotations preced-
ing and following each quotation. As there is a multiplication of quotations, so
there is also a multiplication of contexts. The structural result of this procedure
can be termed collage, the procedure itself montage (Klotz 1976).
2.1.5. Interference
A quotation is always embedded in two contexts: the quotation-text context Cl
and the pre-text context C
2
As these contexts are per definitionem non-ident-
ical, every quotation means a conflict between the quotation and its new con-
text. This conflict may be described as interference. To illustrate interferential
phenomena, we shall single out the code as an appropriate criterion. An interfer-
ence of codes takes place, when quotation and context Cl differ with regard to
language, dialect, sociolect, register, spelling, prosody etc. In these cases we
speak of interlingual, diatopic, diastratic, diatypic, graphemic, prosodical etc.
interference. Codal interferences of the interlingual and graphemic kinds are
often employed in Ezra Pound's Cantos, where quotations from foreign
literatures are rendered in the characters of their originallanguages, e.g. in Greek
letters or Chinese ideograms. Sometimes foreign language quotations are trans-
lated into English, sometimes Chinese ideograms are reproduced in Latin let-
ters. These are cases of "transcoding" (Eco 1976). Every transcoding procedure
signifies an assimilation of the quotation to its new context and hence a diminu-
tion of quotational interferences.
2.1.6. Markers
A of quotation cannot work without a system of markers which indi-
cate the occurence of quotations within the text. These markers are of a deictic
12 H. F. Plett
nature, for they make visible the seams between quotation and context (Cl)'
There are overt and covert seams, hence there exist overt and covert quotations,
depending on whether the author wishes to stress or to disguise the interference
of "frame" and "inset" (Sternberg 1982). The number and kind of textual signals
vary accordingly. Provided a scale of decreasing distinctness is set up, quotation
markers are either explicit, implicit or simply non-existent. Misleading or
pseudo-markers constitute a special class that modifies the first and second
categories. .
Explicit markers indicate a quotation directly, either by aperformatlve verb
like "I quote" or a standardized formula like "quote" - "unquote" or even by
naming the source directly. As opposed to these intratextual markers, notes,
marginal glosses, source indices, prefaces and postscripts as weH as commen-
taries are located outside the text proper. If these are jointly published with the
text, maybe even as an integral part of it, they gain the status of a sub text.
Implicit markers are either features inherent in or added to the quotation. As
features added, they may appear, on the phonologicallevel, as pauses before and
after the quotation or, on the graphemic level, as inverted commas, colons,
italics or empty spaces. They are, however, ambiguous in so far as they do not
only signal quotations but other textual features as weIl (for instance, inverted
commas also signal irony). As features inherent in the quotation itself implicit
markers become effective only in such cases when a codal interference exists
between the quotation and its context. In spite of this restriction, however, an
even stronger ambivalence can be imputed to this type of implicit markers. For
differences of the kind described mayaiso refer to non-quotational characteris-
tics of poetical texts, when, for instance, a play includes speakers of dialects or
foreign languages such as the Welshman Fluellen in Shakespeare's Henry Vor
the French lieutnant Riccaut de la Marliniere in Lessing's Minna von Barnhelm.
Because of the ambiguous of implicit quotation markers, the explicit
ones alone seem suited to indicate a quotation in a reliable manner. But even they
have to be considered with caution, for the commentary may be a pseudo-com-
mentary, and the quotation marked as such may turn out a pseudo-quotation
(BoIler & George 1989). Consequently, it is up to the recipient's "quotation
competence" to decide whether or not a quotation is a quotation: ,!,he
competence is especially challenged when a text lacks both exphClt and ImphClt
quotation markers. In this case the quotational character of a linguistic segment
only emerges on the basis of a "pragmatic presupposition" (Culler 1976; Leps
1979-1980), which, besides the communicating individual, includes the concrete
evidence of the pre-text as well.
2.2. The Pragmatics of Quotation
The remarks made in the first part have led the argument from grammar to
pragmatics. In the following exploration, pragmatics signifies the communica-
tion of quotations. This includes manifold factors: sender, receiver, code, place,
In tertextuali ties 13
time, medium, function etc. For the sake of simplicity, these factors will be
subsumed under two central aspects: 1. the sender as point of departure for
functional modes of quotations and 2. the receiver (recipient) as point of depar-
ture for perceptional modes of quotations. Although these aspects do not cover
the pragmatics of quotation entirely, they are suited to illuminate some of its
essential features.
2.2.1. Functional Modes
If asender, i.e. a speaker or writer, makes use of a quotation, he does so not just
arbitrarily but with certain intentions. These intentions are in their turn mod-
ified by the conventions of the chosen communicative situation. As there are
more or less conventionalized communicative situations, it follows that there
are more or less conventionalized quotational functions, too. Stefan Morawski
(1970) utilizes this insight in his typology of quotational functions which he
outlines in terms of a scale of decreasing normative forces. He distinguishes
three functions of the quotation: an authoritative, an erudite, and an ornamental
one. These functional types are evidently realized in non-literary texts but they
unquestionably occur in literary texts as well. The following discussion will
begin with Morawski' s typology and then proceed to delineate a few functional
aspects of the poetic quotation.
2.2.1.1. The Authoritative Quotation
The authoritative quotation 9ccurs in communicative situations that impose on
the sender an obligation to quote. Such communicative situations are closely
attached to social institutions ; hence the quotation act assurnes a ritualized
character. Illustrative examples are sacral arid legal proceedings, where priests
and preachers, judges and lawyers endorse their reasoning by quotations from
the Bible or the Law, respectively. Within their scope of validity, the authority
claimed for such books admits of no doubts about their legitimacy. They main-
tain the status of "holy books", whether it be the Bible or the Koran, the Corpus
Iuris Civilis or the Civil Code, or, to venture into the field of political doctrine,
the works of Marx, Engels and Mao Tse-tung (hence the term "Mao Bible").
Consequently, every subsequent reference text (e.g. Biblical commentaries) and
every quotation taken from them is subject to a very narrow range of applica-
tion, usuaHy one of an exegetical character. When a quotation in its claim to
authority is not questioned at all, its function mayaiso be regarded as being
"ideological" .
2.2.1.2. The Erudite Quotation
The erudite quotation mainly occurs in scientific texts that refer to other scien-
tific texts. Like the theological quotation, it may be used to rely on the authority
of incontestable knowledge. It differs, however, from the authoritative quota-
L
14 H. F. Plett
tion in so far as it may question its validity as well. Whereas the authoritative
quotation demands an affirmative contextualization, the erudite quotation is
open to a discussion of the pros and cons. It allows of more than one point of
view, even of its refutation. As for the plurality of functions it is likely to adopt,
this quotation mayaiso be termed "argumentative".
2.2.1.3. The Ornamental Quotation
The ornamental quotation is even less subordinate to the normative forces of a
communicative situation. Its spectrum of application is broad, for it includes
numerous kinds of occasional discourse: letters, advertisements, ceremonial ad-
dresses, obituaries, feuilletons, essays. If in these texts the ornamental quota-
tions are obliterated altogether, the communicative act does not fail, since the
basic information is preserved. This is due to the fact that ornamental quotations
only serve as decorative embellishments added to the substance of a text. Hence
the functional relation between text and quotation undergoes a decisive change:
"Whereas in the case of the authoritative function the text serves the quotation,
here the arrangement is the reverse" (Morawski 1970, 696). Being an aesthetic
stimulus for the recipient's delight, the ornamental quotation shows the dosest
affinity to the poetic quotation. In this respect it differs remarkably from the
ideological sway of the authoritative quotation and the persuasive force of the
erudite quotation.
2.2.1.4. The Poetic Quotation
As compared to the non-poetic types of quotation, the poetic quotation is
characterized by its lack of an immediate practical purpose. Such a purpose can,
however, be achieved, whena politician, a journalist or a salesman employs a
poetic quotation in a non-poetic text. In this case the poetic quotation is de-
poeticized, i.e. divested of its autotelic function and invested with the practical
function of the respective quotation context. On the other hand, areversal of
this procedure takes place when a non-poetic quotation is inserted in a poetic
discourse. In that case the quotation is poeticized, i.e. released from the con-
straints of an immediate practical usefulness and transferred to astate of "pur-
posiveness without purpose" which causes "disinterested satisfaction"(Kant).
Instances of this method are to be found in Laurence Sterne' s Tristram Shandy
which contains quotations from treatises of medicine (Robert Burton) and
philosophy aohn Locke) and even from a medieval formula of excommunica-
tion (Bishop Ernulphus of Rochester). A modern development are the "found
poems" of the Canadian author John Robert Colombo consisting entirely of
quotations from non-literary texts such as newspaper reports, political
speeches, dictionary entries etc. Both the poeticizing and the de-poeticizing of a
quotation represent functional shifts that are conditioned by the ruling influence
of the quotation context.
In tertextuali ties 15
The author who re-employs fragments from poetic (pre-)texts in his own
poetic text does so with certain intentions. Any statement of a general nature is,
however, difficult, since it means a curtailment of possible alternatives. A nega-
tive common cienominator could be that the author's primary purpose is not to
bring his audience to an immediate confrontation with reality, but only with
mirrors of reality, i.e.literature - sometimes more sometimes less, depending on
the amount of quotations. He withdraws, to use Fredric Jameson's (1972) well-
known book-title, into the "prison-house of language". Hence literary texts
with a high quotation frequency embody the following paradox: The reality of
literature made up of literature is -literature. There is no better illustration of
this than the exceptional case of a quotatin-within-a-quotation in a poetic text
(Smirnov 1983) which denotes a fictional reality thrice removed from factual
reality.
2.2.2. Perceptional Modes
The receiver, i.e. the listener or reader, who comes across a quotation text, may
either notice the quotations or he may not. If he overlooks them, the text miss es
its purpose which consists in opening up dialogues between pre-texts and quota-
tion texts. The culprit for such an aesthetic failure cannot easily be identified.
Part of the responsibility lies with the author who should feel obliged to supply
the quotations with markers in such a way that their twofold encoding is clearly
made apparent. In his book Literary Quotation and Allusion E. E. Kellett (1969,
3) writes to this effect:
Here is a man who steals, and boasts of his thefts: he covers his walls with paintings, and openly
pro claims they are taken from aNational Gallery. He is not like the Spartan boy who stole and
gained glory if undetected: he desires to be detected, and deliberately leaves clues to guide his
pursuers to their prey.
Authors like James Joyce and Arno Schmidt, however, do not always adhere to
this maxim, but conceal their quotations so carefully that hosts of books and
artides have been written on Joyce and, in the case of Schmidt, a "deciphering
syndicate" has been endeavouring for years to verify even remote quotations
and allusions in his novels. Literature of this kind has apoeta doctus as its author
and requires a litteratus doctus as its recipient.
2.2.2.1. Memory Depositories
For this reason both must be provided with a sufficient knowledge of literary
history . This knowledge is stored in three types of memory depositories which
mark three stages in the progress of civilization: 1. individual, 2. printed, and
3. electronic. Individual memory forms the basis of the tradition of oral litera-
ture in preliterate societies. With the advent of the Gutenberg era individual
memory was supplemented though not superseded by printed memory (written
memory being just an intermediate stage in the development) (Compagnon
16 H. F. Plett
1979,233-356; Ong 1982). This type of memory claims the advantage of being
extrapersonal and hence susceptible to a larger amount of literary experience.
The printed quotation storehouses were called Commonplace Books, Thesauri,
Collectanea, Polyanthea; their history can be traced up to Bchmann's Ge-
flgelte Worte and The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. The first successful
author in this field was Erasmus; his Adagia, Apophthegmata and Parabolae
were among the bestsellers of their century. In the electronic age the computer
data bases take over the part of the printed information holders. They provide
man kind with the prospect of an almost infinite enlargement of their collective
(quotational) memory. This development, however, does not make the indi-
vidual memory superfluous, for it still represents the only instrument of decod-
ing quotations in oral communication.
2.2.2.2. Stages of Perception
The reception of quotation texts does not proceed evenly but is retarded again
and again by "quotation thresholds". Quotations constitute reception obstacles
which impede the process of text communication. The seams between the quo-
tation and its context do not only endanger the homogeneity of the literary
structure,.but also the unity of perception. The perception is diverted by some-
thing alien and unexpected which requires integration. Put in a simple scheme,
the reception of quotations proceeds in three stages:
Stage 1: Disintegration of the perceptional continuum (quotation context) by
the intrusion of an alien element (quotation);
Stage 2: Verification (and interpretation) of the alien element (quotation) by a
digression into "text archaeology" (pre-text);
Stage 3: Reintegration of the alien element (quotation) and resumption of the
perceptional continuum (quotation context) on an advanced (en-
riched) level of awareness.
If the quotation remains unnoticed, this sequence of perceptional stages is not
put into operation at all. If the quotation is not verified, stages 2 and 3 are not
accomplished. If the quotation cannot be integrated in the text, stage 3 has to be
dismissed. In the two latter cases the process of poetic perception comes to a halt
in the stage of alienation. The disruption of the communicative process leaves
the quotation text in a condition of fragmentation that no Ion ger deserves the
Aristotelian epithet of "hen kai h610n". The unity of the work of art then ceases
to exist. Such a failure may even not be due to the recipient's perceptional in-
capacity but sometimes concurs with the author's artistic intentions.
2.2.2.3. Stagnation
If texts become so well known that they develop into storehouses of quotations,
the user of these quotations may easily lose sight of their original contexts. The
quotations then become autonomous language units and assurne the status of
Intertextuali ties 17
adagia and aphorisms. That has been happening to quotations for centuries. The
result very often is that being devoid of their pre-texts they become wo rn out
like "dead metaphors". 'For this reason they have to be revitalized by specific
("defamiliarizing") techniques in order to regain their semantic vigour.
N evertheless the quotation text will lack much of the friction that originates
from a collision of Cl and C
2
(now no longer existing). The decline in spon-
taneity may even affect apre-text not yet forgotten as is testified by Hamlet's
soliloquy beginning with the line "To be or not to be that is the question"
(Bloomfield 1976). The result is that this speech belongs to the texts most often
parodied in world literature. Hence there is great danger that the humorization
encroaches on the source of the quotation as well. Meaninglessness and ridicule
- these are the tributes that a quotation frequently has to pay for its farne.
3. Intertextualities
Charles Grivel's dictum "11 n'est de texte que d'intertexte" (1982, 240) claims
that no text exists in isolation but is always connected to a 'universe of texts'
(Grivel1978). Whenever a new text comes into being it relates to previous texts
and in its turn becomes the precursor of subsequent texts. What can be said for
the production of texts also applies to their reception. No hermeneutic act can
consider a single text in isolation. Rather it is an experience with a retrospective
as well as a prospective dimension. This means for the text: it is an intertext, i.e.
simultaneously post-text and pre-text. Stephen Heath perceives a continual pro-
cess of transformation at work: "Far from being the unique creation of the au-
thor as originating source, every text is always (an)other textes) that it remakes,
comments, displaces, prolongs, reassumes." (1972,24) Consequently, every text
is always subjected to a process of repetition. It exists as a perennial interplay
between identity and difference. That constitutes its intertextuality.
3.1. Repetition
If .intertexts are based on the principle of repetition, the following questions
anse:
1. Which kind of repetition is sufficient to ensure "intertextual identity" (Mil-
ler 1985)?
2. Who decides whether arepetition is an intertextual one?
3. To which evaluative conventions is an intertextual repetition subjected?
All these questions cannot be answered exhaustively here.
3.1.1. Choices
Which kind of repetition constitutes a text as an intertextual one? - An answer to
this question may start from a consideration of the criteria quantity, quality, and
18 H. F. Plett
frequency. These we find in the gramm ar of quotation, too, where they evi-
dendy pose no problem. Yet in special cases certain problems may arise. Thus it
is questionable whether the repetition of a single grapheme - as in George
Tabori's M which refers to Euripides's Medea - is already a quotation. If this is
an instance of minimal identity, the repetition of a whole text - e.g. in Samuel
Beckett's Play - constitutes a maximal one. Is this still intertextuality or just
repetition plain and simple? Proceeding to qualitative criteria, the difficulties
even increase. For one could hold that the material identity of the signs em-
ployed - e.g., the English language - already provides sufficient conditions to
enable us to speak of intertextuality. If this qualitative level seems to be hardly
acceptable, how much more doubtful is the attempt of some critics to demon-
strate that reality as such is a general text or macro(inter)text. Here a nature of
the sign is presupposed which, in the last resort, has its foundations in the
medieval concept of mundus symbolicus. A concept of this kind is, however,
totally irreconcilable with the notion of the arbitrariness of the sign in modern
semiotics. As for the third criterion, frequency, it remains to decide which
number of repetitions of a specific size and quality make a text an intertext: one,
several, multiple? The same criterion mayaiso help to decide whether, relative to
the quantity of intertexts, a literary period can be labelled 'intertextual' or 'anti-
intertextual'. All these are questions which can only be answered by a normative
agency. But all conceivable answers will finally barely hide unresolvable aporias.
3.1.2. Norms
The normative agency which to decide which repetition is intertextual and
which is not can be localized in different kinds of senders/receivers. The subjec-
tive type is the productive/receptive individual whose mnemonic ars com-
binatoria is a source of continual intertextualities. But this agency does not
necessarily distinguish between signs and their repetition but actually res orts to
a fluctuating macro(inter)text of freely available signifiers. The intertextual
norm is based in this case on one's personal experience. The result is often co m-
binatorial arbitrariness. To limit it one could devise - analogous to Riffaterre's
'archilecteur' (1971) - an 'archi-intertextualist' who would embrace the intertex-
tual experiences of all past senders/receivers. Yet this empirical reconstruction
of a trans-individual intertextualist will be rather complicated as it is not clear
whether he should be an educated person or somebody with an average know-
ledge. A third possibility would be the construction of an 'ideal speakerlhearer'
who disregards each concrete intertextual instance. He would operate like an
electronic intertext generator which displays every intertextual repetition ac-
cording to specific instructions. Here one could object that his restriction to the
competence level prevents hirn from doing justice to individual intertextual per-
formances. To sum up, there are three conceivable administrators who could
define the intertextual norm: (1) the individual, (2) the empirical, and (3) the
ideal intertextualist. They are tied to three concepts: (1) subjective impression-
Intertextualities 19
ism, (2) historical positivism, and (3) generative automatism. Each has its advan-
tages and dis advantages which need not be elaborated here in detail.
3.1.3. Evaluations
Intertextuality d?es not exist in a value-free realm but is dependent on reigning
cultural conventIons. These result, among other things, in four evaluative at-
titudes: affirmation, negation, inversion, relativity. Affirmative intertextuality
proceeds fr?m the assumption that intertextual repetition is a positive feature of
the text. The imitatio veterum ideal of classicist poetics realizes this
m ItS purest form. According to it, the aesthetic quality of a text is
determmed by the degree to which it re-employs the structural rules and pre-
of the classical canon - with the aim, though, of excelling the ancients in
thelr craft. Negative intertextuality is strictly opposed to this attitude, either
explicidy or implicidy. In the wake of romanticism, it insists on the inalienable
origi?ality of texts, their separateness in relation to any other texts. The ultimate
a intertext-free text which - as conceived by some genera-
tive lmgmsts - has ItS own grammar and its own vocabulary. A realization of this
postulate, though, seems hardly possible. Even Wordsworth and Mallarme
not do without models. Inverted intertextuality is a more ludic type. We
fmd It most. conspicuously in parody, which transposes 'low' topics, per-
sonages, motIfs and actions into a 'high' style, and in travesty, which, contrarily,
transposes 'high' topics, personages, motifs and actions into a 'low' style. Such
a. reappraisal of values and hence participate both in affir-
mative and m mtertextuality. If fixed conventions cease to exist and give
way to a multltude of equally valid positions, positive and negative evaluation
are both immaterial. Anything can be combined with anything. This is the field
Its manifestations are collage and montage, ques-
even thelr own status. We find this position of a positionless
m certain aspects of modernism but even more so in postmodern-
WhlCh IS a per.ennial process of self-intertextualization. A prime example of
IS Tom Stoppard's Travesties, its tide (plural!) already indicat-
mg dnft. ThlS last type rounds up a range of evaluative attitudes which prove
that mtertextual repetition is not only a stylistic means and method of text con-
but also communicates a specific view of the referent. Similar perspec-
tIves have already been formulated in rhetoric, poetics and aesthetics.
3.2. Transformations
!n our cont:xt transformations are such procedures as trans form textuality into
mtertextuahty. They were already apparent in the discussion of the quotation
(2.1.2.), even if subordinate to grammatical criteria. Here the emphasis will be
reversed. It follows that the criteria mentioned cannot be taken into considera-
in every case. The emphasis is less on a segmental notion of intertextuality-
as m the case of the quotation - than on a holistic one. Texts refer to texts,
20 H. F. Piett
structures refer to structures. The sign character of texts will be defined ex-
tensively.lt will comprise not only verbal but also non-verbal signifiers.
3.2.1. Substitution
This type of transformation is most frequent. It comprises signs and structures
and engenders a multitude of possible combinations. Sign substitution can occur
in identical or in different sign dasses. Structural substitution functions analo-
gously.
3.2.1.1. Medial Substitution
Signs of different dass es are, for instance, verbal, visual, acoustic. As a conse-
quence a substitutional paradigm of six sign transfers becomes possible:
(1) linguistic => visual signs
example: Shakespeare's plays => Henry Fuseli's illustrations of them
(2) linguistic => acoustic signs
example: Goethe's Faust => Franz Liszt's Eine Faust-Symphonie. In drei
Charakterbildern (nach Goethe)
(3) visual => linguistic signs
example: 77 pictures by Rene Magritte => Alain Robbe-Grillet's novel La
belle captive
(4) visual => acoustic signs
example: pictures by Victor Hartmann => Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at
an Exhibition '
(5) acoustic => linguistic signs
example: Beethoven's Kreutzersonate => Tolstoy's Kreutzer Sonata
(6) acoustic => visual signs
example: Maurice Ravel's Bolero => Maurice Bejart's ballet Bolero
As is suggested by the variety of the illustrations, each dass of signs allows of a
division into subdasses, e.g. the visual dass can be divided into static and mov-
ing, two-dimensional and three-dimensional, monochrome and polychrome
pictures. At the same time the examples indicate how difficult it is to effect and
to describe such sign transfers. Usually it is not single signifiers which are ex-
changed for other signifiers but themes, motifs, scenes or even moods of a pre-
text which take shape in a different medium. Thus it seems justifiable to call this
kind of intertextuality intermediality. The respective problems can only be
solved within the framework of a general semiotics and media science which
would have to investigate the convertibility of signs and their accommodation in
different media.
3.2.1.2. Linguistic Substitution
Verbal signs which can replace each other come from different subdasses. The
result of such operations is 'translation' in a wider sense - for instance, from
Intertextualities 21
standard speech (e.g., Standard English) into a foreign language (e.g., High Ger-
man), an earlier linguistic stage (e.g., Old English), a regional dialect (e.g., Welsh
English), a sociolect (e.g., the language of youth culture), a specific linguistic
register (e.g., colloquial), etc. Examples of an interlingual transformation are the
"English Homer" by Alexander Pope and the "German Shakespeare" by
Schlegel, Tieck and Baudissin. A comprehensive cQrpus of interlingual, dia-
chronic and diatopic transformations exists of Wilhelm Busch's Max und
Moritz. This category comprises all kinds of linguistic actualization, transstyli-
zation or poetization (Genette 1982). Details can be found in grammars, hand-
books of style, reference works and other utilities. They dearly show that such
'translations' consist not only in the substitution of signs but in the substitution
of structures as well. Both kinds of transformation go hand in hand. This is
particularly obvious in the text type of the paraphrase (N olan 1970; Fuchs
1982). The paraphrase of archaic, poetic or medical texts requires more than a
one-to-one conversion of signifiers, it requires a linguistic strategy.
3.2.1.3. Structural Substitution
Structural substitution takes place, when one set of rules is replaced by another.
In literature the most conspicuous transformation of this kind is generic change.
Proceeding from the dassical triad of lyric, epic, and drama, the following
generic shifts can be disdosed:
(1) lyric => (a) epic, => (b) drama;
(2) epic => (a) lyric, => (b) drama;
(3) drama => (a) lyric, => (b) epic.
Such a paradigm, however, obscures the manifold difficulties inherent in struc-
tural substitution. For it does not ac count of generic subdivisions such as epi-
gram, sonnet, and ballad (in lyric); verse epic, novel, and short story (in epic);
tragedy, tragicomedy, and farce (in drama), all of them governed by rules of
their own. These sub divisions are again subject to substitutions which enhance
the number of transformations considerably (e.g., verse epic => novel, novel =>
tragedy, tragedy => ballad). Thus generic intertextuality or intergenericity as-
sumes a highly complex character which has hardly been given proper attention
by genre studies. Matters become even more complex, when the traditional triad
is abandoned in favour of a less hierarchic, more democratic system of literary
and non-literary text types. Irrespective of such divisions and subdivisions it can
be stated that generic intertextuality cannot be detached from its material coun-
terpart. This becomes all the more evident, when the structural rules of the
verbal sign system are partly replaced by those of a non-verbal system (e.g.,
pictorial => verbal in carmina Jigurata or concrete poetry). They result in inter-
textual hybrids both in matter and manner.
22 H. F. Piett
3.2.2. Addition
Additive transformations generate further texts out of a given pre-text which
serves as their material source. Hence such texts may be assigned a secondary
status, since they rely on their predecessor for a full understanding. Their auto-
nomy is a limited one which often finds expression in the fact that pre- and
posttext are contained in one publication; if that is not the case, the latter is
frequently furnished with such a title or subtitle as indicates its derivative
character. The referential modality of the intertext may be one of coordination
or subordination. Coordination means a spatial extension of the original text.
This can be located at its end (e.g., Goethe's FaustlI) or its beginning (e.g.,
Gordon Bottomley's King Lear's Wife). More rarely such a supplement resurnes
and expands the central part of a text (e.g., Gerhard Rhm's Ophelia und die
Wrter). Coordinate additions often occur in the novel where they produce
whole series of texts (e.g., John Galsworthy's The Forsyte Saga).
Subordinate additions are prefaces, mottoes, epilogues, postscripts, appen-
dices, notes, marginal glosses, blurbs, and other supplementary texts. Genette
(1987) terms such additions 'epitexts' and distinguishes them from 'peritexts',
i.e. advertisements, interviews, diaries, and reviews which, though closely re-
lated to the original text, are not necessarily published jointly with it. He sub-
sumes both text types under the term 'paratext' and arrives at the formula: para-
text = peritext + epitext. Peritexts may become epitexts and epitexts peritexts,
according to their manner of publication. One further terminological remark
seems appropriate here. Subordinate additions or paratexts often assurne the
status of what is critically known as metatexts. A metatext is a text commenting
on another text. Hence every learned article or book dealing with literary texts
belongs to this category but also the prefaces, notes, and reviews mentioned
above. Such an invention of ever new terminologies may seem an unnecessary
and even burdensome toil; it appears, however, in a different light when related
to the different kinds of emphasis - transformation, publication, reflexivity-
placed on the same phenomenon. Thus like a chameleon intertextuality con-
stantly changes its aspect following the perspective chosen by the recipient.
3.2.3. Subtraction
A subtractive transformation may affect the whole text or only part of it. If it
affects the whole text, the result may be a text type like the abstract, synopsis, or
digest. It is generated either as a shortened paraphrase or an excision of text
segments. An illustrative example of the former are Charles and Mary Lamb's
Tales from Shakespeare, of the latter Tom Stoppard's The Fifteen Minute Ham-
let which condenses Shakespeare's play to a ten-page length and, in a "encore",
even to a two-page length, which is a condensation of a condensation. Stop-
pard's procedure is grounded on the excision of text segments and the piecing
together of the remaining fragments. If handled skilfully, such a collage will
enable the recipient to reconstruct the pre-text. Omission of textual details is a
Intertextualities 23
common practice in theatrical performances where the drama text undergoes
curtailments of lines and sentences, of monologues and dialogues, even of whole
scenes. As a rule, the recipient is not asked here to enter into an intertextual
dialogue between pre- and post-text but just to enjoy a good night out. One of a
large number of examples is J ohn Barton and Peter Hall' s The Wars of the Roses,
a considerably shortened version of the three parts of Henry VI and of Rich-
ard 111. Although text segments of various size were omitted and transposed in
it, no intertextual dialogue was intended with the audience, except perhaps for
those scholars who enjoy analyzing Shakespearean adaptations.
3.2.4. Permutation
This transformation breaks a text down into fragments and rearranges these in a
different order. Its working principle is palpably demonstrated by the Dadaist
poet Tristan Tzara in Tom Stoppard's Travesties. He snips Shakespeare's sonnet
18, written on paper, into pieces and joins them together in a random manner.
No single linguistic sign retains its prior position but und ergo es apermutation.
The resultant re-ecriture is a collage - signifying (almost) nothing. It is embed-
ded - as a structural mise en abyme (Dllenbach 1976) - in another collage of
Shakespearean quotations taken from different plays. The collage-within-the-
collage technique can be viewed as being extended over the whole play. This is in
its entirety not only composed of permutations of one text by one author
(Shakespeare's sonnet 18) or of several texts by one author (Shakespeare's plays)
but of several texts by several authors (0. Wilde's The Importance of Being
Earnest, J. Joyce's Ulysses, etc.). Texts border on texts, are based on texts, trans-
form texts, retreat into texts - a perennial process of inter-textualization.
3.2.5. Complexities
Intertextual transformations take place within the horizontal (syntagmatic) and
vertical (paradigmatic) axes of sign communication. Syntagmatic intertextuality,
when multiplied, results in intertext series, paradigmatic intertextuality, when
multiplied, creates intertext condensations.
3.2.5.1. Serialization
Syntagmatic intertextuality is modelled on the following transformational para-
digm:
(1) onetext => one text
i.e. the prototype of intertextuality which, however, remains an abstraction
in its one-dimensionality.
(2) one text => many texts
i.e. aseries of intertexts proceeding from one text.
(3) many texts => one text
i.e. a collage or cento, if composed of heterogeneous pre-text segments.
24 H. F. Plett
(4) many texts => many texts
i.e. the average experience of intertextuality.
Type (2) is the basis of intertextual serialization. Defoe's novel Robinson
Crusoe, for instance, gave rise to a multitude of successors that form a specific
text group, the 'Robinsonads'. Thomas More's Utopia even initiated a narrative
subgenre, the utopian novel, which marks a shift from material to structural
intertextuality. A single text mayaiso be the source of intertextual inversion
(parody, travesty) and negation (anti-novel, counter-blazon) and hence create
generic and subgeneric alternatives.
A well-known intertextual series may illustrate the complexity of syntagmatic
intertextuality. The interpretation of Salome as 'femme fatale' can be traced
down through several successive stages:
(a) Heinrich Heine' s poetic version in his satiric epic Atta Troll (1847)
(b) Gustave Moreau's pictures of (a) (e.g., Salome, L'Apparition [1876])
(c) Joris K. Huysmans's pictorial description of (b) in his novel A Rebours
(1884)
(d) Oscar Wilde's dramatization of (c) in his play - French version - Salome
(1893)
(e) English translation (1894) of (d) by Lord Alfred Douglas
(f) Aubrey Beardsley's illustrations of (e)
(g) Hedwig Lachmann's German translation (1903) of (d)
(h) Richard Strauss' opera version (1905) of (g)
The links in this chain display the following transformations -
A. in the field of material intertextuality:
I. intermedial: 1. verbal => non-verbal
a) pictorial
b) acoustic
2. non-verbal => verbal
II. interlingual: 1. French
2. French
=> English
=> German
B. in the field of generic intertextuality:
epic => drama (c => d).
(a => b, e => f)
(g => h)
(b => c)
This analytical table reveals only part of the complexities involved in intertextual
serialization. Any additions, subtractions and permutations that accompany
each stage of transformation have been disregarded. The spectrum of intertexts
broadens with every prolongation of the extant series (e.g., by theatrical perfor-
mances, film versions). All the more difficult is the task for the recipient to
disentangle the threads of the intertextual fabric.
Intertextualities 25
3.2.5.2. Condensation
It is by no means an accident that Richard Strauss' opera appears as the most
complex link in the chain of Salome intertexts. It incorporates a multiple inter-
textuality, both material and structural. The material part consists, among
others, of linguistic, musical, choreographie, scenie, and costumic signs. Each
type constitutes an intertextual stratum of its own referring, for instance, to
musical (e.g., fugue) or choreographie (e.g., oriental dance) pre-texts. If taken
together, these strata produce a multi-Iayered material intertextuality. The same
applies to dramatic and operatic intergenericity. Both material and structural
intertextuality do not exist successively but simultaneously. Their various strata
or isotopies are superimposed upon each other. They thus engender a paradig-
matic condensation of intertextual poly-isotopies.
Whenever the members of such an intertextual hybrid as the opera disagree
with each other, the harmony of its complex relationships is disturbed. The
principal means of effecting this disturbance is irony. Its results are parody,
travesty, and satire. Outstanding specimens of this intertextual inversion are the
comic operas by Jacques Offenbach and the Savoy Operas by Gilbert and Sulli-
van, furthermore John Gay and Johann Christoph Pepusch's The Beggar's Op-
era and its 20th century intertext, Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's Die Dreigro-
schenoper. All of them ridicule literary and musical topoi, motifs, phrases, struc-
tures, and genres and thus create complex ironie intertexts. Disruption and dis-
continuity are often regarded as symptoms of intertextual modernity. The ex-
amples of Gay, Offenbach, and Gilbert and Sullivan correct this view and point
out that this alleged modernity reaches far back into the past.
3.3. Tides of I ntertextuality
Temporality is a factor of prime importance in intertextuality. It is interpreted
from two radically opposite perspectives, a synchronie and a diachronie one.
The synchronie perspective claims that all texts possess a simultaneous exist-
ence. This entails the levelling of all temporal differences; history is suspended in
favour of the co-presence of the past. Provided this view is accepted, any text can
be interrelated to any other text. An endless ars combinatoria takes place in what
has been variously termed "musee imaginaire" (Malraux), "chambre d'echos"
(Barthes), or "Bibliotheque generale" (Grivel). The locality designated by these
metaphors - memory - may be conceived of as a personal or a collective one. In
the first alternative the text canon is based on individual experience, in the latter
case perhaps on cultural institutions. Regardless of this differentiation, the inter-
textualist is absolutely free to trace relations between texts. This freedom causes
a "plaisir du texte" (Barthes 1973) or rather "intertexte" . Such an attitude suits
the creative artist, not the discerning scholar. A radically synchronie perspective
establishes the artist as intertextualist, whether as a writer or a critic.
As contras ted to this view, the diachronie perspective proposes the historian
(of literature, art, music, dance) as intertextualist. Being more of a traditionalist
,I
I
26 H. F. Plett
than a progressive he does not hunt after sounds in a diffuse echo chamber but
rather prefers well-ordered "archives" (Foucault) of meticulously researched
intertextualities. These contain the intertextual chronicles of every code and
register its continuities and discontinuities. Such a concept, however, harbours
some dangers. Although proclaimed as early as 1968, "the death of the author"
(Barthes) did not actually occur in intertextual theory; for author and reader
had, at least implicitly, always been a matter of consideration. Of greater weight,
however, seems to be the neglect of the socio-cultural context (Ette 1985). This
situation encourages an aesthetic tendency comparable to that of New Criti-
cism. It can be avoided by integrating the third semiotic dimension, semantics.
From such a methodological position an intercultural remodelling of the inter-
textuality concept would seem to liberate the intertext from its prison-house of
signs and structures and make it resurne its dialogue with reality (Morgan 1985,
8-13; Orr 1986).
Intertextuality is not a time-bound feature in literature and the arts.
Nevertheless it is obvious that certain cultural periods incline to it more than
others. The 20th century has already witnessed two such phases: modernism
and postmodernism. In the modernist period, intertextuality is apparent in ev-
ery section of culture: literature (Eliot, Joyce), art (Picasso, Ernst), music
(Stravinsky, Mahler), photography (Heartfield, Hausmann), etc., even if it is
interpreted in different ways. Postmodernism shows an increase of this trend
which now includes film (e.g., Woody Allen's Play itAgain, Sam) and architec-
ture (e.g., Charles Moore's Piazza d'Italia, New Orleans). As the climax of this
fashion may be regarded pseudo-intertextuality, which means a text referring to
another text that simply does not exist (e.g., Jorge Luis Borges's Ficciones). With
reference to Borges, J ohn Barth, himself an author of intertextual stories and
novels, writes in his essay "The Literature of Exhaustion" (1982, 1):
By "exhaustion" I don't mean anything so tired as the subject of physical, moral, or intellectual
decadence, only the used-upness of certain forms or exhaustion of certain possibilities - by no
means necessarily a cause for despair.
The scepticism inherent in such a statement raises the questions : Can intertextu-
ality be equated with cultural decadence? Are we dealing with Alexandrianism,
mere epigonality here? In his book Statt einer Literaturgeschichte, Walter Jens
(1978, 13) made an apt comment on the historicity and value of a citation cul-
ture:
In einer Sptkultur wird die Welt berschaubar. Man ordnet und sammelt, sucht nach Ver-
gleichen und findet berall Analogien. Der Blick gleitet nach rckwrts; der Dichter zitiert, zieht
Vergangenes, ironisch gebrochen, noch einmal ans Licht, parodiert die Stile der Jahrtausende,
wiederholt und fixiert, bemht sich um Reprsentation und zeigt das schon Vergessene in neuer
Beleuchtung. Alexandrien ist das Eldorado der Wiederentdeckung, der Hellenismus die hohe
Zeit posthumer Nekrologe. Statt Setzungen gibt man Verweise: Amphitryon 38, Ulysses, die
Iden des Mrz. Wenn die Gegenwart keinen Schatten mehr wirft, braucht man, um die eigene
Situation zu bestimmen, die Silhouette des Perfekts; wenn es den Stil nicht mehr gibt, mu man
die Stile beherrschen: auch Zitat und Montage sind Knste, und das Erbe fruchtbar zu machen,
erscheint uns als ein Metier, das aller Ehren wert ist.
In tertextuali ties 27
There is almost nothing to be added to this justification of a literature that does
not refer to life but rather to itself. In present-day avantgarde literature Yl?-ecri-
ture still dominates ecriture, the text engineer the inspired visionary, the
"quotationist" (Milton) the author who seeks to evade the "anxiety of influ-
ence" (Bloom). The revers al of this tendency is only a matter of time.
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HANS-PETER MAI
Bypassing Intertextuality
Hermeneutics, Textual Practice, Hypertext
1. I ntroduction
"Nothing is Text but what was spoken in the
Bible, and meant there for Person and Place, the
rest is Application, wh ich a discreet Man may do
weIl; but 'tis his Scripture, not the Holy Ghost."
Gohn Seiden)
"Jazz is not dead, it just smells funny."
(Frank Zappa)
This essay will attempt to discuss intertextuality in the contemporary
framework of literary studies. It will be argued that a restricted conception of
the term, as it has been developed with the intention of making the concept more
applicable, is not only contrary to the original intention of Julia Kristeva who
proposed the term, but also does not possess any significant heuristic advantages
over more tradition al Consequently, the reigning question will be:
what can it mean today to 'prc;tctice intertextuality' - wh ich I take to be an enter-
prise clearly distinct from older notions of literary scholarship.
I will not attempt to sketch'in detail the unfolding of the intertextuality debate
over the years. In this regard a couple of valuable introductions have already
been published by T. Morgan (1985), M. Pfister (1985 a), O. Ette (1985) and L.
Ping Hui (1983/84). In addition, E. Rusinko (1979) has contributed an informa-
tive article on Soviet precursors. These authors discuss outstanding contribu-
tions in the field of intertextual theory and practice. I will concentrate on a
reconstruction of the initial stages of the theoretical discussion - focusing on
Julia Kristeva, who suggested the term, and on her teacher and 'ally' Roland
Barthes - and thereby try to provide a perspective for an evaluation of develop-
ments since then.
2. Current and Conflicting Notions
The debate on intertextuality so far has spawned a surprising (and confusing)
variety of terminological variants and mutations: CCinter-semiocity" (Popovic
1980); CCintercontextuality" (Zurbrugg 1984); CCintratextual rewriting" (Altman
Bypassing Intertextuality 31
1981); CClnterauktorialitt" (Schabert 1983); CCinterdiscursivite" (Angenot 1983);
CCautotexte" (Dllenbach 1976); etc. (Further examples can be found in Pugliese
1988, note 66.) Yet this terminological inflation is not a fertile elaboration of a
sufficiently defined and agreed upon concept but rather indicative of a contest
for meaning.
The basic dis agreement about intertextuality is whether it is to be regarded as
a general state of affairs textual or as an inherent quality of specific texts. The
least contentious meaning of 'intertextual' designates any allusion in one text to
another text. It serves as a handy label for signalling some sort of interconnect-
edness: CClntertextuality involves the relation of one text to other texts" (Mail-
loux 1982, 151). But although the concept, thus understood, is eminently usable
as scholarly jargon, it is rather banal, as Tallis (1988) points out:
At its least ambitious, the 'intertextuality' thesis is ab out literature. Non-contentiously, it takes
its rise from the obvious fact that many literary works are explicitly or implicitly allusive. Schol-
arly references, quotations, echoes, reworkings of traditional themes, deliberate employment of
established styles and retelling classic or archetypal 'literary' stories, the deIiberate contrivance of
ironic effects by the juxtaposition of disparate and incompatible styles - these intertextual
features have been the very stuff of literature since ancient times. (31)
A restricted intertextuality would refer to all possible textual references within
the clearly delimited domain of beiles lettres. Such usage is indeed common. Galan
(1985), forexample, employs theterm in this sense in his comprehensive presenta-
tion of the Prague School of structuralism when he states that these structuralists
were cc concerned with the autonomous or intertextual functioning of literature as
literature" (21), with intertextuality as ccthe laws of immanent evolution" (8).
Yet what complicates matters is that 'intertextuality' often serves as a syn-
onym for 'deconstruction' or 'poststructuralism'. Nye (1987), for one, clearly
equates the CCintertextual, an irregular mesh of differences and deferrals", with
the Derridean differance (669). Leitch (1983) also associates the term 'intertex-
tual' with a discussion of deconstruction. Notably, he views the development of
notions of (inter-)textuality historically as a 'political' strategy:
In the late 1960s and early 1970s deconstructive theorists conceive intertextuality as something of
a weapon to be used in the contemporary struggle over meaning and truth. Intertextuality [is] a
text's dependence on and infiltration by prior codes, concepts, conventions, unconscious prac-
tices, and texts [ ... ]. (161)
Summing up the deconstructive project and practice, Leitch writes:
[D]econstruction takes the semiological theory of the sign (signifier + signified) beyond the
sliding signified to the floating signifier. (Notice that it eschews the referent.) Since language
serves as ground of existence, the world emerges as infinite Text. Everything gets textualized. All
contexts, whether political, economic, social, psychological, historical, or theological become
intertexts; that is, outside influences and forces und ergo textualization. Instead of literature we
have textuality; in place of tradition, intertextuality. Authors die so that readers may come into
prominence. [ ... ] What are texts? [ ... ] Sites for the freeplay of grammar, rhetoric, and (illusory)
reference.[ ... ] Truth comes forth in the reifications, the personal pleasures, of reading. Truth is
not an entity or property of the text. [ ... ] Deconstruction works to deregulate controlled dis-
semination and celebrate misreading. (122)
32 H.-P. Mai
The opposing, clearly restricted concept of intertextuality is prevalent in sev-
eral German anthologies touching upon the subject published recently (Lach-
mann 1982; Schmid & Stempel 1983; Stierle & Warning 1984; Broich & Pfister
1985). Scholars therein principally welcome the obviously stimulating idea of
'intertextuality', but only insofar as it proves its usefulness within the tradition al
confines of literary and general art theory and interpretation. In this context,
some taxonomic models of intertextual relationships have been developed
(Grivel1975; Grbel1983; Lachmann 1984; Lindner 1985; Plett 1985; Schulte-
Middelich 1985). Yet explicitly revisionist concepts of intertextuality have also
been advocated (Stierle 1982; Schabert 1983). Serious doubts concerning an ex-
tended, poststructural conception of intertextuality are common to most of
these scholars. Yet Pfister (1985 a, 18) has correctly pointed out that a simple
reduction of the complexities of the concept is no adequate reaction.
Traditional text linguistics seems to have co me into contact with the term only
tangentially. Two recent surveys at least mention the term (Nth 1985, 457;
Schlieben-Lange 1988, 1206 f.), yet only with reference to Beaugrande & Dress-
ler (1981) who favour a technological reduction of the intertextual concept to "a
procedural control upon communicative activities at large" (206). An article by
Lemke (1985) is exceptional in this regard.
All in all, discussions of intertextuality seem to be most comfortably localized
within the wide domain of contemporary semiotics, although one should not
underestimate the diversity of approaches which can be found under this head-
ing. Faced with such definitional difficulties, I hope that by reconstructing the
historical intellectual context in whibh 'intertextuality' originated, we may. be
better able to understand the present confusion and factiousness of intertextual
scholars.
But before I proceed in this direction I would like to rule out some other
approaches to the topic under discussion. First, an etymological unraveling of
the word 'intertextuality' does not seem to be particularly helpful for und er-
standing the term (cf. Ruprecht 1983, 13; a much more level-headed explication
can be found in Harty 1985, 2 f.). After all, Greek and Latin morphemes have
always served as a reservoir for neologisms. But Kristeva, for one, did not ex-
pound her concept of intertextuality by reference to (or even reverence for) the
ancients. Her points of reference are not Platol AristotlelOvid but HegellMarxl
H usserllF reud/Saussure/Chomsky.
Second, I am very skeptical of a historical approach which tries to point out
similarities between Renaissance notions of imitatio and intertextuality (Carron
1988; Schoeck 1984). There seems to be a fundamental difference in the way in
which 'intertextual' strategies were pursued then and now. By imitatio the au-
thor tried to position hirnself within an accepted order of literary works; he tried
to partake of it even in the act of distinguishing hirnself from it (even a parodic
attitude was contained bythe classicalmodel; cf. Ruthven 1979, 102-109). Yet as
conceived in contemporary art theory, an intertextual effort would not be so
much an (even reluctant) imitation of venerable precursors as, at least, a subver-
Bypassing Intertextuality 33
sive use of a traditional stock of artistic means of expression. Only if one chooses
to ignore the poststructuralist indictment of authority can one draw parallels
between 'intertextuality' then and now.
Last, M. Bakhtin's relevance for the intertextual debate is rather doubtful. It is
true that Kristeva coined the term 'intertextuality' for the first time in 1966 in
conjunction with a review of his work (Kristeva 1986 b). But much has been
written about his notion of 'dialogism' without 'intertextuality' being men-
tioned at all. Bakhtin seems to be considered mainly with regard to other con-
texts: sociology, formalism, generalliterary theory etc. (cf. e.g. Lehmann 1977;
Gnther 1981; Carroll 1983; Davidson 1983; LaCapra 1983; White 1984;
Swingewood 1986). Some critics even definitely deny any affinity between post-
structuralism and Bakhtin's theories (e.g. Shukman 1980, 223). Others merely
assert a connexion (Bove 1983). Only Pechey, as far as I know, presents a con-
textual reading of Bakhtin which helps to clarify his possible relevance for Kris-
teva' s poststructuralist intertextual concept. Kristeva, it can safely be said, ap-
propriated Bakhtin's ideas for her own purposes. The closest similarity with her
concept of intertextuality is suggested by Feral (who, in turn, is mainly para-
phrasing Kristeva):
From Bakhtin Kristeva borrows the contextualization of any signifying practice [ ... ] in an his-
toricalor social frame. Attempting to replace the static subdivision of texts by a model in which
the literary structure does not merely exist, but elaborates itself in relationship to another struc-
ture, Bakhtin [postulated] that the word was no longer to be considered as a point of fixed
meaning, but as a place - a place where various textual surfaces and networks [ ... ] cross. (Feral
1980,275)
Therefore the following inquiry will take its departure from Kristeva's writings
as the original source of the contemporary intertextuality debate.
3. The Critical Context (1)
Kristeva developed her notion of intertextuality at a time when academic literary
criticism underwent a "crisis, culminating in the late 1960s, of the traditional
definition of the cultural function of the humanities, and especially the study of
literature" (Weimann 1985, 278). Weimann has conveniently summarized the
issues on which the consensus of the intellectual community was falling apart
(278- 84). The emerging concept of 'intertextuality' was one of the symptoms of
this crisis.
The greatest challenge to traditionalliterary scholarship issued from linguistic
models of inquiry which had acquired prestige because of their allegedly scien-
tific nature.
1
This linguistic-structuralist approach promised to do away with
subjective fallacies such as intuition. At last, literary studies seemed to be able to
attain a degree of objective knowledge which had been hitherto reserved for the
1 On the problematic notion of a 'scientific' literary criticism cf. Seamon (1989).
f,T,
34 H.-P. Mai
'hard sciences'. Even more temptingly, linguistic structuralism promised to pro-
vide a master theory of all cultural production. Still, literary structuralism was
not so 'different' that it would not continue to cater for the tradition al notion of
intratextual autonomy, of the self-contained artistic object (as for the roots of
this notion cf. Paulson 1988,115-121). After all, linguistic constructs were to be
explained solely by reference to linguistic means. In addition, the new struc-
turalist approach provided a conceptual space in which an opposition against
traditional forms of scholarship could articulate itself - untainted by academi-
cally still suspicious inclinations of an explicitly political kind. Of course, the
structuralist claims were not accepted undisputedly. But the arguments levelled
against them were largely of a traditionally hermeneutic kind and therefore
could be interpreted as intellectual rearguard operations.
But there were also attempts to reconcile the structuralist spirit with her-
meneutical notions. P. Ricoeur is an outstanding example in this regard. One of
his essays, originally published in 1970, well illustrates the then virulent tensions
in literary criticism. It has the further advantage of explicitly taking into account
ideas of a post-linguist structuralism. Ricoeur starts by making an important
distinction: a text is not merely fixed (personal) speech, text "is written precisely
because it is not said. [ ... ] a text is really a text only when it is not restricted to
transcribing an anterior speech" (Ricoeur 1981 a, 146). In insisting on a qualita-
tive difference between speech and written text, he agrees with the poststruc-
turalist demand for a trans-linguistic approach to texts. He also points out that
an analogy of text and dialogue is inappropriate unless major qualifications are
made (146 f.).2 Language as text, Ricoeur perceives, has a very special relation
towards referentiality:
[I]n living speech, the ideal sense I of what is said turns towards the real reference, towards that
'about which' we speak. At the limit, this real reference tends to merge with an ostensive designa-
tion where speech rejoins the e s t ~ r e of pointing. Sense fades into reference and the latter into the
. act of showing.
This is no longer the case when the text takes the place of speech. The movement of reference
towards the act of showing is intercepted [ ... ] I say intercepted and not suppressed. (148)3
As we can see, Ricoeur does not want to do away with referentiality completely
(which deconstructive theorists such as Derrida advocate). He holds that the
meaning of texts can be recovered through a structural hermeneutics: "As we
2 This assertion, if it holds true, casts a serious doubt upon scholarly approaches which would
want to integrate literature into the domain of communication technology (cf. Beaugrande &
Dressler 1981); it also sheds considerable doubt on glib appropriations of Bakhtin's 'dialogism' .
3 Alluding to poststructuralist notions he continues with: "[I]t is in this respect that I shall distance
myself from what may be called henceforth the ideology of the absolute text." (148) Also,
Ricoeur does retain the notion of authorial intention (147), though in a heavily mitigated form: to
hirn the author is always necessarily his own reader and as such always at a distance from his own
text (he is never a speaker who can be imagined expressing his personal self in his utterances)
(149). It follows that "the intended meaning of a text is not essentially the presumed intention of
the author" (161).
. Bypassing Intertextuality 35
shall see, the text is not without reference; the task of reading, interpretation,
will be precisely to fulfil the reference" (148). Yet it is a special kind of reference:
as the reference to real objects is suspended in a text, the reference to other texts
gains importance, as only the latter ensures the text's comprehensibility. Yet the
meaning thus accruing to the text is much more flexible than the meaning of
speech in everyday communication:
In virtue of this obliteration of the relation to the world, each text is free to enter into relation
with all the other texts which come to take the place of the circumstantial reality referred to by
living speech. This relation of text to text, within the effacement of the world about which we
speak, engenders the quasi-world of texts or literature. (148 f.)
Ricoeur sees two distinct critical approaches resulting from such a notion of the
text: one is a formalist/ structuralist approach (as exemplified also by the close
reading of American N ew Critics), the other is a hermeneutic one:
[T]he quasi-world of texts engenders two possibilities. We can, as readers, remain in the suspense
of the text, treating it as a worldless and authorless object; in this case we explain the text in terms
of its internal relations, its structure. On the other hand, we can lift the suspense and fulfil the text
in speech, restoring it to living communication; in this case, we interpret the text. (152)
Ricoeur clearly opts for the hermeneutic alternative. It only, he avers, makes
possible a meaningful encounter of the reader with the text:
[T]he interpretation of a text culminates in the self-interpretation of a subject who thenceforth
understands hirns elf better, understands hirns elf differently, or simply begins to understand him-
self. [ ... ] explanation is nothing if it is not incorporated as an intermediary stage in the process of
self-understanding. (158)
The social function of such a hermeneutic procedure is to overcome feelings of
alienation. Ricoeur is refreshingly open about this: "One of the aims of all her-
meneutics is to struggle against cultural distance. This struggle can be under-
stood in purely temporal terms as a struggle against secular estrangement" (159) .
After all,the traditional hermeneutic approach is an attempt of the (intellectual)
individual to posit hirns elf within the cultural tradition (a critical account of this
hermeneutic tradition is given by Pugliese 1988,23-36). Accordingly, Ricoeur
holds that the text's meaning sterns from the "tradition in the very interior of a
text" (163). The interpreter's role is to surrender hirnself to the text, passively,
but also knowingly and deliberately - i.e. contemplatively.
4
Ricoeur' s position may serve as a backdrop against which a new poststruc-
turalist skepticism articulated itself, a skepticism concerning both scientific and
4 The traditional notion of hermeneutic understanding has been advocated most convincingly by
H. G. Gadamer and has found a severe critic in J. Habermas (cf. Hauff 1985, 19-34; Ricoeur
1981 b). The resulting quarrel became part of a much more comprehensive, politically motivated
debate in which poststructuralists partook. This is not the place to trace the more strictly political
controversy of this period and its ramifications, particularly in and with regard to literary
studies; for further information cf. J ameson 1985; Hohendahl1980.
36 H.-P. Mai
hermeneutic models of interpretation. It was a skepticism which doubted the
possibility of any master theory. And it questioned also (for political reasons)
Ricoeur's attempt to reconcile then popular structuralist thought with tradi-
tional hermeneutics. A good summary of the ensuing changes in the field of
literary criticism is given by Hartman (1976). Most pertinent to our purpose,
Hartman applies the notion of intertextuality to the activity of the critic: his
writing, he holds, gains an "allusive, dense, intertextual quality" (209) and
stresses "the co-presence in literary works (broadly understood) of mixed or
even discontinuous orders of discourse" (218). This confronts us squarely again
with the initial question: is intertextuality an artistic procedure and hence a
quality inherent in a work of art, or a function of a critic's (reader's) activity?
But first something remains to be clarified: what, actually, is the 'text' to
which 'intertextuality' refers?
4. Versions 0/ 'Text' and Tel Quel
Without a clear understanding of the various concepts of 'text' it is a bold enter-
prise to talk about intertextuality. Surprisingly, few commentators, especially
among its detractors, try to comprehend intertextuality under this heading.
Weimann (1985, 284-85) demonstrates that the word 'text' can be conceived of
differently, depending on the respective intellectual context. On the one hand,
there is the empirical Anglo-American concept based on notions of discourse as
language event. This is to be distinguished from structuralist concepts (of Euro-
pean des cent) in which the text is expressive of an abstract system which condi-
tions it. Structuralist concepts can be enlarged, by the inclusion of non-linguistic
sign activities, into semiotic models. Poststructural, 'textual' notions of text re-
place the notion of text as a mere function of a linguistic system with the notion
of text as an 'activity'. What they also have in common is their critical use of the
idea of 'text', which finds its expression, on the one hand, in their self-awareness
of their own procedures and, on the other hand, in their attempts to point out
the ideological implications of seemingly objectively given entities. Last, the
concept of text diametrically opposed to this all-encompassing 'textualization'
is the one as endorsed by the historical tradition of philology - although even
here the influence of poststructuralist notions is making itself felt (cf. Martens
1989).
Brtting points out the ideological implications of the tradition al notion of
'text', current in academic literary criticism when Kristeva and her combattants
developed their counterstrategy (Brtting 1976,21-24). He also tries to sum up
their new concept of 'textuality', although he cautions that "die avantgardisti-
schen Theoretiker [ ... ] den Begriff texte nie streng formuliert haben und dies in
gewisser Weise sogar unmglich ist [the avantgarde theorists never strictly de-
fined the term texte, which is, in a way, even impossible]" (73 f.; my translation).
Who were these theorists?
. Bypassing Intertextuality 37
The intellectual context of the development of the poststructuralist notion of
'textuality' by a group of intellectuals affiliated with the periodical Tel Quel is
excellently explained by Brtting (cf. also Grimm 1987; Moi 1986; Kao 1981).
He provides a concise history of the group's composition and its general intel-
lectual orientation (Brtting 1976, 115-120), and he rightly stresses its leftist
political commitment. Tel Quel emerges as a group of oppositional intellectuals
whose assorted theories are marked, to a variable extent, by Saussurean, Marx-
ist-Maoist, and psychoanalytical notions (especially in their reformulation by
Jacques Lacan).5 Yet it would be wrong to ascribe to them a unified theoretical
outlook. The group has been much more characterized by internal dissension
than by a monolithic point of view. Tel Quel's political enthusiasm, although
following Marxist precepts, is most aptly characterized as 'textual'. 'Text', for its
adherents
6
, is no lnger only a superstructural epiphenomenon but, if wielded
correctly, a basic ideological weapon which can contribute directly to a rev-
olutionary change in society.7 This 'text' is no Ion ger the object with which
textual criticism used to deal. Actually it is no object at all; it is, as a way of
writing (ecriture), a productive (and subversive) process.
Somewhat hard to grasp but mostimportant to see is Tel Quel's aversion to
the concept of communication. In their ;view, communication acts mainly as the
agent of social cohesion by pressing fpr consensus. Against the 'straight jacket'
of common sense Tel Quelians tried to posit their subversive linguistic practice.
Consequently, they favoured the connotative 'text' and pitted it against all de-
notative language, which they held to be only designed to guarantee law and
order. 'Text', Kristeva held most poignantly, is the expression of a "defiant pro-
ductivity" (1986, 42).
The 'textual' rebels resorted to strong fundamental arguments in order to
justify their attitudes and practices. But historically it is necessary to point out
the much more mundane opposition which also fueled the 'textual' criticism of
Tel Quel: the traditional French practice of explication de texte (cf. Brtting
1976,26-32). Brtting makes it perfectly clear that
die oft berspitzten und radikalen Kritiken der literaturtheoretischen Avantgarde in Frankreich
nicht zu verstehen sind, wenn man sich nicht vor Augen hlt, gegen welche literarischen
Traditionen und Ideologien, gegen welche literarischen Institutionen sie sich zu situieren ver-
suchen. [ ... ] In der [explication de texte} lebt das 19. Jahrhundert weiter, das sie erfunden hat
[ .. .J.
5 The influence of Marxist theory was mediated by Althusser's writings (his theory is sketched by
Seung 1982,112-118; cf. too Coward & Ellis 1977, 69-77; Jameson 1985). Their literary applica-
tion by Macherey is discussed in Frow (1986, 18-29). - For a detailed historical presentation of
the role of Freudian psychoanalysis and Lacan versus the French psychiatrie establishment, cf.
Turkle (1978). Bowie (1979) provides a good (and readable) introcluction to Lacan's theories.
6 Among the contributors to the standard anthology ofTel Quelian writings are Barthes, Kristeva,
Derrida, Foucault, SoUers, to name but those who are still prominent French theorists (cf. Tel
QueI1968).
7 Harland (1987) explains very well the philosophical underpinnings of this new turn, from base to
superstructure, in marxist political thinking.
38 H.-P. Mai
[the often pointed and radical critique of the French avantgarde in literary theory cannot be
understood if one is not aware against which literary traditions and ideologies, against which
literary institutions it tries to articulate itself. The nineteenth century which invented it survives
in the explication de texte.]
(32; my translation)
This tradition al approach to literary texts still survives in the French critique
universitaire and the critique scolaire (69).8
4.1. Kristeva
The persons referred to most often with regard to poststructuralist notions of
textuality/intertextuality are Julia Kristeva, Roland Barthes, and Jacques Der-
rida.
9
In the late 1960s, Kristeva subscribed to Tel Quelian notions of textual, i.e.
cultural, revolution. She tried to achieve this objective by fusing ideas from
philosophy (Husserl/Derrida), political science (Marxl Althusser) and
psychoanalysis (Freud/Lacan) with linguistic-structuralist procedures
(Chomsky) and formallogic (cf. Adriaens 1981). In a way, she borrowed from
the prestige these disciplines possessed while, at the same time, trying to subvert
them. On the terminologicallevel this resulted in a deliberate conceptual mud-
dle. Later on, her criticism acquired a more strictly psychoanalytical tinge. Pres-
entations of her notions frequently do not differentiate enough between her
'structuralist' phase prior to the publication of La revolution de langage poe-
tique in 1974 and her predominantly psychoanalytical theory starting with this
very book. (An outline of her later thought can be found in Kristeva 1975). She
coined the term 'intertextuality' during the earlier phase.
In her essay "Semiotics: A Critical Science and/or a Critique of Science",
Kristeva (1986 a) grounds her enterprise clearly in the intellectually unstable
period of the late 1960s - she diagnoses a "cultural subversion which our civili-
zation is undergoing" (75). One major point of reference is Marx, although
Freudian influence already makes itself clearly felt; but her emphasis is on lan-
guage theory. And, above all, hers is a critical and a self-critical project. She
states: "In a decisive move towards self-analysis, (scientific) discourse today has
8 Brtting is not alone in this assessment. Grimm, who provides a concise his tory of French
academic literary criticism, also finds: "Die fr[ anzsische] univ[ ersitre] Lit[ eratur ]wiss[ ens-
chaft] hat eine [ ... ] Eigengesetzlichkeit des geisteswiss[ enschaftlichen] Gegenstandes nie reflek-
tiert [ ... ]; sie sieht ihre Aufgabe allein in der Suche nach dem einen entstehungs geschichtlich
bedingten Sinn des lit[ erarischen] Gegenstandes [French academic literary scholarship never
contemplated the unique quality of objects of inquiry in the humanities; its aim is solely the
search for the one historically determined meaning of the literary object]." (Grimm 1987, 134;
my translation) Even Hempfer, who severely criticizes Tel-Quelian theories, concedes that
many of the opposition al 'textual' notions become understandable in view of this tradition al
French critical practice (1976, 51).
9 Harland perceptively sketches Kristeva's and Barthes's position and its analogy with Derrida's
philosophy of language (Harland 1987,167-169); as Derrida is less concerned with literature, he
will play only a marginal role here. An extended critical discussion of Derrida can be found in
Seung (1982).
. Bypassing Intertextuality 39
begun to re-examine languages in order to isolate their (its) models or patterns"
(75). In contrast to linguistic structuralism which modeled itself on the exact
sciences, Kristeva envisages a discipline which tries not only to come to grips
with its objects, but, at the same time, seeks to be aware of the fact that those
objects are always constituted as objects of knowledge in the first place, not
found. Hence, Kristeva's brand of semiotics is marked by its self-reflexiveness:
"[T]his is where semiotics differs from the exact sciences, [ ... ] the former is also
the production of its own model-making" (77); "[s]emiotics is [ ... ] a mode of
thought where science sees itself as (is conscious of itself as) a theory" (77). The
consequences are far-reaching:
This means that semiotics is at once are-evaluation of its object and/or of its models, a critique
both of these mode1s'(and therefore of the sciences from which they are borrowed) and of itself
(as a system of stable truths). [ ... ] semiotics cannot hardeninto a science let alone into the science,
for it is an open form of research, a constant critique that turns back on itself and offers its own
auto-critique. As it is its own theory, semiotics is the kind of thought which, without raising itself
to the level of a system, is still capable of modelling (thinking) itself. (77)
The next sentence characterizes such a semiotics as a critique of ideology (in
contrast to traditional hermeneutics) but also as a paradoxical enterprise: "But
this reflexive movement is not a circular one [as in hermeneutics]. Semiotic re-
search remains a form of inquiry that ultimately uncovers its own ideological
gesture, only in order to re cord and deny it before starting all over again" (77 f.).
Finally, Kristeva asserts:
Semiotic practice breaks with this teleological vision of a science that is subordinated to a
philosophical system and consequently even destined itself to become a system. Without becom-
ing a system, the site of semiotics, where models and theories are developed, is a place of dispute
and self-questioning, a 'cirde' that remains open. Its 'end' does not rejoin its 'beginning', but, on
the contrary, rejects and rocks it, opening up the way to another discourse, that is, another
subject and another method [ ... ]. (78)
It seems that in these remarks the political (Maoist) concept of 'permanent rev-
olution' is transposed onto the field of intellectual inquiry.
Kristeva also borrows from the explanatory model of Freudian psychoanaly-
sis. In contrast to former applications of psychoanalytical thought in literary
studies Kristeva stresses the procedural character of the psychoanalytical session
over against the 'scientific' taxonomy of the mind which this discipline also
promises. Tying in with her observations on Marx's concept of 'production'
(81 f.) are her reflections on the Freudian 'dream work'. She deliberately op-
poses the latter to economic production, which she sees characterized by the
valorization of the finished work (object) and its exchange value. The dream
work, on the other hand, is an (utopian) example of a kind of work which is all
play on the surface and yet performs vital functions for the individua1.
10
All in
all, Kristeva advocates the application of an antagonistic (hence Marxist, as com-
10 For Marx's early concept of 'work', on which Kristeva's notions are most likely based, cf. Rder
(1989).
40 H.-P. Mai
pared to Hegelian) dialectics
ll
in a new discipline, a semiotics of cultural mean-
ing. The underlying notion of 'culture' is a far cry from the reconciliatory con-
cept to which tradition al hermeneutics adheres. In this, Kristeva apparently be-
longs to a contemporary group of "Western and Soviet semioticians [who] tend
to interpret culture as a minimal condition for social existence, and to regard it as
the domain of social conflicts and struggle for the collective memory" (Rewar
1976, 375). Kristeva closes her article with a few thoughts on the subject of
literature. Literature is not accorded a privileged place in her cultural semiotics:
"[T]he new semiotic models then turn to the social text, to those social practices
of which 'literature' is only one unvalorized variant, in order to conceive of them
as so many ongoing transformations and/or productions" (87).
What does intertextuality have to do with all this? Kristeva's concept of it is
very much analogous to the model of intellectual inquiry just outlined and
fueled by the same impulses. Writing about intertextuality, her general semiotic
inquiry is only displaced onto the field of literature as cultural discourse. This
transposition takes place in the essay "The Bounded Text" of 1969 (Kristeva
1980 a).12 Here the single text is characterized as a 'productivity' analogous to
the dream work outlined in the former essay. Kristeva defines the text as
a trans-linguistic apparatus that redistributes the order of language by relating communicative
speech, which aims to inform directly, to different kinds of anterior or synchronie utterances.
The text is therefore a productivity, and this me ans : first, that its relationship to the language in
which it is situated is redistributive (destructive-constructive) [ ... ]; and second, that it is a per-
mutation of texts, an intertextuality: in the space of a given text, several utterances, taken from
other texts, intersect and neutralize one another. (36)
The literary scholar's intertextual task would be to define "the specificity of
different textual arrangements by placing them within the general text (culture)
of which they are part and which is in turn, part of them" (36). The intertextual
procedure would, "by study'ing the text as intertextuality, conside[r] it as such
within (the text of) society and history" (37). Kristeva's notion of intertextuality
here resembles very closely a sociological theory of literature. The important
difference is that Kristeva no Ion ger conceives of society Ihistory as something
outside the text, some objective entity over against the text, but partaking of the
same textuality as literature.
Questions as to the scientific status of such an approach are somewhat mis-
leading. They seem inappropriate, first of all, if one considers that Kristeva is
trying to demonstrate that a 'pure science' is an impossible notion in the semiotic
sphere because there is no privileged meta-level from which we can askl answer
universal questions. But Kristeva also very intentionally subverts scientific con-
11 On the fundamental difference between Hegelian and Marxian dialectics cf. Seung (1982,
104-112).
12 Another version of this article has been published as "Problemes de la structuration du texte". It
is less strictly language-oriented and hence displays its proximity to Kristeva's criticism of scien-
tific positivism more overtly.
Bypassing Intertextuality 41
ventions: In her very writing she blithely appropriates scientific terminology
from diverse disciplines for her own purposes.
13
She explicitly justifies this ap-
propriation in the methodological essay presented above. In it she advocates a
deliberate "subversion of the existing terminology" (1986 a, 79), which Marx
allegedly also practiced (80). On the one hand, "[s]emiotics [ ... ] rejects a
humanist and subjectivist terminology, and addresses itself to the vocabulary of
the exact sciences" (80). But it does so not in order to claim objectivity but to
appropriate the terms and re-evaluate them: "Far from being simply a stock of
models on which semiotics can draw, these annexed sciences a r ~ also the object
which semiotics challenges in order to make itself into an explicit critique" (79).
The ultimate aim is the discovery of ideology in all 'objective' assertions: "Play-
ing [ ... ] on the different meanings a term acquires in different theoretical con-
texts, semiotics reveals how science is born in ideology" (79).14
It is important to see the political motivations behind Kristeva's early theoret-
ical efforts. Intertextuality is one lever in her theoretical attempt to dislocate the
mainstays of the "bourgeois world" (1986 a, 75). Hence, Kristeva's intertextual-
ity is a far cry from being taxonomic. In her eyes it is a politically transformative
practice. In the last resort, hers is a political concept which aims at empowering
the reader! critic to oppose the literary and social tradition at large.
4.2. Barthes
The greatest congruence of Kristeva and Barthes
15
concerning intertextual mat-
ters can be found in Barthes's article "Theory of the Text" of 1973. Like
Kristeva, he holds that the limitations of the linguistic-structuralist approach
\3 Feral refers to Kristeva's changing methodologie al preoccupations (1980, 277, 279); he notes,
disapprovingly, "the temptation of science" "to which Kristevian semiotics succombed[sic} in its
early stages" (275); Barthes, approvingly, writes that Kristeva points out "the terminological
slippage of so-called scientific definitions" (1986, 169). Kristeva's terminological inconsistencies
are discussed by Adriaens (1981, 193-195). For a positive evaluation of the 'parasitic' nature of
such a deconstructive enterprise cf. DImer (1983, 93, 99-101).
14 An example of how Kristeva practices this (subversive, or careless, depending on one's view)
appropriation herself can be found in comparing "The Bounded Text" with another version of
the same article and relating the findings to her Revolution du langage poetique. In "Problemes
de la structuration du texte" she devotes a considerable amount of space to developing her no-
tions of the geno- and the pheno-text in analogy to Chomsky's linguistic model of deep structure
and surface structure (Kristeva 1968, 300-304, 309-312); she even calls her method 'transforma-
tional analysis'. In "The Bounded Text" she does not borrow from Chomsky altogether. In La
Revolution she revives her concept 6f geno- and pheno-text, but now it has thoroughly
psychoanalytic underpinnings.
15 Barthes is one of the most popular and controversial French literary theorists. For further infor-
mation.see the bibliography by Freedman & Taylor (1983). Let me mention here only Leitch's
thorough presentation of Barthes in the context of intertextuality (Leitch 1983, 102-115) and
Ray's lucid mapping of Barthes's theoretical progress (Ray 1984). - Barthes expressed his admi-
ration for Kristeva, who once had been his pupil, most explicitly in his review of Semeiotike
(Barthes 1986).
42 H.-P. Mai
have to be overcome by embracing "a new field of reference" (Barthes 1981,35),
namely dialectical materialism and psychoanalysis :
For there to be a new science it is not enough, in effect, for the old science to become deeper and
wider (which is what happens when one passes from the linguistics of the senten ce to the semiot-
ics of the work); there has to be a meeting of different epistemes, indeed on es that normally know
nothing of each other (as is the case with Freudianism, Marxism, and structuralism), and this
meeting has to produce a new object (it is no Ion ger a question of a new approach to an old
object): in the event, it is this new object that we call text. (35)
The major drawback of tradition al scholarship, according to Barthes, is that its
epistemological concern has always been with "objective signification" (37). In
contrast, the new textual practice is marked by signifiance, a ceaseless semantic
productivity :
The text works what? Language. It deconstructs the language of communication, representation,
or expression [ ... ] and reconstructs another language [ ... ] having neither bottom nor surface
[ ... ] but the stereographic space of the combinative play, which is infinite once one has gone
outside the limits of current communication [ ... ] and of narrative or discursive ver-
isimilitude. (37)
This new object, 'text', is intertextual by default:
The text redistributes language [ ... J. One of the paths of this deconstruction-reconstruction is to
perrnute texts, scraps of texts that have existed or exist around and finally within the text being
considered: any text is an intertext; other texts are present in it, at varying levels, in more or less
recognisable forms: the texts of the previous and surrounding culture. (39)
Still, such a approach is not to be equated with mere subjective caprice.
Rather, it is to be conceived o,f as a paradoxical undertaking (45), "a critical
science [ ... ] which [permanfntly] calls into question its own discourse" (43);
"directly critical of any metalanguage" (35), textual analysis is interested in "a
dialectic, not [ ... ] classificatron" (36). This comes ab out, as Barthes notes else-
where, because "from the moment that a piece of research concerns the text [ ... ]
the research itself becomes text, production: to it, any 'result' is literally
im-pertinent" (Barthes 1977 b, 198). It is here that Barthes most clearly parts
with all structurally oriented and even with many hermeneutically inclined col-
leagues because he is claiming that, with regard to the 'text', artistic and critical
activity are indistinguishable: "Not only does the theory of the text extend to
infinity the freedoms of reading [ ... ], but it also insists strongly on the (produc-
tive) equivalence of writing and reading" (Barthes 1981,42). On the other hand,
Barthes does point out that his notion of a 'textual science' would not invalidate
tradition al approaches to literary phenomena; it would only put them into a new
perspective - and would preclude any facile self-aggrandizement: "This
methodological principle does not necessarily oblige us to reject the results of
the canonical sciences of the work (his tory , sociology, etc.), but it leads us to use
them partially, freely, and above all relatively" (43).
Yet on the down side of Barthes's notions of textuality there stilliurks a
dangerous solipsism. After all, textual
Bypassing Intertextuality 43
[p ]roductivity is triggered off [ ... ] either (in the case of the author) by ceaselessly producing
'word-plays', or (in the case of the reader) by inventing ludic meanings, even if the author of the
text had not foreseen them, and even if it was historically impossible for hirn to foresee them
[ .. .J. (37)
Consequently, every textualist would have to content hirns elf with inventing
highly eclectic semantic games, not together with, but parallel to his textual co-
practitioner( s) - which means that their communicative exchange would consist
in interminable charades never to terminate in any consensual agreement as to its
trans-subjective validity. Against this bleak vision intertextuality seems to re-
introduce the sociable aspect of (critical) communication: "Epistemologically,
the concept of intertext is what brings to the theory of the text the volume of
sociality" (39). Barthes upholds that
in relation to the formalist sciences (dassicallogic, semiology, aesthetics) [textual analysis] rein-
troduces into its field his tory, society (in the form of the intertext), and the subject (but it is a
doyen subject, ceaselessly displaced - and undone - by the presence-absence of his une on-
scious). (45)
This assertion of history, society, and the (split) subject seems to contradict
many notions held ab out the poststructuralist enterprise in general, and even
some of Barthes's own words in his very similar essay "From Work to Text" of
1971 (Barthes 1977 a). Here, the historical is being suspended, in the
end, in favour of an utopian egalitarian textual vision:
[B]efore History (supposing the latter does not opt for barbarism), the Text achieves, if not the
transparence of social relations, that at least of language relations: the Text is that space where no
language has a hold over any other, where languages circulate [ ... J. (164)16
But Barthes knows full weIl that this is only avision. As for 'textual' practice, he
does not preach a complacent ahistoricism, an irresponsible free-for-all play -
for reasons of political expediency, as he makes clear (Barthes 1977 b, 207 f.). Yet
politically his attitude is not an activist one (for a criticism of Barthes's 'aesthet-
icism' cf. Huyssen 1988,210-213). One should not overlook that Barthes, for all
his attacks on 'bourgeois culture', has always argued primarily as a literary cri-
tic.
17
16 An important difference in two widespread translations of Barthes's essay should be noted here.
Stephen Heath translates: "the Text participates in its own way in a social utopia" (Barthes
1977 a, 164). In Textual Strategies the line reads: "the Text participates in a social utopia of its
own" (Barthes 1979, 80). The latter example seems to stress the self-contained character of a
'textual domain', whereas the first translation points out the primarily social nature of the utopia
mentioned of which the text is only one aspect. Actually, Heath's rendering is much doser to the
original which reads: "[L Je Texte participe a sa maniere d'une utopie sociale" (Barthes 1971,232).
17 What makes Barthes's argumentative procedure (as to intertextuality amongst other things)
doubtful on a more strictly epistemologicallevel is his privileging language as a me ans of in-
terpretation of all signifying systems (Barthes 1981,42) which leads hirn (and others) to see the
whole world as just one vast text; Seung (1982, 126) has raised a pertinent methodological cri-
tique in this respect.
44 H.-P. Mai
One should beware of too easily dismissing Barthes's or Kristeva's notions of
intertextuality. Their somewhat eclectic theoretical underpinnings do invite
misinterpretation. Yet what is important to see historically is that these concepts
partake of a more general tendency towards a more reader-oriented criticism,
which has turned out to be the most stimulating innovation in literary scholar-
ship of the 1970s.
Subsequently the sociological, that is, the politically activist, aspects of inter-
textuality were shoved into the background. The busy applicators from the field
of literary studies took over. Kristeva herself abandoned her eclectically un-
stable theoretical building in favour of a foundation on what Lewis aptly calls "a
psychobiological model of the germination of semiosis" (Lewis 1974,30) in her
Revolution du langage pohique. In this book Kristeva also discards the term
'intertextuality' in favour of 'transposition' (Kristeva 1986 c, 111), a term which
she uses in a clearly psychoanalytical context. She explicitly criticizes those
scholars who take 'intertextuality' for a fashionable label for source-influence
studies. But this did not stop the process of appropriation.
5. Applied Intertextuality
There are critics with split affinities: they feel tempted by certain poststructural-
ist notions but cannot accept the unlimited creation of intertextual relationships
through the reader nor do they subscribe to a sociologically oriented historical
intertextual practice as exemplified by Kristeva's Le texte du roman because
they 'put the literary text first'. The tendency to interpret intertextuality in such
a more conservative, main1y ,intra-literary fashion seems to have been strongly
influenced by an 1976 article by L. Jenny. His mapping of the intertextual enter-
prise aims at a harmonious 'fusion of the irreconcilable diversity stressed by
theorists such as Kristeva. Jenny starts out with the assumption that intertextu-
ality is a precondition of any cultural semiotics, and he affirms that the "intertex-
tu al attitude is [ ... J a critical attitude" Oenny 1982, 37). But soon enough he
expresses the opinion that the "problem of intertextuality is to bind together
several texts in one without their destroying each other and without the intertext
[ ... J being torn apart as a structured whole" (45). (This statement contrasts
sharply with Kristeva's assertion that in the case of intertextuality "several ut-
terances, taken from other texts, intersect and neutralize one another" [Kristeva
1980 a, 36; my emphasis J.) Jenny' s main intc!-est is: "[HJow does a text assimilate
preexisting utterances?" (50). This assimilation is to take place, preferably, as
"[iJntertextual harmonization" (52). Jenny likes to think of intertextuality in
terms of an accumulation of artistic wealth: "Intertextuality speaks a language
whose vocabulary is the sum of all existing texts. [ ... J This confers on the inter-
text an exceptional richness and density" (45). To such an ontological notion the
earlier intertextualists, Kristeva and Barthes, were vehemently opposed. On the
other hand, Jenny's illusions of grandeur 'harmonize' with traditionally
Bypassing Intertextuality 45
cherished notions of the artistic textY Rejecting Kristeva's radicalized notion of
intertextuality (of whose consequences he is aware, as his discussion of Bur-
roughs shows) and the linguistically formalized version of M. Arrive (1973) as
weIl, Jenny favours "an approach that is at once more naive and more concrete,
which apprehends the text as the material object it is" (50) - the 'material art
object', that is, of traditionalliterary studies. Completely in line with these con-
servative inhibitions, J enny favours dear intertextual demarcations ("we pro-
pose to speak of intertextuality only when there can be found in a text elements
exhibiting a structure created previous to the text" [40]) and even suggests an
intertextual taxonomy based on rhetorical figures (54-58).19 He tries to ensure
the 'concreteness' of his approach by the extensive application of his notion of
intertextuality to exemplary texts.
In line with Jenny's proposals but further restricting the original Kristevian
idea, some German scholars have tried in recent years to make the concept of
intertextuality more operational (cf. the contributions to Broich/Pfister 1985 in
particular). The theoretical consequences are deplorable. One representative
case is M. Lindner (1985), who aims at a unified model of description in order to
point out the intertextual semantic enrichment possible through a rearrange-
ment of textual elements in an intertextual way (117-119). She draws the
methodologicalline by complaining that much poststructural reasoning lacks
"terminologische Sauberkeit und logische Stringenz [terminological tidiness
and logical stringency]" (199, note 5; my translation). Her own approach, on the
other hand, fails to consider its own status. The author is so bent on system
building that the self-reflexive character of any (critical) intertextual procedure
as demanded by Kristeva is simply ignored. (Once she does speak of the neces-
sary consideration of ideological implications [133J but it is highly likely that
these considerations are strongly related to the presumed authorial intentions
also mentioned.)
Perhaps the best way to assess a more conservative, applicable version of in-
tertextuality is by looking at the results it yields. In this regard the actual exam-
pIes of intertextual interpretative practice cast some doubt on the usefulness of a
restricted notion of intertextuality. Arecent article by W. Fger (1989) (who
explicitly refers to the Broich orientation as the one developed furthest [179,
note 2]) unwittingly makes these deficiencies dear. Fger presents an interesting
'intertextual' reading of Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, but except for his gen-
eral theoretical prelude on intertextuality (179-185), the author could have dis-
pensed with the term altogether.
20
At best, the concept of intertextuality in his
18 Jenny displays an affinity with traditional romantic notions of text as organic entity when he
worries metaphorically ab out "[i]ntertextual transplanting [which] creat[ es] survival problems
for the receiving organism" (50).
19 The cryptic explanation of 'intertextuality' und er the heading of "Rhetoric" by Dupriez (1986,
829 f.) can be regarded a result of such a suggestion.
20 An interesting, though no less disappointing, comparison is provided by Horan's article on the
same topic. His attempt "to add to an appreciation of the biographical and psychologie al dimen- r
46 H.-P. Mai
case serves to justify a scholarly proceeding via associations. But does inter-
pretative ingenuity evolve into a scholarly sound procedure by being backed by
a fashionable jargon? All in all, if this is intertextual scholarship then we have not
advanced very far since the times an artide could address the question: "George
Peele andA Farewell to Arms: A Thematic Tie?" (Mazzaro 1960).
Equally doubtful as to its 'intertextual' character, but for somewhat different
reasons, is arecent interpretation of Proust's Recherche by M. Riffaterre (1986),
who normally carries on the business of dose reading in the name of intertextu-
ality (cf. Morgan 1985,24-28).21 In this particular essay he offers a most interest-
ing psychoanalytically inspired account of some basic features of the novel. Yet
he takes pains to distinguish his approach from a psychoanalytical one that (ac-
cording to an outdated notion) supposedly has nothing better to do than point
out sexual symbols and the like. But why doak an interpretation which dearly
follows psychoanalytical insights with the label 'intertextual'?
What then is 'applied intertextual criticism'? Is the inter text just a means of
critical montage as in Hassan (1984)? Or does intertextual practice consist in an
exegesis of the arch-intertextualists, such as in Mortimer's (1989) extended an-
notations to Barthes's The Pleasure of the Text? Conde & Jacobi (1986) use the
label for computerized explorations of word fields. Arecent contribution to
studies in language acquisition employs the term 'intertextuality' to a
feature of children's narrative practices (Wolf & Hicks 1989).
This is not the place to discuss such divergent individual examples of 'applied
intertextuality' extensively. I leave it to anyone interested in practical aspects of
the idea to make his or her own sense. Yet one thing is obvious: 'practical inter-
textuality' appears to be an infiuitely pliable concept,especially when it comes
to incorporating it into own critical vocabulary. Thus, it is all too easily
divested of any heuristic value. And there's absolutely no legal redress! Faced
with the edecticism with which the term 'intertextuality' is currently applied,
one would have to agree with Bennett (1987), who views 'intertextuality' - even
in the Tel Quelian version - as expressive of a text fetishism (249 f.), in a Marxist
sense of the word, signalling nothing more than a "consumer revolution in liter-
ary theory" (249).
sions of [Orwell's] involvement in the writing of the novel" (1987,54) through recourse to an
Orwellian essay on school experiences is almost indistinguishable from tradition al biographical
criticism.
21 For further criticisms of the Riffaterrean version of intertextuality (Riffaterre 1978), cf. Fread-
man (1983); Frow (1986,151-155); de Man (1986). A 'practical' intertextual controversy can be
witnessed in the competing interpretations of Flaubert's Madame Bovary by Riffaterre (1981)
and Rothfield (1985).
Bypassing Intertextuality 47
6. The Critical Context (11)
Is it then useless to talk of 'intertextual scholarship'? Obviously, even conserva-
tive intertextualists agree with Kristeva's observation that in one artistic text
there coexist, more or less visibly, several other texts. This seems to be the mini-
mal consensus in intertextual studies. A scholarly concern proceeding from such
an assumption then would, first of all, have to identify and disentangle these
texts. This is wh at tradition al textual criticism in general and source-influence
studies in particular did and still do. Recent intertextual scholars with a tax-
onomic bent have tried to integrate this traditional preoccupation into a struc-
tural supermodel. Yet this, by itself, does not ensure any intellectual advances:
the results are still of an archiv al nature, the outcome of basically positivistic
endeavours. What Kristeva originally envisioned, though, was a new kind of
hermeneutics. But what in it was actually innovative, aside from the fancy jar-
gon?
Traditionalliterary studies are work-(and author-)oriented. They hold that
literary works are something fit to be respected, if not admired, something au-
thoritative. In their critical effort they aim to find, eventually, the one correct
meaning of a complex but unified message (the 'reliable text'). Even if they are
hermeneutically aware that this one message is never to be fixed because the
historical process of appropriation of meaning is never to be halted, they still do
not give up the attempt to approximate the 'actual' meaning. Traditional her-
meneutics as weIl as positivistic studies are persistent in their quest for positive
knowledge. They do not give in to wholesale relativity nor do they relegate the
production of literary meaning completely to the recipient. They hold that
meaning exists apart from meaning producers. Hence, literary scholarship's
basic function is to reaffirm a system of cherished aesthetic notions of long
standing (cf. Ruthven 1979,passim).
Those approaches to literat ure which modeled themselves, alternatively, on
the natural sciences were only a partial challenge to established literary studies.
The assumption that it is worthwhile to concern yourself with the analysis of
literature per se was not principally doubted. The aim of these literary 'scientists'
was to achieve as much systemic control over the literary text as other sciences
would like to attain over other phenomena of life.
Clearly, in the 1960s the traditional contemplative self-sufficiency of literary
studies had been undermined for various reasons. But the radical doubt that was
to shake the epistemic foundations of the academic establishment was intro-
duced only by minds bent on political activism. The deliberately political criti-
cism of Tel Quel denounced the social function of academic ('bourgeois') criti-
cism as complicit with a social system of real injustices. Traditional criticism's
tendency to accumulate 'precious' meaning was polemically equated with the
capitalist's hoarding of profits. Humanist culture was accused of cultural

r
I
48 H.-P. Mai
Yet what Tel Quel had in common with traditional academic criticism was the
high regard in which art was principally held. In this, the two groups' relation-
ship was analogous to a typical configuration of modernist and avantgarde art:
Where the modernists sought to affirm the relative autonomy of the 'cultural' sphere - asserting
its tradition al constitutive values (of creativity, imagination, individuality, autonomy, etc.)
against the values of the market-place - the avant-garde sought to undermine theideology of
aesthetic autonomy, to collapse the cultural back into the socio-economic, in order to translate
such values into social praxis. (Bennett 1987, 247)
Some Tel Quelians inflated the importance of the 'art text' even beyond
modernist notions of it, as it seemed to be not only a means to escape the alien-
ated existence enforced by existing social conditions but an agent of actual social
change. The 'transcendent', 'liberating', 'ennobling' function of art was not ac-
tually questioned but rather reaffirmed, despite all radicalist rhetoric. (The 'end
of art' was being proclaimed by different quarters [cf. e.g. Hohendahl 1980].)
Yet the poststructural critic/artist had to realize the revolutionary potential of
art in a way radically different from established procedures. To be subversive,
the new 'textual practice' first of all had to undermine the idea of a unified,
accumulative sense. It, therefore, had to point out, retrospectively, contradic-
tions and fissures within the seeming unity (and occasional harmony) of tradi-
tional art. Moreover, these critics advocated deli berate (post-)modernist disrup-
tions of meaning in contemporary and future art practice, the refusal to make
(fixed) sense. In the last resort a new semantic fluidity was favoured, which
abolished all differences between (privileged) semantic producers and (recep-
tive) consumers/critics.
These poststructural notions l;tave been called into question with good, but all
too often only antagonistically self-assertive, arguments (cf. e.g. Hempfer 1976).
Yet is 'textual practice' of the poststructuralistl deconstructive kind the only
consequence that can be elaborated from Kristeva's original concept of an alter-
native hermeneutics?
There are, after all, some scholars who acknowledge the poststructuralist per-
plexities without succumbing to mere deconstructive theorizing. In this regard,
J. L. Lemke (1983; 1985) is to be mentioned, an author who tries to elaborate an
intertextual analytical concept with the help of the linguistic approach suggested
by M. A. K. Halliday. T. Threadgold (1987; 1988) conducts his inquiries on a
similar plane. The problem with these attempts is that any thorough examiHa-
tion of a sufficiently complex text along their lines apparently makes for a critical
vocabulary and diagrams of increasing incomprehensibility (e.g. Lemke 1983;
Threadgold 1988). But these contributions still have to be assessed by other
professed intertextualists. There are also some literary scholars (W. Rewar
[1989]; W.R. Paulson [1988]; G.L. Stonum [1977; 1989]) who res ort to cy-
bernetic theory to reformulate the original Kristeyian concept of an alternative,
self-critical hermeneutics of an intertextual nature. This is not the place to dis-
cuss their contributions at length; suffice it to say their theoretical suggestions
may be able to provide aframework for intertextual studies of an advanced kind.
Bypassing Intertextuality 49
A means to alleviate some of the inevitable frustrations arising from contem-
porary critical intertextual practice (of the theoretical and the applied kind)
could be the new hypertext computer technology - if, that is, the theoretical and
methodological complexities of the subject matter under discussion are heeded.
This technology provides the means to store and interrelate all kinds of informa-
tion and interpretations and make them almost instantly accessible, thus enabl-
ing the creation of intertextual networks of a new kind.
22
7. Hypertext
'Hypertext' is a computer environment which, among other things, allows fast
non-sequential access to large amounts of loosely structured texts in electronic
form.
23
(Good first introductions are provided by Fiderio 1988 and Franklin
1989; for a very thorough presentation consult Conklin 1987.) Yankelovich et
al. (1988) describe it as follows: "In essence, a hypertext system allows authors
or groups of authors to link information together, create paths through a body
of related material, annotate existing texts, and create notes that direct readers to
either bibliographic data or the body of the referenced text" (81).
hypertext file can initially be conceived of as a textual database. Differing
from other database management systems, hypertext embeds links within the
original text to other physically unrelated texts. Thus, the computer user can
immediately jump from one text to another. For example, in its simplest form
such a file can be used to store the text of apoern. Once this is done, textual
variants, explanations of unusual words, annotations or references of any kind
can be attached to this textual item. These secondary texts are located in another
'area' of the hypertext structure but can be called up instantly. Secondary textual
segments can, in turn, be linked to other secondary textual segments, or com-
ments can be appended to them. A reference to a secondary source can be linked
to the original text (as long as it is available in electronic form, which will in-
creasingly be the case) or even the relevant segment of the referenced text. Of
course, informal queries for single expressions can also be conducted, which
allows for a serendipitous strategy of inquiry, very often appropriate to
humanities scholars in particular. In addition, some hypertext systems are not
restricted to verbal information only. They are able to store pictures, sounds,
even animations and also can control external devices such as video recorders,
CD players, etc. Their linking capacity can be extended to these kinds of infor-
mation and.information sources as well. (A practical hypertext application in
22 Some authors already expressly try to make use of the term 'intertextual' in conjunction with
literary studies (e.g. Corns 1986; Paulson 1989, 295).
23 Incidentally, this "hypertext" has nothing whatsoever to do with Genette's (1982) use of the
term.
50 H.-P. Mai
literary studies is described by Landow [1989].) Furthermore, a hypertext sys-
tem can wrk as a stand-alone solution but it also allows teamwork (Halasz
1988,848-850; Irish & Trigg 1989; Trigg & Suchman 1989) and basically even
encourages it.
Although there are still many conceptual perplexities (Halasz 1988; Raymond
& Tompa 1988; Byles 1988) and there will always be relative technical restric-
tions for individuals, the technical concept as such is generally acclaimed. And
even if grand visions of a world-wide scholarly on-line cooperation will not
come true overnight, the acceptance of such a relatively sophisticated and com-
mercially wide-spread hypertext system as Apple's HyperCard allows easy data
exchange for those who are interested in it. In any case, hypertext systems cer-
tainly could be a viable technical solution for those intertextualists interested in
pointing out interconnections in large archives of diverse o.f text (ve.rbal,
visual, and aural) as it allows the construction of comprehenslve mformatlOnal
networks.
Heim (1987) foresees that in such an environment
[e]ross referenees [ ... ] beeome identieal with textuality, not just proximate and mutually
flueneing texts but texts eoresident and in the same interaetive element and eapable of bemg
direetly juxtaposed or superimposed. [ ... ] The sense of a sequentialliterature of distinet, physi-
cally separate texts is supplanted by a eontinuous textuality. (162)
But Heim also worries about the consequences. His critique of such a com-
puterized 'intertextuality' (211-213) covers exactly those sensitive issues which
played an important role in the initial formulation of the intertextual
through Kristeva and in later poststructural approaches: truth/authonty/per- \
sonal vision/stability/composure vs. curiosity/mental excitement/unlimited
combinatory possibilities/a creative superabundance with schizoid undertones.
The computer can bring aboqt only an apparent resolution of these perplexities:
[In] the eleetrie element [ ... ] the logie of manipulative power reigns supreme.1t beeomes possible
to treat the entire verbal life of the human raee as one eontinuous, anonymous eode without
essential referenee to human presenee behind it, wh ich neither feels it must answer to anyone nor
necessarily awaits an answer from anyone. (213; myemphasis)
Whether this state of electronic affairs resembles something like "Nietzsche' s
description of nihilism as astate of indetermination wherein everything is per-
mitted - and as a result nothing is chosen deeply, authentically, and existen-
tially" (211) is debatable. But it is certainly a pertinent observation that in this
new 'intertextual' medium "text [ e.g. literature] is increasingly experienced as
data" (213), i.e. as "only one unvalorized variant" of text (Kristeva 1986 a, 87) -
which will again evoke the well-known (and not completely unfounded) uneasi-
ness of more traditionalliterary scholars.
On the other hand, as Bolter (1989) points out, "the autonomy of the elec-
tronic text is only apparent. Behind the chan ging words and structure lies a
program, and behind the program a human programmer" (139) - not to mention
the hardware owner. The most important question from a Kristevian point of
Bypassing Intertextuality 51
view is again a political one: who provides, under which conditions, which kind
of access to whom. Current database management is conspicuously concerned
with questions as to wh ich 'privileges' are accorded to which users. Only an
accomplished hacker would be 'intertextually free' (in a Barthesian sense) to
follow up any kind of textual connection - but, at the same time, subject to legal
restrictions wh ich try to secure the private property of information. So it will
not happen automatically that "an electronic text deconstructs itself - with no
help from the theorists" (Bolter 1989, 138). The reader as critically constructive
agency will not become Yet hypertext technology's non-linear
character helps to counter any kind of dogmatism. And the electronic texture
may provide us indeed with a flexibility we have never had before because
[t ]he author may try to dominate us eompletely by employing every typographie (and linguistie)
deviee to show what is important in his text: we as readers are not in any ease obliged to believe
hirn. Organization is interpretation, and we may deeide that his ideas lend themselves to another
organization altogether. (Bolter 1989,137)
And reorganization can be accomplished relatively easily. Eventually, it will all
depend on whether "the pro gram allows the reader to make changes in the text
or to add his own connections (as some hypertext systems do)" (142).
Finally, one should remember that suggestions - by a pro gram designer - as to
which path( s) to follow can doubtlessly be very helpful. Guidance through the
intertextual computer network may be even indispensible in a situation, such as
the present one, which is marked by a veritable flood of information. Here it will
again become necessary for the user to distinguish between helpful hints and
manipulation. In this regard, too, a critical attitude will not become obsolete.
And this also ultimately means that without/outside the mind there is no inter-
text relevant to uso
8. Summary
In the foregoing discussion it was argued that two contradictory definitions of
intertextuality are prevalent and at war with each other. A poststructural ap-
proach uses the concept as aspringboard for associative speculations ab out
semiotic and cultural matters in general. On the other hand, traditionalliterary
studies have seized upon the term to integrate their investigative interests in
structures and interrelations of literary texts under a comprehensive, and fash-
ionably sounding, catch-all term. These divergent interpretative interests cannot
be reconciled theoretically. At its least presumptuous, the word 'intertextuality'
merely indicates that one text refers to or is present in another one. Such a
linguistic short cut is convenient but tends to become predominantly ornamen-
tal- and hence is not particularly conducive to a better understanding.
Yet with all the various forms of appropriation of the term, one important
initial (Kristevian) insight must not be frgotten: that literature is (also) medi- r
52 H.-P. Mai
ated through extra-literary discourses - which constitute the actual challenge for
intertextual studies of a distinct kind. Any merely intra-literary, intra-linguistic
taxonomie attempt will serve mainly archival purposes , and even these in a
slightly antiquated fashion.
If one desires a contemporary practical elaboration of the concept one should
perhaps devote one's attention to hypertext computer systems. But most 'prac-
tical' literary scholars may not be content to do this because it presupposes a
willingness to part, to an extent, with the traditional fetish 'literature' and to
subsume literary texts, at least for a time, under the much less intriguing heading
of information.
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! i
HANS-GEORGE RUPRECHT
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality
aMaxPaul
1. Interlocking Analogies
One would be hard put, irrespective of a doute cartesien about assertory cogniz-
ing in general, to find a more appropriate image of current research in/on INTER-
TEXTUALITY
1
than the rankly growing and vertiginiously climbing ivy vi ne (see
the bibliographies by Bruce 1983 and in Broich & Pfister 1985, 349-359).
Correspondingly, it might be hypothesized that the rhizophagous growth
(deep structure?) and the rhizomorphous branching (surface structure?) of the
INTERTEXT present the appearance of a living organism. Thus, one could say, and
no matter whether the question is or was - how to construct/deconstruct, logi-
cally, the pragmatic, syntactic and semantic (in/trans )ference of 'meanings' from
TEXTS to TEXTS: 'Node on node', then, cast in the 'primal' FORM OF TEXTUALITY.
And why not, following Goethe in "Die Metamorphose der Pflanze"? (For a
discussion of Goethe's ideas 9n "Geprgte Form, die lebend sich entwickelt" as
in "Urworte, orphisch" (1817/1820) in respect to present-day life systems re-
search and the genetic code, s'ee Blumenberg 1981, 372-409; Amrine 1987). As if
the INTERTEXT were in astate of dynamic nonequilibrium, - evergreening (cf.
Babloyantz 1986, foreword by 1. Prigogine). Like the flourishing ivy vine,
whose leaves eventually dry up the closer they are to the ground while its life
sustaining foliage contributes, regardless of the seasonal changes in the environ-
ment, to the formation of new offshoots, a LITERARY INTERTEXT in particular
displays, be it continuously, at intervals or cyclically here and there, many a
fresh 'leaflet' together with the yellowing pages of some ancient, so-called 'clas-
sic text'.
Inevitably, a captious critic of these analogies will question the observer's
uncertain perception of the phenomenon. At present, it might suffice to con-
sider Sartre's (1940, 31, 98 ff.) observations according to which the object of an
1 It is advisable to read the notions printed in sm all caps with the critical awareness of their prob-
lematic belonging to the domain of knowledge, which is under scrutiny; that is to say, there is an
INTERTEXTUALITY, and INTERTEXT, etc. if and only if their variables can be quantified in terms of
predicate logic. As far as their occurrence in hypothetical statements is concerned, it should be
understood that they are not necessarily subjected to logical bivalence.
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 61
analogy, and by the same token the above representation of the INTERTEXT, is
absent in the innermost recesses of its very presence. Like an idee fixe, the salient
and intriguing feature of spreading 'intertextual connections' is their overrun-
ning 'everywhereness' in the open heterotopia of the absent. Images of ambi-
guity, vistas on methods of disambiguation, perspectives on ...
... grapes with no seed but sea-foam,
Ivy in scupper-hole. (Pound, Cantos H, 1. 60-61).
Stretching the biological analogy a little further one could say, tongue in cheek
because the hedera is sacred to Bacchus (and hence to Dionysus the patron of
ritual ecstasy, drama and the carnelevarium), that the meta-intertextual dis-
course tends to be 'flowerly' intertwined with the conceptual circumlocutions
for its very loquacity. Its semantic ambiguities (propositional, categorial, struc-
tural; cf. Hirst 1987) in relation to the intertextual process per se connect with
the focus on the 'edges' and the 'borderline' phenomena (affinities, resemblan-
ces, contrasts, shades of difference, etc.) of the meaning productive process.
This can be illustrated in terms of an emblematic motto taken from Ovid' s
Metamorphoses (lib. VI, v. 127). It stands by reference to Arachne's weaving
skills to intertextual practice in general: ,
(a) ultima pars telae, tenui circumdata limbo,
nexilibus flores hederis habet intertextos.
If it is the case that this image tells us something about the artistry of Arachne's
mounting the intertextum, itwould appear, then, that one could consider Ovid's
comment on Minerva's guile as the epitome of an "intertextual frame" (Eco
1979,21). In fact, he is overcoding her false colors, i.e., 'peaceful' warnings to
Arachne, her challenger in the art of intertextual design. Let us look at Ovid's
(Met., lib. VI, v. 101) framing description:
(b) circuit extremas oleis pacalibus oras,
is modus est operisque sua facit arbore finem.
The first point to note is that both strings of poetic discourse are concisely
referring to the borderline phenomena of closure: (a) "ultima pars telae"; (b)
"extremas oras". Furthermore, they are comparable in respect to their sugges-
tive (intradiscursive) passing reference to the forms of expression and of content.
While these forms shape the web by tradition ("antiquas telas" being implied
[ibid., v. 145] and 'intertextually' by tracing ancient subject matter 'downwards'
to the present - "et vetus in tela deducitur argumentum" [ibid., v. 69; my em-
phasis J), the expression-form and the content-form do in fact determine the
transtextual meaning effects as well as the mythemic semiosis of the woven,
poetically transcoded textures. But notice the difference between (a) and (b) as
to Ovid's coreferential focus. On the subject of Minerva's craft it is cataphoric
insofar as the 'peaceful olive-wreath' prefigures inversely the mortal punish-
ment to be' inflicted on her challenger. Pragmatically speaking, it is of course an
interpretative, missive coreferentialization of an emblematic cliche. It functions
i,
62 H.-G. Ruprecht
in regard to the reader- and/or listener-oriented narrative as a prolepsis. N ow, as
far as Arachne's work is concerned, Ovid's coreferential focus on the JNTERTEXT
is strictly anaphoric, that is an implicit representation of her "intertexturai"
(- "of or belonging to texture" ([OEDJ) skills. Both are figurae functionally (in
the sense of L. Hjelmslev's semiotics) related to each other. And yet, it might
be argued, in (a) Ovid hints at the 'nature' and in (b) at the 'significance' of
JNTERTEXTUALlTY.
If this is the case, it seems then that more light ought to be shed on the recon-
struction of JNTERTEXTUALITY in view of its manifest and latent mo des of exist-
ence.
2. Contingencies in Perspective
Everybody knows that the structuralist cognizance of the so-called literary text
- What was/is 'literariness' in relation to 'textness'? - and, subsequently, the
neo- and poststructuralist critiques of this approach have produced a multipli-
city of conceptual clusters. It is also well known that some of them have been
intrinsically connected and/or cogently contrasted with the NaTION of intertex-
tualite a. Kristeva). (Cf. Angenot 1983; Genette 1982; Grivel1982; Jacques
1987; Labarriere 1987; Plett 1985, 1986; Riffaterre 1985 and earlier; Ruprecht
1983, 1986; Somville 1987; Segre 1988; further references in Bruce 1983; Broich
& Pfister 1985.) While some literary critics still have the tendency to cast these
conceptual clusters to the winds like sapless grapelets which might pollute the
hortus conclusus of esthetics, o t h ~ r s keep them stored up in the higher, theory-
laden galleries of the "Biblioteca de Babel" where the sustaining framework of
reference might eventually crumble into dust.
In view, for instance, of the tomprehensive sense T. Eagleton (1983, 138) gives
to the 'intertextual' by virtue of what he believes to be the mind-set and the
theoretical discourse of the "post-structuralists", many a well-read theoretician
of literature will most likely be concerned about this confinement. To shed more
light on this background, further discussions are required: epistemological con-
ditions for differentiated propositional attitudes concerning the FJELDS of inter-
textuality. This is because of the diversified material, the socio- and ideotechni-
cal unfolding of, for example, the 'cinematic', the 'ethnographie', the 'literary',
the 'musical' and the 'pictorial' fields of the JNTERTEXT (see references in Morgan
1985), including the field of 'theatre semiotics' (de Toro 1987; 1988). And what
about another stumbling block to a model-theoretic discourse on 'intertextual-
ity today', namely the academic interest, the 'Why?' of an intertextual research
activity in relation to the professional belief system, be it that of an 'open' or a
'closed' mind (cf. Rokeach 1960)?
Even though "intertextual knowledge" (Eco 1979, 21) has been construed,
convincingly and/or conjecturally - <;a depend! -, it raises nonetheless a funda-
mental epistemological question. How does one account for the fact that some
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 63
TEXTURES whichappear to be "doxastically identical need not to be epistemicallY
identical" (Foley 1987,283 and elsewhere)? A.J. Greimas (1987, 165-179) has
argued that the semiotic analysis of the epistemic act suggests a modallinkage
between "the fiduciary and the logical" dimensions of cognition. Hence his con-
clusion: "Believing and knowing thus are part of the same cognitive universe"
(179). (For further discussions on 'knowledge and belief', cf. Parret 1983.) As
one might expect, investigating this 'universe' entails demanding research on
'cognitive semanties' and 'mental representations' alike (cf. J. Barwise, G.
Fauconnier, R. Jackendorff, G. Lakoff, etc.; in Eco 1988). Although new
ground has been broken in this area of research, it still remains an open question
to what extent this has a direct bearing on the problems (decidable? semidecid-
able? undecidable?) of isotopic (Greimas) intertextual networking (cf. Ruprecht
1977).
From these points of view it seems then that Morgan's (1985, 35) convictions
will be greeted with skepticism; in particular what she has put forth, nomotheti-
cally, almost in terms of a First Philosophy: "Essential [sie] to humanists and
sciehtists alike, the notion of intertextuality is the necessary [ sie] interdiscipli-
nary dimension of a semiotic of knowledge." It is fairly obvious, logically speak-
ing, that the 'necessary' is possibly at variance with the 'contingent'. Also, fol-
lowing the main semiotic traditions (e.g., Saussuro-Hjelmslevean, Peircean),
there are no custodians of consolidated 'knowledge' in the spheres of semiosis,
and the tendency is rather to question the alleged self-evidence of an 'interdisci-
plinary dimension'. In any event, the potentialities of meta-disciplinary vari-
ables remain unaccountable to many a savant as long as they are put in terms of a
notional discourse. In order to comprehend and to convey the 'notion of inter-
textuality' one is probably well advised to do away with the phantom of its a
priori transdisciplinary truth value (infallible vs. fallible).
In addition, it should be emphasized that a context-sensitive approach to the
process of intertextual semiosis steers clear of an idealistic adaequatio rei cum
intellectu and the essentialities of the "metaphysical jungle" (W V. O. Quine).
Moreover, this approach must in fact awaken to the sense of its proper discursiv-
ity: that is to say, to the question of the not-so-obvious analytic and descriptive
relevance of the researcher' s idiosyncratic, ever so often interdiscursively con-
strued conceptualisms. What are the categorial instruments shared for instance
by the humanistic and the social scientific inquiry into the relevancy of hy-
pothesized TEXTURES ? In its most general and cross-disciplinary acceptation this
term refers to "the distinctive textures of the various sciences, and suggests [sic]
that separate textur es exist even within each established discipline" (Fiske &
Shweder 1986, 365).
Quite clearly then, both "theory and practice of intertextuality" (Morgan
1985, 9) posit the problem of a discursively contained and containing heuristic
potentiality. At all events, there lies a transient cause for methodological contin-
geneies. However, this holds only to a certain degree. As far as literary "intertex-
tualists" (Plett 1986, 293) are concerned, this potentia of discourse is of course
"
I
r7,'
~ I
64 H.-G. Ruprecht
historically and socioculturally "anchored", as T. J. Reiss (1988, 134) puts it
while discussing this potentia in relation to the 'principle of uncertainty'
(Heisenberg, etc. revisited via Peirce and Deleuze). Given these tenets, one may
wonder how the anchorage of this discourse potential occurs on the shifting
sands of historical processes. What does this mean in respect to the multiply
connected 'polysystem' (I. Even-Zohar) of literature? For a fact, H. F. Plett
(1986,311) gives an interesting example which should be further scrutinized: the
problem of quotation in normative poetics.
In the course of literary history, the potential normative conflict between quotation and con-
text has given rise to specific literary forms. These have only been possible since the time when
conventions became obsolete and could therefore be called in question. Parody and travesty are
such forms of literature which invert the norm of generic conventions. Parody transposes "base"
topics, persons, actions, places and times into "high" style, whereas travesty transposes "high"
topics, persons, pi aces and times into a "low" style.
In terms of this example, which H. F., Plett rightly sets up against the back-
ground of the classic decorumlindecorum conventions (for a discussion of other
approaches to parody see Dion & Laforest 1987), it is perfectly clear to what
extent the explicatory potential of the critic's own discourse hinges upon the
historical anchorage of the subject matter. As students of literature would have
to notice, this example can only be understood 'intertextually', that is with the
full awareness of some presupposed and of course well-known connexions. To
mention only two:
(a) between the conception of 'parody as inversion' and Scaliger's Poetics
(1561), which stipulated: "Est igitur parodia rhapsodia inversa mutatis vo-
cibus ad ridicula sensum retr;ahens" (Genette 1982,21; cf. also his 'transfor-
mational' concept of parody, ibid. 33 ff.);
(b) between the genre-specific hierarchy of styles and the classic rota Virgilii (cf.
Curtius 1954,602) whichhas been kept running, so to speak, throughout the
Renaissance and beyond, other generic conventions (vernacular, medieval,
etc.) notwithstanding.
Moreover, what the focus on a "potential normative conflict" (H. F. Plett) im-
plicitly highlights is the process of the 'bestowal of sense' (Husserl's Sinn-
gebung) through knowledge. This might include a scholarly re-examination of
the problems of normative poetics in conjunction with the differences/resem-
blances between, say, Puttenham's (1589), Gracian's (1647), Lamy's (1699) and
Gottsched's (1751) rhetorical poetic treatises. At the same time the works of
Jonson and Philips, of Furetiere and Scarron, of Bodmer and Blumauer might
recapture the scholar's attention. To test this hypothesis of implicature, itwill be
useful to be reminded hereinafter of Paul Scarron's Virgile travesti en vers bur-
lesques (1648-1652). (Which is of course one of G. Genette's [1982J privileged
examples.)
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 65
2.1. Portentous Potentials
If literary knowledge presupposes intertextual cognition, does this then enhance
the complexity of the so-called semantic encyclopedia?
Interestingly enough, U. Eco (1988) has reframed his idea of a 'semantic en-
cyclopedia' (lgloball vs. /locall; /rough/ vs. /specific/) in a brilliant sci-fi conte
philosophique "On Truth". Whereas semioticians, of the Paris school in particu-
lar, have taken exception to his controversial notion of the encyclopedia, pre-
cisely on ac count of the "discours veridictoire" (A. J. Greimas) and its epistemic
modalization, Eco, in advance of the next if not of several generations of high-
powered computers fore teils how the encylopedic CSP (=" Charles Sanders Per-
sonal, Antiopodean Computer") will actually process "the world of the text".
But what kind of world is this, the textual one? Even though it is definitely a
'possible world', perhaps showing consistencies within the inconsistent,
isotopic order coming of chaos and noise (in H. Atlan's sense), it will, like the
INTERTEXT, have to be captured by in-I de- and abduction.
To collect further thoughts on these contingencies a different line of argu-
ment, equally pre-theoretic, might offer a guiding hand. In order to see its impli-
cations, it would help if we reconsider briefly the so-called burlesque, parodic
and travesting discourse in 17th-century France (cf. Genette 1988, 20- 88 and
elsewhere). Concerning, for instance, a research program on and into the inter-
textuality of Scarron's Virgile travesti, one must take into account a 'double
bind'. Apart from tenuous historical evidence, this bind is mostly for epistemic
reasons, spatially shifting and variable in the progress of time. The contention is
however that this relations hip - let us call it provisionally the 'topological au-
thor-critic interdigitation' - has a discursive manifestation. Topologically
speaking (cf. R. Thom; J. Petitot-Cocorda; E. C. Zeeman, etc.), this would in-
volve, following W. Wild gen (1982, 27 ff.), the bifurcations of "goal-oriented"
correlative praxis. The latter is to be understood as a process which lends itself to
a presentation in the form of graphs. They may be read as a vectorized doing of
two "possessors" who are handling a textual affair. Of course, in a more
specialized context of discussion the graph formulae would be subject to a
mathematical (geometric-topological) interpretation. In principle this interac-
tive 'praxis' pertains on the one hand to an irreversible and on the other to a
reversible process of meaning production. Functional rather than ideational,
these modes of signification unfold in terms of semantic catastrophes: in respect
to the author through the "processes of possession (taking, having, giving)" , and
correspondingly as regards the critic through the "(processes) of dominance and
control (capture, release)" (Wild gen 1982, 29). Thus author and critic, their
asymmetric cultural self-awareness notwithstanding, like Scarron and both his
contemporary and his present-day critic, are de facto agents partaking in, the
morphogenesis of INTERTEXTUALITY.
Yet, this -does not completely account for the catastrophic semantic features of
a potentially subversive, inversive or reversive conflict concerning the inter tex-
l.
66 H.-G. Ruprecht
tuality of "quotation and context" (Plett 1986, 311), for instance, in the VIth
Book of Scarron's Virgile travesti (1858, 210). To substantiate the model-
theoretic interest of the context, it will suffice to mention that in this book
Scarron recontextualized Aeneas' underworld experience. At the entrance of the
Orcus (Vergil, Aeneid, lib. VI, v. 273-281) the hero is not only faced with per-
sonified sufferings (Grief, avenging Anxiety, Diseases, Hunger) and other mis-
eries, but also with the Furies. Moreover, he comes upon the "insane Discord
with snakes as her hair confined by bloody woolen bands" (Vergil, Aen., VI, 280
[1977, 10; 120]: "et Discordia demens uipereum crinem uittis innexa cruentis").
Very roughly, one could say that this thematic figuritivization of Aeneas' under-
world experience illustrates what 17th-century normative esthetics implied by a
'fitting figure' of 'high' and/or 'sublime style', and, as it was clear to everyone,
Vergil could serve as a model. Bernard Lamy (1699), the influential though not
always respected rhetorician, res ta ted this as follows:
Son Enei'd est dans le caractere sublime, il n'y parle que de sieges, que de guerres, que de Princes,
que de Heros. Tout y est magnifique, les sentiments, & les paroles: La grandeur des expressions
repond a la grandeur du sujet. (271)
What accounts for Scarron's success as a burlesque writer is of course the fact
that the subject matter of his Virgile travesti disprportionally endows the fields
of the heroie with the discursive potential of the 'mean style'. As a 'reasonably'
judicious writer - in terms of Bernard Lamy (1699, 245 ff.) it matters indeed
"d' en juger raisonnablement comme le doit faire un honnete hornrne" - Scarron
then discreetly connects the thematic role of 'viper = dis cord' with a whole set of
contemporary actorial manifestations. Since their sociological significance is not
at stake here (cf. Koritz 1977, 65 ff.), it will do to touch upon the following
mediation:
Force pedans et gouverneurs,
Aussi grands fats que grands parleurs;
Des tyrans et de mauvais princes,
Un gros d'intendans de provinces,
Suivis de larrons fuseliers,
Meles de quelques maUltiers;
De creanciers une brigade,
Et de presentateurs d'estocade;
Enfin tous les maux qu'ici-bas
On craint autant que les trepas. (222)
Within the limits of the topological perspective sketched earlier, it could be
argued with some force that, in this very context, Scarron' s transcoding averse
from Vergil constitutes a figuritivised quality change. Notice also the narrator's
ironie implicature through the process of topicalization:
Et la Discorde, dont les crins,
Qui lui vont jusque sur les reins,
Sont des couleuvres venimeuses
A considerer tres-affreuses. (ibid.)
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 67
It could be shown mathematically, following R. Thom (cf. Wild gen 1982,42 ff.),
that this change in semantic quality unfolds in respect to its correlates as the
standard cusp. Given the polarity of a "stable attractor", that is to say the norm
of a self-regulatory 'bien-seance', Scarron's potentially conflictive intertextual
practice corresponds to a semio-pragmatic catastrophe; and, of course, this links
to the semantics of 'decency' and 'good taste'. Precisely, as is the case of B.
Lamy's (1699, 255) definition of esthetic judgment, that is "le discernement de
tout ce qui se doit dire & de ce qui se doit taire" , there is then a modalized
potential, a deontic modalization of instability. But where is the INTERTEXT as an
object of reconstruction?
Since this is not the place to displaya network of intertextual relations, only
two points will be made to shed some light upon the topological nature of the
bifurcating path from author to critic. Clearly, to break more ground in this area
of research where, for instance, Scarron and L. S. Koritz (1977) appear to be the
"possessors" of INTERTEXTUALITY, the following dynamic non-equilibrium
should come into focus.
First, at a necessary point ab quo the focus is contingent on a multistable
tradition, that is on post-Homeric epic and on early Latin poetic conventions.
This classical tradition comprises also the ancient 'Aeneiskritik' (H. Georgii; cf.
Austin in Vergi11977, 39, 42 and elsewhere). Yet what appears to be stable is
only relatively so insofar as it relates to a point of bifurcation, which is in fact a
moment of disturbance: Scarron and the burlesque, travesting tradition in
France (cf. Bar 1960). It is widely known that the latter trend did mock the
Aeneid (e.g., de Mountech 1648, Furetiere 1649, Barciet 1650, de Bergoing 1652,
Duprat 1666, etc.; cf. Genette 1982,65, who is following V. Fournel's preface in
Scarron, op. cit.) more than any other work of the ancient 'magni auctores'.
Second, at a possible point ad quem, the focus on INTERTEXTUALITY is an
unthinkable covariance of unlimited semiosis. With regard to this process, it is not
surprising that L. S. Koritz (1977, 185), for example, brings hirns elf to believe in
the following connexion. U pon the 'discovery', in Scarron' s Roman comique
(1651), chapter VII (Scarron 1955, 194), of a different recontextualization of the
Discord personification, Koritz implicitly asserts hirns elf as the "possessor" of
intertextual knowledge. Whatever its foundation, or its epistemic (in)validity,
this knowledge resultsfrom a reversible textual practice. In point of fact:
Mais la Discorde, aux crins de couleuvres, n'avait pas encore fait dans cette mais on-la tout ce
qu' elle avait envie d'y faire. (194)
Given this occurrence in the Roman comique, the critic (duly by an
academic institution and with the placet of established expert scholars) resolves
this debatable issue into three components: (1) an allusion to Vergil; (2) a bor-
rowing ("emprunt") from Malherbe's ode "A la Reine mere du Roi" (1610),
stanza 10; and (3) Doctor Koritz's main thesis, Scarron's satiric spirit, i.e., "c'est
clairement se moquer des batailles epiques des romans a la mode" (Koritz 1977,
185).
68 H.-G. Ruprecht
Clearly, from a topological standpoint the issue is not whether one should
support or rule out these possibilities. In any case, the question suggests itself:
How should one go about an issue like this? Could it be that a more empirical
search into "the world of the text" (Eco, 1988, 56), induding inquiry into the
intention-based semantics (cf. Schiffer 1982) of 'Textweltbeschreibung' (as in
DorfmIler-Karpusa 1981, 140ff.), would result, if anything, in a decidable
truth-value of any such multiconnected components? Moreover, would this re-
search have to be conducted while setting aside the numerous arguments about
the (in-)compatibility of intention-based semantics with truth-conditional
semantics? Obviously, the execution of this research plan concerning the INTER-
TEXT would meet with many difficult problems. WeIl, what of it?
What is primarily at stake here, once again it might be argued, concerns the
prospect of a search to be focused on the catastrophe theoretic implications of
the critic's intertextual reading. How many of the alleged transtextual connec-
are fac.t d.ue to a topological author(Scarron)-critic(Koritz) interdigita-
uon? By Idenufymg Scarron's "emprunt" (notice the semantic features of 'em-
prunter' = deriv. from Lat. 'im-pro-mutare', i.e., Itime-bound/+/action/+/re-
vs. giving/+/appropriation/) the critic does in effect identify
hIrns elf as a co-possessor of the INTERTEXT. In this respect he partakes, unfolds
in terms of a semantic catastrophe (capture/release), in "sudden and remarkable
displacements in space-time" (Wildgen 1982, 28). Theoretically put, following
R. Thom, one could say that the INTERTEXTUALITY under discussion lends itself
on the one han.d (Scarron: :Vergil) to a qualitative and on the other (Koritz
: :Scarron: :Vergll: :Malherbe, etc.) to a localistic interpretation. The contention
is of course that both "interpretations", as weIl as their branching topological
are subject to a more ri?orous, mathematical and geometrical, rep-
resentatlon. Knowledge and/or bellef?
3. I nstances of Differentiation
The foregoing is not meant to be a panacea for the heuristic problems which arise
from the entropic, historically grounded potentialities of INTERTEXTUALITY. On
the contrary, it is an attempt to place the genuine instability of any transtextual
configuration in the foreground of analysis. If the general proposition holds that
the catastrophe theoretic modelization of textual processes (cf. Merrell 1985;
helps to un.derstand the dynamic unfolding of a literary system
mdudmg ItS rnorphogenetlc potentialities, then the following propositional
functors should be considered as weIl: Where? frorn wh at ? when? why? how?
for what purpose and to what point, etc. does the INTERTEXT manifest this kind
of dy.namics? U nderlying these questions are, of course, the researcher' s per-
spectlves on the 'textuallandscape' that is part of his/her own cultural environ-
ment. and put though it may be, however, this brings up
further questlOns concermng a whole set of interrelated problems: cultural

The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 69 .
boundaries; macro- and microstructural hierarchies; ideological and
hegemonies; etc. (cf. Ruprecht 1977, 1981, 1983, 1985, The mter-
connectedness of these issues could easl1y be demonstrated m respect to a
privileged field of intertextual Mozarabic (Hispano-Arabic,
Hebraic) lyrical poetry (zagal, 11th and centunes m
point of its relationship to th.e canomcal wntmgs of the Sana
Mulk (1155-1211), (b) as to ItS formal connectedness wlth the medleval (Gah-
cian-Portuguese) cantigas de amigo of the late 12th and the 13th or
turies and (c) as regards its debatable impact upon the themes and dlscurslve
of the troubadours lyric, 1100 -13 50 ) (cf. Heger 1960;
Axhausen 1974). f
Wh at the preceding implies in point of fact is that the 0
ALITY appears of no or little heuristic avail, if one searches mto the
com lexit of such fields of migrating forms of an.
d

whaf abo-!t the evolving problems of mono- vs. mululmguahsm, of
and language-change? On doser inspection one would have sort out
to conceptualize as rigorously as possible the homomorphlc mappmgs of
all unstable writing systems upon each other. 'Writing' should be. seen t e
o!e hand as the graphematics of transmission, and, Speakl?g,
reference to the above example, this means the of plctograp lC,
10 0 ra hic syllabic and alphabetic 'scriptures'. should be
other hand as 'scribal practice', that is, .the habttus of
copying transcribing, inscribing, editing, etc., or parually m :eepm
g
with the' patterns of cultural productivity. (For a dlSCUSSlO
n
of Mozara lC prac-
tice, see Heger 1960.) . d l' ('h
Thus, if G. Genette's (1982) assumptionof er ymg .
tually'), and/or superseding ('hypertextually') hIS were
to be further sustained, the inherent problems of ecnture - Y a var-
iant of the 'writable' and the 'readable' 1953), and theoreucally at var-
iance with "the graphics of differance" (Dernda 1983, 41) - would haIe .to be
reconsidered. Quite frankly, the enquiry needs to be not y m re-
spect of the rather narrow structuralist vs. poststructurahst perspectlVes, but
even more so in view of its cross-cultural relevance. f f
For the present purpose it should suffice to a more 0
'scriptural' and 'transtextual' complexity: the networking of
soft literary magazines such as SWIFT CURRENT edtted by Davey m
Canada. These thought-provoking developments make one. dublOUS t.he
decidability of the time factor and its variables as they pertam to
of the litterae humaniores. What can one reliably assert . ux 0 ec-
tronically coded figures (eticl emic) of an producUvlty m the flelds
of culture today? (What should one single ?ut at thlS very U 22
J
1989]
which is marked, symbolically speaking, by two events. the
" h / d'H ' ""Enlgme It-
of Salvador Dali whose paintings, e.g., Apot eose.. 0rr;ere, " .'
ler", "Apotheose du dollar" , etc., illustrate a speclftcally modern plctonal m-
70 H.-G. Ruprecht
tertext; and, at the same time, the send-off given to the first simultaneous televi-
sion performance of the World Philharmonie Orchestra uniting, visuaIly via
satellite, musicians from Montn!al and choirs in Moscow, Geneva and San Fran-
cisco. In a general way, perhaps, this performance of the finale of Beethoven's
9th Symphony is a 'postmodern' happening, where the medium is the message
(M. McLuhan) - "Seid umschlungen, Millionen!".)
Considering the transduction of heterogeneous object semiotics, one may
wonder how the transtextual perfusion (Genette) could be fuIly understood
without further thoughts on the syntacticaIly ordered categories of temporality.
Is there a syntax which accounts for the 'continuous' - ('concomitant' /'iso-
chronical') - 'discontinuous' as weIl as for the 'anterior' - ('omnitemporality' /
'atemporality') - 'posterior'? In short, while it seems reasonable for many a
historian of literature to believe in a chronological sequencing of the transtextual
process, it is probably as ratiocinative to suggest the following: The many-to-
many relationship between the spreading and the spread INTERTEXTUALITY
strikes the 'attractors' (individual, coIlective, institutional, etc.) as an instanci-
ated catastrophe of one-to-one relations that are seemingly in astate of interdis-
cursive Fliegleichgewicht (L. von Bertalanffy). What is to be discovered, how-
ever, is the instanciating pregnance of the many-to-one and the one-to-many
intertextual relations. This instability includes, it may be hypothesized, the re-
searcher's corroborative and time delaying capture of the INTERTEXT through aIl
the possible bifurcations of its spatio-temporal unfolding.
4. The Logic of Reconstruction: A Tautology?
I
Ever since the NOTIONS of "intertexte" and "intertextualite" were first formu-
lated by J. Kristeva (1969) -"to say nothing of her epexegetical comments on
M. M. Bakhtin's discursive polyphony (cf. Todorov 1981; Segre 1988) - the "In-
tertextualittsdebatte" (Schmeling 1988) has propagated numerous conceptual
frameworks and models. Like any procedure of humanistic inquiry, they could
be questioned as to their functions within the context of systemic thinking. But
this is not the place to foIlow in a model-theoretic attempt towards a critique of
current 'modelizing', be it exploratory or explanatory, descriptive or prescrip-
tive (constructive), reductive or integrative. In aIl events, from R. Barthes' (1984,
73) arguments on "l'intertextuel dans lequel est pris tout texte" to G. Genette's
(1982, 492) "structuralisme ouvert", from M. Riffaterre's (1978) triadic semio-
logical model to C. Grivel's (1982) thought-provoking thirty-one "Theses pre-
paratoires [sie] sur les [ sie] intertextes" (for additional references see Bruce 1983;
Broich & Pfister 1985), there is one major concern. It may be argued that this
concern is equaIly shared, different methodologies notwithstanding, by 'inter-
textualists' and natural scientists (H. R. Maturana, F. G. Varela, A. M. Andrew,
etc.): namely, as M. Zeleny (1981,155) puts it, "that autopoiesis and allopoiesis
are complementary characterizations" not only of a living system but also of a
The Reconstruction of Imertextuality 71
literary system. This complementarity consolidates and widens a non-reductive.
focus on both the biosphere and the anthroposphere. Within the latter, and in
particular as to the cultural activity of an intertextual productivity (in contrast to
what J. Kristeva thought), this means the mutual complementing of self-produc-
ing and in other ways produced meaning effects. In order to understand this
complementarity one has to take in an implied 'principle of uncertainty', and, on
our side, a metasystemic tautology. It should be kept in mind that both lay bare a
problematical, discipline related uncertainty concerning the propositional con-
tents (textual 'objects', 'methods' and 'theories') of literary studies. Intuitionally
speaking (in Kant's sense), there is some evidence to believe that we are, as
humanists, acquainted with p = textology (theory), q = text (object(s and r =
textual criticism (method(s; and this is, quite obviously, the case within a
metasystemic scope "[ ]" of description. The description can be analyzed, logi-
cally following W. Marciszewski (1981, 111,337), in terms of an associativity of
conjunction. Hence, this bracketed tautological formalism where the symbol
"&" stands for the conjunction and "( )" for a systemic and/or dynamic rela-
tional structure:
[p & (q & r) == (p & q) & r]
In the concrete setting of a given research situation this tautology would mean
that we seem to know how to cope, for instance, with the demands of (i) the
textological reconstruction of European affinita culturale throughout the Re-
naissance, (ii) the textual identification of Petrarchism, and (iii) the transtextual
approach to a variant such as the religious Petrarchan discourse of Friedrich
Spee (1591-1635) and Angelus Silesius (1624-1677) in Germany. This research
situation, which is defined by the degree of involvement and by the limits of
competence of any scholar, constitutes on its own ground (INTERTEXTUALITY) a
specific "system-apparatus-observer complex" (Bunge 1967, 51). In any event,
this line of thought would go along with recent perspectives on "scientific real-
ism" in literary studies (cf. Livingston 1988, 80-11 0).
Regardless of whether a literary system can be construed, systemically, on the
analogy of a living system (see Bunge 1967, 68, cautioning ab out the "double-
edged" tool of analogical reasoning in science), one is now inclined, I should
suggest, to see the epistemic relevance of the 'new alliance' (Prigogine & Sten-
gers 1979) to the problems (MEDIUM and PROCESS) of INTERTEXTUALIZATION. In
fact, this correlativism of "Process + Medium, in systemic terms" presupposes,
following M. A. K. Halliday (1988, 144-145) with reference to the 'new al-
liance', "a metastable, multi-level ('metaredundant') system - that is, a human
semiotic".
Semiotically speaking, broadly, but not only ... in terms of the Paris school
(cf. Greimas & Courtes 1982), the MEDIUM (material, lingual, etc., purport) and
the PROCESS (generative trajectory of discourse ) which enhance the evolving
complexity of any INTERTEXTUALIZATION (CAUSINGstate / DOINGaction =
'to intertextualize') do in fact involve two distributional programs. Both are
72 H.-G. Ruprecht
meaning productive, albeit with obvious redundancies (information/entropy).
These pro grams can be summarized as follows:
- Transitive + causative, i.e., the desemantization/resemantization of at least
one intertextualformant (PATIENT) by the addresserladdressee (AGENT);
- Intransitive + mutative, i.e., the display of semantic investments proper to
more than one intertextual functive (PATIENT), virtually subjected to a cog-
nitive, descriptive and interpretive ACT.
(For a discussion and the definition of Hjelmselv's concepts formant and func-
tive in respect to intertextuality, see Ruprecht 1981; 1986. As to the 'lexicase'
grammatical terms [C.}. Fillmore; M. A. K. HallidayJ, see Starosta 1988).
It may now be suggested that the driving force behind these disorderly inter-
twined programs is, among other 'drives' (Nietzsche, Freud, Sartre), the forcel
weakness of MEMORY. Dissolutely engaged in the seizure and in the pleasure (R.
Barthes) of texts, the mnemonical, be it natural or artificial, is in fact a universal
principle of textual organization (cf. Grivel 1978; Ruprecht 1989).
who is acquainted with the occidental tradition of the metaphora memorzae (cf.
Weinrich 1976,291-294), that is, the 'wax tablet' (Plato), the 'store-room' (Samt
Augustine), etc., will not be misled by our suggestion. Mythical, poetic and
transcendental ideas have no place here. This applies as weIl to Yeats's "sudden
conviction that our little memories are but apart of some great Memory that
renews the world and men's thoughts age after age" (1961, 79). (For references
and a discussion of 'poetic memory', see Ruprecht 1975.) What should be
brought into focus, however, is the neurosemiotic hypothe.sis
1985): the ways in which the causal consistencies and the mutatwnal mconststen-
cies of the PRO GRAMS of INTERTEXTUALIZATION associate (functionally? inter-
derivably? inversely?) with the short-term/long-term systematic tensions of
MEMORY. 'Chance and necessity' (cf. Monod 1970), that is, the "hasard capte,
conserve, reproduit par la machinerie de l'invariance et ainsi converti en ordre,
regle, necessite" (Monod 1988, 44) - what does this mean in relation to INTER-
TEXTUAL ASSOCIATIVE MEMORY? Does this relate to the possibility of construct-
ing an 'artificial' model powerful enough to locate the intertextual formants and
functives, for instance, of European Petrarchism (poets, critics and experts) by
'content' rather than 'addresses'?
If one were to pursue this problematic, it would seem appropriate (cf.
Prigogine & Lefever 1975; Zeleny 1981) to reexamine the
of INTERTEXTUALITY in conjunction with the multistable and dlSSlpatlVe conflg-
urations of 'the literary', that is, really, "in memorie and alyve" (Chaucer). Be-
sides, this might eventually contribute to the debunking of what is still being
considered, in certain quarters here and there, as 'the issue': structuralism vs.
poststructuralism. Since new paradigms, cognitive and others, are currently be-
ing developed in the fields of literary studies, the (post)structuralist issue doesn't
have to be unduly pondered; but it may be worthwhile to make short work of
some of its implications, thereby putting new emphasis on the diastructural
The Reconstruction of Intertextuality 73
trajectory of mental processes, including the mnemonical spreading activation
(cf. Anderson 1983). As far as INTERTEXTUALIZATION is concerned, this would
imply the conceiving of a dynamic network whose "driving force" (Prigogine &
Lefever 1975, 51) is indeed the self-regulatory, equifinal many-to-one process of
MEMORY/OBLIVION (the latter not necessarily in Lacan's sense). In the light of
what has been suggested, the following schematization (figure adapted from
Prigogine & Lefever) is certainly not indicative of a research protocol but of a
research proposal.
Figure
TEXTS in a dynamic state of non-equilibrium
MEMORY /OBLIVION of textual formants
emlC
autopoiesis + referential dissipation
. b'l' {macro} d' I
[
msta Ilty + new . la-textua structures
mlcro
allopoiesis + increasing dissipation: "intertexts"
INTERTEXTS/TEXTS (negentropies)
= vectors ofINTERTEXTUALIZATIONJ
A final remark, which is for obvious reasons inconclusive: From the preceding
propositions one might get the impression that this program of enquiry will
result, all in all, in a referential tautology. WeIl, it could also be said - precisely!
Giving due regard to what M. Eigen (1975) has stated at the outset of his influen-
tial article on "Evolutionary Games", let us take in, henceforwards [interdiscur-
sively J the basic rule of reconstruction as he puts it: "The origin of life [intertex-
tuality J is tautologous with the origin of biological [textologicalJ information."
Therefore, ours the task, may be eternal.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Professor Walter D. Mignolo (University of Michigan),
and my colleagues at Carleton U niversity, in particular Arnd Bohm, Georges R.
Carmody, Pierre Laurette and Barry Rutland for stimulating discussions, which
were, implicity, related to the subject matter of this article. For helpful sugges-
tions concerning the improvement of its first version, I am indebted to my col-
league A. T..Tolley.
74 H.-G. Ruprecht
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GARY A. PHILLIPS
Sign/Text/Differance
The Contribution of Intertextual Theory to Biblical Criticism
1. The Present Context
Theory is not pursued for its own sake, but only
in the passion to remain dose to and hard pressed
by what is as such [ ... J. Theory was to be und er-
stood (by the Greeks) as itself the highest realiza-
tion of genuine practice.
Martin Heidegger
In the field of biblical studies today, a critical understanding of intertextuality
provides a strategic means for explaining the nature and function of texts and the
critical task. In spite of its established importance in related disciplines, the use-
fulness of intertextuality as a conceptual category (cf. e.g. Barthes 1981;
LaCapra 1983,25-63) for illumipating various exegetical phenomena, such as
textual citation, allusion, allegorical interpretation, typology, rhetorical and dis-
course structures, narrative st;ucture, reader-response strategies, canonical and
extra-canonical formation, and the like, has not been exploited by biblical ex-
egetes in particular or, for that matter, by religionists in generaU The discipli-
nary preoccupation with matters related to the signifying processes and function
of textual commentary and interpretation that overspread and unite the various
subfields of religious studies ought to be sufficient motivation to account for
intertextual phenomena in a systematic and structured way. However, except
for the work of a small number of exegetes and theologians, there is a conspicu-
ous absence of a sustained theoretical reflection upon such matters as intertextu-
1 The prevailing approach to these intertextual matters is to treat them as discrete and essentially
unrelated phenomena, and further to explain them in theological terms. For example, the Pauline
appropriation of Hebrew Scriptures in the Letters to the Galatians and Romans is read with a
view toward explaining a Christian theological purpose rather than as an instance of Rabbinic-
style intertextual practice, And in the Gospels, the theological indination to read the narratives as
realistic story obscures the complex intertextual weaving of these texts. Ironically, the impetus to
read the biblical texts in nontheological ways has come from outside the field.
Sign / Text / Differance 79
ality and its practical importance for explaining the complexities and thickness
of biblical texts.
2
The penchant in general for avoiding theoretical reflection, to be leary of, even
at times to denigrate, its practice,3 is pervasive and, some have argued, constitu-
tive of mainstream, modern exegetico-theological discourse and its dominant
positivist ideology.
4
At professional meetings, theoretical discussions ab out
modern exegetical foundations and practices typically elicit impatient, even hos-
tile, responses; they are viewed as detracting from the biblical exegete's primary
effort, namely to describe the text and to interpret its meaning, which means to
read and interpret texts using historical and philologically based methods. Sim-
ply put, theory obscures, delays, frustrates the effort to disclose the truth of the
text because it does not remain with a certain type of historical question.
5
This
reluctance to place textual and intertextual concerns within a comprehensive
theoretical framework means that for the most part exegetes are shut out of
important debates taking place over textual issues in semiotic, narratological and
deconstructive circles, conversations that have a direct bearing upon the ex-
egete's critical task. To be knowledgeable today about the conte nt of the classi-
cal and koine Greek corpus, the historical context and purposes these texts
served, and the hermeneutical traditions which have been developed for inter-
preting them, means more than having a philological-style competence; it de-
mands a certain theoretical sophistication, a thinking systemically, a modeling
structurally. If exegetes are to take seriously the call to explain and interpret the
text in the present context after the structural turn,
6
they can not ignore the
theoreticallinkages to textual and intertextual study forged with the thought of
Saussure, Peirce, Barthes, Derrida, Foucault, De Man, Kristeva and BaI, to name
a few. Situating the problem of intertextuality on a theoretical footing has thus
become a practical necessity.
The general reluctance to engage theory as a means for explaining textual and
intertextual phenomena is deeply rooted in disciplinary and ideological con-
straints which frame the understanding of the modern text-critical problematic,
namely, that o[ overcoming the text's otherness as an object and recouping its
2 In the North American scene the two venues for biblical exegetes dedicated to broad-based
theoretical and interdisciplinary work have been: the Semiotics and Exegesis Section of the Soci-
ety of Biblical Literature, and the defunct Westar Institute's Literary Facets Seminar.
3 This posture is summed up in the remarkably typical statement of one exegete: "Wer nichts von
der Sache wei, der spricht von Methode." (Ringgren 1966, 641)
4 A form of this critique is articulated by cells of biblical scholars who are energetically engaged in
conversation about ideology, either from the politico-economic side or from the literary theoret-
ical side (cf. e.g. Sejf van Tilborg 1986, xii ff.; Phillips 1988,2-7).
5 This in spite of the etymological significance of theorein as "to see as, to visualize, to gain a
perspective. "
6 This is J ean-Marie Benoist's (1975) designation for the epistemic environment in the aftermath of
the structural revolution in linguistics, anthropology, literary studies, etc., across both the hu-
man and social sciences.
80 G. A. Phillips
distanciated meaning. This modern problematic has led to a basic division of
labor in the field between descriptive (methodologieal) and interpretive (her-
meneutical) interests.
7
The great German and British historico-critical traditions
affiliated with Tbingen and Cambridge have led the way in establishing the
methodological agenda for the better part of two centuries: identification of
documentary evidence, archeological sourees, rhetorical forms, stages of com-
positional development, oral precursors, Sitze im Leben of original authorship
and readership, and the like. American exegesis, by contrast, has developed a
pragmatic and effective marriage of dose textual reading with certain forms of
twentieth century formalist literary and rhetorical criticism indigenous to the
North American interpretive scene: the preoccupation with metaphor and para-
ble, contemporary rhetoric structuring and, most recently, reader-response
mo des of criticism, and more.
8
On both sides of the Atlantic, dominant his-
torico-critical methodologies and their associated interpretive strategies have
combined to shape the present disciplinary discourse and the modern exegetical
understanding of the nature of the text, its relationship to context, the function
of criticism, and so forth.
Biblical scholarship, and certain forms of theology, of both European and
American vintage, confront the modern problematic of the text within a concep-
tu al framework characterized fundamentally by a positivist, formalist orienta-
tion.
9
This is especially obvious when we look at the major methodological
change that occurred in the exegetical field in the decade of the 70's with the
emergence of structural methods of analysis.
lo
While on the surface structuralist
biblical exegesis augured a turn in direction away from the traditional under-
standing of the critical practice ,as defined in diachronie terms and explicitly
towards a structural and synchronie linguistic modeling of the text, in reality its
effect was to amplify the prevailing formalist orientation of textual analysis and
interpretation.
ll
There was, in'effect, no paradigm shift, to use Kuhn's terminol-
ogy. The modern paradigm, i.e. the conditions for the possibility of thinking
7 In view here is the traditional, operative distinction - owing to Dilthey - between description and
explanation, which is fundamental to the modern conception of the human sciences (cf. Paul
Ricoeur 1971,135-145).
8 Associated most directly with American N ew Criticism as made known through Northrop Frye
1973. Cf. in particular the special edition of Semeia 31 (1985), "Reader Response Approaches to
Biblical and Secular Texts."
9 The use of "paradigm" in this context is owing to Thomas Kuhn 1981, chap. 1. Cf. Hans Frei's
important historical description of the transformation of paradigms which brought biblical scho-
larship into its "modern" historical form, eclipsing its classical antecedents (Frei 1974,2-19).
10 "Structural" here would include linguistic, psychoanalytic, discursive and more. For the classic
statement of biblical structural exegesis cf. Daniel Patte 1974 (chap. 1), 1975 for a representative
sampie of structural exegesis.
11 Cf. my fuller assessments of the transformation of contemporary biblical scholarship from
"modern" to "postmodern" forms in Phillips 1985, 111-119 especially and Phillips (forthcoming
1992). Cf., too, the special edition of Semeia 51: "Poststructural Criticism and the Bible: Text/
History/Discourse," in particular Phillips 1990; also important is Burnett 1988.
Sign / Text / Differance 81
critically about text and its relations hip to context and reader in diachronie,
formalist terms, remained weIl ensconced and continues today both to frame the
critical problematic for exegetes and to dictate the means for answering its ques-
tions.
However, critical rumblings can be heard on the horizon that portend change
in the way scholars of religious texts conceive of the critical task at hand and
therefore of the practical steps to be taken in analyzing and explaining textual
phenomena. In the terminology of M. Foucault a different discursive practice is
appearing, marginal although it may be at the present time (Foucault 1972). This
indicates a transformation of the field's discursive rules, which, over aperiod of
time, wiIllikely force a reframing of the textual problematic on a discipline-wide
basis. Feminist, psychoanalytic, politico-ideological, deconstructive, poststruc-
tural and postmodernist theorists have shouldered their way into the tradition al
sites of biblical and theological analysis bringing with them different critical
agendas and interests. Notwithstanding their very great methodological diver-
sity, all insist upon the need for theoretical reflection and the refusal to separate
theory from praxis.
In this regard, deconstructive thought presents a major challenge in particular
to modern biblical exegetical habits (Burnett, 1990). Modern biblical exegesis is
grounded in an analytical philosophie al tradition whose tendency is to leave
unexamined presumptions about its instrumental conception of language. Der-
rida's ontological critique of what he refers to as the logocentric foundational-
ism of modern Western thought makes deconstructive critique both a serious
theoretical and praxical threat to the prevailing notions of meaning, intent, text,
interpretation and structure, and beyond that to the modern historical prob-
lematic of recovering some lost, originary meaning. From the feminist side, the
critique of patriarchy, power and ideology directed to the institutional practice
and production of textual scholarship and normative theological interpretation
contributes equally to an undermining of a set of presumptive ideas and be-
haviors about the nature of the theological task: theology can no Ion ger get by
appealing to the cultural-historical necessity of the god-givenness of its male-
dominated thinking and action. 12
lt is in this context of shifting, agonistic frameworks that the nature of the
critical problematic for biblical criticism today is being rethought and for which
the discussion of intertextual theory becomes exceedingly important. Oc-
casioned in large measure by attention to sign, structure, and language, which
was the historie contribution of structural linguistics,13 semiotic and decon-
structive theorists are especially helpful in framing the intertextual question in
pertinent and provocative ways for the biblical scholar. Semiotic and decon-
12 For an example of a critic who brings an important feminist and postmodern critique to tradi-
tional exegetical and theological concerns cf. Mieke Bai 1987, 1988 and 1991.
13 Cf. J acqU(!s Derrida's critique of the structuralist moment in Derrida 1977 and Derrida 1972 on
the impact of the structural moment in relation to the Western metaphysical tradition.
82 G. A. Phillips
structive perspectives on intertextuality offer the biblical exegete an alternative
conception of the text and understanding of critical practice in two respects:
first, by providing a semiotic model of the text as sign, which can account for the
process and trajectory by which text relates to text, text to context, text to reader;
and second by providing a perspective upon the epistemic and ontological status
of historical modes of thinking as such, which forces open the question of the
grounding of critical questions, analytic methods, interpretive frameworks and
the search for determinative meanings altogether.
The theoretical effort, therefore, has the salutary effect of situating the biblical
critic in a wholly different dynamic relationship to text and to the critical task.
No longer satisfied with the givenness of the modern question, the critic be-
comes acutely self-conscious of the constraining character of each and every
critical reading and of the presuppositions which inform his/her questioning in
the first place. Far from being a diversion from critical thinking, either ab out the
sacred texts or the longstanding traditions of interpretation, the theoretical ef-
fort to think the intertextual question along semiotic and deconstructive lines
becomes itself a praxical act with important consequences for invigorating both
text and criticism. It does so by drawing attention to the way modern
methodological and foundational concerns have been framed and how they
drive the modern effort to master the text and determine its meaning.
This essay, therefore, is a theoretical gesture intended to contribute to the
practical need for structured, systemic reflection upon intertextual phenomena
in biblical texts. The aim is to frame the intertextual question in structural terms
using semiotic and deconstructive resources: first, by using C. S. Peirce's semi-
otic model to propose an operatiye definition of intertextuality as an indefatig-
able process of semiosis, and thus a means for modeling the relationship of text
to text, text to context, text to reader in a way that does not resort to reductive
psychological, behaviorist or historicist explanations; and second by using Der-
rida's notion of differance as a strategy for thinking the question of the founda-
tional relationship between text and text, text and context, text and reader as one
of difference and differentiation, and thereby to look at what grounds the mod-
ern biblical critical distinction between description and interpretation in the first
place. For purposes of illustration, we will briefly refer to an interesting dis-
course/parable/narrative text identified as the Good Samaritan pericopae 10-
cated in the Gospel of Luke (10 :25 -37). By framing a reading of Luke in semiotic
and deconstructive terms, we can illustrate the way a sustained reflection upon
intertextuality not only opens up this particular biblical text to a different read-
ing but also demonstrates the importance of contemporary theoretical reflection
for disclosing the underpinnings of modern exegetical praxis.
Sign I Text I Differance 83
2. Semiosis, Interpretant, and the Intertextual Trajectory
[ ... ] the word or sign which man uses is man him-
self [ ... ] the fact that every thought is a sign, taken
in conjunction with the fact that life is a train of
thought, proves that man is a sign.
14
C. S. Peirce 1931-1958, 5.314
The first observation to make is that the intertextual phenomenon can be framed
as a fundamentally semiotic process: sign in relation to sign.
15
Following C. S.
Peirce's triadic and categorical model of the sign,16 we can say that the sign
structure is made up of three elements: sign/ground (more or less equivalent to
Saussure's "signifier"), object and interpretant (equivalent to Saussure's "sig-
nified"). For Peirce, each and every sign can become an element within or for
another sign by virtue of the functional relationship of the elements of the sign to
one another: sign/ground, object and interpretant or a complex combination of
these elements in one sign can become sign or a triadic part in its own right, each
in turn with its sign/ground, object and interpretant; and each of these elements
may become a further sign with its own triadic elements, and so forth, ad in-
finitum.
17
So, for example, the sign/ ground - object relationship in one sign can
function as the object to a second sign, which transforms the first interpretant
into a new demanding its interpretant, and so forth. We can repre-
sent the basic semiotic process as follows:
Sign
l
}
= ==? /Interpretant
1
/Sign
2
--- \ /
Object
1
\ / etc.
\ /
V
Interpretanf/Sign
3
Fig.1
What determines the linkage qfone sign to another is "habit". The habit that
grounds the relation of sign to sign is not to be construed solely in behaviorist
14 Henceforth all references will be by volume and paragraph number.
15 Portions of this argument are drawn from and are more amply detailed in Phillips 1986.
16 According to Peirce: "A Sign or Representament is a First which stands in a genuine triadic
relation to a Second, called its Object, as to be capable of determining a Third, called its Interpret-
ant, to assure the same triadic relation to its Object which it stands itself to the same Object"
(2.2274).
17 Since the sign is "anything which is related to a Second thing, its Object, in respect to a Quality,
in such a way as to bring a Third thing, its Interpretant, into relation to the same object, and that
in such a way as to bring a Fourth into relation to that object in the same form, ad infinitum"
(2.292), the sign is ever situated in a continuous, unfolding process by which sign is bound up
with sign in view of some rule or habit. Cf. I van Almeida 1976; Phillips 1982.
84
G. A. Phillips
terms but includes any rule, regulation, practice or pre-established law of con-
tinuity that enables the effective translation of one sign into another. As Peirce
notes, "[ ... ] a sign is not a sign unless it translates itself into another sign in
which it is more fully developed" (5.594). Indeed, translatability, as the linguist
Jakobson has argued, is "the main structural principle of language", and the
interpretant is what insures that "any sign is translatable into another sign in
which it is more fully developed." Gakobson 1971 b, 566).
Viewed thus as a continuous, synthetic process, semiosis is that activity in
which the interpretant effectively establishes a relationship between existing and
future signs in light of an already existing ground or principle of unity. The
interpretant is the principle of unity in semiosis that ins ures its continuity and
translatability into another sign (cf. 4.127; 5.284). However, just as the inter-
pretant may not be reducible to crude behaviorist categories, neither can the
interpretant as a law of continuity be reduced psychologically to mental associa-
tions or aspects of consciousness. Rather, as an operative element of semiosis the
interpretant is constitutive of consciousness in the double sense of "of": as source
of consciousness, and as content of consciousness.
18
The interpretant as sign
functions as the source of unity, not the human being or his/her consciousness
who employs the sign. And while human beings do indeed "employ the sign",
the ground for that signification precedes his/her thinking and acting. The hu-
man is subject because she/he is subjected to this semiotic process, i.e. the inter-
pretant as ground, and is not the originator of meaning. As subject to these
interpretants, human being is himself/herself a sign (5.314).
Peirce' s concept of interpretant thus provides a helpful way of explaining
intertextuality, in part, as that continuing process of semiosis by which texts
function as interpretants to other "texts", thereby establishing in the process
new text/signs which will form their own text/object/interpretant relationships,
and so forth. We may represen,t this process as follows:
Text'
}
- - :: -,. I Interpretant'/Text'
\-- -- /
--------\ /
Object' \ / ... etc.
\ /
\,/
In terpretan f ITexe
Fig.2
Text-understood-as-sign translates into another text/sign in view of some
ground by which the new text/sign provides a more developed meaning. The
'8 "Consciousness does not constitute the semiotic process. Consciousness is not a synthesizer but
apart of a more comprehensive system." (Liszka 1981, 55)
1
Sign / Text / Differance 85
semiotic trajectory leading from textto text to text operates with rules of forma-
tion. Although in principle no interpretant be forecast necessar-
ily in advance, in fact habit delimits the The law of
bility that will propel text to text is a certam habit - we may speak of It a
discursive or intertextual trajectory, even in one sense as a "text" -whose semIO-
tic power de facto rules in and out possibilities.. .
So, to illustrate, tradition al blbhcal cntlclsm has argued that of
Jesus' parables of the Kingdom God as a textual tradltlOn wlthm.the
Gospel narratives was not an or arbltrary but occurred m a
deliberate fashion that signals the partlcular theologlcal mterests textual
signature of each Evangelist/writer. semiotic
governed the possibility of incorporatmg t.he texts m the fIrst
place preceded any one particular Evangeltst/wnter s mterpretl.ve
in the case Luke's inclusion of the parable of the Good Samantan m the mldst
of a disputational discourse betweenJesus and the Pharisees, along with an em-
bedded reference to the love command cited from Deuteronomy 6, the ground
for the intertextual relationship of Deuteronomic text to parable to
ing Gospel narrative rests in the sign habit which is the source of umty. and
significance, namely a certain intertextual trajectory. I? other w?rds, nelther
J esus' Good Samaritan parable nor Luke' s Gospel as lS the. ground
of authority for the former's inclusion m Luke s narratIve. The
constitution of Luke's narrative as a slgn lS of. an
established habit/praxislsign, an intertextual traJectory WhlCh, m Pelrce s Vlew,
is the ground upon which the interpretant can be
Peirce's semiotic logic serves equally weIl to descnbe the of the reader
in relationship to the intertextual of the :narkers of the
discursive subject or enunciation are mamfested lmgulsttcally m .text (cf.
Benveniste 1970, 12; Jakobson 1971 a). We may identif! them as of a
particular semiotic practice or habit - evide?ce. o?ce of a or rule of
translatability - in wh ich the markers of w?uld tem-
porality, spatiality, and modality functIOn as grar:-mattcal
for a given semiotic system (Greimas and C?urtes 19.82, s.:.
The enunciative subject is manifested as the slgn of a pOSltlOn I?
through the material production and of Slgns of
then not only signal the already constltuted dlscurslve of the .subJect wlthm
a semiotic system (sign of a sign), but they also pla! a partlcularly .lmportant role
in the unfolding of the semiotic system along its mtertextual
ciative markers function as so-called "pragmatic" signs (Morns 1964) by
the reader as recipient of and enunciatee to a text text and ItS
enunciative signs into new signs/interpretants. ThlS translatIOn takes place
through the production of new texts and readers. c.ould .say that real readers
in their discursive contexts can become pragmattc of
enunciative indices ("you," "now," "here," etc.) gestured by th.e text s
tion, and thereby continue through the very process of readmg the semIOtlc
r
86 G. A. Phillips
trajectory in which both text and reader are mutually implicated as signs. From
this point of view enunciation functions to constitute the reader as a pragmatic
sign - man as sign according to Peirce - a sign in relation to a textual strategy, a
semiotic system, an intertextual trajectory.
3. Gospellntertextuality: Parable, Citation, Narrative, Reader as Interpretants
Turning to J esus' parable of the Good Samaritan, we can briefly illustrate the
phenomenon of text and reader as interpretant in a particular intertextual pro-
cess. We will not discuss the parable per se (cf. Patte 1974; Crossan 1974); rather,
we will concentrate on the intertextual relations hip of the parabolic text (vv.
30-35), which stands in relationship to the citation of the Deuteronomic love
command, Dt. 6:5, (v. 27) as well as to the controversy dialogue betweenJesus
and a lawyer (vv. 25-38). The Lukan text in translation is as followS
19
:
And behold, a lawyer stood up to put hirn to the test, saying, "Teacher, what shall I do to inherit
eternallife?" He said to hirn, "What is written in the law? How do you read?" And he answered,
"You shalliove the Lord your God with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all
your mind; and your neighbor as yourself." And he said to hirn, "You have answered right; do
this, and you will live. "
But he, desiring to justify hirns elf, said to J esus, "And who is rny neighbor?" J esus replied, "A
man was going down frornJerusalern to Jericho, and he fell arnong robbers, who stripped hirn and
beat hirn, and departed, leaving hirn half dead. N ow by chance a priest was going down that road;
and when he saw hirn he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he carne to the
pi ace and saw hirn, passed by on the other side. But a Sarnaritan, as he journeyed, carne to where
he was; and when he saw hirn, he had cornpassion, and went to hirn and bound up his wounds,
pouring on oil and wine; then he set hirn on his own beast and brought hirn to an inn, and took
care of hirn. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave thern to the innkeeper, saying
'Take care of hirn; and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I corne back.' Which of
these three, do you think, proved neighbor to the man who fell arnong the robbers?" He said,
"The onewho showedmercy on hirn." AndJesus said to hirn, "Go and do likewise."
In the narrative, J esus is challenged by the lawyer to explain the pragmatic
meaning of eternallife (v. 25). Jesus responds to the question with a counter-
question that leads the lawyer to answer his own question by citing Dt. 6 :5,
"You shalliove the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul,
and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself" (v. 27). The lawyer's
answer is followed immediately by J esus' parenetic imperative, "Do this and
you will live" (v. 28 b). In a second movement, the lawyer asks a further ques-
tion, namely to define what "neighbor" means again in pragmatic terms (v. 29).
Jesus responds with the well-known parable of the Good Samaritan (vv. 30-35),
followed by a counter-question put to the lawyer, "who proves to be neighbor
in the story?" (v. 36). The lawyer answers his own question again by saying, "the
one who showed mercy" (v. 37 a). The narrative ends with Jesus' parenetic ad-
19 In the English translation I rnake use of the Revised Standard Version to supplement rny own
translation.
Sign / Text / Differance 87
vice, "Go and do likewise" (v. 37 b). From a tradition al rhetorical viewpoint, the
narrative manifests a clear antiphonal, chiastic structure which contrasts the
Deuteronomic law withJesus' parable:
Lawyer questions
J esus counter-questions I
Lawyer responds
Jesus responds (imperative)
Lawyer questions
J esus counter-questions I
responds
Lawyer responds
J esus responds (imperative)
Fig.3
(knowledge of law)
(knowledge of law)
(knowledge of Dt. 6:5)
(praxis of law)
(knowledge of neighbor)
(knowledge of neighbor)
(knowledge of parable)
(praxis of neighbor)
The two halves of the narrative, however, relate in a much more dynamic fashion
when viewed in Peircian semiotic terms and when the intertextual process is put
into motion. From an intertextual perspective, we can describe the relationship
of the Deuteronomic love command to Jesus' parable to Luke's narration as a
series of interrelated sign/interpretants.
praxis of
law
(Sign
1
)
--.
1
(InterpretantI ISign
2
)
Objecf , --)! I "Do this and you will live"
J (Dt. 6:5--love God/love neighbor)
(Interpretant'/Sign')
life \ / __ \ Gospel narrative of J esus
__ -- -- as Servant of all
(Interpretant
2
/Sign
3
)
"Go and do likewise"
(Samaritan parable)
Fig.4
In the first question, the lawyer asks for a definition (Interpretant
1
) of the
"praxis" (Sign
1
) that signifies "eternallife" (Object
1
). Jesus leads the lawyer to
answer his own question by citing Dt. 6:5 to which J esus adds the interpretive
injunction, "Do this and you will live" (i.e., love God/love the neighbor). "Lov-
r
I
I.
88 G. A. Philps
ing" is the meaning of the praxis that leads to eternallife. The second question
does not simply repeat the previous question but further interprets or translates
the already given interpretant/text. "Doing the law" now becomes aSign2 which
has as its I nterpretant
2
the Samaritan parable and the injunction to do as the
Samaritan did. J esus' parabolic text thus functions as a new interpretant of the
law and is thus a more developed sign in relation to the question, "What do I do
to inherit eternallife?". At yet another level, Luke's narrative portrayal of J esus
throughout the Gospel as a figure "in service to aB" (Lk22:7) functions as an
encompassing narrative I nterpretant'l of both law and parable: the Gospel estab-
lishes the meaning of the law in relation to parable in terms of service to the
neighbor (e.g. feeding the crowds, healing the sick, dying on the cross, as a
model for others, etc.)
In enunciative terms, the implied "you" of the two imperatives "Do this, and
you wiIllive," and "Go and do likewise," constitutes a Signa and that can
have at least two different Interpretants
a
: (1) to the lawyer inside the narrative,
and (2) to a discursive subject outside of the text, who is constituted as weIl in
and through the intertextual process. The reader as "you" is established within
the system of signs of which these texts are apart. Given the fact that the indi-
vidual of the enunciative sign "you" is translated outside of the
text, and is thus determined by the context of use, the injunctive character of the
text underscores the creative capacity of the semiotic process to generate ever
new interpretant/readers along the intertextual trajectory. When properly
translated, the text produces its own reader:
"You"
(Signa) "
"Do this and you wiBlive"
(Objece)
"Go and do likewise"
Fig.5
"You"
(Interpretane)
Lawyer
Reader#l
Reader#2
... etc.
In short, the narrative text demands a semiotic or intertextual completion pre-
cisely in terms of a readerwho will become as reader the translated, living Inter-
pretant of the enunciative "you" and, as practitioner of the injunction, a trans-
lated, living Sign/lnterpretant of Luke's narrative, of Jesus' parable, of the
Deuteronomic law, one among many of the biblical intertextual trajectories.
The reader thus extends this semiotic trajectory by becoming a physical Sign/
Sign / Text / Differance 89
Interpretant the enunicative "you" and to the text. reader, how-
ever, does not necessarily guarantee the correct doing as narrative, parable, law,
or intertextual trajectory demand. The parenesis, which defines
(reader) in relation to the intertextual trajectory, remains only a vlftual
ity. Indeed, one the unanswered questions emer?cing the of
semiotic model IS, what guarantees or controls proper readmg or actIOn
(translation). How does one speak of interp.r:tive if at.all? From the
perspective of its contribution to modern thls model of
intertextuality provides an alternative way of thmking the relatlonshlp between
inside and outside of the text but not its own interpretive grounds.
While it is possible from one perspective to distinguish the praxis
that outside the text, Peirce's semiotic model suggests that that
some sense is an arbitrary one. Both belong together to an traJectory
whose semiotic translation continues in the form of the creatlon of new and ever
differen t texts/ readers/ signs.
4. Intertextuality, Differance and the Critical Task
Up to this point we have seen Peirce's model, to
intertextual processes, emphaslzes the contmutty betweet;t slgns
textual ;rajectory. This theoretical model p:oves m the nch
tertextual play in a text like Luke's Samantan In
now to Derrida's deconstructive reflection upon text and we
find that it is not continuity but discontinuity that is underscored. It IS
tuality understood as discontinuity and difference that is the focus of
concern as he addresses the foundational underpinnings of modern .cntlcal
thinking. It is this effort to examine foundations of the critical task that is Impor-
tant for biblical exegetes.
20

In his weIl-publicized "Yale Manifesto," Derrida reflects the ?otl0n of
borders, those lines of demarcation that constitute the boundanes whlch seem-
ingly separate text from extratextual world, text from text, text from reader. He
says,
The question of the text, as it has been elaborated and transformed in the or so
has not merely 'touched' 'shore,' le bord (scandalously tampering, changm?, as m Mallarme s
declaration, 'On a touche au vers'), all those boundaries that border of what
used to be called a text of what we once thought this word could Identify, l.e., the supposed end
and beginning of a wo;k, the unity of a corpus, the tide, the margins, the signatures, referen-
tial realm outside the frame, and so forth. What has happened, if it has happened, lS, a sort of
overrun [debordementJ that spoils all these boundaries and and forces us to extend
accredited concept, the dominant notion of a 'text,' of what I still call a 'text,' for strategic
20 For a more extended treatment of Derrida's and Foucault's importance for exegesis, cf. Phillips
1985 and Phillips 1990 where a portion of this argument is developed.
r
90 G. A. Phillips
reasons, in part - a 'text' that is henceforth no Ion ger a finished corpus of writing, some content
enclosed in a book or its margins, but a differential network, a fabric of traces referring endlessly
to something other than itself, to other differential traces. Thus the text overruns all the limits
assigned to it so far (not submerging or drowning them in an undifferentiated homogeneity, but
rather making them more complex, dividing and multiplying strokes and lines) - all the limits,
everything that was to be set up in opposition to writing (speech, life, the world, the real, history,
and what not, every field of reference - to body or mind, conscious or unconscious, politics,
economics, and so forth).21
U sing the notion of textuality as a conceptual wedge, Derrida seeks to pry apart
and thereby bring to light the underlayment of the western metaphysical system
as it operates within the primary literary and philosophical texts of the West. As
a means for implementing this foundational reflection, Derrida turns to the
question of boundaries. Boundary, like intertextuality, serves as a trope enabl-
ing hirn to speak of differance; its use represents a strategic rhetorical move
which enables hirn to disclose the prevailing set of positivist assumptions that
operate in and through such expressions such as "that which lies outside of the
text," the "referential realm outside of the text," or in his words "the opposition
to writing (speech, life, the world, the real, history ... every field of reference),"
distinctions which are weighty for the modern textual (including biblical) critic.
Derrida makes the outlandish claim that the text overruns everything estab-
lished as a limit to its working, be that limit defined in tradition al terms as the
textual corpus, the reader's intended meaning, or even the historical context
itself. Derrida attempts to defamiliarize the "natural" distinction between the
textual and the extratextual; his aim is to compel reflection upon the taken-for-
grantedness of the boundary conditions and their relationship to the various
"analytico-referential" interpretiive strategies used to read texts today (Reiss
1982,21-55). These are the very boundary conditions and interpretive methods
which undergird modern biblical exegesis and inform its critical purpose.
At one level Derrida's concern is obviously not to deny the reality of or to
diminish the need for the other-than-text, i.e. the extra-textual; on his own
grounds the logic of "difference" demands "an other." Still, "11 n'y a pas de hors-
texte" can be taken as a provocative statement meaning just that. Rather, his
effort is to direct slumbering attention to the border and the fact of the border as
a way of lifting a corner of the camouflage so as to draw attention to the natural,
unreflected-upon distinction that allows the modern critic to so neatly separate
text from context from reader from the extratextual and to discover the "truth"
of the text, i.e. its meaning, its referent, its world-of-meaning, etc. The question
Derrida poses to the biblical critic here is: What does the status of the boundary
or border imply for the grounding of the critical problem of description and
interpretation? What does it mean to consent to the distinction between text and
21 Derrida 1979, 83-84. This is an essay in two parts with both "essays" running continuously on
top and bottom of the same page. "Living On" refers to the top half; "Border Line" to the
bottom half.
Sign / Text / Differance 91
extratext, i.e. between text and context, text and reader? What is the status and
significance of the difference and differentiation that is to be located here?
In raising the matter of borders in this fashion, Derrida is able to speak about
difference at a foundationallevel in a way that draws attention to the very status
of critical thought itself. The boundary that differentiates the text from the ex-
tratext ("speech, life, the world, the real") is a well-established and heavily
guarded border for the modern text critic. It is a given. Derrida's understanding
of intertextuality as the detour and deferral of signs, as a disseminating process,
challenges the biblical critic to reflect upon that boundary condition and the
difference it means for an understanding of the constructed nature of the critical
task when he asserts that "no border is guaranteed, inside or out" (Derrida 1979,
78) on its own grounds, but is authorized by some "external constraint;" all
borders and relationships are arbitrarily enforced and at the same time subject to
violation. Derrida does not seek to dismiss or dissolve boundaries (only to
"spoil" them), nor does he wish "to extend the reassuring notion of the text to a
whole extratextual realm and to trans form the world into a library by doing
away with all boundaries, all framework" (Derrida 1979, 84). This is to read his
concern in the wrong way. Rather, he problematizes the very notion of bound-
ary and along with that the way textual critics habitually think about text, mean-
ing, reader, context, his tory, and the critical task in order to engage critics in
thought about what in fact they do with texts. This is not an effort to do away
with this form of critical purpose, to free oneself from the modern critical
boundary condition altogether. For, he exposes the very need he has for these
borders in circumscribing his critical effort when he says, "I am here seeking
merely to establish the necessity of this whole problematic of judicial framing
and of the jurisdiction of frames" (Derrida 1979, 88). Derrida is not proposing
an escape either from frames or the modern critical problematic, but an angle of
reflection upon both that comes from attending to the differential quality of
signs and texts, upon differentiation itself.
From the perspective of the modern biblical critic, why should Derrida's view
of text understood in terms of difference and what it implies about the text's
relationship to the reader and the reader's critical task within his tory be so un-
settling? In part it is because he does not honor traditionally established bound-
aries which distinguish, for example, between literary criticism and literary his-
tory, disciplinary boundaries which define the latter as a search for the cause,
origin, goal, purpose of a text, an approach predicated upon the positive separa-
tion of text from history, text from reader, text from context. More perturbing
still for the biblical critic is his persistent effort to force an accounting of the
investment in these boundaries. What is the personal, professional, conceptual,
ethical investment riding in the border configuration which characterizes mod-
ern critical thought? Thus, the very idea of borders as an enigma is a blow to the
critic for whom the methodological borders (e. g. the distinction between de-
scription and interpretation) are a given. There is considerable reluctance in
admitting that the borders which organize modern critical activity are imposed
92 G. A. Phillips
or that any formalist separation, say, of text from context, reader from text is
always an imposition (in the sense of "imponere"), which means a deceit, an
imposture: "It is always an external constraint that asserts a text in general [ ... ]"
(Derrida 1979, 171). For if this were so, then the ultima te purpose served by
modern exegetical practice is called into question. And for exegetes that means
the theological agenda of employing the text and the critical practice of the field
to sustain a certain metaphysical structure or foundation is problematized. The
danger of the deconstructive critique is feh acutely by the religionist and the
biblical critic whose attachment not only to the canonical text but also to those
modern methods prornotes and supports the theological agenda.
In this regard, the status of the reader and the reader's role in this process of
differentiation is no less problematized by attending to boundary distinctions
and no less a concern to the modern critic. Precluded from the start is an "ideal"
objective reader - a function of the modern critical myth - who exercises an
uninvested competence connecting text with text. Such a view implies a "right"
sort of reader and an identification of the "right" borders, permanent borders,
natural distinctions. Within the intertextual project scoped out by Derrida, the
reader, like the text, translates into a process, an activity of writing, textual dis-
semination. This activity is neither a reactionary contraction to the true borders
nor an anarchical overthrow of all those that prevail, simply a statement that "no
one inflexion enjoys an absolute privilege" (Derrida 1979, 78). In other words,
there is no eschatological reader who at some point in time and space will read
the text right, will critique the text without the possibility of another word, a
remainder. The activity of reading is not exempt from the inevitable play of
differentiation as well, which effeets the setting of the limits for the critical task.
One might conclude from this statement then that reading is a value-free ac-
tivity a la Roland Barthes. Wt;re that the case the reader would be hardly more
than an occasion for penetrating and expanding the network of texts that make
up the literary intertextual chain, in service to some agenda "out there," border-
less, transcendent, outside of the confines of boundaries and free of all founda-
tions; subjectivity would be swallowed up and subordinated to an uhimate
privileged text and manner of interpretation. Instead, the critical reader must be
seen as a sign of a difference that escapes the borders that have traditionally
confined and distinguished author, referent, the context, the cause, etc. The
reader as subject is in important ways inseparable then from all texts, embedded
in the disseminating flow of meaning. From Derrida's perspective, intertextual-
ity is useful concept for dramatizing the force of difference that plays through-
out hiStory, thoughout the text, throughout the reading, throughout thinking.
Thus, we are brought to see in Derrida's notions of textuality and intertextuality
that text, context, reader, thought are not isolable entities within an historical
flow of texts and events to be explained simply in terms of cause/ effect, and the
like, but are foremost effects of differentiation.
Sign / Text / Differance 93
As for the text itself:
text is.a plal' of not simply in the obvious sense that a "work" of art always .
ongmates m the fleld of predecessors. Its own play of differences mirrors its displace-
ment and reappropnauon of other texts, and anticipates the necessary critical text which must
'supplement' it [ ... J. (Riddel1979, 249)
Every. te:ct is to ?e vie.wed as always already bound up within a systemic dif-
ferentIatmg relatlOnshlp with other texts, readings, readers, woven in Peirce's
terms as sign to sign. One text defers, differs from, is differentiated from
every text as a supplement, as writing, as sign, the reader's
mdlvlduahzmg, authorizing voice disappears in favor of the effects of difference
and process of differentiation itself only to emerge in the guise of the new
text, slgn, commentary, writing. That being so, the critical task is not a search for
an Ur-text or originary meaning that has founded all others but a demonstration
of of texts present by negative implication, by dif-
ferences m, not commonahtIes of, source or intention. Criticism is an act that
discontinuities rather than continuities. This means, of course, at the
same time, that textual criticism is by necessity to be measured by aseries of gaps
that can be found and that it effectively creates between text and text, text and
reader.
Thus, i.magining a response to Luke's Samaritan para-
ble dlSC?UrSe, the readmg that attends seriously to Derrida' s under-
standmg of mtertextuahty as a celebration of difference will want to reflect both
up?n the semiotic linkages that are established within the intertextual trajectory
as ItS operates and upon the fact of the distinctions that can be drawn between
one thing .another. is less important from the deconstructive point of view
that the .aPRreclate the fact of the connections between parable,
cltatlOn and encompassing narration here than appreciate the
dlfferentlatmg process that allows each to have its relationship to the other.
Further, is to see that the very status of the modern critical apparatus
that to make this discerning observation is subject to the
same dlfferentIatmg forces. What should be of interest is the fact that the critical
task can be reconstituted differently in different ages, with different questions
and purposes and outcomes.
. A work of and its reading from this perspective is better seen as an
- mvoke Barthes once again, a tissue, an interweaving, texture - in
there IS always the possibility of finding and establishing a relationship
some other reader, some other critical method and point of
vlew .. A cntIcal readmg IS always a gap to be filled momentarily but never ex-
haustIvely? always more activity to take pi ace, always room for one
What thlS means for a literary criticism of the biblical text
IS a short-ClrcUltmg of the search for the one meaning, the one sign, the one
stable mental content, the one voice, the ideal entity, the final interpretant that
one seeks to make present by invoking the proper method and technical her-
94 G. A. Phillips
meneutic, in other words the authoritative dlvine reader who stands outside of
history because he/she stands outside of the differentiating process that is inter-
textuality. That texts are understood to camouflage a meaning only later to be
reconstructed through a positive interpretation is a traditional view that has
forgotten its own literary critical and theological boundary conditions, has for-
gotten difference. But if we view criticism, along with Derrida, as continuous
acts of dissemination, dispersion, spreading out, as functions of attention to
differentiation, interspersed through the myriad play of difference both within
the text and between texts, within and between readers, the critical task is rede-
fined so as to engage in an effort at displaying the boundaries/limits/ conditions/
differences that join and disjoin texts and readers and the critical praxes from one
another in the unending process of differentiation. The critical task is to uncover
discontinuities not continuities, differences not identities.
"Il n'y a pas de hors-texte." One could read this as a denial of the external
world and of history, but only if it were removed from its intertextual relation-
ship with what Derrida has said elsewhere about the reader's critical responsibil-
ity to the text and to his/her modern critical condition. There is no trumpet blast
calling retreat from historico-critical methodologies or theological reflection to
some truer critical position. Rather, if anything, Derrida affirms the impossibil-
ity of escape to any form of transcendence either from the Western tradition
itself or the play of differentiation, from textuality, from criticism. We cannot
do with texts and readers and critical method what Kant wanted but failed to do
with philosophy, namely to make it a science of self-knowledge that effectively
enables it to get outside of our forms of representation to some high ground of
apodicticity where we can deteqp.ine the truth about the text, its meaning and
context, or the reader and his(her intentionality, the ultimate critical purpose.
There is no respite or escape from the process of differentiation. Not for the text,
the reader or the critical task. "
We can conclude by saying that Peirce's understanding of the process of semi-
osis and Derrida's meditation on differance offers much to the biblical critic
whose involvement with texts and their intertextual relations hip demand
theoretical footing. From Peirce's perspective, intertextual phenomena are am-
ply explained in terms of an indefatigable, generative process. Critics who seek
to understand and explain the ways in which multiple texts and traditions of
textual interpretation intetJ.ct can benefit from his semiotic modeling; indeed we
saw in the brief reading of the Lukan narrative the possibilities that this theoreti-
cal framework opens up.
From Derrida's perspective, the disseminating quality of textuality calls for
biblical critics not only to comprehend the texts that they seek to explain and
interpret in terms of the discrete methodological framework that operates when
they read; but also to extend that process of differentiation to the depths in order
to ask what it is about the character of the critical effort itself that can be ac-
counted for in precisely the same terms. Derrida's deconstructive understanding
of the intertextual process "simply" extends logically and radically that basic
Sign / Text / Differance 95
insight of Peirce's regarding the semiotic status of human beings to bring under
the light the foundation of the critic's very own praxis. It is a difficult word for
the modern critic to hear, for Derrida compels the critic to come to grips with
the apparently hopeless effort to search for some fundament of truth, meaning,
language or subject that stands apart from the differentiating process. Con-
cretely, Derrida's claim means that there can be neither escape from the Western
tradition and its boundaries nor an ignoring of these borders, only an overrun-
ning of the limits. It is those limits which frustrate the critic, but only if there is
the illusion that one can somehow gain control of the text and its generative,
intertextual trajectory.
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1976 "Operativite semantique des recits - paraboles: Semiotique narrative et textuelle:
Bal,Mieke
1987
1988
Hermeneutique du discours religieux." Diss. Universite Catholique de Louvain.
Lethai Love: Feminist Literary Readings 0/ Biblical Love Stories. Bloomington: In-
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Murder and Dif/erence: Gender, Genre, and Scholarship on Sisera's Death.
Bloomington: Indiana UP.
1991 On Story-Telling. Ed. DavidJobling. Sonoma: Polebridge Press.
Barthes, Roland
1981 "Theory of the Text." In Robert Young, ed. Untying the Text: A Post-Structuralist
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Benoist, J ean-Marie
1975 La revolution structurale. Paris: Bernard Grasset.
Benveniste, Emile
1970 "L'appareil formel de l'enonciation." Langages 17, 12-18.
Burnett, Fred W.
1988 "Exposing the Implied Author in Matthew: The Characterization of God as Father."
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Cross an, J ohn Dominic
1974 "The Good Samaritan: Towards a Generic Definition ofParable." Semeia 2,82-112.
Derrida, J acques
1972 "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourses of the Human Sciences." In Richard
Macksey/Eugenio Donato, eds. The Structuralist Controversy: The Languages 0/
Criticism and the Sciences 0/ Man. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Up, 247-265.
1977 "Signature Event Context." Glyph 1,172-97.
1979 "Living On: Border Line." In Harold Bloom et al. Deconstruction and Criticism.
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Foucault, Michel
1972 Archeology 0/ Knowledge and the Discourse on Language. Tr. M. Meridan Smith.
Frei, Hans
1974
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The Eclipse 0/ Biblical Narrative: A Study 0/ Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century
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96 G. A. Phillips
Frye, Northrop
1973 Anatomy o[Criticism. Princeton: Princeton UP.
Greimas, A. J.lJ. Courtes
1982 Semiotics and Language: An Analytical Dictionary. Tr. Larry Crist/Daniel Pattel
Gary Phillips et al. Bloomington: Indiana UP.
Jakobson, Roman
1971 a "Shifters, Verbal Categories and the Russian Verb." In Selected Writings. Vol. 2:
Word and Language. The Hague: Mouton, 130-147.
1971 b "Results of a Joint Conference of Anthropologists and Linguists." In Selected Writ-
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Kuhn, Thomas
1981 The Structure o[ Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2nd
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LaCapra, Dominick
1983 Rethinking Intellectual History: Texts, Contexts, Language. Ithaca: Cornell UP.
Leitch, Vincent
1983 Deconstructive Criticism: An Advanced Introduction. New York: Columbia UP.
Liszka, Jakob
1981 "Peirce and Jakobson: Toward a Structuralist Reconstruction of Peirce." Transac-
tions o[ the Charles S. Peirce Society 17,55-72.
Morris, Charles
1964 Signification and Significance: A Study o[ the Relations o[ Signs and Values. Cam-
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Patte, Daniel
1974
1974
1975
"An Analysis ofNarrative Structure and the Good Samaritan." Semeia 2, 1-26.
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Peirce, Charles Sanders
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Harvard UP.
Phillips, Gary A.
1982 "Enunciation and the Kingdom ofHeaven: Text, Narration and Hermeneutic in the
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1985 "History and Text: The Reader in Context in Matthew's Parables Discourse."
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1986 "Text and Enunciation as Interpretant: .A Peircian Contribution to Textual Semio-
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Ricoeur, Paul
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11. Structures of Intertextuality
I
I'
: I
I
I.
I
I
WOLFGANG G. MLLER
In terfigurali ty
A Study .on the Interdependence f Literary Figures
1. I ntroduction
In his surrealistic nvel Il Visconte dimezzato (The Cloven Viscount, 1952) Ital.o
Calvin teIls the story f the Italian Viscunt Medard wh, having been hit by
a cannn ball in the Turkish wars, returns, with nly ne half f his bdy pre-
served (the right eye, the right ear and s frth dwn t the right leg) to his castle,
where his ghastly appearance and his reign f terrr hrrify all the peple. This
grtesque figure seems t be abslutely unique, withut precedent in earlier
literature, until in the seventh f the bk's ten chapters, the secnd half f the
Viscunt returns, miraculusly preserved, t the castle after a lng pilgrimage,
turning .out t be in all mental and mral respects the .oppsite f the first half.
After this effectively delayed return everything falls int.o place. The reader
realizes that this nvel belngs t the "dualistic Internatinal" (Miller 1985,
127).It is an .original fictinal re-frmulatin f the theme f the divided sul, an
ingenius variatin f such pairs f figures as Rbert Luis Stevensn's Dr
Jekyll and Mr Hydein the tale f that name (1886). What seemed t be a ttally
singular figure at first sight, independent f ther fictinal characters and
character cnstellatins, prves t be part f a netwrk .of relati.onships that exist
between literary characters f different authrs and ages.
The interrelatins that exist between characters f different texts represent
ne f the mst imprtant dimensins f intertextuality, as the fllwing ran-
dmly chsen titles may indicate: Troilus and Cressida (Shakespeare), The
Female Quixote (Lennx), Grandison der Zweite (Musus), Faust (Gethe),
Don Juan und Faust (Grabbe), Verter (Lazarevic), Ulysses Oyce), Dr. Faustus
(Th. Mann), Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (St.oppard), Grendel
(Gardner). In view f the prminence and imprtance f such relatins it is
astnishing hw little attentin they have fund s far in intertextual thery and
criticism. One reasn fr this lacuna may be the suspicin generally felt towards
character-riented studies, character being, as J.onathan Culler has said, re-
garded by mdern thereticians as an "idelgical prejudice" rather than a re-
spectable topic fr inquiry (Culler 1975, 230; Jeffersn 1980, 235). T.o bviate
such reservatins we will, in this study, lk at character as a strictly structural
and functinal textual element and apply t it fr the mst part the "o/rd "fig-
102 W. G. Mller
ure" which is ideologically less suspicious. A second and perhaps more impor-
tant reason for the scarcity of work on the interrelation between literary charac-
ters is the absence of a critical term for this aspect of intertextuality, which gap is
to be filled here by the neologism interfigurality. The introduction of a new
word, and a hard one at that, may be frowned upon in a time of terminological
inflation - John Hollander speaks of caconyms (Plottel/Charney 1978, xiv)-,
but in this case a new term is necessary, because without it important aspects and
problems of intertextuality would not come into view.
There are some studies that refer to or imply interfigural phenomena, but they
usually are very limited in scope, isolating individual aspects of interfigurality.
Thus, studies dealing with the figure of the reader in literature - the stock
character of the "reading protagonist" - tend to include in their discussions a
special type of interfigurality, which manifests itself in a fictional character's
imitation of, or identification with, a character from another literary work
(Pabst 1975; Wuthenow 1980; Goetsch 1983; Kleinert 1983; Stckrath 1984). A
similar approach is taken in arecent collection of essays devoted to a motif its
contributors call Gelebte Literatur in der Literatur (Wolpers 1986), a volume
wh ich does not use the terminology of intertextual criticism for the most part, but
provides, from Cervantes' Don Quixote to Plenzdorf's Die neuen Leiden des
jungen w., penetrating analyses of texts which are relevant to a discussion of
interfigurality. A special form of interfigurality is discussed by Theodore Ziol-
kowski (1983), namely the transfer of a figure from one fictional work to another
fictional work, for which phenomenon he coins the term figures on loan.
In the following we will try to formulate prolegomena to a systematic descrip-
tion of the whole range of interfigural phenomena. Our survey does not attempt
to be exhaustive, but it will map some of the most important coordinates in this
field of intertextuality and isolate and discuss a few essential types of interfigur-
ality and thus lay the foundatin for a more complete and systematic study of
the subject and for more detailed examinations of individual kinds and instances
of interfigural relations. As far as documentation by concrete examples is con-
cerned, our approach will, of necessity, be comparative. Just as authors, in their
references to figures from other texts, constantly pass over the boundaries of
different literatures, so theoreticians and critics focusing on interfigural rela-
tions cannot limit their material to instances from one literature only. The topic
of intertextuality is comparative by nature, offering rich theoretical and practical
possibilities for comparative literature as a discipline of literary studies that is
still seeking to define its object and method convincingly.
2. Names as Interfigural Devices
Names belong to the most obvious devices of relating figures of different literary
texts. Interfigural relations are to a large exten t internymic - yet anoth,er -ne01Q-:.
gism - relations. The shift of the name of a fictional" character, whether in its
Interfigurality 103
identical or in a changed form, to a figure in another text is, as far as the linguistic
aspect is concerned, comparable to a quotation. ne could almost speak of a
quoted name, which we hesitate to do for reasons to be seen later. Like a quota-
tion a re-used name "repeats a segment derived from apretext within a subse-
quent text" (Plett 1986, 295), and just as in a quotation the segment taken over
from the anterior text is frequently subjected to alteration or transformation in
the posterior text, so a name from an earlier text often recurs in a changed form
in a subsequent text, the alteration being, as in a quotation, not only a matter of
form (or surface structure) but of content (or deep structure), too. Another
affinity is to be mentioned. Just as in a quotation the transfer of a segment from
one text to another one usually causes "a conflict between the quotation and its
new context" (Plett 1986, 300), so the shift of the name of a literary character to a
new fictional context is bound to create tension or conflict.
The analogy between quotation and re-used names should not be overem-
phasized, however, since names are in literature allied to characters, the latter
representing a category of its own. A literary character can be defined as a coher-
ent bundle of qualities (character traits), and the name given to a character is its
identifying onomastic label. There is, however, not a necessary relations hip be-
tween signifier and signified in literary names. Names like Emma Woodhouse
Gane Austen, Emma), Lily Briscoe (Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse), and
Holden Caulfield G. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye) hardly tell us anything
about the characters they are attached to. But there are a great many possibilities
of investing names of literary figures with meaning, and authors have been
highly inventive in doing so. One of the most prominent meaning-generating
devices in literary name-giving is the linking of the name of a literary figure to
the name of an earlier literary figure. Identity or partial identity (similarity) of
names from different literary works is always an interfigural element, although
interfigurality may work out in very different forms in the individual cases. The
re-emergence of a name from an earlier work may express an affinity with the
figure thus evoked, as is the case with the parson in Laurence Sterne's Tristram
Shandy who is named Yorick after the king's jester in Shakespeare'sHamlet and
whose name reappears as Sterne's pseudonym inA SentimentalJourney. In ex-
treme instances such a re-used name may coincide with the identity or, rather,
near-identity of the figures related internymically. A well-known example is the
appearance of Pamela, the heroine of Richardson's epistolary novel Pamela, in
Fielding's Joseph Andrews. A grotesque example illustrating the opposite case,
i. e. the identity of the name coinciding with the strongest contrast of the figures
thus related, is the rat called Desdemona which the protagonist carries with hirn
as his pet animal in Robert Nye's would-be Rabelaisian re-write of the story of
Falstaff (Falstaff, 1976).
As was said above, the clearest interfigural reference is contributed by the
identity of the names of the figures related. Let us begin our discussion of con-
crete examples, which will try to combine structural and functional analysis,
with a rather complex case. In Kierkegaard's Diary of the Seducer the protago-
I'
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I
104 W. G. Mller
nist's first name Johannes refers to two great literary figures, Don Juan and
Doktor Johannes Faust, who are earlier in Either-Or (Enten-Eller, 1943), of
which the Diary is apart, contras ted as the sensual and the reflective varieties of
the demonic. This interfigural reference, which is constituted by the identity of
the Christian names (see Pau11986, 207), is reinforced in the Diary itself by a
number of allusions of which those to Goethe's Faust are more frequent. Now
Kierkegaard's Johannes cannot be simply interpreted as an amalgamation of
Don Juan and Faust. Faust is obviously a model for Johannes, whereas in the
latter's relation to Don Juan similarity and dissimilarity are mingled. That it
would be wrong to characterize Don Juan merely as an antipode to Johannes is
shown by another interfigural element. Johannes' servant, the analogue to Don
Juan's servant Leporello, bears the same name Gohannes) as his master in The
Diary of the Sedueer. This identity of the names suggests the absolute dedication
of the servant to his master's concerns, whieh Kierkegaard notes as a characteris-
tic of the relationship between Don Juan and Leporello. To sum up, internymic
identity provides the reader of Kierkegaard's portrait of the seducer as an aes-
thetician with a hint at the intricate relationship of the protagonist to two earlier
literary figures.
Names extricated from one fictional eontext and inserted into another one are
often changed and this kind of interfigural deviation can, as is the case with
quotations, be "deseribed in terms of transformations" (Plett 1986,296). One
such procedure is subtraction, for instanee in the form of back-clipping. In Poe' s
The Fall of the House of Usher the I-narrator reads the fictitious medieval r-
mance The Mad Trist to his neurotic host immediately before the tale's eatas-
trophe. The clipping of the last .. syllable turns the name Tristram from the
medievallove epic of Tristraml and Isoud into Trist, a proeedure whieh evokes
the French word triste and points, together with the adjective mad, to the emo-
tional state of the story's protagonist.
Back-clipping is also used to give names a distinctly modern English or
American touch. If diminutive suffixes are added, this procedure can also be
defined as substitution. This is the case in Ulrich Plenzdorf's novel and play Die
neuen Leiden des jungen W. (1972), where the name Charlotte is changed to
Charlie, whereas in Goethe's Werther the shortened version of the name, Lotte,
is produced by fore-clipping. An analogous transformation occurs in Horst
Krger's extension of Hlderlin's Bildungsroman Hyperion (Hrtling 1971,
49 - 51 ). Hyperion, now a male prostitu te in Berlin, beeomes H ypi, and Diotima,
now his wife, Didi. Similarly, in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Stop-
pard gives the names of the play's protagonists a modern ring by back-clipping,
which results in Ros and Guil.
Less frequent than subtraction is addition as an internymic deviation. In
Fielding's joseph Andrews Mr. B. from Riehardson's Pamela returns as Mr.
Booby, the extension or completion of the name having a distinctly parodie
effect (booby = silly dull-witted fool). A more complicated case is the name of
the heroine of Erica Jong's mock eighteenth-century novel Fanny Being the
Interfigurality 105
True History of the Adventures of FannyHaekabout-jones (1980). This name is
a combination of the Christian name of the heroine ofJohn Cleland'sFanny HilI
and the surname of the hero, Tom Jones, in Fielding's novel of the same name.
An extension is effeeted by the insertion of an additional name element, Hack-
ab out, which is derived from William Hogarth's Kate Hackabout in The Har-
lot's Progress. Addition at the name's beginning and subtraetion at its end oecur
in MaeBirdl, Barbara Garson's adaptation of Shakespeare's Maebeth as a politi-
cal satire on the sixties in America: Thc name Dunean becomes 0' Dune the
added patronymie hinting at the Irish background of the Kennedy family. '
An important device of internymic deviation is substitution. Substitution
may range from the phoneme as the smallest linguistic segment to the whole
body of the name exeept for one phoneme. If substitution affects the combina-
tion of first name and surname, whole words can be substituted too. Instances of
minimal substitutions are: HamletlSamlet Geremy Geidt's andJonathan Marks'
The Tragieal History of Samlet, Prinee of Denmark ; see Priessnitz 1980, 12) and
Macbethl Macbett (Ionesco's Macbett). In the latter example, like in the two-
letter subtraction Malcolml Maeol from the same play, the English names are
adapted to Freneh ears. A tiny change which may be interpreted as a substitu-
tion, too, is OthellolO'Thello in a distinctly Irish parody of Shakespeare's play
(General O'Thello or, The Wipe and the Wiper, 1869; see Priessnitz 1980,307).
The initial vowel of the name of Shakespeare's charaeter is replaced by the Irish
patronymic 0'. One could also define this transformation as a kind of deglutina-
tion of the name's initial sound.
There are plenty of more extensive substitutions, too. In Henry Fielding's
Shamela the name of Riehardson's heroine is parodied by the substitution of the
free morpheme sham (= imposture, pretence, mock) for the root of the name
Pamela. Similar transformations are Maebethl MaeBird (Barbara Garson, Mae-
Bird/); Macbethl MaeBarsh (Dietrich Schwanitz' satire on the Barschel Affair in
Kiel); RosencrantzlEhrliehcrantz, GuildensternlHaldenstern (Geidt's and
Marks' already-mentioned Watergate play). T. S. Eliot's "Aristophanic melo-
drama" Sweeney Agonistes changes the name of the hero of Milton's drama
Samson Agonistes into Sweeney. Here the irony of the internymie deviation is
perceptible only within the context of the titles of the works related intertextu-
ally (Plett 1986,310).
Another form of internymic transformation is the adaptation of foreign
names to their new context. Thus Don j uan Tenorio is Anglicized in Shaw' s
Man and Superman intojohn Tanner. So strong is the deformation of the origi-
nal name in this case that the spectator or reader would hardly grasp it, if John
Tanner did not appear in the play's central dream-scene under the name of his
ancestor Don Juan. A similar adaptation is the change ofAgamemnon into Ezra
Mannon in Eugene O'Neill's Mourning Beeomes Eleetra. Another possibility is
the translation of the foreign name into the target language, as is the case with
Johannes Faust transferred asjohn Fist into the American undergraduate milieu
of the sixties Gohn Hersey, Too Far to Walk, 1966).
106 W. G. Mller
There ist a great wealth of types of internymic which is ,to. be illus-
trated by a few more instances. The first comes from fme book
Flaubert's Parrot (1984), which is novel, biography, and cntlClSm all m one. The
surprise effect of its conclusion derives to a great from the disc.losure that
the narrator's attraction to Flaubert's life and work IS connected wlth the fact
that his wife is, like the heroine of Madame Bovary, an adulteress and that his
attitude towards her is analogous to that of Flaubert's fictional character Charles
Bovary. Now Barnes gives several hints at this relation the
story of his protagonist and that of Flaubert' s novel, for mstance that hIS
rator is like Charles Bovary, a doctor, or the narrator' s remark that three stones
contend within hirn: "One about Flaubert, one ab out Ellen, one about myself."
(85-86). One of these hints is of an internymic character. The the nar-
rator's wife is Ellen Braithwaite, which is related, through the Identlty of the
initial sounds, to that of Emma Bovary. A slight similarity of the names of the
two characters is here used as a subde interfigural device which will not evade
the perceptive reader. With a stronger internymic signal Barnes would have
given the show away. . .
A significant interfigural criterion can be the omISSIon of the name of a charac-
ter referred to intertextually. In John Gardner's re-write of Beowulf (Grendel,
1972) the viewpoint is shifted to Grendel, the novel's I-narrator, apos-
trophizes hirnself by his name several times - :'1 was G:endel, Rumer of
Meadhalls, Wrecker of Kings!" (69) -, whereas hIS antagomst, Beowulf, who
appears not until the last but one chapter, is called "the stran?er" and r;tever
mentioned by name. The namelessness of the hero, whose name IS so promment
in the Old English epic, the radically new figural orientation of the
modern version. it is interesting to note that in Jean Rhys' Wide
Sargasso Sea, which supplies the antecedents of the relationship between
Rochester and his first wife ih Charlotte Brond;'s Jane Eyre, the name of the
male protagonist is never referred to. This is an important structural detail which
will be discussed in another context in this study.
Let us, finally, mention two more internymic devices. The first is the
ence to a figure from the pre-text in the tide of the subsequent work (m
paratext, in Genette's terminology), while the character bears another name m
the work itself: Doktor Faustusl Adrian Leverkhn (Thomas Mann), Pygma-
lion/Henry Higgins (George Bernard Shaw). This procedure is possible at the
level of the work's chapters, too. In its serialized first publication in the Little
Review Joyce confirmed the interfigural relation indicated in the tide of Ulysses
in several of the work's chapter tides: Nestor, Proteus, Calypso etc.
(Genette 1982,355). .' .
The second internymic device to be mentioned here IS a very old one WhlCh IS
no longer popular in modern literature. It is a variety of the rhetorical trope
antonomasia, in which a proper name is replaced by another proper name that IS
generalized to a common noun. Thus in the foll?wing quotation a
eighteenth-century satire on Richardson's Szr Charles Grandzson, Musaus
Interfigurality 107
Grandison der Zweite, the characters of the satirized text are evoked by aseries
of instances of antonomasia, which are given in italics here: "[ ... ] unser Grandi-
son scheint in seine Byron zum Sterben verliebt zu seyn, und gb alle Clementi-
nen und Henrietten um eine Julie hin." (Musus 1800, n.81). Usually, however,
antonomasia establispes a looser relation to a figure from apre-text. An extreme
example would be Robert Nye's strongly intertextual novelFalstaff(Neumeier
1988), which makes abundant interfigural references to Shakespeare's works
without aiming at a tight structural pattern. This is shown in the names of the
many lovers Sir Falstaff has in the book: Ophelia, Imogen, Juliet, Perdita,
Titania, Beatrice etc. The same looseness of the interfigural references is to be
found in Nye's use of antonomasia. Here is an example from one of the book's
many sex scenes: "She was his Juliet. He her Romeo. She was his Cressida. He
her Troilus. She was his Cleopatra. He her Antony [ ... ]" (Nye 1976,335).
3. Literary Revenants: Re-Used Figures
Let us begin our survey of some forms of interfigurality with an extreme type,
which raises several fundamental issues. This type of interfigurality emerges
whenever a literary figure is extricated from its original fictional context and
inserted into a new fictional context. In a seminal article, to which all future
studies on this subject will be indebted, Theodore Ziolkowski coined the term
"figures on loan" ("Figuren auf Pump" in an earlier article written in German)
for this phenomenon (Ziolkowski 1983), a coinage which is a litde misleading
since it suggests, first, that a figure is borrowed from its source to be returned to
the source again, and, second, that there is an identity of the original figure and
the figure transplanted into a new context.
Ontologically and aesthetically, it is, however, impossible to have entirely
identical characters in literary works by different authors. For if we do not
simplistically regard a fictional character as a mere sum of qualities (character
traits), but, rather, understand it as a constituent of an artistic whole, related to a
plot and part of a constellation of characters, we realize that it cannot reappear in
its identical form in another author's work. That is why here the term "re-used
figure" is preferred to "figure on loan" or "borrowed figure". Complete interfi-
gural identity is unattainable. A similar problem, that of intertextual identity, is
raised in Borges' story "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote", which deals
with the project of producing in the twentieth century "a few pages which
would coincide - word for word and line for line - with those of Miguel de
Cervantes" (Borges 1981,66).
We speak of "re-used figures" in order to indicate that if an author takes over a
figure from a work by another author into his own work, he absorbs it into the
formal and ideological structure of his own product, putting it to his own uses,
which may range from parody and satire to a fundamental revaluation or re-
exploration of the figure concerned. With regard to two of his chief examples of
108 W. G. Mller
"borrowed figures" , the appearance of Goethe's Wilhelm Meister in the Ger-
man romantic novel Karl's Trials and Tribulations (Die Versuche und Hinder-
nisse Karls, 1808) and the appearance of Richardson's Pamela in Fielding's
Joseph Andrews (1742), Ziolkowski notes that "we are amused because the fig-
ure on loan deviates so greatly from our expectations" (Ziolkowski 1983, 133).
A glance at a relevant passage fromJoseph Andrews can make it quite clear that
the Pamela of Richardson's and that of Fielding's novel are not at all identical.
The quotation comes from the scene in which Pamela tries to dissuade her
brother from marrying his beloved Fanny because of the latter's low social rank:
'Brother' said Pamela, 'Mr. Booby advises you as a Friend; and, no doubt, my Papa and Mamma
will be of his Opinion, and will have great reason to be angry with you for destroying what his
Goodness hath done, and throwing down your Family again, after he hath raised it. It would
become you better, Brother, to pray for the Assistance of Grace against such a Passion than to
indulge in it.' - 'Sure, Si ster, you are not in earnest; I am sure she is your Equal, at least.' - 'She
was my Equal,' answered Pamela, 'but I am no longer Pamela Andrews; I am now this Gentle-
man's Lady, and as such am above her - I hope I shall never behave with an unbecoming Pride;
but at the same time I shall always endeavour to know mys elf, and question not the Assistance of
Grace to that purpose.' (Book IV, Chapter 7)
If name and language are identifying criteria, Fielding's Pamela is not the same as
Richardson's original figure. The simple fact that Pamela appears inJoseph An-
drews not as Lady B. but as Lady Booby makes her another figure, and her
language may look deceptively like that of Richardson' s heroine, but differences
are unmistakable. Thus Fielding's Pamela uses the pious vocabulary and the
moralizing tone of her model, but the underlying attitude is that of entirely un-
Christian pride and pretentiousness. The discrepancy between Pamela's show of
piety and her declared solicitude for her brother on the one hand and her base
and calculating attitude on the other mark her as a hypocrite. Fielding's Pamela
is a parodic version of the original, which can be proved by further linguistic
details such as the use of the diminutive terms of endearment "Papa" and
"Mamma" (Richardson's heroine usually refers to her parents as "Father" and
"Mother").
Fielding's figure is a replica of Richardson's with parodic deviations meant to
undermine the original. These deviations are not very conspicuous since Field-
ing does not want the reader to realize immediately that what is presented to hirn
here is not the real Pamela. The pretended identity of Fielding's with Richard-
son's Pamela is a fiction in the service of parody. Purporting to take over into his
own novel a figure from his great riyal in the art of the novel, Fielding presents
his own view of that figure which satirizes Richardson's conception. A compari-
son of Fielding's Shamela with his Joseph Andrews is revealing in this respect.
While Shamela is from first to last explicitly a parody of Richardson's novel, its
protagonist being by name already a parodic version of Richardson's heroine,
Joseph Andrews is a novel with only a subsidiary parodic dimension, a novel
which builds up its own fictional world, yet introduces with Pamela a figure
which seems to be taken straight from another fictional context. Fielding's
Interfigurality 109
an ov.ert parody of a literary figure, his Pamela is a covert parody of a
Smce the parodic element is not as explicit in Fielding's Pamela as
lt IS m hIS Shamela and since his Pamela is so introduced and delineated as to
create the impression of her having been directly taken over from a novel by
a.nother author, we can here speak of a literary revenant, even though the iden-
tlty of model and replica is only apparent.
The problem of the ontological status of literary revenants, the question
whether or not figures from earlier works re-emerging in later works are identi-
cal with their originals, may seem to have been laboured here, but it is essential
to J:7ealize that such figures are more than mere duplicates and that they are
by a characteristic tension between similarity and dissimilarity with
theu models from the pre-texts. An instructive text is in this regard Walter de la
Henry Brocken (1904), whose hero travels through the land of romance
?n horse Rosinante, meeting various figures from the literary tradition which
m:ana?ly puzzle or trouble hirn since they deviate more or less from his precon-
celVed Image of them. Thus he encounters a little girl who bears the name of one
of Wordsworth's figures, Lucy Gray, and seems to be identical with her to all
appearances, but does not know or remember her story as told in Wordsworth's
poem. On Henry Brocken's reminding her of it, she answers, "That will be a
long time since" (de la Mare 1904,21).
The conversation with Jane Eyre in the book's second episode raises almost
ontological problems:
"And am I indeed only like that poor mad thing you thoughtJane Eyre?" she said, "or did you
read between?"
I answered that it was not her words, not even her thoughts, not even her poetry that was to me
Jane Eyre.
" "Wh.at then is left of me?" inquired, stooping her eyes over the keys and smiling daddy.
Am I mdeed so evanescent, a wmtry wraith?"
"WeIl," I said, "Jane Eyre is left."
She pressed her lips together. "I see," she said brightly. "But then, was I not detestable too? so
stubborn, so wilful, so demented, so -vain?"
"You were vain," I answered [ ... ]
(de la Mare 1904, 36)
Henry Brocken perceives in this encounter not really the literary revenant -
".not her words, not even her thoughts" - nor is the woman he sees the original
flgure from Bronte's novel - who was in the revenant's words, "detestable",
"st bb "" lf 1" "d d""" b h . 1 h f
u Wl u, emente , vam -, ut t e essenua c aracter 0 J ane
Eyre, the ldea of her. What de la Mare does in this airy book is constantly to test
and counterpoint alternative conceptions of traditionalliterary figures. In the
course of the novel the deviations of the literary revenants from their originals
become ever more striking, and a profound re-exploration of some of the best-
known figures from English literature, for example from Swift's Gulliver's
Travels and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, is achieved.
110 W. G. Mller
4. Re-Used Figures in Allographie Sequels
A domain of literature in which figures from other works reappear by definition
is the large field of re-writes and sequels to earlier texts. Two basic types of
sequels have to be distinguished, those written by the author of the pre-text
hirns elf (called autographie sequels here) and those written by another author
(allographie sequels). We will first deal with the second type. Sequels are usually
interfigural, centred round one or more figures from their pre-texts. thus, to
mention just a few types, minor figures can become main figures in the subse-
quent text (Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead), or the antago-
nist can be turned into the protagonist Qohn Gardner, Grendel). A sequel may
present aperiod in a character's life anterior to that of the pre-text (Gordon
Bottomley, King Lear's Wife [1915], Gruaeh [1919], the latter dealing with the
antecedents of the life of Lady Macbeth) or posterior (Anna L'Estrange, Return
to Wuthering H eights, Ariost, Orlando furioso [sequel to Boiardo, Orlando
amoroso ], La Segunda parte dei Lazarillo de Tormes), or it may fill a gap the pre-
text leaves in the representation of a character's history (Fenelon, Les aventures
de Telemaque, Jeffrey Caine, Heathcliff). These three types of sequels can be
associated with the terms analepsis, prolepsis, and ellipsis (Genette 1982,
197-198).
As was said above, the re-emergence of one or more figures from the pre-text
is one characteristic feature of sequels. Sequels are characterized by an intersec-
tion (or at least a contiguity) of two different fictional contexts which manifests
itself most conspicuously on the figural level. But here again it would be wrong
to take for granted an identity of the figures from the pre-text with the corre-
sponding figures in the s u b s e q u e ~ t text, even though they may bear the same
names. Like other intertextual phenomena figures re-used in sequels follow
their literary ancestors and simultaneously deviate from them. An interesting
example is in this context J ean Rhys' Wide Sargasso Sea (1966), a sequel to Char-
lotte Bronte'sJane Eyre (1847). A simplistic view of the relation between these
two texts would see the posterior text as a supplement to the anterior text pro-
viding the antecedents of the relationship between Rochester and his first wife.
In actual fact, Wide Sargasso Sea is, though intertextually related to J ane Eyre, an
independent artistic creation, which manifests itself, among other things, in the
change of the setting from England to J amaica, the conversion of a shadowy
minor figure, the mad Creole prisoner-wife in the attic, Bertha Mason, into the
protagonist, Antoinette Cosway, and the shift of the narrative perspective from
the conventional I -narration of J ane Eyre - who does not figure in Rhys' novel at
all- to the modern figural I-narration of Antoinette and her husband (Roches-
ter). There is no room for a detailed analysis here, but some interfigural aspects
must be mentioned, particularly Rhys' handling of the names of her figures. The
first thing to be no ted - a detail generally overlooked in criticism - is the fact that
the male protagonist remains nameless in the novel. Critics usually refer to hirn
by his surname (Rochester) or his first name (Edward) inJane Eyre. This is, of
Interfigurality 111
course, acceptable from an intertextual viewpoint. Wide Sargasso Sea is so de-
signed as to make the reader shuttle back and forth between the sequel and its
pre-text. As far as the male protagonist is concerned, the reader will, by going
back to Jane Eyre and returning to Wide Sargasso Sea again, be all the more
struck by his namelessness in the sequel, a fact that distances hirn from his coun-
terpart in the source. That is why it runs counter to Rhys' artistic intention to
call her male protagonist Rochester or Edward. This figure's lack of a name as an
identifying mark must be taken seriously; it calls his identity into doubt and
impairs hirn as aperson.
Similarly intricate is the naming of the fern ale protagonist in Rhys' novel. For
her the authoress invents a new name, Antoinette Cosway. After her marriage
her husband not only takes all her money, he also insists on her accepting
"Bertha" as her first name, an act of male possessiveness which "strips her of her
individual essence" (Nebeker 1981, 159). Antoinette protests against this re-
naming: "Bertha is not my name. You are trying to make me into someone else,
calling me by another name." (Rhys 1987, 121). She feels that by naming, which
is, as we know, a magic act of taking possession (Porter 1976, 550), he is robbing
her of her individuality. Clear-sighted in her lunacy, she nostalgically laments,
later in the novel, the loss of her former self which coincided with the loss of her
name: "Names matter, like when he wouldn't call me Antoinette, and I saw
Antoinette drifting out of the window with her scents, her pretty clothes and her
looking-glass." (Rhys 1987, 147). This act of re-naming puts her on the way of
becoming the "Bertha Mason" of Jane Eyre. In Bronte's novel Rochester de-
clares in the crucial scene of the discovery of his first marriage, "I now inform
you that she is my wife, whom I married fifteen years ago - Bertha Mason by
name" (Bronte 1966, 320).
This is not yet the end of J ean Rhys' subtle internymic references. At one place
inJane Eyre - in the solicitor's public declaration during the marriage ceremony
- the full name of Rochester's first wife is given: "Bertha Antoinetta Mason."
(Bronte 1966, 318). Hence we see that the first name of Rhys' heroine is also
derived from the pre-text, the authoress giving, however, a F rench flavour to the
name by substituting the suffix - ette for the ending - etta. Now Antoinette's
husband also tampers with this name. He robs it of its French ending - thus,
unwittingly of course, restoring the original name as it appears inJane Eyre-
and associates it with a name rhyming with it, "Marionette" I"Marionetta", thus
onomastically emphasizing the doll-like role (marionette = a puppet moved by
strings) he forces onto her. In a quotation of his thoughts the development this
name undergoes at his hands is summarized, "Marionette, Antoinette,
Marionetta, Antoinetta" (Rhys 1987, 127).
It is true that Rhys allows her male protagonist to express his viewpoint as an
I -narrator in a large section of the novel and that she presents hirn as a victim of
his social and economic background and of the cultural and racial tensions and
conflicts inJamaica and, concretely as the dupe of an intriguer and deceiver, but
the way he systematically destroys the personality of his wife, shows hirn as a
I,
I
I I
112 W. G. Mller
male chauvinist, a representative of a patriarchal society which suppresses wo-
men and allows them only to exist in the role chosen for them by men. This
attitude is mirrored in the treatment of his wife's name. The novel delineates the
change of Antoinette Cosway into the "Bertha Mason" ofJane Eyre. Sargasso
Sea is a sequel that, as a modern work of art, exists in its own right; yet simul-
taneously it evinces intricate intertextual relations, with the novel's end actuaUy
dovetailing into its pre-text. Many of this work's intertextual devices are interfi-
gural, and especially internymic, making the reader's attention constantly move
to and fro between the figures of the text and its pre-text. Wide Sargasso Sea
makes it quite clear that a critical approach absolutizing the derivative aspect of
interfigural relations in sequels is too limited.
5. Re-used Figures in Autographie Sequels and Series
It seems to be obvious that figures from an earlier work by an author that reap-
pear in a later work by the same author are identical. But even when the subse-
quent text comes from the same pen as the pre-text, things may be more complex
and problematic than it seems at first sight. There are instances of complete
identity, of course, especially in the stereotyped heroes of popular literature.
The Sherlock Holmes of Conan Doyle's detective stories remains the same all
through the series. Even when Doyle, siek of his hero, plunged hirn over the
Reichenbach Falls at the end of his second collection, he continued to be
haunted by hirn. Public demand and enormous financial offers made hirn resus-
citate his detective, who was, of cpurse, expected to be entirely the same person
he had been in the first two collections.
Consistency of character ~ a r k s novel sequences, too, like James Fenimore
Cooper's Leather-Stoeking Tales, in which the hero, Natty Bumppo, functions
as the unifying figural link. Or in sequences of novels delineating the fate of a
family or a group of families over several generations such asJohn Galsworthy's
Forsyte Saga the family is the multifigurallink that provides the coherence of the
narrative. The situation is somewhat different in William Faulkner's Yok-
napatawpha County novels. Here identical families, notably the Compson fam-
ily, emerge in several works of the series, but the great variety of Faulkner's
techniques of narrative mediation, the subtleties in viewpoint and the temporal
shifts in his narration differ strongly form the linear unfolding of the stories of
the individual figures in their temporal progression in The Forsyte Saga. But
nevertheless interfigural relations form a bond in Faulkner's novels that, in addi-
tion to the mythical region in which they are set, contribute to unifying the
senes.
Recurring figures form a connecting link, too, in Honore de Balzac's large-
scale cycle of novels and tales in La Comedie humaine, for instance the criminal
Vautrin (Pere Goriot, Illusions perdues, Splendeurs et miseres des eourtisanes).
Several twentieth century novelists have a predilection for using the same hero in
Interfigurality 113
different novels (for example J ames J oyce, Portrait oi the Artist as a Young Man,
Ulysses; Theodore Dreiser, Cowperwood-Trilogy; John Updike, Rabbit-Tril-
ogy; Martin Wals er, Kristlein-Trilogy; Philip Roth, Zuckerman-Trilogy). A
unique work is in this respectJohn Barth's novel LETTERS, an ingenious play
with fact and fiction which recycles "Characters from the Author's Earlier Fic-
tions" (Barth 1979, 190). The fictitious "author" actually writes letters to the
characters of B arth' s previous novels asking them for permission to re-use or, he
says, "reorchestrate" them. The "author" in LETTERS calls his intended work a
"Sequel" (Barth 1979,431), but it is singular among sequels in that it resurreets
figures "from each of my previous books" (Barth 1979, 431).
The identity of a figure of the pre-text with its namesake in the subsequent
text is evident, too, in continuations written to exploit a book's success. Examp-
les would be Defoe's The Further Adventures oi Robinson Crusoe, Richardson's
Pamela, Part 11, or Dumas' continuations of Les Trois Mousquetaires, Vingt ans
apres and Le Vicomte de Bragelonne. Such potboilers or warmed-up versions of
successful books must be distinguished from the second parts of works of
world-literature like Cervantes' Don Quixote, Goethe's Faust or the same au-
thor's Wilhelm Meister, which deal with a later phase in a character's life and
manifest a greater artistic freedom or philosophical depth. In either case the
connecting link between the anterior and the posterior text is figural, as the
names of the works indicate already.
A celebrated classical example of a figure's reappearance in a subsequent text
by the same author is Homer's Odyssey, which describes the adventures of
Odysseus in the course of his return from the Trojan War to his wife Penelope in
Ithaca. Odysseus is in the latter work, of course, the same as in the pre-text, but
within the Odyssey as an aesthetic construction he is a new figure. While he was
only one of several outstanding warriors in the Iliad, the focus is now totally on
hirn as the protagonist, and he is no longer seen in the role of a warrior, but in
that of the central hero of a sequence of adventures which prefigures the genre of
the novel (Genette 1982,200) or, rather, romance.
Changes in a figure that reappears in an autographie sequel or a sequence or
series of an author's works may be due to a new intention or aesthetic vision of
the author's. Thus in Shakespeare's historical tetralogies, which cover a rather
coherent sequence of historical events from the end of the fourteenth to the end
of the fifteenth century, a number of characters are bound to reappear in the next
play or plays of the series. As historical figures such characters are always identi-
cal, of course, but from the viewpoint of the plays' aesthetic conception they
frequently change. To give an example, in 3 Henry VI Richard, Duke of
Gloucester, is a callous warrior, cynical, revengeful, ever willing to use his
sword, whereas in Riehard 111, the next play in the series, we never see hirn
soiling his hands with blood. In the latter play Shakespeare conceives hirn as a
villain-rhetorician, an accomplished simulator and dis simulator who perfectly
practises courtly role-playing in his attempt to implement devilish intrigues and
machinations. Another conspicuous change a character undergoes in the his-
114 w. G. Mller
tories is that ofPrince HaI (1,2 Henry IV) to King Henry V (Henry V). A rather
drastic interfigural deviation in Shakespeare's Roman Plays concerns Antony:
InJulius Caesar he appears in the role of Caesar's right hand and, later, in that of
the power politician and demagogue, whereas, in Antony and Cleopatra, he is
delineated as an eminent Roman warrior and statesman, who, in a kind of mid-
life crisis, loses hirns elf to the fascination of the Orient. To explain the figure's
different qualities in the two plays in terms of a development of the personality
would simplify matters. In the posterior play Shakespeare obviously conveys an
image of the figure different from that of the anterior play, an image which is
part of a new aesthetical design.
6. Inter[igural Combinations and Contaminations
A domain in which interfigurality is frequently to be observed is the grouping of
the characters or configuration, as it will be termed here. Figures from different
literary works can be brought together in a new fictional context, or a constella-
tion of characters (configuration) from one or more pre-texts can be changed or
even inverted in the subsequent text. A very obvious example of a new config-
uration as a result of bringing together figures from different works or traditions
is Christian Dietrich Grabbe's Don Juan und Faust, a play which polarizes its
eponymous heroes, who, with equal intensity, strive for the same concrete aim,
the possession of Anna, but who in their ultimate objective are sharply distin-
guished. Faust seeks in love also the absolute, whereas Don Juan's pursuit of
love is an emanation of his unbounded vitality and freedom which leads hirn
from one woman to another. ..
The two plots of Grabbe's play alternate and intersect without joining except
through Anna as the bone of contention (Genette 1982, 303). But the essential
thing is the play's new configuration, which counterpoints two life-
philosophies that are embodied in two figures from different literary works. A
similar example at another level would be Maurice Leblanc's collection of detec-
tive stories Arsene Lupin contre Herlock Sholmes, which, in the burglar-hero
Arsene Lupin, an ingenious master of disguises and roguish inventiveness, and
Conan Doyle's English detective Sherlock Holmes, the methodical observer
and deductionist, juxtaposes two contrasting cultural myths. The parodic nature
of this pairing is indicated by internymic devices: The French hero's name is
derived from Poe's detective Auguste Dupin, and the name Herlock Sholmes is
the result of the transposition of the initial phonemes of the first name and the
surname of the English detective. An extreme example of re-using figures from
other works is Charles George's play When Shakespeare's Gentlemen Get To-
gether, a burlesque which assembles several characters from various plays by
Shakespeare, Romeo, Othello, Antony, and Hamlet, who all ask for money
from Shylock, reciting their most famous soliloquies to emphasize their demand
(Priessnitz 1980, 14).
Interfigurali ty 115
A contamination of t ~ o distinct literary figures is effected in Kierkegaard's
Diary of the Seducer, an intertextual phenomenon marked internymically, as
was explained above. The seducer's first name Johannes relates hirn to Johannes
Faust and Don Juan. It would, of course, be simplistic to define Kierkegaard's
protagonist as an amalgamation of Goethe's and Mozart's characters, even
though he could, without these two models, never have been created in this
form. While the combination of two different literary figures in one person is
extremely subtle and intricate in The Diary of the Seducer, it is quite obvious in
Alphonse Daudet's Tartarin de Tarascon, who incarnates at once Don Quixote
and Sancho Panza. Tartarin has the soul of the Spanish hidalgo and the body of
his servant, and his self-debates, in which Tartarin-Sancho and Tartarin-
Quichotte exchange voices, are a funny nineteenth-century revival of the
medieval allegorical dialogues of the body and the soul.
The configuration of the pre-text can, in the subsequent text, be subjected to
various kinds of inversion. In The Female Quixote for example, an eighteenth
century imitation of Cervantes' Don Quixote by Charlotte Lennox, the pre-
text's pairing of master and servant is replaced by that of mistress and maid. And
in a German Cervantes imitation of the same period, Wilhelm Ehrenfried
Neugebauer's Der teutsche Don Quichotte, a male and a fern ale Quixote are
brought together with their respective servants. Another kind of configurational
inversion, which also involves the sex of the figures, occurs in George Bernard
Shaw's Man and Superman. Here the pairing of Don Juan and a woman as the
object of his desire is exchanged for that of seductress and guileless man.
Another type of configurational inversion is the already-mentioned exchange of
protagonist and antagonist in Gardner's Grendel. The pre-text's configuration
is in this book changed in yet another way. The dragon, which in Beowulfhas
nothing to do with the story of the hero's slaying of Grendel and his mother,
becomes Grendel's mentor in the modern novel. Interesting instances of similar
interfigural variations are to be found in several short stories by J oyce Carol
Oates which "re-imagine" works of world literature (Herget 1986).
The last type of interfigural variation to be discussed in this context is the
superimposition or contamination of different character constellations. A nice
example is Graham Greene's Monsignor Quixote, whose intertextual relation to
Cervantes' novel is almost excessively emphasized (Broich in Broich/Pfister
1985, 3 ~ 9 ) , whereas the novel's connection with Guareschi's Don Camillo and
Peppone is so weakly marked that it has virtually escaped notice. But it is impor-
tant to realize that Greene superimposes on the master-servant relationship of
Cervantes' novel a relationship of socially equal but politically and ideologically
contras ted figures. Another example of such a superimposition is Stoppard's
play Rosencrantz and GuildensternAre Dead, which turns Shakespeare's pair of
minor characters into twin-protagonists. Stoppard superimposes on this pair of
figures the Vladimir-Estragon relationship from Beckett's Waiting [or Godot
and the persona of Eliot's dramatic monologue The Love Song of J. Alfred Pruf-
rock. Such interfigural contaminations contribute essentially to giving Stop-
pard's playa distinctly modern character.
116 W. G. Mller
7. Literary Figures I dentifying with or Imitating Other Literary Figures:
Quixotism and Related Phenomena
A very large and important field of interfigural relations is constituted by those
literary figures that, as a consequence of intense reading experiences, forget the
boundary between life and fiction, empathizing so much with the heroes or
heroines of the works they have read that they use them as models guiding their
own lives and actions, which may lead them into collisions with reality. This
kind of interfigural empathy tends to trigger off actions. It is here that interfigur-
ality reveals an acute relevance to plot.
The term "reading protagonist" or its German equivalents "der Held als
Leser", "der lesende Held", and "Leserfigur" (Wuthenow 1980; Montandon
1982; Goetsch 1983; Stckrath 1984) is not entirely adequate to most of the
literary figures in question since they are rarely delineated in the act of reading.
Cervantes' Don Quixote and the many works written in its tradition, for in-
stance by Fielding, Lennox, Neugebauer, Scott, Flaubert, or Greene, present
heroes and heroines whose minds have been shaped and whose actions are deter-
mined by their reading, but the reading process is sparsely described.
An example of an identification with literary figures coming ab out in the
process of reading is to be found in the story of Paolo Malatesta and Francesca
Rimini from Dante's Inferno, Canto 5 (see Pabst 1949). Here the two lovers
discover their love and are moved to kiss during the very act of reading a love
scene from a medieval romance on Sir Lancelot. In George H. Boker's fine play
Francesca da Rimini it is the reading of the encounter of Guenevra and Lancelot,
told in libidinous words, that releases the erotic desire in the lovers. Another
example of an identification of w ' ~ literary figures occurring in the act of reading
is provided by The Picture of Dorian Gray, where Wilde's protagonist, reading
the "yellow book", interpretsits hero, the young Parisian hedonist, as a "kind of
prefiguring type of hirns elf" (Chapter 11), which confirms hirn in his intention
to live his life entirely and radically in accordance with his hedonistic principles.
A positive example of the identification with a literary hero is Wilhelm Meister's
reading of Shakespeare's Hamlet, which contributes essentially to his finding his
own identity (Goethe, Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre).
To describe the whole range of the ways in which fictional heroes empathize
with literary figures from earlier works would require aseparate study. Only a
few fundamental categories can be mentioned here, which are to be exemplified
by Cervantes' Don Quixote, a veritable store-house of different types of
interfigural relations. Intertextuality is realized in Don Quixote largely in the
form of interfigurality. The protagonist's enormous knowledge of chivalric
romances is fixated on the heroes of those texts, as is drastically illustrated in the
scene in which he mistakes two great Hocks of sheep for armies, reeling off the
names and descriptions of a great number of imaginary knights (Part I, Chapter
18).
Interfigurality 117
An extreme attitude Don Quixote takes towards the heroes of chivalric
romances is total identification (identificatio) as it occurs in Part I, Ch. 5, where
he returns, severely battered, from his first expedition, believing hirns elf to be, in
one of a sequence of strange delusions, the wounded moor Abindarraez and
talking "in the very words and phrases [ ... ] as he had read the story in J orge
Montemayor's Diana." Another, and a very frequent, type of conduct of the
knight of the sorrowful countenance is the imitation of literary heroes (imitatio),
his favourite model being Amadis of Gaul. He says to Sancho Panza that "the
knight errant who best copies hirn [Amadis] will obtain most nearly to the per-
fection of chivalry" (Part I, Ch. 25). At times he debates with hirns elf which hero
to imitate. Thus he once has to decide what is better and nobler for hirn, "to
imitate Roland's downright madness or Amadis' melancholy moods." (1,26) A
third type of conduct is emulation (aemulatio), the attempt to outdo the heroes
of the romances, "to eclipse the most famous deeds they ever performed" (1,20).
A fourth type is characterized by invention (inventio), for instance in the imagi-
nary description of the chivalric heroes, for which he believes to be qualified by
his competence as areader: "'For my absolute faith in the details of their his-
tories and my knowledge of their deeds and characters enable me by sound
philosophy to deduce their features, their complexions and their stature. ", (11, 1)
Don Quixote uses precedents from the lives of the heroes of the books he has
read as a guideline for his own life and actions, regarding those heroes not only
as models of strength and courage, but of virtue and ethics, too. Intertextuality
manifests itself in Cervantes basically on the interfigural level, Don Quixote
constantly and in ever new variations interpreting his life and attempting to
shape his conduct in accordance with the actions and ethics of the literary figures
he admires.
8. Intratextual Interfigurality: A Postmodern Form of Intertextuality
Interfigurality realized intratextually, i. e. within a text, may seem to be a con-
tradiction in terms. But it is an important modern phenomenon which has only a
few precedents in earlier literature. Its precise definition is necessary, particu-
larly a distinction from the term 'configuration'. Configuration is the constella-
tion or grouping of the characters of a fictional text. However, when a literary
work combines two or more fictional contexts and relations are established be-
tween the characters belonging to the different fictional contexts, a special form
of interfigurality can be recognized. An instructive example would be the play-
within-a-play. Thomas Kyd's Spanish Tragedy, for instance, repeats in Soliman
and Perseda, the play-within-the-play arranged by Hieronimo as a means of
effecting his revenge, the configuration of the play proper with a number of
significant deviations, thus creating intricate figural interrelations.
What is decisive in The Spanish Tragedy is that in the play-within-the-play a
somewhat changed mirror-image of the real situation is presented as a fiction,
118 W. G. Mller
which gives way at its revelatory climax to truth, when the audience on stage is
shocked into realizing that the villain-murderer of the playlet, the Turkish
Bashaw, is in reality the avenger-murderer Hieronimo of the play proper. In-
tratextual interfigurality offers enormous possibilities for the representation of
the relation between fact and fiction, an aesthetic potential that is exploited by
postmodernist works, as can here be illustrated only by two examples. The first
is Max Frisch's novel Mein Name sei Gantenbein (1964), whose leitmotif is the
formula "Ich stelle mir vor" ("I imagine"). The novel's narrator constantly tries
on stories like clothes ("Ich probiere Geschichten an wie Kleiderl") in which he
projects fictitious versions of his life that are related to figures identified by
names, among which those of Gantenbein and Enderlin stand out. Interfigural-
ity is here realized in the counterpointing of alternative narrated vers ions of the
self. Such figural relationships are a new invention in the history of the novel,
although they are foreshadowed in earlier periods, for instance in Cervantes'
Don Quixote and some eighteenth-century novels (Musus, Neugebauer, Wie-
land). They are of a kind totally different from the relationships between the
figures of a literary work which are traditionally designated as the grouping or
the constellation of the characters (configuration). Intratextual interfigurality has
its origin in the intersection or interpenetration of different fictional contexts,
which in Frisch's novel results in an ingenious rope-walking between fact and
fiction.
An American novel which is strikingly similar to M ein Name sei Gantenbein
is Philip Roth's masterpiece The Counterlife (1986). It is necessary to give a
rough - and much simplified - outline of the plot. The novel begins as a rather
conventional narrative, telling the story of theJewish dentist Henry Zuckerman
who, on account of a heart disease, has to take medication that makes hirn sexu-
ally impotent, incapable, that is, of having intercourse with his wife and his
lover, his practice assistant Wendy. To recover his virility he undergoes a heart
operation of whose consequences he dies in the book's first part ("Basel"). In the
second part ("Judea") Roth dishes up the surprising information that Henry is
still alive, having left the life to which he seemed to cling so much and gone to
Israel where he joins a group of Zionist settlers. After five months his brother,
the writer N athan Zuckerman, follows hirn to Israel in order to make hirn return
to his family. In the fourth part - after a grotesque account of a failed hijacking
on Nathan's flight back - the reader is all of a sudden plunged into Roth's intri-
cate play with fiction. We are told that Henry is not dead, that he does not live in
Israel and that he never had a heart disease. Everything turns out to be a fiction
invented by Nathan who transferred his own personal situation (the problem of
his heart disease and his attendant problems as a lover) to his brother. Wh at
Henry finds among his deceased brother' s papers in the fourth part are the
novel's first three parts, which mingle details of his own private life and his
brother's story. Among these papers there is also the book's last part ("Chris-
tendom") in which we learn that Nathan, too, is not dead, in fact trying to live a
bourgeois life with his former lover in England.
Interfigurality 119
Roth's play with fiction concerns, to a large extent, the identity of his charac-
ters. It is essentially of an interfigural nature. This can be illustrated by a passage
the novel's fourth part, where Henry Zuckerman reads, to his dismay, the
fIctlOn Nathan made out of his brother's and his own lives. What he protests
against is the writer's exchange of names and identities.
Wh at is most disgusting, Henry thought, the greatest infringement and violation, is that this is
not.me, not in any way. I am not a dentist who seduces his assistants [ ... ] my job is getting my
patte.nts to trust me, them comfortable, completing my work as painlessly and cheaply as
posslble for them, and Just as well as it can be done. What I do in my office is that. His Henry is, if
anyone, hirn - it's Nathan, using me to conceal himself while sirnultaneously disguising hirns elf
as hirns elf, as responsible, as sane, disguising hirns elf as a reasonable man while I arn revealed as
the absolute dope. (Roth 1988,258)
A more concentrated representation of intratextual interfigurality than in this
passage is hardly possible. The source of the interfigural relations in The Coun-
terlife is twofold. First, Nathan Zuckerman has "a variety of impersonations I
can do, and not only of myself - a troupe of players that I have internalized, a
permanent company of actors that I call upon when a self is required" (Roth
1988,366-367). He defines hirns elf as "a theater and nothing more than a thea-
ter." The second source of interfigurality, which is related to the first one, is
Nathan's fictionalization of the persons with whom he has relations. His lover
complains of his treating her as material for his art, asking hirn not to write abou t
her. He answers, "I can't write 'about' anyone. Even when I try it comes out
someone else." (Roth 1988,217). Interfigurality arises in this novel from the
multiplying of fictionalized versions of the self and the nonself, which results in
an intricate network of figural relations.
Two of the many instances of figural interdependence in The Counterlife
involve internymic relations. The two versions the novel presents of N athan' s
brother , the bourgeois American dentist and the fanaticized settler in Israel, are
distinguished as "Henry of Jersey" and "Hanoch of Judea". And the two non-
J ewish women who playa role in the lives of the Zuckerman brothers are called
Maria, a fact which Henry attributes to Nathan's predilection for that name-
"Nathan called all shiksas Maria" (Roth 1988,260-261) -, while Nathan's part-
ner Maria speaks of his "Mariolatry". She ultimately refuses to exist as N athan' s
invention under the name of Maria. The identity of the names of the two women
must be traced back to the fictionalizing mania ofNathan Zuckerman to which
all the novel's characters and character constellations are related. The source for
the specific formthat interfigurality assurnes in The Counterlife is what could be
called' 'interfictionality', the constant production of new interrelated fictions in
Roth' s "narrative factory" , of new versions of the main characters which depend
on one another.
120 W. G. Mller
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123-151.
WOLFGANG KARRER
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices
Research on tides, especially in literature, has grown to a respectable body of
findings du ring the last thirtyyears. And with the studies ofHoek (1981), Rothe
(1986) and Genette (1988) - the first two containing
it has also reached a theoreticallevel that permits connectIOns with the ongomg
debate about intertextuality. Hoekhas even coined the term "intertitularity" for
tide-intertextuality, and Genette jokingly refers to the subdiscipline of "titrol-
ogy". Mottoes have done less well. Research (Bhm 1975; 1977;
Berger 1982) remains mainly tied to the enumerative form-and-functlon ap-
proach, also typical of many of the earlier tide studies. This also holds true for
the few studies on tides for poems or for chapters in novels.
In this paper I shalllook at only one aspect of tides and their
textuality, and thus ignore many of the other aspects the studies above deal with.
On the other hand, I intend to use tides and mottoes as miniatures to contribute
to the more general and far more complex discussion about the intertextualitJ:' of
entire texts, genres, or period I shall begin with some theoretlcal
systematizations, to be by some social and historical considerations.
1. Theory
In its simplest form an intertextual tide is a literal quote from another text. Ship
of Pools (1962), for example, is a novel by Katherine Anne Porter quoting and
translating the tide Das Narren Schyff(1494), a social satire by Sebastian Brant.
In other words, Porter reproduces a textual element, also a tide, from another
text. Historical, cultural and geographical distance, and the contents of the two
books forbid any thought of plagiarizing. Porter uses what I have proposed to
call "elementary reproduction" (Karrer 1985). Just like any literal quote, the tide
reproduces a combination of words, specific and salient enough to be recog-
nized as a quote. And just like any literal quote, the tide overcodes s
novel with a second layer of meanings (Eco 1976, 133-135). The characters m
her novel, the ship situation, the whole social structure emerging in her book as
weIl as the moral framework she applies to it, will have to bear comparison with
Brant's representatives for the medieval estates and his humanistic values
grounding his satire.
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices 123
Here is a second example. Gf Mice and M en (1937), a story by J ohn Steinbeck,
derives its tide from a poem by R. Burns: "The best laid schemes o'mice an'
men/Gang aft a-gley/An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain/For promised joy."
The parallelism between animals and humans as weIl as the almost proverbial
saying apply very weIl to Lennie, George, and their dream of a piece of land. The
difference to the tide quote from Sebastian Brant is minimal. In both cases the
reader has to supply a context, whether the overall structure or theme or a
specific wording completing the quoted element. In both cases there is overcod-
ing of the text that follows the tide. And retro-actively the quote in the tide
receives its overcoding from the following text. For some readers of Steinbeck's
story, even the quoted line, when read in the context of Burns' poem, might have
acquired a permanent overcoding. But a twentieth-century reader might also
think of Porter when turning to Brant's satire. The difference between a tide
quoting another tide and a tide quoting from a text obviously lies somewhere
else.
Let us look at a third example: T. S. Eliot prefaces The Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock with a Dante motto from Inferno 27, 61-66, without marking or iden-
tifying the motto as a quote except by the shift to another language. The motto
functions very much like a literal tide quote in overcoding the following text:
Prufrock's love song is also a confession, his Boston a modern inferno, he him-
self a false counsellor like Count Guido da Montefeltro etc. And re-reading
Dante after T. S. Eliot might "uncover" traces of modern despair in Dante's
medieval hell. Again, overcoding works both ways. As recent studies have
shown (Bhm 1975, 122-130), mottoes for individual chapters behave very
much like motto es under tides. The same holds true for quotes embedded in
chapter tides. They all subsurne the following text under an element reproduced
from an earlier text or tide.
Instead of producing further examples for quotes in chapter tides or chapter
mottoes let me draw some tentative first conclusions: Quotes in tides or mot-
toes, whether for an entire text or parts of it, follow each other in hierarchical
positions. The main difference between a quoting tide and a simple quote occur-
ring somewhere in the text consists in the extension of the overcoding: a text tide
overcodes the whole text. So does the motto immediately beneath the text tide.
Tides and motto es for chapters or parts of a text extend their overcoding over
exacdy the part they are assigned to. Their overcoding is switched off by the next
following quote on the same hierarchicallevel (cf. Wieckenberg 1969,20). Sim-
ple quotes embedded in the current text are overruled by quotes inserted as
motto es and tides. The extension of their overcoding remains vague, unless rein-
forced or overruled by other quotes in mottoes and tides. It is more fruitful to
think of tides and motto es as privileged and hierarchical slots in texts, slots,
which can be filled - in the case of tides - or must be filled with quotes, as in the
case of mottoes.
Consider the following excerpt from a book tided A History of the United
States Atomic Energy Commission. Vol. 11: Atomic Shield:
124 W. Karrer
In selecting the title Atomic Shield we do not mean to suggest a definitive interpretation of the
post-World War II period of American history . Not enough time has passed for that. But we do
believe our title reflects a cornmon perspective shared by American leaders during those years
and that it will help the reader to perceive broad currents of historical change running through
our narrative. (Hewlett/Duncan 1969, xiv)
By quoting a key metaphor from political speeches in their tide, the authors
suggest a common perspective, that of American leaders, to their readers. In
other words, they borrow authority from the government - the book was com-
missioned by the AEC - to guide their readers' perception and interpretation of
events like the construction of the hydrogen bomb. The prior text subsurnes the
new one, and selects for it a point of view, not a definitive one, but authoritative.
Here is a fifth, rather elaborate example: Upton Sinclair's World's End (1941):
BOOK ONE: GOD'S IN HIS HEAVEN
I. Music Made Visible
II. Cote D' Azur
III. Playground of Europe
IV. Christmas-Card Castle
V. The Facts of Life
VI. Arms and the Man
BOOK TWO: A LITTLE CLOUD
VII. The Isles of Greece
VIII. This Realm, this England
IX. Green and Pleasant Land
X. La Belle France
XI. C' estla Guerre
BOOK THREE: BELLA GERANT ALII
XII. Loved I not Honour more
XIII. Women must Weep
XlV. The Furies of Pain
Xv. Amor inter Arma
XVI. Business as Usual
XVII. A Man's World
XVIII. Away from All That
BOOK FOUR: LAND OF THE PILGRIM'S PRIDE
XIX. Old Colonial
XX. The Pierian Spring
XXI. The Thoughts of Youth
XXII. Above the Battle
XXIII. Midsummer Night's Dream
XXIV. The World WeIl Lost
BOOK FIVE: THEY HAVE SOWN THE WIND
XXV. The Battle Flags are Furled
XXVI. The Parliament of Man
XXVII. The Federation of the World
XXVIII. The Red Peril
XXIX. A Friend in Need
XXX. Out of the Depths
XXXI. In the Enemy's Country
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices
BOOKSIX: THEY SHALL REAP THE WHIRLWIND
XXXII. I Have Seen the Future
XXXIII. Woe to the Conquered
XXXIV. Young Lochinvar
XXXv. I Can No Other
XXXVI. The Choice of Hercules
XXXVII. Peace in our Time
XXXVIII. Battle of the Stags
125
Quotes and extensions of their overcoding can be arranged as a top-down tree:
TEXTTITLE: Bible
I
I I I I I I
TITLE OF BOOK: I 11 111 IV V VI
I I I I I I
Browning Bible Virgil Smith Bible Bible
I I
TITLE OF CHAPTER: 6 8 9 etc.
I I I
Shaw Shake- Shake-
etc.
speare speare
This example leads us to a second conclusion: Elaborate hierarchies of tide
quotes and motto es with their elaborate demarcations of multi-Iayered overcod-
ing create certain systematic restraints in a horizontal, and systematic overdeter-
minations in a vertical direction which strongly, and perhaps not gratuitously,
remind one of organizational charts in modern bureaucracies. The hierarchy
itself in its homology to top-down decision processes is overcoded and assigns
to the Bible a high er position than to Shakespeare and Shaw. But Shakespeare
and Shaw by being subordinated to the Bible become third-rank sacred texts,
entided to overcode certain assigned areas of the novel. On the other hand, the
horizontal direction enforces a certain equality (cf. Rothe 1986, 333-347) or
dignity of the texts quoted: Browning and S. R Smith make it to the second rank
because of their religious references, and the 38 chapter tides are finely attuned
to a more chivalresque code of intertextual references. And the search for the
right quote in such elaborate tide or motto systems has led more than one author
to damn, fake or abandon motto es or tide quotes (Berger 1982; Bhm 1975,
11-13, 191).
Other texts prefer subtides (Rothe, 1970, 10-25; Rothe 1986,321-327) for
hierarchy; others, again, double mottoes as in the interesting case of The Souls o[
Black Folk, or multiple mottoes (Segermann 1977,43-145), inflated to the mon-
strous motto of Moby-Dick; others reproduce tides from mottoes (Rothe 1986,
67; Wieckenberg 1969, 15 L), elevate motto es JO tides or use quotes as both
(Segermann 1977, 141-145).
126 W. Karrer
Elementary reproduction in tides and mottoes uses all the transformations
known from quotations: the rhetorical metataxes, parody etc. (cf. Plett 1985,
81-88; Karrer 1977, 67-69). These transformations can also be reproduced in
tide games, where tides are strung together to form a new text: a kind of tide
cento (cf. Rothe 1986, 148) etc. But intertextuality cannot be reduced to the
literal or non-literal quotation of bits from other specific texts. Besides elemen-
tary there is also structural reproduction in intertextuality (Karrer 1985,
98-104). Structural reproduction in a tide like The System of Dante's Hell still
contains a tide quote ("Hell"), but it is not only quoting but also referring,
overcoding the parts of LeRoi J ones' new text with the elaborate divisions in
Dante's Inferno. Even if the tide is considered to be pardy literal, the text repro-
duction is purely structural. Tide reproduction is also structural.
Consider our sixth example: double tides as they move through the genres
(Rothe 1970):
Phaidros or On the Beautiful
Baptistes sive calumnia
Susanne ou le miroir des mesnageres
La Dieromene ou Le Repentir d' amour
Olympia ou la Caverne de Strozzi
Benno von Rabeneck oder
Das warnende Gerippe im Brautgemach
Dr. Strangelove or
H ow I leatned to stop worrying
and love the bomb
Hhnchen a la Toscana oder
Braten Sie schon in Ton?
,.
(philosophical dialogue)
(school tragedy)
(comedy)
(pastoral)
(melodrama)
(gothic novel)
(satiric film)
(advertisement)
Imitation and limited variatipns harden into conventions: a syntactic pattern,
which began as a pupil's addition to Plato's texts, becomes associated with dia-
logue and drama, moves by extension through emblematic double featuring into
decadence and final parody. Double tides are often used to ennoble other "Ies-
ser" genres by borrowing from philosophy and tragedy (Rothe 1970, 19). The
interior distribution of the two parts of the "or" disjunction also implies hierar-
chy: the seeming equality of the two parts turns into linearity and subordination
(Rothe 1970,23 H.).
Let us reconsider our first example: Brant' s Narren Schyff goes back to a long
and rather successful tradition of Narrenspiegel, Mirrors for Fools, early exam-
pIes like the Speculum stultorum leading back to the latetwelfth century (Volk-
mann 1967, 1207 f.). Brant simply changed the popular-genre marker "mirror"
for a new metaphor, or rather a metaphor occurring in other types of context.
The tremendous success of the Narren Schyff led imitators like Murner to new
variations of Brant's tide. He wrote a Narren Beschwrung (1512), a Der Schel-
men Zunft (1512), and a Geuch Matt (1519). By keeping "fools" constant and
ringing variations on Brant's "ship" such as "evocation", "guild", or "meadow",
Murner also reproduces Brant's device of reproducing and innovating the mir-
ror convention. The mirror convention had consisted in keeping the mirror part
Tides and Mot.toes as Intertextual Devices 127
constant and making the second position variable, mainly by filling it with vari-
ous social classes and groups such as dukes, magistrates, women etc. Exhaustion
sets in and the overcoding fades, if the pattern is taken far enough like in I deas
Mirrour (1594), Daily Mirror or, simply, the Spiegel.
It seems, the imitation-variation technique, so characteristic of elementary
reproduction in titularity (Grivel1973, 182; Hoek 1981, 184f.), leads to para-
digm formation, whether syntactic, as in the case of the double tide, or semantic,
as in the case of the mirror convention. One and the same tide, Ship of Fools,
refers to another tide (Brant) or a tide code (the fool paradigm).
Do these tide codes form a system (Rothe 1986, 9) ? Not quite, I think, but we
can try to systematize elementary and structural reproduction in semiotic terms,
drawing freely from the examples in the literature :
phoneticslgraphematics: reproduction of sound or letter patterns, such as trochaic rhythm
(Bergengruen 1960, 11, 13), alliteration (Bergengruen 1960, 139 f.); special typography, coloring
("rubrics"), spacing on the page, lining, the whole tide page taken as a graphematic system (Rothe
1986,425; Sondheim 1927). Mottoes carry their graphematic, decorative patterns, too (Seger-
mann 1977,44-57).
syntax: reproduction of certain phrase structures, such as noun phrases and their progressive
amplifications (Bergengruen 1960, 19 ff.), or, probably a more fruitful approach, a generative
grammar for sentences with deletions or transformations (Hoek 1981, 83-91) to allow for trans-
formations of genitives into compounds or other noun combinations (as in the "fool" example).
More generally, surface syntactic patterns serve to foreground certain words, arrange them in
linear order, and to connect them. The surface typologies in Bergengruen, Hoek, and Rothe
cover the essential paradigms for simple, double, tripie, or multiple noun phrases and their com-
binations: compound, genitive, copula series are frequent surface paradigms. If we extend the
rules to cover the relations between tide, second tide, subtide, tide group, and motto etc., the
patterns become more complex (cf. Grivel's typology, 1973,21-23; Rothe 1986,333,347,321),
but still remain patterns intertextually imitated and differentiated. There are even paradigms for
incomplete sentences, containing verb phrases (Bergengruen 1960, 155-177). Mottoes, though
mainly restricted to elementary reproduction, are habit-forming, too: certain conventions of
cutting and adapting quotes for motto es can be identified (Segermann 1977, 146 ff.). Faked
quotes in mottoes would make a fascinating study for motto paradigms.
semantics: paradigm formation through non-variation of one concept ("fool") or one semantic
marker in aseries of adjectives, nouns, compounds, single or in any syntactic linking. As a simple
formalization of Narren Schyff will show, there are different levels of abstraction:
(1 )
(2)
(3)
< fool + x > or < x + fool > < mirror + y > or < y + mirror >
~ /'
< x = "container" > < y = "social group" >
~ /
< - fool > < x + Y > < - mirror >
'-...../
< e. g. L 'reoie des femmes >
Thus, World's End or Of Mice and Men do not simply quote the Bible or Burns. They also
paradigmatically reproduce, for instance, all < y + End> or all < Of + x> patterns. Of Mice and
Men thus suggests, beyond its literal or elementary reference to the lines in a poem by Robert
Burns, a structural or generic reference to the dignity of philosophical tides simply by beginning
the quote with "Of" (from Latin "De"). "Of" plus noun(s) is a syntactic tide paradigm, which
serves to enrich the tide quote with a structural reproduction. Both together overcode the follow-
128 W. Karrer
ing text by Steinbeck, and make it - among other things - a philosophical treatise on the human
condition. Other important paradigms are structured by semantic oppositions like new/old,
great/little, first/last etc. (Bergengruen 1960,63-70; Volkmann 1967, 1295) and one of the terms
is able to evoke intertextually its opposite. Semantic paradigms in mottoes need studying, the
examples in Bhm and the commonplace tradition suggest there are such paradigms (e. g. the
decorative Victorian "flower" motto; cf. Bhm 1975, 115-122).
sigmatics: the reproduction of the same reference, mainly through tides and names (The System of
Dante's Hell; U[ysses), where titles function like names (Hoek 1981,206-243). But tides do not
refer to individuals like names do, but to serial products, often mass-produced. Tides containing
the word "AIDS" or "American" , for instance, acquire their intertextuali ty only through the fact
that they refer to the same referent. Computer-supported full textual search in tide files more
often comes up with such co-references than with intertextuality. Are there sigmatic paradigms
for mottoes?
Before turning to pragmatics, let met try to sum up. Elementary reproduction
and structural reproduction are dialectically connected: the second arises from
the first, and serialization leads to increasing levels of abstraction. The further
away the new element moves from the established paradigm, its semantic mar-
ker(s), the weaker the overcoding and the paradigm, until complete exhaustion
and vacuity sets in (cf. Hoek 1981, 196). Each tide thus inscribes itself, know-
ingly or unknowingly, into one or more historie tide codes within which it
posits itself through elementary or structural reproduction, strongly or weakly.
Sigmatic, semantic, and syntactic paradigms may form independendy from each
other, but where they combine, like in the double tide, they may establish very
strong conventions lasting for centuries.
2. History
I
Critics have often noted fashions and period styles in tiding and mottoing
(Rothe 1970, 299). These changes are intimately connected with the medium
carrying the text (Kuhnen 1953; Wilke 1955). But the pragmatics of ti ding can-
not be reduced to author-text-reader relations, even if we include the medium.
They will have to be related to a larger social and historie context. It is true,
much intertextuality derives from the author's expression ("Confessions",
"Autobiography", "Letters" etc.) or reader's response ("lustig", "thrilling" etc.;
cf. Volkmann 1967, 1177f.) or reference to common objects (e. g. the many
books called The Life of George Washington ). Others, mainly generic markers,
point at the medium employed (Song, Sermon, Treatise etc.; cf. Kuhnen 1953,
19-25; Hoek 1981, 189 f.). But to get through to the social relevance of tides and
mottoes one has to move beyond such narrow communicational functions.
Oral cultures know no tides. People refer to texts, stories told or songs sung,
through some name or episode, vaguely or clearly stored in their memories.
There seems to be no literal quoting, except for some sacred ritual texts, some
opening and ending formulas. These formulas create an intertextual framework
that allows people to identify the kind of textual situation they are about to enter
(Wilke 1955; Wieckenberg 1969, 27-40).
j
-'='
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices 129
All this changes in scriptural societies. Intertextuality increases, though re-
stricted to a small group of (mainly religious) scribes. Tides appear and differen-
tiate one manuscript from another. First paradigms begin to form. Scribal con-
ventions for opening and concluding texts replace the old oral formulas. Initial
letterings and subscriptions to manuscript illustrations lay the groundwork for
the mottoes. Tide slips are inserted into manuscript rolls; lemmata, rubrics,
performance indications are added to structure the texts and their readings
(Wilke 1955,2-45; Wieckenberg 1969,42-58). Tides are being catalogued. The
distinct roles of creator, performer and librarian of texts begin to emerge.
Print cultures change everything. The text becomes an increasingly mass-pro-
duced commodity, the tide its advertisement. Additional functions of the tide
emerge (Hoek 1981, 244-290). A differentiation of book, magazine, newspaper
texts sets in, and with it a differentiation of tide codes (Meyer 1987). Length of
tides, their placement, graphematic distribution, the linearity and hierarchy of
information, the relation of tide and motto, all undergo increasingly rapid semi-
otic codification; The main period of standardization is the 18th century with its
growing markets for reading matter (Rothe 1986, 266). Tide competition, tide
fraud, motto plagiarizing lead to regional, national and international copyright
agreements, often treating tides like registered trademarks of other commodities
(Rothe 1986, 39). Tides are slimmed down, many of their earlier ingredients are
exported to the cover, blurb, and back of the book or the frontispiece. Tide
changes become intricate bibliographie and economic problems (cf. Genette
1988,696 ff.). Intertextual elements signifying serialization are bracketed as the
additional serial tide (Rothe 1986, 15). Tide cataloguing codifies into manuals
for librarians and bibliographers.
The age of electronic media like films, radio, television, and videotexts freely
borrows from print culture and the stage, but also increases top-down hierar-
chies in tiding. Especially films, intertiding until the development of the sound
film, developed highly sophisticated codes of symbolizing power; market pro-
duction relations in a film or television studio are thoroughly welded to
graphematics and syntax. They carry semantic and sigmatic rules of their own.
Videotexts open their tide files like any hard-disc computer, from the top on
down. Through market research and large computer files, intertextuality
achieves new dimensions. Swiftian machines register tides for bestselling books,
test salient key words among consumers, and rate attractive syntactic and
semantic paradigms for authors in search of a good tide (Rothe 1986,96). New
tides are registered through trade papers. It is not possible to register paradigms
as trademarks, but longer series will create the same effect. In 1988 the German
Ullstein Verlag reserved the right to use intertextual tides like Erotostrojka, Sex-
ystroika, or Sexnost exclusively (Spiegel 52, Dec. 26, 1988, 178).
Not only does overcoding itself establish a positive, negative or ambivalent
relation to the tradition it quotes. Intertextual tides and mottoes also reproduce
with the elements and structures of texts from the past a way of reproducing
literature and its functions. What simply began as a device to distinguish and
130 W. Karrer
identify one manuscript from another, accumulated through print and elec-
tronic media other functions (to justify, facilitate, open, structure the text, to
produce an interest, inform about the poetic code, and fictionalize the co-text;
finally to attract the attention, dispose the reader, ,make hirn value and buy the
text). But these functions tend to integrate into functional hierarchies (Hoek
1981,279), serving to dissemble the ongoing reproduction of devices and func-
tions and to make the reader assent to the reproduced values of the dominating
ideology (Hoek 1981, 280-287).
If tide differentiation increases with competition in different consumer mar-
kets, this seems to reflect differences in social and cultural capital as postulated
by Bourdieu (Bourdieu/Boltanski 1981). The often noted presence of social ti-
des in literary on es (Volkmann 1967, 1166, 1183, 1232, 1251, 1274f.; Hoek
1981, 120, 126; Bergengruen 1960, 77-92) seems to point at a more than a
homonymous coincidence. The asynchronous and conflicting relation between
tide and economic position (Bourdieu/Boltanski 1981, 89-90) seems to find its
equivalent in the relation between intertextual tide or motto and following text.
Textual relations in novels, plays and poems innovate more quickly than their
intertextual tides and mottoes. The literary tide stakes a claim for a position in
the market, analogous to social tides in the job market. Intertextual tides and
motto es carry a cultural and social capital (Bourdieu/Boltanski 1981, 95) that
through paradigms establishes systems of classification for such tides. And these
classifications reflect (as in reallife) intense social conflicts and negotiations
between paradigms and tide codes (Bourdieu/Boltanski 1981, 103 ff.). Intertex-
tuality in tides and motto es thus not only reproduces bits of earlier texts, but
also conflicting systems of tide carrying different social and cultural capi-
tal. Intertextuality itself thus a product and tool of social reproduction,
reflecting hierarchies in society and reproducing them at the same time. Let me
test and illustrate these rather abstract hypotheses with a few additional exam-
pIes.
They come from the chronological chart of tides in the Oxford Companion to
American Literature, mainly from the nineteenth and twentieth century. I shall
look at tided tides, tides that bring social and literary tides together. Explicit
social ranking tends to fade away after the American Revolution to be replaced
by the subder ranking through ethnici ty and ancestrallines in American society:
The Prince o[ Parthia (1765)
Julia and the Illuminated Baron (1800)
Bracebridge Hall (1822)
"Alnwick Castle" (1822)
Koningsmarke (1823)
Charles the Second (1824)
Richelieu (1826)
Tamerlane and Other Poems (1827)
Fanshawe (1828)
Metamora (1829)
The Hawks o[ Hawk-Hollow (1835)
I
Bianca Visconti (1837)
Ferdinand and Isabella (1837)
Beauchampe (1842)
Major Jones's Courtship (1843)
Conspiracy o[ Pontiac (1851)
Hiawatha (1855)
Francesca da Rimini (1855)
The Cassique o[ Kiawah (1859)
Miss Ravenel's Conversion (1867)
Roderick Hudson (1876)
Count Frontenac (1877)
Lady o[ the Aroostook (1879)
The Grandissimees (1889)
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices
The decline of this aristocratic tide code is due to the rise of another:
Simon Suggs (1845)
Margaret Smith'sJournal (1849)
Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)
Mrs. Partington (1854)
Widow Bedott Papers (1856)
Neighbor Jackwood (1857)
Courtship o[ Miles Standish (1857)
Elsie Venner (1861)
Margaret Howth (1862)
John Brent (1862)
Private Miles O'Reilly (1864)
Hans Brinker (1865)
Josh Billings (1865)
BillArp (1866)
Tom Sawyer (1876)
Daisy Miller (1876)
Roxy (1878)
HazelKirke (1880)
Uncle Remus (1881)
Mr. Isaacs (1882)
Huckleberry Finn (1884) etc.
131
Even without explicit ranking, tide names imply through their intertextuality
with social names, caste, class or social standing. Both Roderick H udson and
Tom Sawyer appeared in 1876, but belong to two different sigmatic and pragma-
tic paradigms or social codes. If names condense semantic markers of time, place
and social standing, then tide names imply all that and contain a full narrative
program for their heroes of the book (cf. Rothe 1986, 13; Hoek 1981, 206-43).
Ranking through names ce des to symbolic ranking through traditional em-
blems of superiority or humility. The change, again, comes with the second half
of the 19th century and realism. Compare the following symbolic rankings (I
emphasize only the key words):
The Marble Faun (1860)
Surry of Eagle's Nest (1866)
The Gates Ajar (1868)
132 W. Karrer
The Fair God (1873)
Sevenoaks(1875)
Hearts of Oak (1879)
A WhiteHeron (1886)
The Tragic Muse (1890)
Flute and Violin (1891)
Golden House (1894)
The Choir Invisible (1897)
Sacred Fount (1901)
Wings of the Dove (1902)
The Golden Bowl (1904)
The Eagle's Shadow (1904)
Roads of Destiny (1909)
Dome of Many-Colored Glass (1912)
Sword Blades and Poppy Seed (1914)
Painted Veils (1920)
This Side of Paradise (1920)
BlackArmour (1923)
Roan Stallion (1925)
Silver Stallion (1926)
Look Homeward, Angel (1929)
Green Laureis (1936)
ThePilgrimHawk (1940)
Masque of Mercy (1947)
Guard of H onor (1948)
Thrones (1959)
If we compare these emblazoned titles, deriving from religious or medieval
heraldry, if not from ancient Greece, to the following titles, the contrast be-
comes dear:
Leaves of Grass (1855)
Bricks without Straw (1880)
Five Little Peppers (1881)
Old Swimmin'-Hole (1883)
The OldHomestead (1886)
Main-Travelled Roads (1891)
The Pit (1903)
Cabbages and Kings (1904)
TheJungle, (1906)
The Scarecrow (1908)
The Harbor (1915)
Cornhuskers (1918)
Smoke and Steel (1920)
A Few Figs from Thistles (1920)
Triumph of the Egg (1921)
Covered Wagon (1922)
Black Oxen (1923)
Adding Machine (1923)
All God's Chillun (1924)
Enough Rope (1926)
Street Scene (1929)
Tobacco Road (1932)
Man with aBull-Tongue Plow (1934)
The Cradle will Rock (1937)
Of Mice and Men (1937)
The Naked and the Dead (1948) etc.
Titles and Mottoes as Intertextual Devices 133
Again, compare Black Oxen to Black Armour, both appeared in 1923, both
belong to the same syntactic and even semantic (color) paradigm, but pragmati-
cally they are as farapart as knighthood and fieldwork are. Cabbages and Kings
(1904) summarizes the underlying conflict rather neatly. The shift from name
paradigm to symbol paradigm reflects increasing reification and brings titles and
mottoes doser together; mottoes stern directly from the heraldic and emblema-
tic traditions these titles draw on (Segermann 1977, 14-23). Mottoes in
nineteenth century literature and in twentieth-century criticism rank authors -
and by implication their texts -like a device for gentry and nobility. Notice that
many of the ennobling symbolic titles are intertextual, drawing on the Bible,
Shakespeare, Shelley etc. Intertextuality in titles and mottoes may pragmatically
serve to legitimize, ennoble, and dissemble products from a market economy,
promising a use value the texts they introduce often do not have.
If texts open to their social conditions through titles and mottoes and dosely
reproduce or challenge the dominating cultural codes, reproduce or innovate the
very reproductive mechanisms themselves, then literary titles and mottoes do
not only reflect the social fantasies of their readers (Rothe 1986, 115f., 124).
They reproduce and standardize them in paradigms that help to stabilize the
ruling ideologies about the individual creator or hero in society. They reproduce
or challenge the literary canon, genre hierarchies and social ranking etc. If the
relatively simple model of paradigm formation and code building sketched here
holds, we will have to try them out in more complex syntactic, semantic, sigma-
tic or pragmatic structures like plots, narrative stances, configurations, symbolic
networks, or dialogue construction. Titles and mottoes may just be miniatures,
but also a beginning for a more pragmatic study of intertextuality, induding
questions of ranking, authority, ideological reproductionand hierarchical over-
coding. '
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Irrtmern durchsetzte Gedanken zur Naturgeschichte des deutschen Buchtitels;
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Berger, D. A.
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Bhm, Rudolf
1975 Das Motto in der englischen Literatur des 19.Jahrhunderts. Mnchen: Fink.
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UD0J. HEBEL
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion
Critical enthusiasm for the newly created, though not entirely novel, concept of
intertextuality has resuscitated scholarly interest in the time-ho no red concept of
allusion.
1
While Genette treats allusion as only one manifestation of intertextu-
ality within his elaborate classification of transtextuality (Genette 1982, 8),
Schmid asserts allusion as the cardinal manifestation of intersemanticity (Schmid
1983, 145-146). Definitions of allusion as a device for the "formation of intertex-
tual patterns" (Ben-Porat 1976, 108), "a device for linking texts" (Ben-Porat
1979, 588), a "link between texts" (Perri 1978,289), or a "trope of relatedness"
(Perri 1984, 128) bear ample witness to the multifaceted attempts of theoreti-
cians of allusion to employ the terminological, and conceptual, advantages of
intertextual theory. The fusion of traditional allusional research with recent in-
tertextual approaches has prompted a more far-reaching appreciation of allu-
sion; and the latter may now serve as the over-arching category for an interpreta-
tion of verifiable relationships between texts, or, in poststructuralist terms, be-
tween a text and the intertextual deja of the texte general. The following paper
outlines major developments in allusional theory and presents a working defini-
tion of allusion as evocative manifestation of intertextual relationships. It intro-
duces a sequence of categories designed to describe overt allusions as functional
parts of narrative texts. The approach submitted is to advance the theoretical
understanding of allusions and to contribute to the formalization and systemati-
zation of their interpretation.
1. Allusion as I ntertextual Device
1.1. AllusionRedefined
In his A Map 0/ Misreading, Harold Bloom sketches the history of allusion on
the basis of the respective entries in the Oxford English Dictionary and, eventu-
ally, arrives at the distinction between a "fourth meaning, which is still the cor-
rect modern one [ ... ] and involves any implied, indirect or hidden reference,"
As the paper will limit its references to tides direcdy bearing on the argumentation, the following
three bibliographies may provide further sources : Perri 1979; Bruce 1983; Hebel 1989 a.
136 u. Hebel
and a "fifth meaning, still incorrect but bound to establish itself [that] now
equates allusion with direct, overt reference" (Bloom 1975, 126). Bloom's con-
clusive dichotomy draws attention to a significant point of controversy among
scholars of allusion as it foregrounds the definitional opposition 'covert' vs.
'overt.' Traditional notions that tend to emphasize the very indirectness, covert-
ness, tacitness, or implicitness of allusions have mainly been perpetuated in
handbooks to literature, above all in Preminger's Princeton Encyclopedia of
Poetry and Poetics (Preminger et al. 1974, 18; cf. Schweikle/Schweikle 1984, 15;
Holman 1980, 12; Wilpert 1979,30; Cuddon 1977, 30-31). This conception of
allusion has inspired an almost infinite number of encyclopedic endeavors,
which trace and document hidden references, without, however, always paying
due attention to the interpretive potential of the intertextual links retrieved.
N evertheless, philological zeal, sometimes even a kind of detective passion, has
laid invaluable groundwork for ensuing interpretations of some of the most
allusive works of world literature (cf. e. g., Rathjen 1988; Weisenburger 1988;
Coffler 1985; Clark 1931/1974; N athan 1969; Thornton 1968; J ensch 1925;
Burgess 1903/1968).
Recent studies on allusion, among which those by Ben-Porat (1973, 1976,
1979), Perri (1978,1984), Johnson (1976), Coombs (1984), Rodi (1975), and,
though in a different mann er , Conte (1974/1986) and Schaar (1975, 1978, 1982)
deserve special mention, have paved the way for a more encompassing under-
standing of allusion. Thus, Ziva Ben-Porat, defining (literary) allusion as "the
simultaneous activation of two texts," differentiates between allusion as a device
for "the formation of intertextual patterns" on the one hand, and allusion as a
"directional signal" (or " m a r k e r " ~ on the other, and asserts that the "marker is
always identifiable as an element or pattern belonging to another independent
text, [ ... ] even when the pattern is a comprehensive one, such as the tide of a
work or the name of a protagonist" (Ben-Porat 1976, 107-108). Ben-Porat's
inclusion of tides, names, and, later in the essay, "exact" quotations (Ben-Porat
1976, 110), modifies traditional views of allusion as it recognizes overt references
as allusional markers. Even more frankly, Carmela Perri urges the "disregard for
the usual criterion of covertness" (Perri 1978, 299): "Allusion-markers may be
overt, indeed, may occur as the extreme case of overtness, proper names" (Perri
1978,298, cf. 289 and 304). Allusional studies no Ion ger focus on an allusion's
implicitness or explicitness, but direct attention to its relational quality. The
allusion's potential to guide the reader to an additional referent outside the al-
luding text and the allusion's potential to build up semantically significant links
between the alluding text and the alluded-to text have moved into the limelight
of critical interest. Notwithstanding Preminger's 1986 rehash of the traditional
definition (Preminger et al. 1986, 10) and Bloom's contemptuous assault quoted
above, this perspective has by now found access to at least two literary hand-
books (Abrams 1981, 8; Frye, Baker, Perkins 1985, 15).
What seems to be litde more than an inconsequential exercise in definition
entails litde less than a restructuring of the terminological and conceptual field
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 137
of intertextuality, allusion, and quotation. Within the larger frame of intertex-
tual theory, as it has been laid out by Kristeva and her disciples, allusion becomes
the over-arching category under wh ich quite divers devices for establishing veri-
fiable intertextual relations can be subsumed. Above all, this stratification over-
comes the weaknesses of several studies on intertextuallinks as regards the rela-
tionship between allusion and quotation. Even Herman Meyer, in his still im-
portant work Das Zitat in der Erzhlkunst, calls the two categories "irgendwie
verschwistert" (Meyer 1967, 15), but does not explain the specific nature of this
congeniality any further. While Oppenheimer (1961, 1), Wheeler (1979,3), and
Bettina Plett (1986, 10) have argued in favor of allusion as the generic term,
Tetzeli von Rosador (1973, 2), Neumann (1980, 302), and Stierle (1984, 148)
have underscored quotation as the comprehensive concept. Genette treats allu-
sion and quotation as equally leveled subcategories of intertextuality (Genette
1982, 8). The above redefinition of allusion, together with the establishing of the
latter as a directional signal that refers the reader to another text outside the
alluding text, allows for the incorporation of quotations into the larger category
of allusion. Quotations, whether cryptic or marked, are nothing more, and
nothing less, than specific fillings of the syntagmatic space of the allusive signal.
It may even be contended that quotations, especially marked quotations, are
particularly 'directional' because, in addition to literalness (cf. Simon 1984,
1052; Morawski 1970, 691), referentiality has repeatedly been stressed as an
important feature of quotations (cf. esp. Meyer 1967, 15; Neumann, 1980,297;
Voss, 1985, 9; Plett 1988).
1.2. Allusions as Evocative Fragments of the Intertextual Deji
The changing focus of allusional theory, i. e., the disregard for the criterion of
covertness and the interest in allusion as an intertextually relational device, em-
phasizes the evocative potential of allusions and the description of the dynamic
process of their actualization. While Perri oudines this process almost laconi-
callyas "recognizing, remembering, realizing, connecting" (Perri 1978, 301),
Coombs distinguishes between the steps of "allusive reference" and "allusive
implication" (Coombs 1984,477), and Schmid sketches as many as seven phases
with regard to 'diegetic allusions' (Schmid 1983, 152). Once again, however, it is
Ben-Porat who provides the most effective, and interpretively significant,
model:
The more complex process of actualizing a literary allusion can be described as a movement
starting with the recognition of the marker and ending with intertextual patterning. The reader
has to perceive the existence of a marker before any further activity can take place. This percep-
tion entails a recollection of the original form of the marker, and in most cases leads to the
identification of the text in which it has originally appeared. The recollection of the marker's
original form may suffice for a modified and fuller interpretation of the sign as it appears in the
alluding text. Identification of the marker's larger "referent," the evoked text, is mandatory for
intertextual patterning beyond the modified interpretation of the marker itself. The process can
be roughly summarized in four stages. (Ben-Po rat 1976, 109-110)
138 U. Hebel
The four stages, then, read as folIows: recognition of a marker, identification of
the evoked text, modification of the initial interpretation of the signal, activation
of the evoked text as a whole in an attempt to form a maximum of intertextual
patterns.
Besides the formalization of theprocess of actualizing allusions, the addi-
tional systems of signification drawn into the alluding text playamajor role in
re cent approaches to allusion. Coombs's interest in allusive implications,
Schmid's concern with intertextual equivalences and oppositions, Ben-Porat's
emphasis on the intertextual referent and the formation of intertextual patterns,
and Perri's stress on "additional inter- and intra-textual patterns of associated
attributes" (Perri 1978, 293), all suggest that a successful allusion does not sim-
ply direct the reader to another text on a purely referentiallevel. More specifi-
cally, a successful allusion enriches the alluding text semantically by going be-
yond the level of me re denotation; the latter is, however, instrumental in estab-
lishing the intertextual relation as it dovetails text and pretext. A successful allu-
sion always evokes theoretically unlimited and unpredictable (cf. Ben-Porat
1976, 127) associations and connotations. Thus, a text's allusions disrupt its
syntagmatic flow and expose the reader to the realm of predominantly, if not
purely, associative "vertical context systems" (Schaar 1975, 1978, 1982). Each
allusion becomes "the apex of an associative paradigm" (Riffaterre 1978, 95).2
Such adynamie view of allusion is figuratively best expressed in Johnson's
dichotomy of "denotative nucleus" and "connotative cytoplasm" (Johnson
1976,580).
In the wake of poststructuralist textual theory and in accord with major
theoreticians of allusion (Perri 1978,295,305; Schmid 1983, 153; Coombs 1984,
477), it seems possible and onl)'i consequent to extend the scope of this concept
of allusion beyond the limits of Ben-Porat's approach that restriets itself to liter-
ary allusions (Ben-Porat 1976)."In the same way that literary allusions are con-
sidered evocative links between texts, allusions to nonliterary points of refer-
ence - nonliterary texts, persons of past or contemporary his tory, events of
social or political history etc. - may be regarded as evocative links between the
text and the intertextual deja. Carmela Perri's correlating allusions and proper
names may support this argument: "Allusion-markers act like proper names in
that they denote unique individuals (source texts), but they also tacitly specify
the property(ies) belonging to the source text's connotation relevant to the allu-
sion's meaning." (Perri 1978, 291) Searle's definition of proper names as "pegs
on which to hang descriptions" (Searle 1969, 172) further illustrates the similar-
ity between the working of literary allusions in terms of Ben-Porat and the
working of onomastic allusions to persons outside the alluding text. Just as liter-
2 lt will be interesting to note that Ferdinand de Saus sure contrasted 'syntagmatic' and 'associa-
tive': "Le rapport syntagmatique est in praesentia: il repose sur deux ou plusieurs termes egale-
ment presents dans une serie effective. Au contraire le rapport associatif unit des termes in absen-
tia dans une serie mnemonique virtuelle." (Saussure 1969, 171)
r
"
~ . , : - Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 139
ary allusions evoke the whole of the alluded-to text and, therewith, further
semantic equivalences and oppositions, "topical or historie al allusions to per-
sons or events" (Perri 1978, 305) evoke further attributes and connotations of
their referents that mayaiso contribute to the semantic enrichment of the allud-
ing text. Thus, any allusion acts as a "stumbling block" (Riffaterre 1978, 6),
drawing the reader's attention to the text's intertextual relationships.
From this perspective, the allusive system of a text becomes the verifiable
cross section where text and intertext meet, and where the intertextual back-
ground of the text becomes tangible for the reader. In terms of intertextual
theory, allusions are manifestations of the text' s ideologeme that marks the text' s
historical and social coordinates: "L'acceptation d'un texte comme un
ideologeme determine la demarche meme d'une semiotique qui, en etudiant le
texte comme une intertextualite, le pense ainsi dans (le texte de) la societe et
l'histoire." (Kristeva 1969, 114) Therefore, allusive signals are to be studied as
fragments of the intertextual deja, as metonymie elements participating in - at
least - two systems of signification. In following critics who have stressed the
general metonymie quality of allusive and quotational elements (cf. e. g., Hhler
1969,48; Pollak 1974, 62; Klotz 1976,265; Ben-Porat 1976, 108; Schaar 1978,
384; Voigts 1981, 362; Bell 1981 ; Stierle 1984, 148; Pfister 1985, 29), the present
approach argues for an understanding of allusions as metonymie fragments of
the intertextual deja.
1.3. Dialogie Allusions and the Reader as Text A reh eologist
Dynamic conceptions of allusions as metonymie or sylleptic (Riffaterre 1979;
Riffaterre 1980) elements in the alluding text involve a modified view of the
referent. Traditional studies of allusion are all too often primarily concerned
with the identification of the alluded-to referent and do usually not lead to a
reinterpretation of the latter. In the context of the Bakhtin-renaissance, intertex-
tual approaches to allusion have emphasized the dialogic nature of the relation-
ships between alluding texts and evoked referents, i. e., the consequence that any
allusion involves a commentary about the text, person, or event called up. While
Ben-Porat and Perri remain rather truncated in this regard (Ben-Porat 1976,
114-115; Perri 1978,296), Renate Lachmann affirms for quotation what holds
equally true for allusion:
Der fremde evozierte Text (Referenztext) tritt durch die Signale (Referenzsignale) mit dem ak-
tuellen, fremde Texte evozierenden Text (Phnotext) in eine intertextuelle Beziehung, die nach
der Art der Qualifizierung der Referenzsignale selbst in ihrer Funktion fr die Sinnkonstitution
bestimmt werden kann. [ ... ] Das Zitat wird in seiner Doppelfunktion: im Verweis 'auf einen
Referenztext diesen sowohl in seinen Elementen zu reprsentieren als auch gleichzeitig ber ihn
eine Aussage zu machen [ ... ] voll genutzt. [sie] (Lachmann 1980,19; also Lachmann 1984,136)
Nadel specifies this position: "Literary allusions, in other words, are a covert
form of literary criticism, in that they force us to reconsider the alluded-to text
and request us to alter our understanding of it." (Nadel 1982, 650) Thus, notions
140 U. Hebel
of allusion as evocative, bilaterally operative signal link up with Genette's con-
cept of metatextuality (Genette 1982, 10) and render Eliot's quasi-intertextual
ideas about the simultaneity of all works of literature and the perpetual process
of readjusting, if ever so slightly, the relations among them surprisingly up-to-
dale (Eliot 1917/1932).
These dynamic conceptions of allusion require the active participation of the
reader in the actualization process in order to exhaust the allusion' s evocative
potential as far as possible. It is therefore small wonder that, e. g., Perri (1978,
301) and Schaar (1982, 23) stress the importance of the reader for their approach
to allusion. Interestingly enough, it was Julia Kristeva herself, though in differ-
ent terms and in a different context, who took note of the role of the reader:
"Pour le sujet connaissant, l'intertextualite est une notion qui sera l'indice de la
fac;on dont un texte lit l'histoire et s'insere en elle." (Kristeva 1968, 311) The
establishment of intertextuallinks and the actualization of the evocative poten-
tial of allusions depends on the reader's "Resonanzbereitschaft" (Rodi 1975,
129) and his/her "Allusionskompetenz" (Schmid 1983, 154) because allusions,
defined by Rodi as "kulturelle Kommunikationseinheiten" (Rodi 1975), always
presuppose a certain foreknowledge on the side of the reader. If this allusive
competence is not available, if the reader cannot "recreate the textual universe"
(Schaar 1982,23), he/she must compensate for this deficit. To the best of his/her
abilities, he/she must work towards becoming an "informed reader" who makes
his/her "mind the repository of the (potential) responses a given text might call
out" and who "suppress[ es], in so far as that is possible, [ ... ] what is personal
and idiosyncratic" in his/her response (Fish 1970, 145). The reader's archeologi-
cal endeavors (cf. Schaar 1978, 382 ;.Stempel1983, 87) to appreciate the allusion's
evocative potential with the help of as many extratextual sources as accessible to
hirn/her prevents the confusion of one interpreter's allusive competence with
the allusion's potential, and bases the interpretation of allusions on more verifi-
able grounds.
The interpretation of allusions should no Ion ger content itself with more or
less atomistically tracing (hidden) allusions or with listing allusions denota-
tively; it should proceed to the fuller appreciation of their evocative potential,
elusive as the latter may be. The archeological activity of actualizing allusions
leads to the verbalization and documentation of the potential associations they
might trigger.
3
The resulting compendium that will be especially important for
historically or culturally removed texts serves to bridge presuppositional gaps
and to stop intertextual erosion (Riffaterre 1978, 136), not to limit a text' s
semantic openness or to curb the theoretically unlimited and uncontrollable
range of associations. The ensuing interpretation can, of course, no longer be
considered a spontaneous act of reading, but turns into the deli berate attempt of
3 I have demonstrated this kind of archeological work in my study on Fitzgerald's This Side 0/
Paradise; Hebel 1989 b. This work also includes the schema of the intertextual paradigm for the
documentation of evocative potential as weIl as an extensive apparatus of reference works.
T
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 141
an 'informed' critic - the text archeologist - to res tore the text's associative
verticality that purely syntagmatic readings are inclined to disregard.
1.4. Verifying Intertextual Allusions
The archeological work of documenting allusions and verbalizing their evoca-
tive potential goes hand-in-hand with, and actually presupposes, the verification
of those textual elements as intertextually related signals that strike the inter-
preter as possible allusions when reading the text syntagmatically. This initial,
still assumption will be stirred by the interpreter's allusive compe-
tence In most cases of unmarked allusions, and by special features of the alluding
text, such as quotation marks, italicization, capitalization, or even a character's
comment, in most cases of titles or marked quotations. After the interpreter's
initial assumption has been checked against the archeological apparatus, the sig-
nal is either established as a truly intertextual allusion evoking a referent trace-
able in the extrafictional dejd or, as will be the case with playfully marked sig-
nals, recognized as a pseudointertextual allusion without a traceable extrafic-
tional referent. In instances of suspected implicit allusions, a third variant may
concern the falsification of the reader's initial assumption.
The verification of a textual element as intertextually related allusion is the
prerequisite for actualizing an evocative potential that is independent from the
interpreter's individual disposition. Allusions verified as metonymic elements
of the extrafictional dejd the text's potential and the informed interpret-
er's "repertoire" (cf. Iser 1984, esp. 114-116). If, however, a textual element
hypothetically assumed to be an intertextually allusive signal on account of any
of the features mentioned above cannot be verified extrafictionally and, conse-
is classified as a pseudointertextual allusion, the following interpreta-
tIOn has to cope with a primarily arbitrary level of meaning. Associations
sparked by pseudointertextual allusions remain predominantly personal and
playful and are only checked by their cotextual embedding, with the latter, how-
ever, participating in the same system of signification. Pseudointertextual allu-
sions neither tack the signals toward definite points of reference in the extrafic-
tional dejd, nor do they establish verifiable links between the text's potential and
the informed interpreter's repertoire. Pseudointertextual allusions to "The Se-
cret Goldfish" in Salinger's Catcher in the Rye (Salinger 1951/1964,1), to "'Mad
Trist' by Sir Launcelot Canning" in Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher" (Poe
1839/1978,413), or to "The Courier's Tragedy" in Pynchon's The Crying of Lot
49 (Pynchon 1966, 63) may serve as representative examples of signals that,
though in different ways and to different degrees, seem to evoke intertextual
points of reference, but only direct the reader back onto themselves and back
the deluding text. Although the signals mentioned above are able to call up
hterary conventions, neither a verifiable referent nor any definite attribute
guides the text' s play with the reader. Although pseudointertextual allusions can
be traced back as far as Cervantes and have always been employed as particularly
142 u. Hebel
ingenious devices, pseudointertextuality has once again become prominent in
postmodern literature.
2. Describing Allusions
2.1. Syntagmatic Manifestations of Allusions
The verification - or falsification - of a signal as (pseudo )intertextual allusion
and the actualization of its evocative potential is to be followed by the descrip-
tion of the allusion with regard to its form and function within the alluding text
as weIl as with regard to its original status as an element of the extrafictional deja.
Referring to Frye's dichotomy, Rudat states:
I will call the first step, i. e., the "playing to" the allusive context, the centrifugal vector of the
allusion, and the second step, i. e., the "pulling in" of meaning into the alluding context, the
centripetal vector of the allusion. (Rudat 1985,2)
Whereas the actualization of evocative potential correlates to Rudat's first step,
the description and interpretation of allusions resembles his second step. The
approach presented hereafter does not, however, content itself with the "pulling
in" of meaning, i. e., with the semantic enrichment of allusively organized texts;
moreover, it aims at the systematic description of allusions with regard to their
working within the alluding text. The categories introduced have been designed
in the context of repeated demands for such a descriptive poetics (Lachmann
1983, 67; Plett 1985, 80). In its scope, the description mainly concentrates on
explicit (marked) allusions in narrative texts; but for a few exceptions, examples
are therefore mostly taken froql novels. The openness of the descriptive system
nevertheless ensures its modified transfer to the interpretation of implicit allu-
sions as well as to the interprettion of allusions in non-narrative texts.
In its first step, the descriptive appreciation of an allusion has to account for
the manifestation of the intertextuallink within the syntagmatic flow of the text.
Besides the basic distinction between implicit (unmarked) and explicit (marked)
allusions, with typographie conventions such as quotation marks, italicization,
capitalization, and spacing being the most important means of indicating an
intertextual relationship on the text's surface, the distinction between quota-
tional allusions, titular allusions, and onomastic allusions may serve to further
classify allusive signals. The distinction 'marked' vs. 'unmarked' is of only
minor significance for onomastic allusions because, owing to their particularly
referential nature, proper names are able to direct the reader to referents all by
themselves. Thus, proper names that do not refer to characters of the fictional
world are readily affirmed as allusive signals. When, in The Great Gatsby, Nick
Carraway yearns for "the shining secrets that only Midas and Morgan and
knew" (Fitzgerald 1925/1953, 4), the reader is confronted with three
names that cannot be related to any of the novel's characters. As onomastic
allusions whose extrafictional referents can easily be verified they are able to
1.'<;'
f'



Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 143
evoke a rather broad range of associations pertaining to proverbial, beneficial, yet
also destructive wealth. Quite similarly, Prufrock' s claim, "'No! I am not Prince
Hamlet, nor was meant to be,'" in Eliot's "The Love Song ofJ. Alfred Prufrock"
(Eliot 1963, 17) sets up an in tertextuallink between Eliot' s poem and Shake-
speare's play that ironically illustrates Prufrock's indecisiveness and insecurity.
Onomastic allusions are more complex when a character of the fictional world
bears a name that also functions as an intertextual allusion. The degree of simi-
larity between a character's name and the name of the referent person may vary
greatly; the equation and inversion of initials, as is the case with the letters "J"
and "C" in the names of Jim Conklin, one of the soldiers in Crane's The Red
Badge of Courage (1895/1982), and Jesus Christ, and with the letters "H" and
"F" in the names of Henry Fleming and Frederick Henry, the protagonists of
The Red Badge ofCourage and Hemingway'sA Farewell toArms (1929/1957),
the phonetic and graphie similarity of the names of the protagonists of Lewis's
Babbitt (1922) and Updike's Rabbit-trilogy (1960, 1971, 1981), and the evoca-
tion of Jean-Marie Villiers de L'Isle-Adam and - only recognizable on ac count
of the novel' s events - J ohn Peale Bishop by means of the name of Thomas Parke
D'Invilliers in Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise (1920/1970), elucidate the al-
most limitless range of possibilities available to authors in relating fictional
characters to intertextual points of reference. Clearly, comparable onomastic
allusions such as, e. g., toponymic allusions can be equally evocative.
The group of quotational allusions, first of all, needs to be divided into
'marked quotations and unmarked quotations. The recognition of unmarked
quotations depends almost entirely on the reader's allusive competence that, to
include one example, allows for the identification of Amory Blaine's self-
characterization in This Side of Paradise ("'[ ... ] yet I have not one drop of the
milk of human kindness."'; Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 280) as an allusion to Shake-
speare's Macbeth. Quotations can be marked as intertextual signals by means of
quotation marks, as in the case of the quotation from Keats's "The Eve of St. Ag-
nes" ("I don't catch the subtle things like 'silver-snarling trumpets."') in This
Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 84), by italicization, as in the case of a
quotation from Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind" ("How many miles must a
man . ... Folk. Rock is out ... the answer, my friend ... Love and peace are in. ")
in Updike's Couples (Updike 1968,439), by italicization and reproduction in the
originallanguage, as in the case of a quotation from Tristan und Isolde ("Oed'
und leer das Meer") in Eliot's The Waste Land (Eliot 1963,64), or by spacing
longer quotations, as in the case of the quotation frorn MarveIl's "To His Coy
Mistress" in Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms (Hemingway 1929/1957, 154).
Of course, all means of indicating allusions can be combined with each other
and/or with the name of the author, with the latter furthermore supporting the
foregrounding of the intertextual link, Examples for this subgroup are the
quotes from "To His Coy Mistress" in A Farewell to Arms and from "Triumph
of Time" in This Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,231-232) in which
instances Marvell and Swinburne are explicitly referred to in the text.
144 u. Hebel
Titular allusions also need to be described as unmarked or marked signals.
While unmarked titular allusions - two examples may be the allusion to Allen
Ginsberg's "Howl" in Cheever's Bullet Park (Cheever 1969/1979, 6) and the
allusion to Thompson's "The Hound of Heaven" in This Side of Pa ra dise (Fitz-
gerald 1920/1970, 262) - must be counted in among the most difficult signals to
be recognized on the text's surface, most marked titular allusions, no matter
whether the signal evokes a book, a magazine, a song, or a painting, employ the
typographical conventions mentioned before to activate the reader's allusive
competence. Thus, italicization marks "Penrod Jasper [sic], Uncle Tom 's Cabin,
U.S.A." (Oates 1968, 105) and 'CScientific American" and "Reader's Digest"
(Oates 1968,46) in Expensive People; quotation marks designate "'The Scarlet
Letter'" and "'Tom Sawyer'" ironically presented as quasi-historical reading in
Cather's The Professor's Hause (Cather 1925/1938, 50), '"Middlemarch''' read
by Penelope in Howells's The Rise of Silas Lapham (Howells 1885/1971, 88),
and the painting '''Cherry Ripe'" mentioned as decorative piece in Fitzgerald's
This Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 167); and capitalization specifies
"Golden Treasury" as the tide of a book in This Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald
1920/1970,47) although the widespread use of this poetry anthology in America
is, of course, not yet evoked.
Typographical conventions mayaiso help distinguish lexically identical allu-
sions to different points of reference. Thus, Doyle's novel Sir Nigel is evoked
twice in This Side of Paradise: firsdy, by means of a titular allusion with the
signal marked as a tide by quotation marks (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 27; "Sir
Nigel"); and, secondly, by means of an onomastic allusion to the novel's pro-
tagonist with the name not markeq as an allusive signal (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,
31; Sir Nigel). When a verbal sequence has been recognized as an intertextually
related signal on account of quotation marks, capitalization can similarly help
decide whether the allusion is to be treated as a (short) quotation or as a tide.
Capitalization identifies the signal '''Mystic and Somber Dolores'" (Fitzgerald
1920/1970, 51) as a titular allusion to Swinburne' s poem even if the original tide
merely reads "Dolores," whereas the use of smal11etters in the signal '''silver-
snarling trumpets'" cited above indicates that the phrase is to be classified as a
quotational allusion.
The systematic description of a text's allusions as (marked and/or unmarked)
quotational allusions, titular allusions, or onomastic allusions allows for the
evaluation of the text's referentiality and communicativity (Pfister 1985, 26-27),
and therewith for the evaluation of the text's intertextual and metatextual inten- t.
sity. The analysis of the various means of marking intertextuallinks on the text' s
surface permits the appreciation of the consciousness of the intertextual relation
both in the act of producing the text and in the act of actualizing the text. Prac-
tices such as Eliot's "Notes on the Waste Land" (Eliot 1963,80-86) document a
maximum of intertextual consciousness on the side of the author and intend to
ensure an equally intense intertextual awareness on the side of the reader, pro-
vided that such notes or indexes are not just another manifestation of the text' s -
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 145
and the author's - playfulness as, e. g., in Nabokov's Pale Fire (1962). The ex-
plicit mention of authors in connection with quotational and titular allusions
further contributes to the intertextual intensity of the signals, and the text in
general. Although intrinsically referential and communicative, onomastic allu-
sions are, however, less selective (Pfister 1985,28-29). While quotations, owing
to their specific metonymic structure, are likely to establish rather precise inter-
textuallinks, an author's name is much more prone to evoke an a:uvre or even a
literary tradition. Tides, especially tides of so-called classic works of literature,
should be placed in the middle between these two poles that represent a quite
definite, yet evocative intertextual connection on the one hand, and a more com-
prehensive, even more evocative intertextual connection on the other. Thus, the
analysis of this first descriptive category not only leads to the examination of an
allusion's and, eventually, a text's intertextual intensity, but also to the analysis
of an allusion's and, eventually, a text's semantic openness. One step further,
then, the analysis will deal with the structure of the text's implied reader and the
latter's presupposed allusive competence.
2.2. Localization of Allusions
The second category assesses the localization of allusions:
Die Ebenen, auf denen jeweils der Bezug zu Geschriebenem erfolgt, drfen nicht verwischt oder
verschoben werden. Ein aus einem anderen Buch stammendes Motto ber einem Buch ist etwas
anderes als derselbe Ausspruch im Munde einer der Hauptfiguren eben dieses Buches. Was ein-
mal nur ein Signal ist, das ist bei anderer Gelegenheit, also innerhalb des Rahmens der Fiktion, ein
Charakteristikum oder ein Mittel der Motivierung. (Wuthenow 1980, 18)
Notwithstanding Wuthenow's limited perspective on literary allusions, the
above quotation draws attention to the significance of the localization of allu-
sions within the text's multilayered webwork. The opening passage of Salinger's
The Catcher in the Rye with its allusion to "all that David Copperfield kind of
crap" (Salinger 1951/1964, 1) evidences how the interpretation of allusions
needs to consider the narrative situation of the alluding text, in this instance a
retrospective first-person narration. The allusive self-characterization of Hol-
den Caulfield, especially his outspoken contempt for tradition al Victorian cul-
ture, and the metatextual contrast between the novelistic convention evoked by
the mention of Dickens's David Copperfield on the one hand, and its inversion
in Salinger's novel on the other, has to be placed into the context of Holden's
account of his life. Owing to the mediative nature of any act of narration, allu-
sions can neither be taken as pseudobiographical clues to the author's reading or
intellectuality, nor can they be analyzed with regard to their stylistic effect only.
The interpretation needs instead to ponder the consequences of the mediation of
allusions and their cotextualization for, e. g., the assessment of their characteriz-
ing function, not only in instances of first-person narrative situations, but in
instances of figural and omniscient narrative situations as well.
146 U. Hebel
On the basis of structuralist models of the text and their distinctions between
the level of the (narrating) discourse and the level of the (narrated) story\
Broich's suggestions for a classification of means of marking intertextuality
(Broich 1985, 31-47), and Genette's concept ofparatextuality (Genette 1982,9),
the present approach proposes a threefold differentiation: allusions can occur as
elements of the paratext, as elements of the extern al system of communication,
or as elements of the internal system of communication. Paratextual allusions
include, above all, allusions in titles, epigraphs, chapter headings and chapter
epigraphs, notes, and prefaces. Titles such as Tender is the Night (1933/1961),
with its allusion to Keats, and The Sun Also Rises (1926/1954), with its allusion
to Ecclesiastes, are well-known examples of intertextual titles. The quotations
marked as taken from Melville's Benito Cereno and Eliot's Family Reunion in
Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man (Ellison 1947) bear witness to the widespread
convention of the epigraph. Fowles's The French Lieutenant's Woman (1969)
makes ample use of quotational allusions for chapter headings. Eliot's "Notes on
the Waste Land" show how intertextuallinks can also be established on this level
of the paratext.
Although some paratexts may be intricately mingled with the narrative pro-
cess proper - e. g., the "forewords" to Nabokov's Lolita (1955/1958/1970) and
Pale Fire (1962) which are also partly reminiscent of the topos of the found
manuscript - the majority of paratextual allusions, and especially intertextual
titles, epigraphs, and chapter headings, are usually not part of the mediative
process of narrating and often border on authorial commentary. They are there-
fore not grouped with those allusions that are located in the extern al system of
communication between the nan:i1tor (whose realm of existence needs not be
identical with the fictional world, but who is still not identical with the historical
person of the author) and the ;eader. Allusions on this level are primarily par-
ticipating in the act of narrating; i. e., they are primarily part of the discourse as
the linguistic and semantic concretization of the events. Such allusions are un-
known to the characters of the fictional world, and they have frequently been
treated as elements of the "parole of literary men" (Boswell 1922, 152) or as
elements of a "Geheimgesprch" (Giustiniani 1965, 113) between - in terms of
older narrative theory - author and reader. Striking examples of such discursive
allusions are the adjectival signals "Freudian," "Swinburnian," "Byronic,"
"Shelleyan," "Dionysian," and "epicurean" in This Side 0/ Paradise (Fitzgerald
1920/1970,6,7,99,107,109,143) whose attributive usage evidences their far-
reaching assimilation into the discursive strategies of this text and makes them
assurne quasi-Iexical status, especially when the capitalization is dropped as in
the last example.
Allusions located in the internal system of communication are accessible to
the fictional characters and presented as part of the narrated fictional world. At
4 For a survey of structuralist approaches by Barthes, Bremond, Chatman, Genette, Stierle, and
Todorov, cf. Ludwig 1982, 65-77.
. j
I
T owards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 147
first sight, it may seem largely irrelevant for their description whether the
characters themselves, including first-person narrators and reflector characters,
quote texts at length and mention books or historical figures in their own
speeches, or whether the narrator's text refers to books or persons from outside
the fictional world in such a way that their presence within the fictional world,
e. g., as books read or discussed by the characters, becomes obvious. Closer
analyses of these subcategories reveal, however, that there are nevertheless con-
siderable differences in intertextual intensity between the brief mention of a
book as part of a character's reading in the narrator's text as opposed to the
explicit discussibn of a book. When, in J oyce' s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young
Man, Stephen Dedalus "pored over a ragged translation of The Count of Monte
Cristo" Ooyce 1916/1976, 62), the foregrounding of the intertextuallink is not
quite as effectual as when, only little later in the same novel, Captain Marryat,
Cardinal Newman, Lord Tennyson, and Byron Ooyce 1916/1976, 80-81) are
'critically' evaluated in a reported conversation of the boys. The following pas-
sage from the dialog between the protagonist and Mr. Norton in Ellison's Invis-
ible Man illustrates how allusions located in the characters' direct speech in-
crease the intensity of the intertextual relation:
..
"You have studied Emerson, haven't you?"
"Emers on, sir?"
"Ralph Waldo Emerson."
I was embarrassed because I hadn't. "Not yet, sir. We haven't come to hirn yet."
"No?" he said with a note of surprise. "WeIl, never mind. I am a New Englander, like Emerson.
You must leam ab out hirn, for he was important to your people. He had a hand in your destiny.
[ ... ]" (Ellison 1947,42)
The description of allusions with regard to their localization allows for the
evaluation of their functioning either as discursive elements in the external sys-
tem of communication or as elements of the fictional world rendered in the act of
narrating. The analysis of discursive allusions contributes to the appraisal of the
artistic dimension of the alluding text and touches upon, among other things,
techniques of characterization or setting evocation. The analysis of allusions
presented as part of the fictional world emphasizes the metatextual dimension of
the text because these allusions are narrated, and thus commented upon, just as
the events and characters of the fictional world are narrated and commented
upon. The interpretation of the localization of allusions documents their dou-
ble-directed role: "Die Sprache bildet im Roman nicht nur ab, sondern sie dient
auch selbst als Gegenstand der Abbildung." (Bachtin 1979, 309)
2.3. Dimension(s) of Reference
While the first two categories remain mostly independent of the preparatory
archeological work and mayaiso be applied to pseudointertextual allusions, the
third category, dimension(s) of reference, relies on both the extrafictional verifi-
cation of the point of reference and the actualization of the allusion. The sys-
148 U. Hebel
tematic analysis of a text's allusive frame of reference not only replaces the
atomistic examination of single allusions but above all reveals the text's metatex-
tual position within the intertextual deja. As early as 1928, Johnson focused on
the "sources of literary allusion and reference used by modern writers, espe-
cially in America" Oohnson 1928, 1), and established ten groups: the Bible,
religion, classical life to 300 A. D., his tory, folklore, medieval literature
(300-1550), modern literature (since 1550), art, science, and commerce/indus-
try. Fifty years later, Wheeler stressed three major areas:
Cultural allusions help to identify or define national, regional or dass cultures. [ ... ] Generic
allusion indicates the relationship between an adoptive text and a literary convention or tradition.
[ ... ] Textual allusions are by far the most common kind in Victorian fiction, establishing links
between specific adopted and adoptive texts. (Wheeler 1979, 18-20).
Taken together, both studies suggest a threefold partition of the referential di-
mension: temporally, spatially, and with regard to the area of reference.
The description of allusions with regard to the temporal aspect permits the
assessment of the overall temporal frame of reference of the alluding text as well
as the analysis of the latter's topicality effected by connections with the immedi-
ate texte general. In addition to Johnson's rather broad chronological classifica-
tion (biblical times, classical antiquity, middle ages, modern times), it will there-
fore be necessary to define the temporal dimension of an allusion more precisely
with regard to the century to which its referent can be traced and/or with regard
to the latter's contemporaneity with the alluding text, i. e., with the time of its
production and immediate reception. Contemporary allusions contribute deci-
sively to a text's 'realityeffect' (Ba.rthes 1968), while, at the same time, eroding
the text's understandability by "their very topicality. Two striking examples of
topicality achieved by means of evoking prominent figures of the contemporary
texte general concern the last-minute insertion of the allusion to "a critic named
Mencken" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,209) into the galley proofs of Fitzgerald's first
novel and the allusion to Norman Mailer giving "a perfectly coherent, surpris-
ingly pedantic talk on 'The Great American Novel: When Is It Due?'" (Oates
1968,67) in Expensive People.
The analysis of the spatial aspect places allusions into the geographical and
linguistic surroundings of the text. This subcategory requires ongoing modifica-
tion with every new text examined and renders strictly national or linguistic
differentiations basically inadequate. The interpretation of American and Eng-
lish texts, however, should always account for the specific historical and linguis-
tic relationship between both nations. Together with the temporal analysis, this
second subcategory provides further insight into the text's presuppositions and
the structure of its implied reader. That authors do pay attention to problems of
presupposition and intertextual erosion can be documented by Fitzgerald's
"plan about the reissue of Paradise Ci. e., This Side o[ Para dis e ] with changed
names, (For those underThirty Six.)" (Fitzgerald 1978, 315; cf. also Preisendanz
1984,543 on Wieland).
T
f
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 149
Although the description of the areas of reference may take up Johnson's and
Wheeler's proposals, it must be left particularly open to modification. Each new
text may require scholars to add areas of intertextual reference and/or drop
those that have traditionally been prominent. Nevertheless, subcategories such
as literature, religion/Bible, history, politics, science, economics, philosophy,
the fine arts (including their subdivisions ), legal affairs, education, sports, mass
media (including their folklore, mythology, etc., may furnish a
starting point for the intertextual study of any text. The interpretation of twen-
tieth century texts should employ the subcategory of popular culture and espe-
cially popular literature, popular music, and the movies.
5
Already a superficial
perusal of modern American literature induces the hypothesis that the Bible,
cla;sical antiquity, and Shakespeare that Wheeler stresses as the three most im-
portant sources for allusions in Victorian fiction (Wheeler 1979, 11, 16,24) have
lost at least part of their influence on modern and contemporary literature al-
though the significance of the Bible as an intertextual point of reference still
seems hard to overestimate. Two exemplary texts worth studying with respect
to popular culture allusions are Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye with its allu-
sions to magazines ("Vogue," "Saturday Evening Post"; Salinger 1951/1964, 58,
124-125), entertainment (" the Ziegfeld Follies"; Salinger 1951/1964,29), and the
movies ("Cary Grant," "Peter Lorre," "Sir Laurence Olivier"; Salinger 1951/
1964,37,72,117), and Sam Shepard's play The Tooth o[Crimewithits abundant
allusions to popular rock music of the 1960s (e. g., "'Heroin' by the Velvet
Underground"; Shepard 1974/1981,205). The allusion to David Belasco in Fitz-
gerald's The Great Gatsby ('''This fella's a regular Belasco. It's a triumph. What
thoroughness! What realism! Knew when to stop, too - didn't cut the pages."';
Fitzgerald 1925/1953,46) evinces how allusions to contemporary (popular) cul-
ture, in this instance to one of the foremost American theater producers of the
times, supersede allusions to the Bible, classical mythology, and Shakespeare.
This allusion to Belasco and his obsession with creating an illusion of reality on
stage parallels the thematic core of the novel, i. e., Gatsby's ultimately futile
attempt to make his illusionary dream ofDaisy, and all she represents, come true
by staging one gigantic show for her. -
The systematic analysis of a text's allusive frame of reference with regard to
the three dimensions discussed leads to the retrieval and evaluation of the text' s
intertextual coordinates. It lays the groundwork for the interpretation of the
text's metatextual position as it outlines major areas of intertextual reference. In
connection with the second category (localization) this third category enables
the interpreter to appraise the characterizing function of allusions more pre-
cisely, as those signals located in the characters' direct speech - or otherwise
accessible to the fictional characters - are now assessed with regard to their
field(s) of reference and thus, consequently, with regard to their characterizing
5 Further may utilize the subcategories established by Inge in his Handbook 0/
American Popular Culture (In ge 1978-1981).
150 U. Hebel
implications. Finally, the analyses of various texts spread out historically may
disclose possible changes in the intertextual frames of reference throughout
literary his tory and, thus, possible changes in the structures of implied readers
and their presupposed cultural knowledge.
2.4. Modi[ication o[ Allusions
The fourth descriptive category, modification, pertains to possible differences
between the wording of the allusive signal in the alluding text, on the one hand,
and the wording of the quotation in its original cotext, the original tide, and even
the true proper name of a person, on the other. As the present approach concen-
trates on the alluding text, questions as to the intentionality or unintentionality
of such modifications are rendered obsolete. Theoreticians of quotation have
repeatedly emphasized the significance of modifications (esp., Metschies 1966,
5; Meyer 1967, 15; Simon 1984, 1053; Plett 1988), and Heinrich F. Plett writes as
follows:
Bislang war vom Zitat als einer intertextuellen quivalenz die Rede, wobei stillschweigend un-
terstellt wurde, da das zitierte Textsegment unverndert vom Prtext in den Text bergeht. Eine
derartige quivalenz oder Identitt ist jedoch nicht die Regel. Vielmehr drfte das Zitat hufig
gewisse nderungen erfahren, die [ ... ] im poetischen Kontext zustzlichen Spielraum fr Poly-
semie- und Ironie-Phnomene schaffen. Die Vernderungen erfordern die Aufspaltung des
Zitatsegments in zwei Varianten; die erste ist Bestandteil des Prtextes, die zweite Bestandteil des
Textes. (Plett 1985, 82)
The impact of modifications is quite obvious for quotational allusions, and it
will weIl suffice to once more pointJo the extended allusion to Benjamin Frank-
lin in The Great Gatsby (Fitzger1ald 1925/1953, 174) where, on the fly-leaf of "a
ragged old copy of a book called H opalong Cassidy, " young Jimmy Gatz noted a
trivialized twentieth-century version of Franklin's well-known schedule for
self-improvement. However, the following passage from Tender is the Night
illustrates the applicability of this fourth category to onomastic and titular allu-
sions as weIl:
The sun had dipped into the Via N azionale and he [Dick Diver] let it through the portieres with a
jingling of old brass rings. Waiting for a suit to be pressed, he discovered from the Corriere della
Sera that "una novella di Sainclair Lewis 'Wall Street' nella quale autore analizza la vita sociale di
una pie cola citta Americana." Then he tried to think about Rosemary. (Fitzgerald 1933/1961,
207).
Notwithstanding the debatable nostalgia in Lewis's Main Street, an allusion to
this novel by means of its genuine tide might have evoked a critical image of
America and her 'sociallife' for the contemporary reader. Yet, the variant "Wall
Street" with its substitution of "Wall" for "Main," and the resulting explicit
reference to the hub of the Great Depression emphasizes the dark sides of
American economic life and its avowed materialism. Whereas it may go rather
far to read the variant "Wall Street" as an allusion to the subtide of Melville's
"Bardeby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-Street" and induce further implica-
T
T owards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 151
tions from this link, it will be agreeable to most critics of Fitzgerald's novel
to stress the allusion "Wall Street" as a major means of support to its thematic
core.
The modification of "Sinclair" to "Sainclair" sparks equally interesting as-
sociations. Though somewhat more speculative, three interpretations come to
mind: "Sainclair" may call forth Fitzgerald's and Lewis's common but differing
relations hip with Saint Paul, Minn.; "Sainclair" may be taken as an ironic allu-
sion to the reverence Lewis enjoyed as the first American winner of the Nobel
Prize for literature; finally, and most convincingly, "Sainclair" may evoke, again
ironically, Lewis's appearances and sermons in various churches in the course of
his investigations for his novel Eimer Gantry (1927). Although it is neither pos-
sible nor desirable to decide on the "correctness" of any of these readings, they
can nevertheless serve to elucidate the additional interpretive potential brought
in by seemingly minor modifications, in this instance the insertion of the letter
"a" in Lewis's first name. Both modifications, that of the tide by means of sub-
stitution and that of the name by means of addition, prove that the fourth cate-
gory must not be limited to quotational allusions, but be applied to onomastic
and titular allusions as well.
The description of allusions with regard to possible modifications can refer to
traditional rhetorical transformations such as addition, deletion, substitution,
and permutation (cf. Plett 1985, 82-83). Besides, the description should mark
deviations in punctuation and obvious misprints whose far-reaching effect was
once and for all demonstrated by the well-known example of the "soiled/coiled
fish" in Melville's White lacket (cf. NichoI1949/1950). However, despite this
last subgroup, the evaluation of recognized modifications aims at the apprecia-
tion of the text's polysemies, not at the retrieval of editions used by the author or
at the correction of textual corruptions, no matter how important these ques-
tions might be philologically. Another major point of interest lies with the
metatextual factor of modifications because deviations between the variants
quite frequendy imply a commentary on the point of reference. Yet, such com-
mentaries are also to be seen as part of the semantic potential of the text, not as
clues to the critical opinions of the author.
2.5. Semantic Meaning o[ Allusions
The fifth category deals with the semantic meaning of the signal within the syn-
tagmatic flow of the text and approaches the allusion independent of its actual-
ization. This category interrelates with the first one because the semantic struc-
ture of onomastic, titular, and quotational allusions differs gready. With the
exception of telling names, nicknames, and names in connection with a special
rank or status - "Peter the Hermit" and "Queen Margherita" in This Side o[
Paradise (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 149, 3) are to be mentioned as representative
examples -, onomastic allusions usually lack a semantic meaning in the sense
proper. Borderline cases are names that have become lexicalized and, as, e. g.,
Babbitt and epicure, are included in dictionaries. As "pegs on which to hang
152 U. Hebel
descriptions" (Searle 1969, 172), proper names are primarily referential and, at
the same time, particularly open to associative fillings, with the latter more de-
pendent on the allusive competence and personal disposition of the individual
reader than on his/her linguistic competence. When Winston Smith, the pro-
tagonist of Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, is awakened from his dream about
the Arcadian "Golden Country" to the dreary reality of Big Brother's Oceania
"with the word 'Shakespeare' on his lips" (Orwell1949/1984, 24), the interpre-
tive significance of this "word" is not equal to the meaning of its two semantic
components, but rather to what the reader associates with the name of William
Shakespeare. The evocation of a counterworld to Oceania by means of the al-
lusion to Shakespeare as a prominent representative of Western civilization
only succeeds if the onomastic allusion is actualized accordingly. That
onomastic allusions are especially endangered by intertextual erosion and par-
ticularly liable to incompetent actualization needs little elaboration at this
point.
With the exception of quotations constituted by proper names only, quota-
tional allusions usually hold a semantic meaning owing to the lexical items en-
closed within the signal. Without challenging the axiom that the actualization of
an allusion always enriches the alluding text semantically, passages organized
around quotational allusions can, to a certain extent at least, be comprehended
without further actualizing the allusions. Thus, the quotation from Marvell's
"To His Coy Mistress" in A Farewell to Arms ('''But at my back I always he ar/
Time's winged chariot hurrying near."'; Hemingway 1929/1957,154) conveys
the idea of time running out for the protagonists almost by itself. Extreme cases
of such quotational allusions are proverbs or epigrams quoted in their entirety,
as, e. g., the "old epigram [ ... ] playing listlessly in [Amory's] mind: 'Very few
things matter and nothing matters very much'" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,266), and
quotations that have become independent from their original cotexts, as is the
case with the following stanza from Nicolson's popular poem "The Teak
Forest" that has even been anthologized separately:
For this is wisdom - to love and live,
To take what Jate or the gods may give,
To ask no question, to make no prayer,
To kiss the lips and caress the hair,
Speed passion's ebb as we greet its flow,
To have and to hold, and, in time -let go. (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,194-195)
On the contrary, short or elliptic quotational allusions, as e. g., the quotes from
the popular song "Babes in the Woods" in This Side o[ Paradise ('''Fourteen
angels were watching o'er them' [ ... ]"; Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 71), from Dylan's
"Blowin' in the Wind" in Updike's Couples, and from Tristan und Isolde in
Eliot's The Waste Land, remain rather incomplete, cryptic, and predominantly
suggestive in their meaning.
Titular allusions belong to the most complex signals as far as the description of
their semantic meaning is concerned. Rothe (1986), Buder (1982), and Hoek
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 153
(1981) have discussed the semantic incompleteness, ambiguity, and openness of
titles and the reciprocal or dialectic relationship between tide and text. Titles are
both comparable to proper names as regards their referential nature and differ-
ent from proper names as regards the usually motivated connection with their
texts. The description of titular allusions faces the problem of analyzing the
semantic meaning of titles that are disconnected from their texts and the latters'
explicatory effect. In terms of Buder, it deals with the 'absolute information' of
titles (Buder 1982, 74-75). Buder's proposals for the analysis of the lexical and/
or suggestive meaning of titles (Buder 1982, 81-91, 98-99) and his discussion of
'name titles' (Buder 1982, 93 -94), Rothe' s remarks on copulative and subordina-
tive titles (Rothe 1986, 176; also Buder 1982, 96), genre conventions (Rothe
1986, 204-206), and the generalizing, specifying, or identifying functions of
subtitles (Rothe 1986, 321), and, finally, Rothe' sand Hoek' s concern with inter-
textual titles (Rothe 1986,41-51; Hoek 1981, 190), all provide valuable starting
points for a description of the semantic meaning of titular allusions. '''Riders of
Ranch Reckless'" (Lewis 1920,51), '''The Rise of the Colored Empires'" (Fitz-
gerald 1925/1953, 13), "The Love Nest" (Fitzgerald 1925/1953, 96), '''The Girl
from Kankakee'" (Lewis 1920,219), "'The Damnation ofTheron Ware'" (Lewis
1920,66), '''Joan and Peter'" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 209), '''Mystic and Somber
Dolores'" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 51), "The N ew York H erald" (Fitzgerald
1933/1961, 18), "Scientific American rand] Reader's Digest" (Oates 1968, 46),
'"Hamlet''' (Lewis 1920, 223), "lEneid" (Cather 1925/1938, 249), and '''Wall
Street''' (Fitzgerald 1933/1961,207) may serve to elucidate various types of titu-
lar allusions. The 'absolute' semantic meaning of these signals depends on their
lexicalized items, their onomastic elements, their syntactic structures, and, pos-
sibly, their intertextual potential. Even more than onomastic and quotational
allusions, titular allusions require the interpretation of the intricate interrelation
between their semantic meaning in" the narrower sense and their suggestive and
connotative potential.
The preceding discussion shows that the description of the semantic meaning
of allusions cannot be formalized all too sttictly. As soon as the interpretation of
allusions tackles questions related to the understandability of a text in general,
and its semantic openness, its presuppositions, and its implied reader in particu-
lar, it becomes obvious that the text's infinite, ever elusive semantic potential
cannot, and must not, be pressed in heuristic categories. For these reasons, the
fifth category contents itself with a less formal and more verbally descriptive
assessment of the lexical, suggestive, and connotative meaning of allusive sig-
nals. All the same, the evaluation of this category will yield further insight into
the text's semantic openness and/or closure, its vulnerability to intertextual ero-
sions, and its accessibility to the allusively incompetent reader.
154 u. Hebel
2.6. Cotextualization of Allusions
After examining the semantic meaning of the signal, the description turns to the
latter's cotextualization.
6
Similar to the prior category, this sixth one remains
largely independent of the actualization of the allusion. Although quite a few
scholars have pointed to the significance of the signal's cotext(s) (cf. e. g.,
Motiramani 1983,13; Brownson 1976, 10; Lemke 1973,56), they have not yet
offered a systematic approach to this important issue of allusion studies. With
exc.eption.of paratextu.al signals, allusions may be cotextualized by their
ImmedIate lexlcal surroundmgs and/or by their relation(s) to structural elements
such as character or setting. Of course, lexical and structural cotextualization
may overlap when allusions are lexically cotextualized and, at the same time,
related to a character in the narrator's text, or, together with the lexical cotext,
located in a character's direct speech.
When Rosemary Hoyt, in Tender is the Night, is presented "as dewy with
belief as a child from one of Mrs. Burnett's vicious tracts" (Fitzgerald 1933/
1961, 34), the allusion located in the (external) narrator's text characterizes
Rosemary, while its intertextual point of reference, Frances Burnett's Little
Lord Fauntleroy or any other of her sentimental success novels, is commented
upon by means of lexical and figural cotextualization. The examples of "all that
David Copperfield kind of crap" (Salinger 1951/1964,1) in The Catcher in the
Rye and of Richard Everett and his mother Nada, a writer herself, "scorning the
Reader's Digest" (Oates 1968, 46) in Expensive People, underscore the impor-
tance of the respective narrative situation (first-person retrospective narration)
for a full comprehension of the lexical and figural cotextualization and their
commentating effect. In both instances, it is not only the immediate lexical
cotextualization ("kind of crap," "scorning") that affects the allusion, but also
its figural cotextualization (Holden Caulfield, Richard Everett). Yet another
variation of lexical and figural cotextualization working together concerns the
localization of an allusion in a character's direct speech and its lexical co tex tu al-
ization by this very character' s own words:
"[ ... ] I need young critical things like you to punch me up. Tell me, what are you reading?"
"I've been re-reading 'The Damnation ofTheron Ware.' Do you know it?"
"Yes. It was clever. But hard. Man wanted to tear down, not build up. Cynical. Oh, I do hope
I'm not a sentimentalist. But I can't see any use in this high-art stuff that doesn't encourage us
day-laborers to plod on." (Lewis 1920, 66) ,
In this passage from Main Street, it is Carol Kennicott's '"re-reading''' of
Frederic's controversial novel and the literary attitudes voiced by Vida Sherwin
that cotextualize the allusion and comment on its referent. The example illus-
trates that the specific intellectual and emotional disposition of the respective
6 The terms cotext and cotextualization are given preference over the terms context and contex-
.in order to t.he dimension of this sixth category as compared to
the dlmenslOn of the text s soclohlstoncal context that would be related to the third category.
I
"
T owards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 155
character( s) needs to be taken into account, and that a fruitful application of this
requires a dose interpretation of the fictional characters employed
for figural cotextualization. The interpretation of the characters involved be-
comes especially important when fictional characters and intertextual referents
are directly linked or even equated in the speech of another fictional character.
When Jesse Ferrenby, one of the Princeton students in This Side of Paradise,
greets Burne Holiday, the campus radical and intellectual, with the words
"'Hello. there, Savonarola. '" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 133), both, Burne' s c'ampus
reputatIOn as expressed by Jesse and Burne's character as it can be inferred from
the events and further allusions to The Masses, Tolstoy, Wells, Edward Car-
and Whitman (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 123-124), cotextualize the evoca-
tIon of Savonarola.
The brief discussion of this last example implies that the particular situation or
setting into which an allusion is embedded mayaiso cotextualize the intertextual
link. Although this type of structural embedding remains somewhat vague in
most. it can be a productive interpretive tool if the definition of setting is
hmlted to the actual time and place of an action or episode, but indudes its
mtellectual, social, and historical background and its general atmosphere and
mood. Thus, the emotionally charged love scene between Amory Blaine and
Isabelle Borges in This Side of Pa ra dis e possibly attributes respective features to
the popular song "Babes in the Woods" evoked in this situation (Fitzgerald
1920/1970, 69).
An especially interesting, but equally complex variant of lexical cotextualiza-
occurs in allusion sequences. When, in Main Street, Blodgett College is
mtroduced as "still combating the recent heresies of Voltaire, Darwin, and
Robert Ingersoll" (Lewis 1920, 1), it is not only the "recent heresies" and the
ironic historical perspective that cotextualize the three onomastic allusions;
moreover, the signals cotextualize themselves mutually, with their additive ar-
and the a?sence of. differentiating transitions suggesting a certain
conslstency of evocatlve potential. Elaborate sequences of this sort are a promi-
nent the system of This Side of Paradise: "One week, through
general cunoslty, he mspected the private libraries of his dassmates and found
s as typical as any: sets of Kipling, O. Henry, J ohn Fox, J r., and Richard
Hardmg Davis; 'What Every Middle-Aged Woman Ought to Know,' 'The Spell
of the Yukon'; a 'gift' copy of James Whitcomb Riley [ ... ]." (Fitzgerald 1920/
106) Lexical in this case with a strong ironic undertone
owmg to the quotatIOn marks (around "'gift'" copy) and the plural references
to the works of such truly productive writers as Kipling, Fox, and
fIgural cotextualization, in this case the double affiliation with Amory
Blatne and Fred Sloane and their different attitudes toward the authors evoked
and intertextual cotextualization by means of sequencing signals, are combinecl
to establish an intricate network of cotextualizations. That the last form of
cotextualization is largely dependent on the allusive competence of the reader
and may instigate inadequate readings if the evocative potential of allusions thus
156 u. Hebel
linked together is inconsistent - or even intentionally juxtaposed - deserves
special mention at this point.
All means of cotextualization sketched above influence the actualization that
can therefore be considered a "Proze gelenkter Wahrnehmung" Gau 1970,
175; cf. Anderegg 1977, 13-14) in terms of reception theory. To different de-
grees and extents, lexical and structural (i. e., figural and situational) cotextual-
ization contributes 10 the syntagmatic - intratextual- understandability of allu-
sions. The analysis of the types of cotextualization employed in a text sheds light
on the latter's semantic openness and the allusive competence presupposed in
the structure of the implied reader. Furthermore, the analysis of the cotextuali-
zation of allusions elucidates the metatextual dimension of the alluding text as it
is the dialog between the alluding text and its means of cotextualization, on the
one side, and the intertextual point of reference, on the other, that evidences the
stance the alluding text takes toward the other text, person, or event.
2.7. Functions of Allusions
Whereas the six categories discussed so far concern themselves primarily with
the text's intertextual intensity, its intertextual relatedness, its syntagmatic
understandability, its presuppositions, and the structure of its implied reader,
and thus with questions rarely touched upon by scholars of allusion, the last
category, function, can refer to a fair number of previous studies. Although the
functional analysis has lost its traditionally privileged position in the present
approach, it is nevertheless revalorized in the wake of hermeneutic perspectives
on intertextuality (cf. Broich/Pfister 1985; Schulte-Middelich 1985) and ac-
knowledged as significant part 0f the description and interpretation of interse-
mantic allusions. The seventh, and last, descriptive category is divided into three
subcategories (cf. Plett 1986, .12; Schulte-Middelich 1985, 214): intratextual
function (e. g., characterization, thematic parallel, setting evocation, fore-
shadowing); metatextual function; and intertextual function (authentication).
In order to pursue the semantic potential of an allusion as far as possible, its
functional interpretation needs to be based on the evocative potential archeolog-
ically retrieved. The intertextualist now becomes the allusively competent, truly
informed reader who strives to fill the structure of the text' s implied reader as
comprehensively as possible, though knowing that a complete equation will
never be achieved.
The examples used 10 illustrate the first six categories already imply most of
the functions allusions may perform. The onomastic allusion to David Belasco
in The Great Gatsby and the quotational allusion to Marvell's "To His Coy
Mistress" in A Farewell to Arms dearly support the themes of these novels;
Monsignor Darcy's description as a "pagan, Swinburnian young man" in This
Side of Paradise (Fitzgerald 1920/1970, 7), Holden Caulfield's contempt for
David Copperfield in The Catcher in the Rye, Richard Everett's "scorning" of
Reader's Digest in Expensive People, and Vida Sherwin's opinions about The
T
I
I
Towards a Descriptive Poetics of Allusion 157
Damnation of Theron Ware in Main Street, all advance the characterization of
these figures.
7
The evocation of "Babes in the Woods" in This Side of Paradise
supplies part of the background for the romantic love scene between Amory and
Isabelle. The way in which allusions may foreshadow events or outcome of a
novel can be demonstrated by the two epigraphs to This Side of Paradise: while
the quotation from Rupert Brooke's poem "Tiare Tahiti" hints at the general
spirit of disillusion the protagonist Amory Blaine eventually arrives at, the quo-
tation from Oscar Wilde's play Lady Windermere's Fan, with its implication of
Lady Windermere's personal sacrifice for her daughter, ironically points to
Amory Blaine's "supercilious sacrifice" for his friend Alec Connage (Fitzgerald
1920/1970,243-253).
The passages ab out "all that David Copperfield kind of crap" and "Mrs. Bur-
nett's vicious tracts" are striking examples of lexical cotextualization involving
metatextual commentary, not only on the specific texts evoked, but also on the
literary conventions they represent. The figural cotextualization of the allusions
to The Masses, Tolstoy, WeIls, Edward Carpenter, and Whitman in This Side of
Paradise associates their referents with Burne Holiday, the campus reformer,
and his socialist and pacifist views. It will be obvious that this type of metatextu-
ality requires the dose examination of the cotextualizing characters' attitudes
toward the alluded-to points of reference in order to heed possible ironic twists.
When Amory Blaine is "rather surprised by his discovery through a critic named
Mencken of several excellent American novels: 'Vandover and the Brute,' 'The
Damnation of Theron Ware,' and 'Jennie Gerhardt'" (Fitzgerald 1920/1970,
209), the lexical cotext ("excellent") evaluates Norris's, Frederic's, and Dreiser's
novels positively; the intertextual cotextualization by means of "a critic named
Mencken," however, places these texts in the tradition of naturalist writing that
was hotly debated weIl into the 1920s. Although the mere evocation of an inter-
textual point of reference already entails a metatextual gesture (Beugnot 1976,
8), the cotextualization opens up the dialog between the alluding text and the
latter's intertextual coordinates. Prerequisite for this metatextual interpretation
of allusions is their understanding as dynamic, bilaterally directed intertextual
signals.
A third functional perspective, in addition to and in between the intratextual
and the metatextuallevel, appreciates the allusion's contribution to the 'reality
effect' of the narrative text. As basically nonfictional elements of the deja (Eyk-
man 1978; Schmid 1983, 153; Simon 1984,1074), extrafictionally verified aIlu-
sions anchor the fictional world in the extrafictional world. Of course, the 'real-
ity effect' gains momentum with the contemporaneity, topicality, or controver-
siality of the points of reference. Thus, the allusions to Belasco in The Great
7 The type of the 'reading protagonist' cannot be discussed again at this point; among the large
number ofstudies on this time-honored phenomenon of literary history, the following recent
studies des erve special mention and provide further bibliographical references: Wolpers 1986;
Stckrath 1984; Wuthenow 1980.
158 U. Hebel
Gatsby, to Velvet Underground in The Tooth 0/ Crime, and to the assassination
of President Kennedy in Couples (Updike 1968,293) affirm the authenticity of
the fictional worlds and tack them onto the extrafictional worlds of their im-
mediate contemporaries. On the contrary, temporally and geographically re-
mo te allusions do not only complicate the text's presuppositional structure but
also ren der its fictional world less authentie and less immediate.
8
*
The notion of allusion as bilaterally directed, evocative signal of intertextual
relationships and the sequence of descriptive categories (manifestation, localiza-
tion, dimension( s) of reference, modification, semantic meaning, cotextualiza-
tion, function) aim at a more dynamic and comprehensive understanding of this
prominent feature of intertextually organized (narrative) texts. The approach
offered is intended to replace atomistic interpretations of single allusions and to
induce the analysis of allusive systems at large, not only with regard to their
intratextual functions, but with special regard to their significance for the under-
standability of texts and to their role in the process of metatextual positioning.
The examples presented evidence that allusional studies with a firm footing in
intertextual theory may not only (re)constitute a text's verticality, but mayaIso
allow for the study of a text's metatextual dimension as manifestation of its
active participation in the ongoing dialogic process of literary history .
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THEODOR VERWEYEN and GUNTHER WITTING
The Cento
A Form of Intertextuality from Montage to Parody
Aksit Gktrk
. .
Inmemonam
1.
Undoubtedly, also terms have their heyday. Some economic scientists may deny
that something like it is possible, but at least as far as "intertextuality" is con-
cerned it can be said that it was talked into being. If you trace the development
from Bakhtin's concept of dialogism to Kristeva's notion of "intertextualite,"
something about this procedure becomes all too dear. Rolf Kloepfer, for
example, describes three stages of such a development: at first it is held
"da ein fremder Text durch Zitat, Anspielung oder zumindest Indiz (auf allen
Ebenen der jeweiligen Kodierung [ ... J)" has to be actually evoked; sub-
sequently one argues "da sich sowieso in jedem Text sein Grundmuster
(z. B. 'realistischer Roman' oder 'Roman' berhaupt), seine Epoche oder gar
bestimmte 'abendlndische Traditionen' 'einschreiben"'; finally the text is
only perceived as "parole der jeweiligen (Gattungs-, Reihen-, Kultur-)Sprache"
(Kloepfer 1980/1982).
Yet such semantic branching demands its price: not only does one easily lose
sight of descriptive properties of the term itself, but it happens that its apparent
conceptual modernity or universality makes one forget terminological tools
which traditionalliterary criticism has long held in store. More than that: Just as
Nietzsche' s universal application of the term metaphor rather inhibited than
furthered a theorization of the metaphor so Bakhtin's reception and its conse-
quences did not yield what one could have expected: a multitude of dose analy-
ses of the elementary strategies of textual references to other texts. For when
intertextuality is equated with literariness or even becomes the mark of textual-
ity as such (cf. Beaugrande/Dressler 1981), hardly any interest is left for such
literature which does not belong to the canon of 'great works'. Such talk has
provoked reactions, doubtlessly. Today it has become almost topical to demand
a new terniinological precision. Whether this can be accomplished, is yet to be
seen. It may weIl be that, as Renate Lachmann surmises, the term will be "vor-
166 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
erst nicht disziplinierbar, seine Polyvalenz irreduzibel" (Lachmann 1984, 134)1.
Yet one should not surrender to this semantic branching without resistance.
There have been attempts enough, one being, for example, a Munich conference
on intertextuality in 1984. The distinction made there between "Einzeltextrefe-
renz" and "Systemreferenz" (Broich 1985; Pfister 1985; Karrer 1985) offers
enough opportunities for analyzing the simple forms of adaptation favoured by
us, without entering into speculations concerning the "uerste Randzone der
Intertextualitt" (Pfister 1985, 53).
Yet one should beware of premature conclusions even he re : On the basis of
these differentiations one cannot formulate general statements about diverse
procedures. There are certain forms of intertextuality which provide "sowohl
eine Einzeltext- als auch eine Systemreferenz, " as Broich has pointed out
(Broich 1985,49). Other forms may be characterized exclusively as "Einzeltext-
referenz" or "Systemreferenz. "
An interesting case of references to individual texts is the cento, which is
mentioned only cursorily by Broich (1985, 49) and other participants of the
Munich conference (Plett 1985, 94; Karrer 1985, 109). But this should not come
as a surprise. The cento is not anthologized representatively. Equally absent is a
history of the term and its usage. Almost no positive, at least no reliable know-
ledge exists as to the origin of the term and the specific way it was employed to
characterize texts. Some examples will illustrate this. In the Deutsches Wrter-
buch by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm the term "cento" is not even mentioned; it
would have been due in the second volume published in the year 1860. Only the
Neues deutsches Wrterbuch by Lutz Mackensen of 1953 has an entry "cento."
Here the term is explained as "grie.chisch-Iateinisch. Flickgedicht aus Versen
verschiedener Dichter; Flickarbeit" (Mackensen 1953,157). Best's dictionary of
literary terminology contains the explanation: "ital. aus bunten Flecken zusam-
mengesetzte Jacke des Harlekin"(Best 1986, 88). The East German Wrterbuch
der Literaturwissenschaft reads: "griech.llat., aus Flicken zusammengenhte
Kleidung oder Decke" (Trger 1986, 86). Analogously, Shipley makes the term
derive from "L[ atin], patched cloth" (Shipley 1970, 40 f.). Fowler writes, und er
the entry "pastiche" : "[ ... ] in its original Latin form it meant a garment or
patchwork and, applied to literature, a poem made up by joining scraps from
various authors." (Fowler 1973,139) There seems to exist somewhat of an ety-
mological confusion about the cento.
2
1 As long as the discourse of the intertextualists is supposed to represent a model of intertextuality
the chances for disciplining the term are, as Lachmann thinks, slight indeed.
2 One glance into Paulys Realencyclopdie der Classischen AltertumswissenschaJt would have suf-
ficed to find out that the term "cento" is of Greek origin-XEvtQOOV, in vulgar Greek also 'XEV"tOOV
- and came into current usage with Plautus and Cato. The lexicographer explains the semantic
development of the word as: "nach der aus bunten Flicken zusammengesetzten Decke oder
Harlekinsjacke [ ... ] wird das aus entlehnten Versen und Vers teilen zusammengesetzte Gedicht
benannt." (Crusius 1899, 1930; cf. also Lamacchia 1958, 207)
~
I
The Cento 167
Yet compared to the arbitrary etymological ascriptions the terminological
definitions are surprisingly constant. One of the most comprehensive explana-
tions can be found in the Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics:
A poetic composition made up of passages selected from the work of some great poet of the past.
Homer largely served this purpose in Gr.literature from the adaptations by Trygaeus of various
lines in the Iliad and Odyssey (Aristophanes, Peace 1090-94) to the Homerokentrones of the
Byzantine period. Similarly Virgil was the most popular source for centos in later Roman times.
The oldest of those extant is the tragedy Medea by Hosidius Geta (2d c. A. D.), while the C.
nuptialis of Ausonius and the C. Vergilianus ofProba (4th c. A. D.) are among others drawnfrom
his work. Renaissance and later works of this kind included the It. Petrarca spirituale (1536) and
the Eng. Cicero princeps (1608), which was a treatise, compiled from Cicero, on government. In
the modern era may be mentioned a Shakespearean c. which appeared in English (Nov. 1919) and
humorous centos which are occasionally published in popular literary reviews. (Preminger 1974,
112)3
Possible references to definitions in traditional historical poetic theory though
are neglected.
Attempts at a historical description of the cento normally recur to a highly
selective and very small textual corpus. Such an arbitrary approach to the topic is
also demonstrated, unwittingly, by Reinhart Herzog. He makes the parodie
cento end at the beginning of early modern times. This sudden demise is no less
surprising than the alleged reason for it, the decline of mnemonic faculties de-
pendent on a school curriculum which no longer stressed the memorizing of the
classical writers (Herzog 1975, 13).4 Herzog's verdict, however, overlooks the
fact that the educational system remained essentially the same until the end of
World War 11. It may have been suggested by the highly selective cento collec-
tion assembled by Octave Delepierre in his Tableau de la litterature du centon
(1874/75)5 which he consulted. This evidently made hirn lose sight of the con-
tinuance of the parodie cento tradition in modern times.
Epochal changes in literary his tory can be deduced from changes in the do-
minant mood of the cento, from serious to comic. This is not only of historical
but also of systematical interest.
2.
A short historical survey shall now introduce to the intertextual phenomenon of
the cento. This survey is necessarily cursory as comprehensive scholarly studies
are still desiderata. Therefore, one can start with the Poetices Libri Septem (1561)
by Julius Caesar Scaliger. This author writes:
3 Other extensive explanations can be found in Benet (1948), Schmid (1965), Trger (1986).
Herzog's allegations are contradicted by the assertions of his teacher Manfred Fuhrmann in his
Konstanz inaugurallecture of 1968 (Fuhrmann 1969, 16-20).
5 Fritz Nies also mainly relies on this anthology for his explication (Nies 1978).
168 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
HAud absimiles Parodiis, quos Centones vocant. Deducitur enim sensus alius ab sensu pristino
versuum: hoc parodiam refert. quorum versuum membra hinc inde collecta quum assuantur,
Rapsodia: nomen repra:sentant. atque iccirco Centones sunt a fiunt
stragula. Tale apud Ausonium poema valde ingeniosum & lepldum, ex frustls Vuglhams coag-
mentaturn [.] Tale etiam Proba: poetria: Christiana:: cui ab opere Centone cognomen factum est.
(Scaliger 1964, 47)
The rules for writing centos here are expressly formulated following those two
authors who had become models in this literary vein: Ausonius, who corres-
ponded with Symmachus, and Proba who lived around 322 to 370 A. D. The
Christian Proba's biblical cento was written in the second half of the fourth
century, at about the same time as the pagan Ausonius' s though
possibly a few years earlier. Of course, these are not the earllest speclmens.
Older models go back as far as the last third of the second century A. D., to
name, for example, Lucian's epithalamium from verses by Pindar, Hesiod, and
Anacreon (cf. Helm 1906, 255 f.), which is spoken by the grammarian Histiaios
in the satirical dialogue Symposium, written c. 160-165 A. D. (Lucian 1972,
159 f.). Also, there exist Homeric centos in which a mythological occurrence
such as Hercules's confrontation with Cerberus is narrated in verses borrowed
from the Iliad and the Odyssey. Herbert Hunger mentions as the characteristic
features of these centos:
1. Alle Verse sind (mit geringfgigen nderungen) aus Homer entnommen. 2. Niemals werden
zwei oder mehr Verse hintereinander entlehnt [ ... ] 3. Durch die neue Zusammensetzung ver-
lieren die Verse die inhaltliche Beziehung zu ihrer ursprnglichen Umgebung, sie werden ver-
fremdet [ ... ] 4. Das Ergebnis ist ein mehr oder weniger gelungenes Mosaik aufgrund einer neuen
Vorzeichnung, d. h. ein neues Thema. 98 f.)
Later Homeric centos such as die epigram by Leo the Philosopher (5th c. A. D.),
to be found in the Greek Anth,plogy (Book IX, No. 361), do still imitate their
famous models rather closely - which were learned by rote by pupils even in late
antiquity - but they also use frivolous procedures of defamiliarization with an
obscene intention. The epigram reads:
MfrtEQ EflT] MOfll1'tEQ, aXl1VEU eUflOV EXOUOU,
ALl1V UXeOflaL flE Oil'tUOEV aVT]Q
vux'tU eh' OQCPVULl1V, 'tE e' EOUOL QomL UAAOL,
U'tEQ 'tE XUL OU' EXEV
xv ' ULflU'tL' uutaQ EXEL'tU
oiiQ6v tE XQOEl1XEV a:Jtllflova 'tE ALUQ6v tE.
My cruel-hearted mother, an evil
mother to me - it pains me much,
the wound that amortal man in-
flic ted on me - in the dark night
when other mortals sleep - naked,
without a helmet and shield, nor
had he a spear - and all his sword
was bathed in hot blood - but after-
wards he sent forth a gentle and
harmless gale.
Here, as one can surmise with Hunger (1978, 99), we are concerned with a case
of parodic quoting. In the text, the first word of the sixth verse, deviating from
Homer, is exchanged for an obscene homonym ("gale" for "liquid") and it is
used at the same time as the point of the epigram.
The Cento 169
In its play with frivolous defamiliarization this epigram from late antiquity
seems to resemble closely that epithalamium by Ausonius which, according to
Herzog (1975, 11), has become the model for the 'obscene centos' in literary
his tory from Latin antiquity up to the eighteenth century. Not the least reason
for this is that it is patched together from several verses by Virgi1.
6
Ausonius's
model of the Virgil cento has been used for diverse purposes. Because of his
theoretical exposition in the dedicatory letter to the Cento nuptialis (Schenkl in:
Ausonius 1883, 140f.; Prete in: Ausonius 1978, 159-161f the Virgilian form
provided "eine Freisetzung [ ... ] zur Paraphrase neuer Themen, die beliebig
gewhlt werden [konnten]" (Herzog 1975, 7). And because of its artistic poten-
tial to group "ursprnglich inkohrente Bedeutungsfragmente zu einer neuen
Konsistenz" (Herzog 1975, 4) it has continually provoked competing imita-
tions. Thus Delepierre can present 19 centos in the manner of Virgil by Laelius
and 32 by Julius Capilupus in his anthology Capiluporum Carmina. Here one
can find an "epitaphe-centon" as well as a "prosopopee de Rome". Eulogies of
cities and mansions change into panegyric centos on popes, cardinals, and prin-
ces. Praises of virtue and calls for peace alternate with occasional centos on the
nomination of a cardinal or even the election as pope. Besides, there are
Rollengedichte in which Virgil hirns elf, for example, appeals to Cosimo I de'
Medici "en vers de Virgile." A most artful attempt of a special kind is a cento by
Julius Capilupus in which the Lord's Prayer finds itself transformed into Virgi-
lian verses. In this case each single line is made up of two half-lines which are
culled from the most diverse places in the Aeneid and the Georgica
8
; they are
joined almost imperceptibly, with only minor adjustments, strict1y following
Ausonius's cento theory:
Salve, sancte parens, summi regnator Olympi,
Quem primi colimus, coeloque ereboque potentem,
Semper honos, nomenque tuum, tua magna voluntas,
Imperium sine fine tuum, laudesque manebunt.
Dona laboratae Cereris, noctesque diesque
Da deinde, auxilioque leves quaecumque labori
Debita erant nostro; jam fas est parcere genti;
Nos tua progenies, atque haec exempla secutus,
Atque idem casus, miseris succurrere disco.
Nec segnem patiere animum tentare precando;
Eripe me his, invicte, malis; haec omnia firma.
(Delepierre 1874,219)
6 The first editor of the Cento nuptialis, Carl Schenkl, meticulously proved the borrowings, espe-
cially from theAeneid (cf. Ausonius 1883, 140-146; see also the recent edition by Sextus Prete
[Ausonius 1978, 159-169]); for the quotations from the eclogues see Herzog (1975,9).
7 It is also included in the Capiluporum Carmina (cf. Delepierre 1874,223).
8 An analysis renders the following results: line 1 = Ae. 5.80 + Ae. 7.558; 2 = Ae. 11.786 + Ae.
6.247; 3 = Ae. 1.609 + Ae. 12.808; 4 = Ae. 1.279 + Ae. 1.609; 5 = Ae. 8.181 + Ae. 6.556; 6 = Ae.
2.691 + Ae.1.330; 7 =Ae.l1.166 + Ae. 6.63; 8 =Ae. 1.250 + G. 4.219; 9 =Ae. 3.504 + Ae. 1.630;
10 = G. 1.72 + Ae. 4.113; 11 = Ae. 6.365 + Ae. 2.691.
170 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
As representatives for the history of the cento, the Virgilian centos by the two
Capilupi have been dealt with somewhat extensively. The his tory of the cento
itself is yet unwritten. Its post-classical and post-medieval parts can be said to
begin with the cento by Albertino Mussato which is made of distichs from
Ovid's Tristia (Lamacchia 1958, 216? It had its heyday in the sixteenth and
early seventeenth centuries, in the era of Neo-Latin poetry when other poets
besides Virgil were ransacked, too. An almost random example in this respect is
Lanx Satura sive cento in Christogoniam, published in 1657 by Daniel Georg
Morhof, who additionally borrowed verses from Statius and Claudius (De-
lepierre 1875,303). In a history of this extremely artificial way of writing exter-
nal references, too, would playamajor role as, for example, in a satire on Louis
XlV, Le Justin Moderne, anonymously published in 1677, which borrowed
fromJustinian (Delepierre 1875, 300), or in the cento anthology in the manner of
theAeneid by Andreas Fabri, published in 1609, in wh ich the author, disguised
as Cassandra, addresses the F rench king Henri IV of Navarra (F abri 1609, 9 -44,
45 -63 )10. One would, moreover, have to mention such important writings as the
politico-theoretical treatise Politica by Justus Lipsius of 1589, the commentaries
in Julius Wilhelm Zincgref's emblem book of 1619, or The Anatomy of Melan-
choly of 1621, in the epistle to the reader of which the author Robert Burton,
impersonating the younger Democritus, characterizes the work's design in the
following topical images:
As a good housewife out of divers fleeces weaves one piece of cloth, a bee gathers wax and honey
out of many flowers, and makes a new bundle of all, Floriferis ut apes in saltibus omnia libant [as
be es in flowery glades sip from each cup], I have laboriously collected this cento out of divers
writers. (Burton 1932, 1: 24f.)
The history of the cento would Icertainly be distorted if one would leave the
present sketch as it iso Of special import is the aforementioned Cento Probae as it
is to be seen in connection with the 'two-realm theory' which divides poetry
into worldly and sacred poems. One could cite the testimony of Erasmus of
Rotterdam in this context. Before J. C. Scaliger, he laid down in his adage "Far-
cire Centones" the catalogue of authorities and model texts which are requisite
for cento writing:
Exstant adhuc, quorum meminit et divus Hieronymus, et Virgiliocentones
Probae mulieris, et Centon nuptialis Ausonii, qui legern etiam ejus carminis tradit. (Erasmus
1961, 542D)
The reference to Hieronymus may indicate the extent of Proba's reputation
which ranges from being held a model fit to be emulated to being considered a
mere trifler. For Hieronymus rejected Proba's programme, which she expressed
in the following verse of the proem of her cento: "Vergilium cecinisse loquar pia
9 A short excerpt can be found in Delepierre (1875, 2:304f.).
10 We would like to thank Mr. Christian Hogrebe of the Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Wolfenbt-
tel, for his kind assistance.

i
I
i
1
The Cento 171
munera Christi." (Proba 1888, 570 [v. 23J)11: "I would like to demonstrate that
Virgil wrote about Christ's sacred gifts." This programme of spiritualization of
pagan literature is well-known in the history of allegorical expression. Yet
Hieronymus commented harshly on some of the Virgilian verses adapted by
Proba: "Puerilia sunt haec et circulatorum ludo similia" (Hieronymus 1910,454
[ep. LIIIJ)12: "These are mere trifles and they resemble the diversion of moun-
tebanks."
Yet this verdict is only one side of the appropriation of pagan antiquity which
H. Hunger has characterized with reference to the biblical centos by the bishop
Patrikios and by the empress Eudokia, the daughter of an Athenian professor
and wife to Theodosios 11 (408-450). The reason for their efforts he sees in the
authors' conviction,
da die von der absoluten berlegenheit der homerischen Epen ber alle andere griechische
Dichtung berzeugten Autoren als gute und geistig rege Christen die Heilsgeschichte in einen
mglichst kostbaren Rahmen fassen wollten.
And he compares these endeavours to the "sekundren Gold- und Sil-
berrahmungen vieler Ikonen der orthodoxen Welt [ ... J, deren materieller Wert
den knstlerischen zumeist bertrifft" (Hunger 1978, 100f.)13. This interpreta-
tion is obviously pertinent to the biblical centos in Byzantine literature culled
from Homer and also to the Cento Probae, which is held to be their model
(Smolak 1979,31). It is even more appropriate, when we come to the era of the
"imitatio veterum," if we look at, for example, the Virgilian Lord's Prayer by
Julius Capilupus and the many biblical cento epics, namely Paulus Didymus's
Josephiados libri VIII (Leipzig 1581), Ulrich Bollinger's Moseidos libri IX
(Tbingen 1608), or Alexander Rosaeus's Vergilii evangelisantis Christiados
libri XIII (Amsterdam 1638). When it comes to literary imitation, it is less im-
portant for the cento to 'ennoble' pagan material, which Hunger names another
function of the appropriation of antiquity (Hunger 1978, 101). The prevalent
idea here is the 'precious framing' of biblical simplicity and prose.
In the long tradition of cento writing, the authority of antique models has
rarely been doubted or questioned. It may happen in times of ideological
reorientation, as is evidenced by Hieronymus's reservation. For different
reasons altogether Montaigne, writing in the Renaissance spirit of introspection
and self-representation, distanced hirns elf in his Essais from the writing of cen-
tos and their implicit approbation of the "language of authority" (Bakhtin):
11 This edition is an excellent text to work with because of its complete references to the verses
borrowed from Virgil.
12 Hieronymus refers in his verdict, for example, to the Probae Cento 403 (= Aeneid 1.664) and 624
(= Aeneid 2.650). His judgement is part of a lengthy disquisition which gives evidence of his
intimate literary knowledge of this tradition: "quasi non legerimus Homerocentonas et Ver-
giliocentonas ac non sic etiam Maronem sine Christo possimus dicere Christianum, quia scrip-
serit [ .. .J." Bere follow the quotations from Proba's cento and the verdict.
13 This opinion does not, of course, invalidate Herzog's interpretation of the "erbaulichen
Motivierung" of the Cento Probae (Herzog 1975, 46-51).
172 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
De ma part il n'est rien que je veuille moins faire. Je ne dis les autres, sinon pour d'autant plus me
dire. Cecy ne touche pas des centons qui se publient pour centons : et j' en ai veu de tres-ingenieux
en mon temps, entre autres un, sous le nom de Capilupus, outre les antiens. Ce sont des esprits
qui se font voir et par ailleurs et par la, comme Lipsius en ce docte et laborieux tissu de ses
Politiques (Montaigne 1924,2:100 [1,26]).
Laurence Sterne, though, put the cento to the severest test, the test of the
ridicule, in his Tristram Shandy. As Herman Meyer could show in an inquiry
into Sterne's art of quotation (Meyer 1968, 72-93), this author pilfered the pil-
ferer Robert Burton, not desisting from writing a 'stolen' philippic against liter-
ary thievery (cf. book 5, chapter 1), in order to indict plagiarism by amassing
plagiarisms. Meyer adds: "In doing so, [Sterne] had every right to expect that the
educated among his readers would recognize his source and savor the persiflage
of his jesting plagiarism." (Meyer 1968, 90 f.) The writing of centos, which was
based on authoritative quoting, is being erroneously identified with plagiarism
and thus comes und er severe strain.
3.
So far it can be said that the traditional definitions of the cento as a special form
of poetry and epic can no longer be upheld. Cento is not a generic term but an
ecriture - such as parody, travesty, contrafacture, and pastiche - which can be
realized in a lyric and in an epic form as weIl as in the prose of political treatises
and the literary essay, even in dramatic form.
This ecriture consists in the selec.t:ion of sentences or syntagms from one or
several texts and transferring the,m unalteredly into a new text with a different
topic. With this definition, of course, the whole range of cento devices is not at
all completely described, as can b'e seen not only in Sterne's case but also in two
poems by Edwin Bormann and Erich Weinert (cf. Appendix). In 1885, Bormann
published a "Goethe-Quintessenz" which revels in citational references to
Goethe. His sources are "Der Zauberlehrling," "Der Sieger," "Kennst du das
Land, wo die Zitronen blhn," "Der Fischer," "Rechenschaft," "Der Knig von
Thule," "Hier sind wir versammelt zu lblichem Tun," and above all both parts
of "Faust," as weIl as "Iphigenie auf Tauris, " "Clavigo," and "Torquato Tasso."
But this reveIling is practiced tongue in cheek. Erich Weinert's "Einheitsvolks-
lied" of 1924 adapts common and popular verses from folklore and akin sources
such as Matthias Claudius's "Mein Neujahrslied," Ernst Moritz Arndt's "Das
Lied vom Feldmarschall," Joseph von Eichendorff's "Abschied" and "Das zer-
brochene Ringlein," or Johann Gabriel Seidl's "Die Uhr," too.
Both texts realize essential conditions for the cento as a special form of inter-
textuality: citational reference to apre-text or a corpus of pre-texts plus the use
of extremely few linguistic means of the author to join the snippets. Yet contrary
to the cento procedure in Lipsius's Politica and Zincgref's emblem commen-
taries in wh ich the quotations are motivated by a politico-ethical perspective of
The Cento 173
the author, in this case all of the quotations and all of the text are placed, to cite
M. M. Bakhtin, "in spttisch-frhliche Anfhrungszeichen" (Bachtin 1979,
314). The way in which here "Worte gleichsam widerwillig zum Ausdruck eines
ihnen bisher ganz fremden Sinnes gezwungen erscheinen" (Gerber 1961, 2:370;
cf. Verweyen/Witting 1979, 152 f.), i. e. in which syntagms and sentences of the
pre-texts are disposed with as set pieces, aims at debunking without expressing a
serious alternative. This strategy only aims at the comic imitation of the models
and at their disparagement. Texts for which such a strategy is constitutive are
completely deficient in an individual point of view (Witting 1985, 11). Their
parody closely resembles the epigram in the Greek Anthology mentioned above.
This may become even clearer if one considers the respective contexts of those
two poems. Weinert, a writer for the periodical Rote Fahne since 1924 and
member of the communist party since 1929, hinted at the reasons for hirn to
write the "Einheitsvolkslied" in his autobiographical essay "10 Jahre an der
Rampe" (1934):
Als ich nmlich das Brger- und Kleinbrgertum, das ich in meinem Umgang berhrte, wieder in
seiner ganzen feigen Arroganz und Verlogenheit sich restaurieren sah, reagierte ich mit Ha. Ich
fhlte das Verlangen, diese patriotischen Gehrcke, die sich schon wieder, kaum, da das Blut
der Arbeiter getrocknet war, ffentlich mit den Emblemen der Reaktion versammeln durften, bis
auf die Unterhosen auszuziehen, um sie dem Spott der Welt preiszugeben. Ich konzipierte
Gedichtchen, in welchen ich sie lcherlich machte. (Weinert 1964, 120)14
In his cento Weinert accordingly dissects with malicious intent those texts
which articulated the identity of a certain social dass. Once the deconstruction is
achieved he combines the scraps into a contrasting and comical puzzle so that
derision ensues.
The context in which Bormann's "Goethe-Quintessenz" appeared is signifi-
cant in itself: is was the satirical periodical Fliegende Bltter published in
Munich (Bormann 1885, 190)15. This publication, founded in 1845, liked to
ridicule the revived classical myths and the national myth of the Weimar classi-
cis m through the use of caricature, travesty, and parody. Bormann was a prolific
contributor. His poems were of the spirit indicated by the tide of the anthology
"Wenn Geedhe un Schiller gemietlich sin: klassischer Lorbeerkranz." Bakh-
tin called this abolishment of distance and the transposition of the sublime into
the realm of the intimate and familiar, within his theory of carnival, 'familiari-
zation' (Bachtin 1969,49 f.).
In sum, it should have become clear that the kind of quotation as practiced by
the cento can serve two opposite purposes : on the one hand the constitutionl
formation and confirmationl endorsement of norms, on the other hand their
violation. The latter is achieved through the ridiculing of models held unique.
These different functions are exactly analogous to those of contrafacture and
14 In this very publication the "Einheitsvolkslied" is reprinted. - Cf. also VerweyenlWitting 1983,
118+294.
15 Cf. Verweyen/Witting 1983, 102f.+171 f.
174 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
parody. It thus seems reasonable to define the cento as a special case of these
ecritures.
Yet both forms of cento writing do not exist side by side at all times. There is a
distinct historical development, as indicated in the tide of the present essay,
from the citation of authoritative writings towards their parody. Thus it seems
to be highly probable that the cento is representative for the whole process of
literary evolution, but in a sense different from the Russian formalists' notion.
The reordering of the material, which is such a central tenet of the formalist
school, here develops according to strict codes. The cento as contrafacture and
as parody belongs, following a systematic proposal of J. M. Lotman's, to an
aesthetics of identity (Lotman 1972, 410 ff.) and therefore it is not evolutionary
by itself.
Its significance thus lies not in the realm of formal innovation but in the
changing dominance of either variant. If it is true - and the literary scholarship of
the last two or three decades seems to point to it - that a process started in the
eighteenth century in which the growing autonomy of art was attended by a
growing historicization of the concept of form, then not only individual authors
and texts, but even more the principle and ideal of imitatio veterum itself lost
their exemplary status.
It is in the context of this development from a normative to a historical con-
cept of allliterary models - to modify a hypothesis by H. Blumenberg (in Iser
1966, 461 ff.) - that emerges the idea of a literature from and against literature. In
contrast to this, a literary practice in the historical vein of the imitatio veterum
follows another principle which could be called "literature from literature and
with literature. " I.
As for the cento this means: It;l the course of imitation a collage of quotations
predominates which usurps the authority and splendor of the pre-texts and
thereby stabilizes their normativity. In the course of innovation the formal col-
lage principle dominates the pre-texts quoted. This does not yet make the cento
innovative - and this may account for its lack of popularity - but it makes the
cento at least belong to those forms of writing which further the literary evolu-
tion.
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1979 Die sthetik des Wortes. Ed. R. Grbel. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp.
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1948 The Reader's Encyclopedia: An Encyclopedia of World Literature and the Arts. N ew
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Best, Otto F.
1986 Handbuch literarischer Fach begriffe. 8th rev. ed. Frankfurt: Fischer.
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1885 "Goethe-Quintessenz (Allen citatenbedrftigen Gemthern gewidmet)." Fliegende
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1985 "Zur Einzeltextreferenz." In U. Broich et al., eds. Intertextualitt: Formen, Funk-
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Burton, Robert
1932 The Anatomy of Melancholy. 3 vols. Ed. H. J ackson. London:J. M. Dent (rpt. 1961).
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tumswissenschaft. Stuttgart: J. B. Metzler, rev. ed., 1929-1932.
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1609 Centones, cum Diana, et iuvenilibus. Paris, 1609. (HAB Wolfenbttel: 20.8
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1973 A Dictionary of Modern Critical Terms. London: Routledge & Kegan PauL
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1961 Die Sprache als Kunst. Pt. 2. Hildesheim: Olms. (Rpt. ofthe edition Berlin 1885)
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1906 Lucian und Menipp. Leipzig/Berlin: Teubner.
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1975 Die Bibelepik der lateinischen Sptantike: Formgeschichte einer erbaulichen Gat-
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1966 Immanente sthetik - sthetische Reflexion: Lyrik als Paradigma der Moderne.
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1980 "Einige literaturwissenschaftlich relevante Grundlagen und Anwendungen des
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1958 "Dal1'arte allusiva al centone." Atene e Roma 3,193-216.
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1953 Neues deutsches Wrterbuch. Laupheim: Pfahl-Verlag.
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1968 The Poetics of Quotation in the European Novel. Tr. Theodore & Yetta Ziolkowski.
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1985 "Zur Systemreferenz." In U. Broich et al., eds. Intertextualitt: Formen, Funk-
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1985 "Sprachliche einer intertextuellen Poetik." In U. Broich et al., eds.
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1974 Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics. Princeton, N. J. : Princeton UP.
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1888 Probae Cento. Ed. Carolus Schenkl. Wien: F. Tempsky. (= CSEL 16, 568-609)
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1965 "Cento." In Carl Andresen et al., eds. Lexikon der alten Welt. Zrich/Stuttgart:
Artemis, 565-566.
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1979 "Beobachtungen zur Darstellungsweise 10 den Homerzentonen." Jahrbuch der
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1986 VC:rterbuch der Literaturwissenschaft. Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut.
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Verweyen, TheodoriGunther Witting
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Weinert, Erich
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Appendix
Text 1
EDWIN BORMANN
Goethe-Quintessenz.
(Allen citatenbedrftigen Gemthern gewidmet)
Ihr naht euch wieder? In die Ecke, Besen!
Luft! Luft! Klavigo! Meine Ruh' ist hin.
Der Knig rief: Ich bin ein Mensch gewesen:
Das Ewig-Weibliche, das war mein Sinn.
Ein deutscher Mann mag keinen Franzen leiden,
Der and're hrt von allem nur das Nein.
Ich wei nicht, nur die Lumpe sind bescheiden,
Ein Werdender wird immer dankbar sein.
Mir graut's vor dir, der Kasus macht mich lachen,
Und Marmorbilder steh'n und seh'n mich an:
Wer fertig ist, dem ist nichts recht zu machen,
Der Morgen kam, khl bis an's Herz hinan.
Prophete rechts - mein Herz, was soll das geben?
Du sprichst ein groes Wort gelassen aus:
Das Wasser rauscht in's volle Menschenleben,
Ich denke dein, so oft er trank daraus.
Wenn ihr's nicht fhlt, ihr werdet's nicht erjagen:
Der Page lief, man sieht doch wo und wie.
Was hr' ich drauen? Frulein, darf ich's wagen?
Grau, theurer Freund, ist alle Theorie.
Heit mich nicht reden, schwankende Gestalten!
Man merkt die Absicht, dunkler Ehrenmann!
Durch Feld und Wald lat mir herein den Alten:
Ich kenne dich, du siehst mich lchelnd an.
Er sah ihn strzen, himmlisches Behagen!
Der Knabe kam und ward nicht mehr geseh'n.
Die Sonne sinkt, du mut es dreimal sagen -
Dies ist die Art, mit Hexen umzugeh'n.
Der Geist der Medizin ist leicht zu fassen,
Von Zeit zu Zeit seh' ich den Alten gern ...
Es mu sich dabei doch was denken lassen?!
Ergo bibambus! ist des Pudels Kern.
178 T. Verweyen, G. Witting
Text 2
ERICH WEINERT
Einheitsvolkslied
Stimmt an mit hellem, hohem Klang!
Nun mu sich alles wenden.
Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weib und Gesang
Mit Herzen, Mund und Hnden.
Das Wandern ist des Mllers Lust.
Was blasen die Trompeten?
Wir treten mutig Brust an Brust
Zum Beten, ja zum Beten.
Stolz weht die Flagge schwarzweirot
An uns und allen Dingen.
Wir sterben gern den Heldentod.
Es mu uns doch gelingen.
Ich schie den Hirsch im wilden Furst.
Wie brennt mein Eingeweide!
Ein frischer Trunk, ein deutscher Durst
Im Wald und auf der Heide.
Ich steh allein auf weiter Flur.
o Tler weit, 0 Hhen!
Drum Brder, reicht die Hand zum Schwur!
Sie blieb von selber stehen.
Ein freies Leben fhren wir.
Ich trage, wo ich gehe,
Ein treues, deutsches Herz bei mir.
Was kommt dort von der Hhe? .
Die Lerche schmettert himmelan.
Es geht von Mund zu Munde.
Der Kaiser ist ein lieber Mann "
In einem khlen Grunde.
111. Historical Aspects of Intertextuality
RICHARD J. SCHOECK
'In loco intertexantur'
Erasmus as Master of Intertextuality
Intertextuality has its own history, although it is not yet written.
1
Some of its
glories are to be found in Virgil's employments of Homer, in the skilful games of
Ovid in his allusions to Virgil, Propertius and Horace: these constitute a great
deal more than simply poetry that is a comment on other texts ratherthan on
society.2 Here one can ci te the established books ofWilkinson (1945 and 1955),
of Hermann Frnkel(1956) on Ovid, now supplemented by the recent volume
edited by Charles Martindale (1988), which extends the reading of Ovidian in-
fluences into the Middle Ages and on to the twentieth century. In yet another
way, Leonard Barkan's recent explorati<;>n of metamorphosis (1986) offers a
challenging way to pursue intertextualities thematicaIly. In all of these Ovidian
studies, as weIl as Thomas M. Greene's (1982) investigation of imitation and
discovery in Renaissance poetry, and my own emphasis on the dimensions and
implications of imitatio in the Renaissance (1983), there is an emphasis on the
concept that imitatio (and with it intertextuality) may function not only as an
infra-literary operation but also as a mediation between the institutions of litera-
ture and society.3 There is, obviously enough, a dynamics of interrelating texts,
but we must also insist, along with Frnkel and others, that the poetic texts of
Ovid, Virgil, Horace, and Propertius also related to a societal context and its
pressures upon the conventions and institutions of literature. So too with Dante,
where intertextuality is a primary element in his poetics for examining his cul-
tural past and revalidating tradition as a continuing process; and for Dante as for
the Roman poets, intertextuality was a comment both on other texts and on
society. In its quasi-archaeological diggings, modern scholarship continues to
reveal to us this in-and-out, or centripetal-centrifugal functioning, this beneath
1 By ahistory I mean both of the practice and of the theory. An important contribution to the
theory is the re cent article of H. F. Plett (1986 [pub!. 1988J). A contribution to the his tory of the
praxis is provided by Ottmar Ette (1985).
2 I am indebted to the books of L. P. Wilkinson on Latin poetry, as weil as the studies of Frnkel
and Martindale cited in the bibliography.
3 In the 1983. study cited I have tried to stress inter-art intertextualities as weH as the necessary
connections between literature and society. Imitatio, to stress the point, may function not only
as an infra-literary operation, and intertextuality must be studied as one extension of imitatio.
182 R. J. Schoeck
the letter mode of intertextuality. Like the work of archaeology which finds new
places to dig and always more artifacts to catalogue and correlate, intertextuality
is an exciting exploration of meanings that may once have been alive but now
may have become covered by dust and forgotten.
Erasmus was, I think - in ways and for reasons that I shall try to make clear -
the most intertextual of prose writers and perhaps also of poets, certainly of the
Renaissance; and his writing in turn became the source for such master intertex-
tualists as Rabelais and Montaigne, whose pages glitter with the gold quarried
from theAdagia/Adages and Colloquies especially.4 The source, I have said: we
may think in terms of the river metaphor, which reverberates with the familiar
Petrarchan figure, or we may prefer the metaphor for one source of energy that
feeds another: that is, a fountain (which has its own rich his tory, and endless
intertextualities), or mirror, or (with thanks to Thomas Greene [1982]) the light
from Troy.5 All of these may be summoned up to illuminate the process of
supplying ideas and energies for subsequent writers; and all generate intertex-
tualities.
I want therefore to focus on Erasmus in this present excursus of intertextual-
ity.6
It is weIl known that all of Erasmus' writings are rich in allusion and quota-
tion, in commentaries that do many things with works being studied or edited -
and medieval and Renaissance commentaries (wh ich may weIl be the most
characteristic and productive form for the scholarship of these centuries, with
each individual commentary having its own weavings of intertextualities going
out from the text being studied) - rich in general awareness of generic and ca-
nonical relationships, and in many o.f the questions about canon formation that
engage critical attention today. In one paper it is not possible to deal with all of
these points and questions ; and as weIl as the literary intertextualities there are
examples of cross-art intertextalities, and interdisciplinary approaches.
7
I
propose to work primarily with the Adages and to display Erasmus' awareness
and techniques of intertextuality, calling attention to intertextuality within cer-
tain selected adages and between adages and his other writings.
4 See Screech's edition of Rabelais (1964) and Cave (1979).
5 On the multiple dimensions of metaphors in literary theory see R. J. Schoeck (1968).
6 My studies of Erasmian intertextualities may be seen first, in an initiating effort, in Intertextual-
ity and Renaissance Texts (1984), in a deepening fashion in Erasmus Grandescens (1988 b), and
continuing in my forthcoming biography of Erasmus.
7 As an example of the cross-art I would cite Holbein's The Ambassadors, which owes a recogniz-
able debt to Erasmian texts and which in its programme (foregrounding in the painting the tools
and instruments of the liberal arts) manifests the vitality of humanistic values; or Rembrandt's
Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer in the next century. As an example of the interdisci-
plinary, one may think of the workings of perspective in theories of art as well as in literature. See
further Schoeck (1983).

!
'In loco intertexantur' 183
The tide for this paper, I should reveal at this point, comes from the introduc-
tion to the Adages, and the full sentence in the English translation reads:
A?d so to interweave a?ag.es deftly and is to make the language as a whole glitter
':lth sparkles from AntlqUlty, please us wlth the colours of the art of rhetoric, gleam with jewel-
hke words of wisdom, and charm us with titbits of wit and humour.
8
(Prolegomena: Proinde si scite & in loco intertexantur
9
adagia, futurum est ut
sermo totus, & antiquitatis ceu stellulis quibusdam luceat, & figurarum arrideat
c?loribus, sentententiarum niteat gemmulis, & festivitatis cupediis blan-
dlatur: demque novitate excitet, brevitate delectet, auctoritate persuadeat. LB
1703, II, 8.)
. Let us begin with the earliest of Erasmus' writings, a letter dated provisionally
In 1484, when Erasmus was probably 17.
10
In this early letter Erasmus writes
that he "one of the kind who worry in case the sky should fall." The phrase
surfaces In the collection of adages which Erasmus published in 1500, the Collec-
Adagiorum, which is the earliest form of a work which continued to grow
and In 1508 became the Chiliades Adagiorum.
ll
The tide of this adage is Quid si
coelum ruat? and it comes from Terence in the H eautontimorumenos, one of the
texts which Erasmus had virtually by heart and which he again cites
In a later letter of 1487. I think, and I have argued elsewhere, that Erasmus was
already keeping a commonplace book at this early age, for it was a conventional
thing urged by humanist educators; and his 1500 collection of adages - his first
published book - is most probably drawn from a commonplace book. But none
of Erasmus' commonplace books, I must add, is extant.
In the same letter of 1484, our earliest extant letter in a correspondence that
numbers more than 3,000 letters, of which sixteen hundred are by Erasmus,
Erasmus go es on to say, "Meanwhile, as Ovid has it, 'time flies by on winged
feet,'" a quotation from the Ars amatoria 3.65, another text weIl known to the
8 From the translation in CWE 31: 17/10-18/13. This quotation is from the section of the Intro-
duction entitled "Decorative Value of the Proverb," but I think its application is wider.
9 The form in LB (presumably based on the 1540 text in Opera Omnia) is intertexantur, which is
striking. There is the root word texo, to make a fabric on a 100m, to weave, or to represent in
tapestry. In classical Latin it had also come to signify forming by plaiting or twining, and thus to
put together or construct a more complex structure (even a ship), or to fit together into a complex
structure.
Textum is the past participle of texo and meant a woven cloth; but it was also transferred to
rhetorical style, as Quintilian uses it in the Institutes IX.iv.17: "illud in Lysia dicendi textum
tenue". And it could mean the framework of a ship, formed by intercrossing timbers; this points
towards the metaphors for building a house that one finds in medievalliterary theory.
Perhaps Erasmus in coining (apparently) intertexantur wanted to emphasize the act of weaving
rather than the finished product.
10 I take 1467 as the year of Erasmus' birth, for reasons given in Erasmus Grandescens (1988 b), and
chapter 2 of my biography (forthcoming). The dating of Ep. 1 was made by P. S. Allen in his
Opus Epist. Erasmi and is followed in CWE 1 :2.
11 For an ac count of this process see Phillips (1964).
184 R. J. Sehoeek
schoolboy and one which Erasmus quotes again and again in the Adages. This is
not all of the weaving of quotations in his first letter, a short one of only 17 lines
in the Toronto edition;12 but it is enough to suggest that the interweaving habit
of mind had already begun. Erasmus was an intertextualist at the age of 17, and
some of the habit of mind had been established by the commonplace book
method of registering his reading.
Erasmus' second letter, most probably (though we are speaking in terms of
what has survived, and there were certainly others), is addressed simply to
Elizabeth, a nun, and the dating is also uncertain: it may be 1487, or as late as
1489. Here again Erasmus quotes Ovid, four lines from the Epistulae ex Ponto,
which project the topos of the shipwrecked individual. But in the text of thirty
lines there are also allusions to such commonplaces as Fortune and her wheel
and two faces, to fair-weather friends, and to seeing more clearly than the sun
(line 21). This is not remarkable, perhaps. But as I have remarked elsewhere
(Schoeck 1988 b, 79 ff.), there are problems of interpretation in the early letters
of Erasmus; and one aspect or dimension that needs to be considered can be
called the silences of Erasmus - those things he takes for granted, or for whatever
reason does not make explicit in writing to one of his numerous correspondents;
or it may be that he writes within a context that lost letters would have made
clear. In writing to Elizabeth, a nun, he makes no overt Scriptural allusions,
which is striking. But there are Scriptural allusions enough in the Oratio Fune-
bris in Funere Bertae de Heyen, which Erasmus had already written, and which
paid tribute, as we think, to the mother of this nun (LB VIII, 551-60), and there
are still other Biblical echoes in the Epitaphium Bertae de H eyen (LB VIII, 560),
with echoes of medieval hymns as w.ell as of classical elegiac poetry:
Dum sydera lueidus aether,
Roseum dum sol agat orbem,
Phoebe dum roseida noetem ...
these lines suggest the allusive or evocative tenor of the Epitaphium.
One letter does not build a case or support too broad a generalization. How-
ever, I would suggest that the letter to the daughter - to Elizabeth, a nun -
should be read together with the oratio and epitaph. Then the intertextualities
can be seen to be broad enough and inclusive of Christi an as weIl as classical
points of reference. We can only guess at the specific occasion for the letter to
Elizabeth, but we can safely infer that she had read the other two texts. Beyond
that, the key remains concealed in the reference in the first lines of Erasmus'
response: "Dearest sister in Christ, your letter has been delivered to me. [And] it
12 In general, only classieal allusions and quotations (as well as eontemporary historieal events and
the identifieation of personages) are identified in the eommentary of the Toronto edition. Serip-
tural allusions in the main are not noted, and yet they add another level of weaving; indeed, the
interweaving of classieal and seriptural allusion is an important aspeet of Erasmus' humanistie
style, and it manifests ab initio the working together of the two.
eIn loeo intertexantur' 185
offers the strongest possible evidence of yout good will towards me ... " (CWE
1 :3/3-4). It seems safe to conclude that something in the letter now lost had
triggered not only a letter in response from Erasmus, but also the mode and tone
of his reply.
IOne further example from these earliest letters. It is another from Erasmus'
monastery years and can be provisionally dated c. 1487 as weIl. In a single sen-
tence of Erasmus' letter to his friend Servatius Rogerus, a young monk at Steyn
(outside Gouda):
Why do I uselessly strive to plough the sand or wash a briek; and why do I roll this stone any
longer? (Ep. 7, eWE 1: 11/50-1)
All three of these topoi - 'plough the sand', 'wash a brick', and 'roll this stone' -
are taken up and developed in much expanded form in the Adagia. 13 The last of
them in fact is played with again, in another letter to Servatius Rogerus, prob-
ably in the following year:
Am I, like Sisyphus, onee again with useless toil to roll a stone uphill? (Ep. 23, eWE 1 :17/16-7)
It is evident that Erasmus wove ideas and expressions back and forth between his
letters, and then from them to the Adages. At this stage the letters came forth
first, but in later years more often it is the Adages that precede and the letters
which work upon them as sub-texts. In fact, the Adages are quintessentially
intertextual by their very definition, design, and execution.
The first version of the Adages was published in 1500 and it bore the title
CollectaneaAdagiorum, which emphasizes that the adages were assembled from
various sources. It was a rather small book of 152 pages and contained only 818
adages. This number was greatly increased, and many of the individual adages
were expanded in the 1508 edition called Adagiorum chiliades tres: three
thousand adages. Both the 1500 version, the Collectanea, and the 1508, had
separate printing histories and were printed in a number of European cities by
different presses for many years. The 1500 Collectanea, in fact, was reprinted at
least eleven times during the sixteenth century; and there were in addition at
least fourteen digests, abridgments, epitomes of theAdages. All in all, by the end
of the century perhaps as many as one hundred editions, abridgments, transla-
tions, and the like of the two versions had been published. It was universally
used as a thesaurus intertextualis; and more than any single work of Erasmus' it
led to the concept of hirn as a man of great learning, or, in Pliny's words in one of
his epistles, mihi ... quotiens aliquid abditum quaero, ille thesaurus (Ep. I.
22.2).14
Let us look at these models of intertextuality more closely. In the Collectanea
(at number 408) there is a list of phrases or proverbs expressing fruitless labour;
numbers 48 to 98, in the Adagiorum Ch ilia des, are all examples of fruitless
13 See eWE 31: I iv 51, I iv 48, and 11 iv 40.
14 See Phillips (1964), "General eharaeteristies of theAdages."
186 R. J. Schoeck
labour - very early adages, they are relatively quite brief and undeveloped. It is
evident that Erasmus' general practice is ta quote an authentic source and to
define it in one way or another. He then comments on it, often (as in 51) offering
additional references to other or fuller developments of the adage. In the later
adages, especially those written after 1517, Erasmus will weave in an essay on the
contemporary relevance, and then conclude in some way that shows the rela-
tionship of the past to the present. In the adages of the last decade of his life,
Erasmus often gives us scenes and persons remembered from his youth: perhaps
the sound of Dutch voices in his boyhood, or the story of the day he went
around in circles on horseback in the fog.
15
The early adages, then, tend ta be
short, certainly much shorter than the later ones, for Erasmus learned, especially
in the edition of 1533, how to make use of the form and provided "the system of
the Adages at its fullest development, a vehicle for the ripe comments and mel-
low reminiscence which are the late harvest, the 'aftermath' of a long life" (Phil-
lips 1964, 39).
There is some Greek in the 1500 Collectanea, but in only about a third; the
number of adages with Greek references and quotations increases markedly af-
ter 1508, underscoring Erasmus' growing mastery of the Greek language and of
Greek literature, and the uses made of the Greek become fuller and richer. Eras-
mus professed ta be ashamed at how litde Greek there was in his first version of
1500, but it is considerable and it marks the importance of the Collectanea as a
humanist book that made a significant contribution by enlarging the canon, as
well as in other ways. There is always, one may remark, a reciprocal functioning
between intertextuality and canon; except in post-modernist writing, where
there may be an avowed effort to de&troy the canon, intertextuality works best
where there is a consensus about
l
the canon, that is to say, a shared canon of
literature, so that there can be a response to the intricate process of encoding and
decoding.
16
The story of interrelating texts and interwoven quotations does not end with
the publication of the Adages through the years, of course, for there is their
Nachleben. In his work that is still in progress, Mathieu Knops is bringing to-
gether aseries of essays on the influence of the Adages in different European
countries, for there were readers everywhere; and it is appropriate that the con-
tributors to his volume are Erasmians from several countries. In this volume
Knops will provide an analysis of the fifty-five copies of sixteenth-century edi-
tions of theAdages found in the Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbttel, some
of which contain marginalia and other indications of reader-response.
Here I want simply and briefly to call attention to three kinds of response in
later writers who then use the Adages as their sub-text. The first is Rabelais, and
M. A. Screech in his edition of the Tiers Livre has demonstrated that on nearly
15 Phillips (1964), 38-39.
16 See Schoeck, "Intertextuality and the Rhetoric Canon" (1988 a). This problem quite obviously
requires much further discussion.
'In loco intertexantur' 187
every page there are allusions to the Adagia, sometimes one, sometimes as many
as half a dozen; Rabelais' own book is interwoven with strands from that of
Erasmus. Not only are many of these textual traces manifest to the careful
reader, but the practice is perhaps Rabelais' way of paying tribute ta a master-
text to which he owed so much.
17
A second writer is Montaigne, whose essays
are generically indebted to the form of the later Adagia, which discourse upon a
range of subjects and involve the writer's personal experiences. There are dif-
ferences, obviously, but in the development from adage to essay there is a clear
line of organic development. A third writer is Robert Burtan, whose Anatomy
o[ Melancholy (1621) carries us inta the seventeenth century. An elaborate en-
cyclopedic work that is organized thematically, it is, in the words of J ohn Hol-
lander and Frank Kermode (1973, 964), a book that is "also ab out the very
condition of being learned," for the "interior dialogue of the whole book is
between scholar and books, English and Latin": it marks a limit to possible
development of the intertextual essay.
From Montaigne to Francis Bacon there had been a development of the essay
form, to be sure; but in the hands oE- Burton extensive and wide-ranging essays
are subordinated to the controlling central system of a compendium on melan-
choly. Wh at is to ~ no ted is the extent to which on every page there is a bringing
together - we return to that root metaphor in the 1500 tide of Erasmus' Collec-
tanea, "assembled from various sources" - an adduction of adages from the
wide world of learning. Not only is it a development from the Erasmian techni-
que of assembling adages, with many of Burton's individual quotations being
also found in the Adagia, which may have been for Burtan both the index in
going to a locus classicus as well, perhaps, as in some instaQces his direct and only
source. (Burton's quotations, as far as I know, have not been fully checked
against the Adagia, and until that is done one cannot speak too firmlyon this
matter.) But, not only is Burton's Anatomy a development of Erasmian techni-
que, it is also a kind of commemoration of Erasmian inspiration, as in their ways
the books of Rabelais and Montaigne were. But it is an overdevelopment, and I
suggest an inter-art metaphor: we can characterize Burton's technique in terms
of the over-ornate Baroque arch, as Churrigueresque, an overloading of the
building with ornament.
18
This characterization takes us inta the world of art
and architecture, and it is appropriate to bring to an end this indication of the
widening circles of readers of the Adagia with a notice of Alciati; I refer to
Andrea Alciati's Emblematum liber of 1531, which introduced the developed
emblem into European literature and established a concept as well as a new
form, one that had enormous vogue for more than two centuries. The greatest
debt of Alciati was ta Erasmus, as many of the individual emblems, drawn from
the Adages, make evident. In form, there was the motto with an explication,
17 Rabelais' letter to Erasmus that begins "Salve itaque etiam atque etiam, pater amantissime"
speaks of this great debt unequivocally: "Everything that I do, all that I am, I owe to you."
18 This is in Eco's terminology "over-coding": see Eco (1976),133-135.
188 R. J. Schoeck
accompanied by a woodcut or engraving symbolically expressing the meaning
of the words; the explication was usually in verse. As the form of the emblem
developed there were often linguistic intertextualities, with the motto in one
language, for example, and the explication in another. At times (especially with
the J esuits in the seventeenth century) emblems were instruments for teaching of
languages or moral instruction.
19
There are other ways to identify and study the workings of intertextuality in
Erasmus. One such way would be to take a single work and to explore it fully.
For purposes of this paper I should call attention to intertextuality in what is
probably Erasmus' earliest work (other than letters and poems), his De Con-
temptu M undi. This is a work which he began in the monastery, in his early
twenties, but did not publish until many years later. A rejection of the world,
like a renunciation of the self, may be done for a number of motives; and Eras-
mus seems to have been most influenced by Petrarch's attitude that regarded the
world as detrimental to fulfillment of one's own personality, more than an em-
phasis on hating sin, embracing penance, and seeking grace as one finds in
St. Bernard and Innocent IU. It may perhaps be best seen, as Tracy (1972, 32)
suggests, as making the strongest case possible for monasticism. But Erasmus, as
we know from external evidence, kept recasting this early work - changing the
form of declamatio to that of dialogue, and years later adding a final chapter that
condemns abuses and excesses of monasticism - all this makes it perilous to press
too closely upon this work as evidence of the monastic years. "Thus, he appa-
rently sought in the monastery security to pursue his studies, deliverance from
the vulgar crowd and peace of conscience. This is the ideal of De Contemptu
Mundi" (Tracy 1972, 37). ,.
There are, then, formal intertextualities in the writing of a work that con-
demns certain aspects of the world, and Erasmus par consequent establishes and
calls into discussion relations wi'th the works of Innocent IU, Petrarch, and
Dionysus the Carthusian. It is of interest that Innocent had cited averse from
Juvenal (xiv. 139) which was also cited by Erasmus (see PL 217/720A and LB V,
1243 EF, as noted by Tracy 1972, 40n.). Such borrowings and cross-markings
are the traces left of readings and subsequent intertextualities.
We easily recognize the employment of Matthew 11 :29-30: "Take my yoke
upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will
find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." (Yoke here
is a code-word, for rabbinical teaching spoke of the yoke of the Law.) And we
note the references to J erome, Augustine, Ambrose, Cyprian, Lactantius,
Thomas, and Albert: a movement from the Gospels to the Church Fathers to
medieval masters. There are also interesting resonances of Valla's De Voluptate,
19 For its admirable brevity and clarity I am indebted to J. L. Lievsay's description of the emblem in
the Princeton Encyclopedia (1974). Again, during the Renaissance itself there was an easy famil-
iarity with interart metaphors - a kind of intertextuality. See now W. S. Heckscher, The Prince-
ton Alciati Companion (New York, Garland, 1989).
'In loco intertexantur' 189
which he perhaps began to read in the monastery at ab out the same time that he
was reading Valla's Elegantiae, that work which so greatly influenced his con-
cept of true Latinity of language and a true classical style. Finally, very much to
the point of viewing intertextuality within Erasmus' writing and reading during
these crucial years in the monastery, when he was from about nineteen to about
twenty-five, is the consistent paralleling, really echoing, of ideas and words
from the De Contemptu M undi to the three elegies written during this period, as
Reedijk has shown (Poems, 1956,205-17); and from these writings there are, as
always in Erasmus, echoings in the letters, which I think sometimes precede,
sometimes accompany, and sometimes look back upon those other works.
What is needed is a sense of possible models or paradigms for intertextuality,
and these might range from overlays or maps, to sets of intertwined ropes or
rugs and garments from woven materials. Without attempting at this point to
generate a new vocabulary for the study of intertextuality I would like to con-
sider the notion of mobiles as an analogy for the play of texts with and against
each other in the writings of Erasmus. A mobile (largely innovated by the
American sculptor William Calder) describes a type of hanging sculpture con-
sisting of parts that move, especially in response to air currents, for these parts
are usually hung by wire from the ceiling or from other parts.
20
Take, then, a
number of mobiles in a room of this size, and imagine that there are severallines
coming down from the ceiling, and on each line there is aseparate little set of
suspended objects, a system of mobility, oE potential interdependence, of vary-
ing movement. Within each set or system there is relationship : movements oc-
cur as a result of energy somewhere else in that system, doubtless initiated by an
external force, such as a current of air - or a great social event, or achallenging
new concept, to extend our analogy in the world of thought and leiters. But in a
room this size it is likely that there are already connections that we do not see-
very fine wires connecting the different sets, at different points - and so if there is
a tug or push over there, unexpectedly there is movement over here; and we may
not have known that there was a connection. Connections, we must think, can
always be made between systems; and in fact there is a larger galaxy of intercon-
nections always potential. It is almost impossible to conceive a limit to the pos-
sibilities of systems of mobiles within this galaxy. The world of literature is such
a galaxy of mobiles. The Reformation was one system, and the Renaissance
another; and we keep discovering connections between these two systems that
were not visible before. And Erasmus? He is a whole system hirnself.
20 The term from which the Calder sculpture derived its name, mobile, is a synonym for movable, as
in a mobile horne. But it is also something special in the sense in which I have been speaking.
Here, in Calder's kind of mobile, there is also a sense of play, which is a vital part of the Renais-
sance society and imagination. Intertextuality, I suggest, works best in a spirit of game.
190 R. J. Schoeck
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DEREK N. C. WOOD
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space
Intertextuality in Milton's Samson Agonistes
nos quoque has apes debemus imitari et quaecum-
que ex diversa lectione congessimus, separare,
melius enim distineta servantur, deinde adhibita
ingenii nostri cura et-jacultate in unum saporem
varia illa libamenta confundere, ut etiam si ap-
paruerit, unde sumptum sit, aliud tamen esse
quam unde sumptum est appareat.
Seneca. Ad Lucilium, Ep.lxxxiv.
There is still much to be learned about the relations hip between the Renaissance
poetics of Imitation and the poetics of Intertextuality. Gerard Genette has al-
ready made a valuable contribution to that enquiry (1982,11-17; 80-112 etc.),
and Laurent J enny has suggested that the Renaissance, like the early twentieth
century, is a particularly interesting period for the student of intertextuality
(1976,259). As he says, "le dogme de propre a la Renaissance est aussi
une invite a une lecture double des Fextes et au dechiffrage de leur rapport inter-
textuel avec le modele antique. Les mo des de lecture de chaque epoque sont
donc aussi inscrits dans leurs modes d'ecriture" (258). This essay will focus not
on the theoretical relationships but on the actual practice of one of the most
accomplished literary artists working within the poetics of imitation. Milton's
tragedy Samson Agonistes is of considerable interest to the intertextualist, refer-
ring as it does to a vast intertext of classical, Biblical and Renaissance pre-texts
and hypo-texts. In these pages, I will develop two connected arguments. For the
theorist, I propose to return attention to the role of the author, so often ignored
if not despised in recent years as emphasis has increasingly been placed on the
reader's apprehension of meaning. For the traditional scholar, I suggest that the
concepts generated by intertextual theory, or "transtextuality," can help resolve
a controversy that criticism of Samson is locked in just now. The level of disa-
greement about fundamental aspects of the play is quite startling: Is the hero
finally the champion of God or of Satan? Is the hero's achievement a triumph of
Christian morality, perhaps typifying Christ' s redemptive death, or is it a sinful,
presumptuous, self-indulgent orgy of vengeful violence? Disagreement follows
about the structure of the play, the nature of the tragedy and its place in Milton's
thought. An understanding of its intertextuality - and of Milton's understand-
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 193
ingof its intertextuality - can help us appreciate the play's sustained multiva-
lency held poised as it is in delicate suspension. It offers the reader unanswered
and unanswerable questions. It enacts the problems encountered by the Chris-
tian in reading the Word of God, when that Word raises questions and uncer-
tainties which are not clarified by the silent Divine Author. Criticism of Samson
Agonistes in the last two decades has been predominantly contextual as scholars
have tried to find a location for it in the geography of Milton's work, while some
have laboured to recuperate in it what others have found intolerable. Most have
tried to achieve a simpl/e linear resolution of its multivalent ambiguities. Few
have indicated these as honestly and revealingly as Ulreich, who exclaims: "Is
Samson Agonistes a demonic parody of the Apocalypse? Or is Samson the anti-
type, the Word made flesh,of which Samson's holocaust is the type? I am not
sure that this choice can be determined [rom the evidence o[ the play [.:.]" (1983,
313; italics added).
It is no secret that intertextual theorists recently have shown little interest in
the text's author. Linda Hutcheon, attempting to describe the "actual experience
of reading," eliminates the author from Kristeva's model of that activity: "Is the
intertextual dialogue not rather one between the reader and his/her memory of
other texts, as provoked by the work in question ? Certainly the role of the
author in contemporary discussions of intertextuality has proved to be minimal
[ ... ]" (1986,231). So, the concern of the intertextualist has moved away from the
creative function of the author to the perceptive function of the reader, from the
craft of the maker to the enjoyment of the receiver. Riffaterre describes intertex-
tuality as "a modality of perception, the deciphering of the text by the reader in
such a way that he identifies the structures to which the text owes its quality of
work of art" (1980, 625). The tendency has been to see intertextuality not so
much as a condition of the text - semantic, linguistic or structural - but as a
decoding activity. As Riffaterre goes on to say: "The term indeed refers.to an
operation of the readet's mind [ ... ]" (1984, 142). Of course, some have gone
beyond ignoring the activity of the author to denying it. Eco insists that "it is not
true that works are created by their authors. Works are created by works, texts
are created by texts, all together they speak to each other independently of the
intention of their authors" (1986, 199). Loy Martin "abolishes effectively the
poet as unique innovator." For Martin he is merely "the well-instructed mis-
sionary of the language which constitutes both his own subjectivity and that of
his culture. And the site of his mission is the literary past" (1980, 667).
To some extent, this averting of the gaze from the author is grounded
in ideological distaste. Many have found offensive the treatment of the text as
the property of the author, who thus, like a colonial imperialist lays claim to
structures of meaning that others see as the common property of humanity.
The author as owner and profiteer has readily been identified with the entre-
preneur in the capitalist market place. Likewise, the Romantic compulsion to
glamorise individual genius also threatens the interests of the community. Such
impulses have produced a male-dominated canon of great writers, rejected
194 D. N. C. Wood
by feminist and marxist critics alike. Barthes, for instance, flaunts his dislike of
capitalist ideology and the prestige of the individual in his irritation at the
"Author-God" :
The writer can only imitate a gesture that is always anterior, never original. His only power is to
mix writings, to counter the ones with the others [ ... ]. Did he wish to express himself, he ought at
least to know that the inner 'thing' he thinks to 'translate' is itself only a ready-formed dictionary,
its words only explainable through other words [ ... ] (1988,170).
Such conclusions invite deconstruction, but all I suggest here is that the activity
of the encoder can be plotted, and that sometimes it deserves and rewards
scrutiny. Even the writers cited above appear to concede as much, guardedly.
Linda Hutcheon admits that "someone obviously had to place those strategies in
the text" (1986,234). Although Barthes reduces the author's contribution to
"mixing" writings, that is itself an arguably interesting function, although the
word describing it is so dismissive. Riffaterre defines the "intertext" as the "cor-
pus of texts the reader may legitimately connect with the one before his eyes,
that is, the texts brought to mind by wh at he is reading"(1980, 626). If we ask
what makes a particular reading-act "legitimate," the answer must be that it is
determined by the text being read, which therefore has its own integrity,
sovereignty and individuality. Then the activity of shaping or mixing that text
must be a valid subject for critical enquiry. After all, the author is also areader,
the first more or less critical reader of the text. The author has apower to ma-
nipulate and organise which exceeds that of the reader of the most" scriptible" of
texts. As Jean Verrier says, "L'ecrivain lit et est lu; le lecteur ecrit et est ecrit.
C'est le mouvement circulaire ou en spirale, que doit suivre notre lecture: l'ecri-
vain devenu lecteur-voyeur est plus 'que jamais identifiable au scripteur" (1976,
346). The writer as text-manipulator can be sensitive to the intertext and fashion
the work so as to exploit its ambiguities or its suggestiveness. Every
act of selection - of genre, sentence, word - by the author implies an act of
criticism. As Riffaterre states, "The literary representation of reality, then, for
all its objectifying stance, is essentially an interpretive discourse [ ... J. In sum,
intertextuality cannot avoid being hermeneutic" (1984, 159-60).
Milton is a writer with a particularly sensitive intertextual awareness. A spe-
cial place in a taxonomy of intertextualities should be allocated to works
fashioned with such creative selfconsciousness. Few works are better proof-
examples than is Samson Agonistes of LaurentJenny's affirmation: "L'intertex-
tualite designe non pas une addition confuse et mysterieuse d'influences, mais
le travail de transformation et d'assimilation de plusieurs textes opere par un
texte centreur qui garde le leadership du sens" (1976,262). Late in the play, the
Chorus celebrates Samson's destruction of the Philistines in words that serve
to illustrate not only the intertextual density of Milton's poetic language but
also the delicately controlled authorial indirection wh ich is the theme of this
essay:
With inward eyes illuminated
His fiery virtue roused
From under ashes into sudden flame,
And as an evening dragon came,
Assailant on the perched roosts,
And nests in order ranged
Of tarne villatic fowl [ ... J. (1689-95)
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 195
Modern scholarship has tried to assess the seventeenth century reader's response
to the chorus's conception of "virtue". Most scholars consider that Samson is
the regenerate and triumphant champion of God (e. g. Stein, Allen, Low, Rad-
zinowicz); many feel that Samson typologically anticipates Christ's redemptive
sacrifice or his final judgment (e. g. Scott-Craig, Lewalski); some feel the play is
a defiant statement of hope by a stubborn, anti-monarchic revolutionary (e. g.
HilI, J ose); but others are convinced that Samson is sinful or satanic or a
pathological, brutal murderer (e. g. Samuel, Carey, Bouchard, Wittreich).
Should the reader accept or reject the Chorus's idea of "virtue" as a sdund
Christian one? I think it is fair to say that we cannot decide from the text alone.
Virtue is a word that acts in Milton's poems like an intertextual signpost. It is an
instrument for fictionality, silently revealing the ideologicallimitations in the
fictional consciousness of its user. The author seldom intervenes to indicate
where the sign directs uso When Satan in Paradise Lost upbraids the fallen angels
for reposing their cCwearied virtue" abjectly (PLi. 320), the word is devoid of the
Christian significance it has when used by the narrator of the sinners Adam and
Eve cCdestitute and bare Of all their virtue"(9. 1063). Sometimes, what looks like
authorial indication is nonetheless fictional, as in cCphilosophic pride, By hirn
called virt'\le"; the commentator here is ideologically perfect, for it is cc our
Saviour" in Paradise Regained evaluating the Stoic (4. 300). However, Satan's
intellective limitations are revealed when, misconceiving God's nature, he
speculates, cCWhether such virtue spent of old now failed More angels to
create"(PL 9.145). While Eve's pre-Iapsarian wisdom is undefiled, she can play
subtly with the word's meanings of cCpower" and cCgoodness": cCFruitless to me,
though fruit be here to excess, The credit of whose virtue rest with thee" (9. 648)
but, yielding to her tempter, she sadly mistakes the nature of the fruit and of
virtue: CCFair to the eye, inviting to the taste, Of virtue to make wise" (9. 777).
If we turn back now to the Chorus in Samson we may notice that the rejoicing
of the Danites recalls another response in Milton's poetry to horrifying destruc-
tion. Sin congratulates Satan on his cCmagnific deeds":
Thou hast achieved our liberty [ .. .J.
Thine now is all this world, thy virtue hath won [ ... ] thy wisdom gained
With odds what war hath lost, and fully avenged
Our foil in heaven [ ... J. (PL 10.368-375)
They proceed to cCdestroy [ ... ] waste and havoc" (611,617). The similarities in
the two situations are disturbing. Rationalising self-interest, in both cases, dis-
torts the analysis of events. Victory, honour and liberty are wrongly conceived
196 D. N. C. Wood
of. Destruction is made to serve as a measure of success. The echo es are am-
plified in the Dragon image. Samson's "virtue" is "fiery" (1690). This is a pre-
Christian "virtus" - or physical might- ravaging the nests of "tarne villatic fowl"
(1695). This image even calls to mind the serpent in the way of the Lord in
Genesis. Christopher HilI dismisses Irene Samuel's reading of the playas dis-
torted by "a modern liberal Christianity which [Milton] did not share" (1977,
444), but this is to ignore the intertext of the play. It is Sin who misconceives
destructiveness as virtue. It appears then that the chorus also misconceives the
nature of virtue as, by Christian standards, they obviously should. Are they
fashioned to act out aJ udaic consciousness as seen by a Christian? If this seems to
be obvious, it is a view that is normally rejected by most of those who have
traced a Christian ethic in the play's personae. The critics mentioned are readers
whose scholarship is consummate and whose critical sensitivity is exquisite, and
yet they disagree about almost every aspect of one of the best known poems in
English literature. The author is silent; we may say he has chosen to die. He has
left us with indirection, knowing that other texts will speak to this text. Later, I
will show that the indirection is creative.
The deep dis agreements among scholars and critics who often flatly con-
tradict one another about every important element in the play, suggest either
that Milton has failed hopelessly to communicate its meaning or that perhaps the
indirection is controlled and deliberate. Sometimes an intertextual echo clearly
reveals the author at work. J oseph Wittreich has shown this neatly in the belief
stated by the Chorus (1270-72) and by Manoa (341) that Samson is invincible.
Wittreich shows from other texts that "invincibility is an attribute only of God-
head," and human boasts about invin<;,ibility are more indicative of intractability
and pig-headedness. Manoa and thy Chorus are wrong (1986, 248 - 50). Samson' s
own evaluation of his strength provides problems for the reader until it is placed
within its intertextual web of refe'tents. Christ's triumph was in a "great duel,
not of arms" (PR 1.174), and many readers are convinced that Samson's
triumph, o ~ , was the culmination of an agon, a victory over temptation, a hard-
won struggle for spiritual growth and renovation. However, his end re-enacts
his violently physical prime, when "old warriors turned Their plated backs
und er his heel; Orgrovelling soiled their crested helmets in the dust" (139-41).
He measures his own "great act" by an ethic of strength and blood-heroism. His
worst moments of despair were linked with the memory of lost physical
strength (631-51). "Strength is my bane" (63), he cries more prophetically than
he realises. A Treatise of Civil Power contains an intertextual gloss on this ethic:
"Force is no honest confutation; but uneffectual, and for the most part unsuc-
cessfull, oft times fatal to them who use it" (CP 7: 261-2).
In the field of listening to Samson - to paraphrase Barthes - meaning comes
sometimes from glimmerings, sometimes from eclats, penetrating blows from
other scenes. Characteristic of the poetic language in the play is a condition of
misconception: concepts that have a certain significance in Christian theology
are understood differently by the fictionalJudaic characters, conceptions such as
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 197
redemption, deliverance or ransom. It is as if the intertext available to the users of
these words in the play excludes a large portion of the intertext available for a
later reader to consult. Michael Riffaterre in a passage of analysis describes the
effect of certain words as being that of
signs which have the primary function, at the level of significance, of telling the reader there is a
latent intertext at work. These connectors work by triggering presuppositions, by compelling the
reader to recognise that the text makes sense only by reference to meanings found neither within
the verbal context nor within the author's idiolect but within an intertext (1984, 148).
The reference of Samson's-poignant lament at his blindness is peculiarly com-
plex. Again it appears to me that the writer controls the intertext9al reference
with great care but also withthat evasiveness that has been noted above:
Light the prime work of God ta me is extinct [ ... J.
o first-created beam, and thou great word,
Let there be light, and light was over all;
Why am I thus bereaved thy prime decree?
[ ... ] Since light so necessary is ta life,
And almost life itself, if it be true
That light is in the soul [ .. .J. (70-92)
The intertextual reference here works quite differently from that in the much
discussed Invocation in Paradise Lost with its entirely Christian allusions:
Hail, holy Light, offspring of heaven first-born,
Or of the eternal co-eternal beam
May I express thee unblamed? since God is Light [ ... J. (3. 1-3)
The pre-text of Samson's anguished cry is Genesis 1.3 which he quotes con-
sciously but he is unconscious of the Christian material that forms the intertext
of the epic invocation. However, Samson's reader interconnects that entire body
of Christian Gospel, commentary, sermon and allusion, including prominently
the words of St.John:
In the beginning was the Word [ ... ] In hirn was life; and the life was the light of men. And the
light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not [ ... ] That was the true Light,
which lighteth every man that cometh inta the world. He was in the world, and the world was
made by hirn, and the world knew hirn not [ ... ] And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among
us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and
truth. (1.1-14)
Samson is consciously quoting Genesis but does Milton not make hirn uncon-
sciously quote John? And is this not the key to the code which has divided
commentators on this play? Is not Samson a dramatic exemplum of a moral
consciousness that is honest but flawed, morally flawed in its ignorance of the
example and teaching ofJohn's Christ Incarnate in time (see Wood, 1989). Sam-
son, in physical and moral darkness, cannot know the light and the incarnation
of the Word that will come centuries later and te ach an ethic so different from
Samson's ethic of strength and destruction. That Word will te ach a word Sam-
198 D. N. C. Wood
son does not mention: "charity." This is a long way from interpretations of
Samson as type of Christ or triumphant champion of God. The intertextual
connectors are faint. As Heinrich F. Plett writes:
The receiver, i. e. the listener or reader, who comes across a quotation text, may either notice the
quotations or he may not. If he overlooks them, the text misses its purpose which consists in
opening up dialogues between pre-texts and quotation texts. The culprit for such an aesthetic
failure cannot easily be identified. Part of the responsibility lies with the author who should feel
obliged to supply the quotations with markers [ ... ] (1986, 306-7).
Here the markers are not clear and the effect again is one of indirection. The
dramatic form makes it easier for the author to silence his own voice and to
exclude the voice of any privileged, authoritative moral commentator, such as
we hear in the epics. Any narrative framing that occurs must be done by the
fictional dramatic characters and all their evaluations are, it folIows, subject to
error. Indeed, the author makes an effort to present them from the start as being
morally and intellectually flawed. The author's indirection has an important
effect. Does it not make deciphering the code more difficult? Does it not make it
difficult to read the moral significance of reading the text? And does this not
mime or re-enact the Christian's difficulty in reading the significance of its great
pre-text, the Bible?
Milton's tragedy enacts the problem of reading the Word of God, itself en-
meshed in a formidable network of echoes, glosses, cruxes and obfuscations.
Sometimes its meaning is quite clear as when The Letter to Hebrews contex-
tualises Judges and affirms Samson's status as a hero of faith. Yet that Letter
insists on the differences between the Law and the Gospel. Should the Christian
be meek, turn the other cheeck and ~ j e c t the power of this earth as Christ does
in Paradise Regained, or imitate this Old Testament hero as a model, with his
violence and brawling destructiveness? Christopher HilI is quite certain that
Milton's Samson is offered unamblguously as a rle-model for contemporaries
who hated the enemies of God, namely the Caroline monarchists (1984,
310-319). Is Samson, then, an example of Christian strength in weakness, or of
the unChristian misuse of deadly force? The ambiguous Samson tradition had
manipulated Milton hirns elf over the years. Before the Revolution, he had treat-
ed Samson as a praiseworthy figure, but had identified hirn with the king (CP 1 :
858-9). In Areopagitica he had caressed the English people by allusively com-
paring them to Samson rising in his strength (CP 2: 557-8). In Eikonoklastes
Samson came to his mind as a figure of degradation (CP 3 : 461, 545 - 6). Later, in
the First Defence, Samson was cited as a destroyer of tyrants and overlords (CP
4, 1: 402). And then, it was Samson as remorseful sinner whom the writer recol-
lected at the moment of the fall of humanity (PL 9. 1059-62). Years later, when
the Revolution had collapsed, words Milton had written at a time of military and
political triumph would come back to torture hirn: "Certainly in a good Cause
success is a good confirmation; for God hath promis'd it to good men almost in
every leafe of Scripture" (CP 3 :599). Later he could also reconsider bitterly and
at leisure the words he had written in an exuberant time about "Justice, which is
1
I
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 199
the Sv;.ord of God, superior to all mortal things, in whose hand soever by appar-
ent signes his testified will is to put it" (CP 3 :193). After 1660, with the machin-
ery of earthly justice securely in the hands of the monarchists, and surrounded
by the ruined remnants of victories won by physical resistance, the rev-
olutionaries had to cope with disillusionment, not only about their vanished
achievements but about their very aims and their methods.
How could the God who willed 1649 also will 1660? And how could he sacrifice his servants then
even if others had let down his Cause? Men had believed that their cause was invincible because it
was God's. The defeat therefore called in question either God's goodness or his omnipotence, or
their understanding of God's will [ ... ] 'The Lord had blas ted them and spit in their faces,' wailed
Major-General Fleetwood (Hill 1984, 307).
Their understanding of what constituted right heroic behaviour in the service of
God appeared to have been mistaken. For many revolutionaries, Samson had
symbolised the Good Old Cause and the N ew Model Army. N ow it was neces-
sary to re-read the text of the Samson story and remember, perhaps, that he had
achieved nothing for the deliverance of Israel. In The Experience o[ Defeat,
Christopher Hill has measured the bitterness of that defeat and beautifully illus-
trated the ways in which it was dealt with. Yet he insists that Milton did not turn
away from politics to pacifism as the Quakers did, spiritualising his conception
of God's kingdom on e;uth. "Milton's thinking thus in a sense represents a dead
end, with its blind assertion that good will triumph" (318). Yet HilI, like Low
and Bennett and Radzinowicz, often draws illustration for Milton's thinking
from works written many years before the collapse of the Revolution. In the
later works the poet does remark, as the Bible instructs hirn to, that we should
hate the enemies of God and so on, but counters this heavily with warnings
against force and violence, and with exhortations to teach and persuade
whenever possible rather than compel or punish.
The deeply anibiguous nature of the poem produced in these circumstances
can best be appreciated by the intertextualist. One of the most important cruxes
in the text is the moment when Samson suddenly revers es his refusal to go to the
temple of Dagon, indicating to his Israelite companions that he is impelled by
God to do so:
I begin to feel
Some rousing motions in me which dispose
To something extraordinary my thoughts (1381-83).
Many interpreters read this simply as a divine sanction for Samson's destruction
of the Philistine temple, seeing God's impulse moving his champion to heroic
Christian action. Wittreich's conclusion, however, suggests how unconvincing
the evidence is for this: "[ ... ] Samson' s last act is left ambiguous, deliberately so
[ ... ]. Milton's poem is not about Samson's regeneration but, instead, about his
second fall" (1986, 80). In fact, the word "motions", with its implied claim to
divine impulsion or inner light, is a word that explodes in the reader's mind with
a polyvalent clamour of contradictory voices. In Kristeva's words, "en effritant
200 D. N. C. Wood
ainsi [ ... ] le langage poetique met en proces le sujet a travers un reseau de mar-
ques et de frayages semiotiques" (1974, 58). By 1660, a multitudinous host of
fools, charlatans and fanatics had claimed divine impulsion for their excesses and
even apparently blasphemous and outrageous behaviour. Knowing the truth of
another human being's claim to have been motioned by God was entirely prob-
lematical. Milton wrote in a late pamphlet: "Divine illumination [ ... ] no man
can know at all times to be in hirns elf, much less to be at any time for certain in
any other" (CP 7: 242). The word "motions" here is a kind of syllepsis. Rif-
faterre explains Derrida' s term:
Syllepsis eonsists in the understanding of the same word in two different ways at onee, as contex-
tual meaning and as intertextual meaning. The eontextual meaning is that demanded by the
word's grammatieal eolloeations, by the word's referenee to other words in the text. The inter-
textual meaning is another meaning the word may possibly have, one of its dietionary meanings
and/or one aetualized within an intertext. In either case, this intertextual meaning is incompatible
with the context and pointless within the text, but it still operates as a second reference - this one
to the intertext (1980, 637- 8).
And he adds: "Undecidability can exist only within a text; it is resolved by the
interdependence between two texts." Undecidability is what the author offers
the reader, and it is mimetic of the ambiguity any individual must cope with
when probing the conscience of any other. By the end of the Puritan revolution,
the most partisan of believers were forced to reflect ruefully on the claims of
those who insisted they had been motioned by God. Cromwell tried to be tact-
ful early on in the Putney Debates: "I know a man may answer all difficulties
with faith, and faith will answer all difficulties really where it is, but we are very
apt, all of us, to call that faith, that may be but carnal imagination, and
carnal reasonings" (Woodhouse 1 8). It is difficult to know God working in
oneself, let alone in another, and in this too Samson is an imitatio of the am-
bivalences of human understandil'1g. Milton is harsher than Cromwell when he
excoriates the hypocrites, those who, lying, pretend that they have been moved
by the Spirit:
all the sacred mysteries of heaven
To their own vile advantages shall turn
[ ... ] though feigning still to act
By spiritual, to themselves appropriating
The Spirit of God [ ... ] (PL 12.509-519)
Milton's syllepsis reminds the reader of all the idiots, mountebanks and mis-
guided ones who had claimed to be led by divine impulse. Samson hirnself had
been baffled by his own experience of being motioned. How difficult it is to read
God's own text, given its baffling intertextuality!
The meaning of Samson Agonistes is written in an intertextual space that had
already been frequently intercrossed when the latest narrator inJudges finally
reworked a story that recedes into a trackless antiquity of sacrificial sun-heroes
and springtime renewal. It has been endlessly overwritten since then by cen-
turies of exegesis, allusion, citation, liturgical juxtaposition and refictionalisa-
1
:
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 201
tion. The space is full of queries, contradictions, flickerings of meaning: "L'e-
nonce poetique est un sous-ensemble d'un ensemble plus grand qui est l' espace
des textes appliques dans notre ensemble" (Kristeva 1969, 194). Gerard Genette
reduced Kristeva's definition of intertextuality to only one of five categories he
proposed, and he restated her description of it in these words: "une relation de
co-presence entre deux ou plusieurs textes, c' est-a-dire, eidetiquement et le plus
souvent, par la presence effective d'un texte dans un autre" (1982, 8). Milton as
author has tactfully withdrawn from the reader's presence so that the intertex-
tual space (Kristeva's "lieu d'enonciation") is filled with echoes, questions,
whispered doubts and noisy contradictions: "un echange chatoyant de voix
multiples, posees sur des on des differentes et saisies par moments d'un fading
brusque, dont la trouee permet a I' enonciation de migrer d'un point de vue a
l'autre sans prevenir" (Barthes 1970,49). In connection with this, I agree with
those scholars who do not believe that Milton is working within the typological
tradition of Biblical hermeneutics to present Samson as a type of Christ. How-
ever, he is aware of that element in the intertext supplying voices that suggest
those ways of reading the Samson text.
The impasse or face-to-face confrontation that Samson criticism finds itself in
is the result of a yearning for closure: for one fixed, finite, circumscribable
meaning. In the case of this text, it is more than ever true that such a longing is
merely "le reve d'une reuvre totale, parfaite, OU chaque fragment trouverait sa
place harmonieuse; reve d'accomplissement de l'histoire, projet hegelien" (Per-
rone-Moises 1976,378). Most readers of SamsonAgonistes consider,that Samson
is a tragic hero intended to command admiration and and that Milton
presents hirn as a model for Christian imitation. Anthony Low pictured Samson
as a gloriously triumphant Christian hero: "The image and example of the
champion of God"(1974, 117). M. A. N. Radzinowicz concluded that the de-
struction of the temple is "a human imaging of God's might [ ... ] an exemplary
act which teaches how God gives freedom" (1978, 346). How much further
could one be from the objections of Irene Samuel who finds in Samson's last
words that, "It is still a monomaniac who speaks, and the mania is still egomania
[ ... ]." This maniac brings hirnself to destruction through his "shortcomings"
(1971,246,250). Some readers have placed Samson in the typological tradition as
a type of Christ the redeemer (Scott-Craig 1952), Christ the exemplar (Sadler
1972) or Christ surrounded by the Elect in final apocalyptic judgment (Lewalski
1970). Several Christian concepts have been invoked to describe his temporal
and spiritual victory: the descent or renewal of grace, divine impulsion, patience
triumphant over despair, temptation resisted, conversion, spiritual growth and,
most frequently, regeneration. Yet, Carey, reading the same text, finds in Sam-
son "no spiritual development, only [ ... ] resentment which has been gnawing
inwardly" (1969, 139). Among those who find it impossible to accept that Sam-
son is an exemplary Christian is J. A. Wittreich who insists that "Milton's 'mar-
tyr-play' is T ... ] less a celebration than a censure of its hero" (1986, 326). He
draws support from a vein of contemporary Renaissance allusion "that exhibits
202 D. N. C. Wood
a tarnished Samson - a Samson who, nurtured in blood, delights in vengeance
and whose enterprise entails the wretched interchange of wrong for wrong"
(244-5). These citations will serve as examples of the hugely different responses
the text evokes. Each reader seems to have selected a pattern from a mosaic that
contains many other patterns, without considering whether the meaning might
not include all the patterns. "Si l'on veut rester attentif au pluriel d'un texte [ ... ],
il faut bien renoncer a structurer ce texte par grandes masses [ ... ] point de con-
struction du texte: tout signifie sans cesse et plusieurs fois, mais sans delegation a
un grand ensemble final, a une structure derniere" (Barthes 1970, 18). The truth
seems to be that the author is not trying to sponsor one possible meaning for the
behaviour of his but that he co-operates with the intertextual multi-
plicity of possible motivations for behaviour and possible divine judgments of
the actions and sayings of Samson and his companions. The text has been shaped
to allow for many possible responses. The author is especially sensitive to this:
"Le propre de l'intertextualite est d'introduire a un nouveau mode de lecture qui
fait eclater la linearite du texte [ ... ] etoilant le texte de bifurcations qui en ouv-
re nt peu a peu l'espace semantique" Genny 1976, 266).
The imitation of a Biblical pre-text is an especially interesting case in the poet-
ics of imitation. The dynamics were different from those involved in the retelling
of a fictional story or the fictionalisation of an historical event. They are not
quite like those described by Gerard Genette in his discussion of the relationship
of a hypotext like the Odyssey to hypertexts like the Aeneid or Joyce's Ulysses.
However, the seventeenth century Christian author did not treat a Biblical hy-
potext as either fictional or historical. lt had an absolute factual validity that the
"truth" of human his tory did not haye in a sinful, doomed world in which the
evidence of the senses is specious, illusory. The main pre-text, in
Judges, sets up certain expectations because of the force of Scriptural sanctions:
Samson is aN azarite, he is sacred fb God, there are angelic predictions about his
future achievements, his strength is above human and its mysterious location in
his hair indicates divine intervention, especially when it is restored. The implica-
tions of the story for a seventeenth century Christian are worth examining,
particularly the case of the revolutionary who believed it was possible to estab-
lish Christ's kingdom on earth by force in 1650 but who turned away from force
to a spiritualisation of hope after 1660, as the Quakers did, when most revolu-
tionary optimism died. The presuppositions in the minds of such readers were
richly contradictory and have been weIl set out by F. M. Krouse (1974) andJ. W.
Wittreich (1986). Krouse amasses commentaries over the centuries that lead hirn
to emphasise "Samson's zealous heroism, his confidence in his calling as a
champion of God, and his readiness as a saint to end ure dark captivity with
patience and suffer martyrdom with fortitude" (99n). Wittreich stresses evi-
dence that the significance of Samson in the seventeenth century grows increas-
ingly ambiguous. Once regarded as a plague to the uncircumcised, Samson now
appears to be a plague to his own people. His story, previously cast as a saint's
life, continues to figure in such literature, but now to mark the fall and mortifica-
Creative Indirection in Intertextual Space 203
tion of various saints, not their recovery and exaltation (182-3). Now, the in-
tersection of the Scriptural intertext with the richly varied intertext of Christian
tradition has an interesting consequence. The affirmation in H ebrews that Sam-
son is a "hero of faith" has absolute, divinely underwritten validity, but what is
not dear is how much of Samson's behaviour met with divine approval. Much of
it was sinful and indefensible, but which aspects precisely? The intertextual
force of the tradition is that almost any aspect of this behaviour, except his faith,
may be read as sinful, even satanic or demonic. The writer may intervene to
exclude possible traditional interpretations but Milton does not. He co-operates
with the intertextual potentialities and even intensifies them. Some demonic
echo es of Samson's behaviour have already been noted but there are more. His
dimactic figure of impatience and revulsion: "Eyeless in Gaza at the mill with
slaves" (41) recalls that of Satan' s follower, Moloc:
what can be worse
Than to dweIl here, driven out from bliss, condemned
In this abhorred deep to utter woe. (PL 2.85-7)
/
In both cases glory, pride, splendour are in ruin and both falls are associated
with a trust in physical strength, violence, and primitive heroism. Very late in
the day, Samson still defines his God essentially in terms of physical might:
"Soon feel, whose God is strongest, thine or mine" (1155). Milton co-operates
with the intertextual tensions in this material. His Samson is admittedly a hero of
faith, but little else in his sensibility, his morality or his personality is unambigu-
ously praiseworthy. We do not know how to read Samson's text, let alone adopt
it as a model for Christian action.
In the dying moments of the Revolution, Milton went into hiding. He came
dose to being excluded from indemnity, and he was imprisoned until he en-
dured the humiliation of begging for the King's pardon. He could no Ion ger
publish his political views openly. Some scholars are now dredging his Christian
Doctrine for statements supporting a violent and militant Christianity. What
they are not inclined to quote are the reservations made there about such state-
ments, the exhortations to peaceful persuasion, to teaching in preference to
force. Christ in Paradise Regained rejected military solutions, and Adam in
Paradise Lost is taught by an angel to embrace mercy, meekness, suffering and
charity. Is Samson's political violence and bloody vengefulness, then, admirable
or misguided? Shawcross expresses frustration at "the uselessness of such action
[ ... ] the evil which hope becomes in man [ ... ] a sense of waste, of the meaning-
lessness of good [ ... ]" (1971, 304). There is no dear authorial guidance in the
paratext, and Milton avoids reference to Samson at moments in his later work
when he might have revealed his own attitude to a figure so enigmatic and con-
tradictory in Christian tradition, a figure who must have loomed large in his
own consciousness, the hero of his only tragedy in the ancient manner. Why is
Samson not cited when Milton is discussing judicial violence, or war on the
ungodly, or good temptations, or justifiable lies or suicide? On the other hand,
204 D. N. C. Wood
neither does Milton rnention hirn when he lists penitents who were unregener-
ate: Cain, Esau, Judas and others (CP 6:458). He alludes to Hebrews without
reservation when he rnentions the first three names in the order there listed,
Abel, Enoch and Noah, "illustrious men who lived under the law" (475), and
H ebrews is his authority when he discusses implicit faith in the harlot Rahab
(472). His silence about Samson suggests adetermination to leave his dramatic
poem to speak for itself, ambiguous and enigmatic by calculation. The text he
has fashioned is highly "scriptible."
The intertextual complexity of Samson Agonistes vividly enacts and highlights
the problems a seventeenth century reader faced in reading the Bible itself and
using it as a guide-text to moral behaviour. The rewards for reading that text
were not earthly jouissance but eternal joy; the punishment for inept reading
was eternal perdition. So the problems were significant. Those problems are
integral to the meaning of the poem. Possible meanings intercross in the inter-
textual space on which Samson is written but the writer's voice is silent and he
points to no one of these paths. As LaurentJenny says, in spite of all the records
of historians, "le site de la bataille reste introuvable. C'est que pn!cisement, dans
l'ecriture, l'evenement reste insituable, il se derobe, on n'en a que des versions"
(1976,280-1). Milton knew exactly what he was doing.
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MANFRED PFISTER
How Postmodern is Intertextuality?
1. Postmodernism and Intertextuality
Let me admit at the outset: I am not a postmodernist. To flourish a labellike
that, my awareness of the glibness of such labelling and my scepticism with
respect to such all-comprehensive constructions of history would have to 'be less
well developed. Above all, some vers ions of this concept are inspired by at-
titudes towards contemporary reality that I find extremely dubious, and the
whole range of versions of postmodernism covers too divergent constructions
of the relationship between past and present to invite wholesale acceptance
(Ptz/Freese 1984). The reasons why this concept has been coined and why it
has become so wide-spread as a journalistic label are readily understandable;
after all, "Modernism", which has so emphatically dedicated itself to being con-
temporary and topical, cannot last for six, eight, or ten decades without losing its
provocative powers and "deteriorating" into "Classical Modernism". Still, as
much as I can understand the necessity of a new concept for new kinds of con-
temporaneity, I find it difficult to subsurne altogether divergent constructions of
contemporaneity under the one heading of postmodernism.
Concerning the relationship between modernism and postmodernism at least
three different and quite heterogeneous notions compete with each other. The
first, which tends to take architecture as its paradigm, regards postmodernism as
arevisionist movement, as the attempt to undo modernism, in this instance the
functionalism of the Bauhaus school, and to return to a syncretistic style re-
echoing the architectonic forms of previous periods and even re-employing or-
nament, once, in the heyday of modernism, castigated as a crime by the influen-
tial Adolph Loos. A second version of postmodernism, for which Leslie Fiedler
may serve as an example, sees postmodernism not as modernism undone, but as
a breaking away from modernism, a breach with modernism as with all things of
the past, arevolt that is orientated towards the future and has its roots in the
trivial mythologies of the mass media and pop culture, and not, as modernism
had, in the onerous burden of history and its cultural heritage (Fiedler 1971 and
1975). The third version, that of, for example, Ihab Hassan, Gerald Graff and
Jean-Fran<;ois Lyotard (Hass an 1971, Graff 1973, Lyotard 1979), presents post-
modernism as the logical extension and culmination of modernism, as one
further and final turning of the screw of the process of modernization which set
in in the 19th century if not earlier.
208 M. Pfister
If there is a common denominator at all to these different constructions of
postmodernism, it is in the element of the parasitic: Postmodernist culture pre-
sents itself as a playful mise en scene of pre-given materials and devices, and these
may be taken either from the imaginary museum of historical styles, from con-
sumer society's storehouse of pop artefacts yet untouched by High Culture
o ameson 1984), or from the repertoire of modernist aesthetics and practices. In a
world experienced as totally contingent and random; under the setting sun of
the fin de millenaire, when history appears to have reached its end and when all
that seems to be possible is some post-historical afterpiece, some carnivalesque
postlude; in a political blind alley, in which the economical, ecological and
ideological contradictions, particularly in the most advanced Western societies,
increasingly come to be regarded as inaccessible to, and insoluble by, rational
analysis and instrumental planning; on a level of consciousness that no longer
allows us to regard reality as something to be experienced directly and immedi-
ately, as it reaches us always pre-structured by language, pre-formed by culture
and filtered through mass media - in such a situation, in which "so etwas wie ein
unbesprochener, freier Naturraum so gut wie undenkbar geworden ist"
(Schpp 1985, 333), a new Alexandrinianism of quotation, parody and travesty
must arise, that plays its se rene, intoxicated or despairing games with the left-
overs of the cultural heritage and the garbage of the cultural industry. "Lost in
the Funhouse" : this is J ohn Barth' s metaphor for this state of consciousness, that
is at once euphoric and disconcerting (Barth 1968). Lost in a maze of mirrors:
thus Barth's hero Ambrose reels through a labyrinth of fictions reflecting each
other, through a world in which "mirror on mirror mirrored is all the show"
(Yeats 1950,375). In such a situation <J.,rt and literature can no Ion ger be a simple
reflection of reality, the traditionalispeculum vitae and mirror held up to nature,
since they turn into distorting mirrors reflecting other mirror-images and pro-
ject further reflections in this wilderness of mirrors.
The production of art and literature under these auspices becomes a recycling
of waste material rather than an act of creation; it turns into a "Technologie
verbrauchten symbolischen Wissens" and a "recycling des Bedeutungsabfalls" ,
to quote Botho Strau' metaphors drawn from nuclear technology (Strau 1977,
85). This development has not occurred in a theoretical vacuum; it was actually
accompanied by a particular theory legitimizing it and redefining the status of
texts and their producers. This theory is the theory of intertextuality, which
arose in France in the context of the cultural revolution of '68 and was avidly
taken over by American postmodernists. In the same year 1967, in which Julia
Kristeva first coined, or rather made current, the word intertextualite (Kristeva
1967), the American novelist and professor of literature John Barth announced
that we have entered a new phase in literary history , a phase dominated by the
"Literature of Exhaustion" (Barth 1982), a terminal phase in which all creative
impetus is spent and in which originality will only survive in the form of sophis-
ticated games with extant texts and traditional structures, i. e. in the form of
allusion, quotation, parody and collage. The intentions behind Kristeva's and
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 209
Barth's programmatic statements are different: in Kristeva's case they are re-
volutionary and critical of bourgeois subjectivity, whilst Barth is marked by an
ambiguous attitude towards the haut gout of late bourgeois culture. What they
share is, however, the view of each text being enmeshed in a network of relation-
ships and cross-references with other texts. Similarly, Raymond Federman, like
Barth both critic and novelist, sees literary production as a case of continued
"pla(y)giarism", i. e. as a combination of the ludic with the intertexual, as a
playful and self-conscious plagiarism (Federman 1975/76). And, to mention a
further example, Harold Bloom, one of the leaders of the Yale School,
literary history in terms of an antagonistic scenario, in which each major poet,
suffering from "The Anxiety of Influence" , works out his own individuality and
originality in contradistinction with that of earlier masters, thus engaging in an
intensive, though mainly negative dialogue with them (Bloom 1973). In Poetry
and Repression (1976) he goes one step further ancl completely dismantles the
traditional idealist notion of a self-contained, autonomous text:
Few notions are more difficult to dispel than the 'commonsensical' one that a poetic text is self-
contained, that it has an ascertainahle meaning or meanings without reterence to other poetic
texts. ( ... ) Unfortunately, poems are not things hut only words that refer to other words, and
those words refer to still other words, and so on in the densely overpopulated world of literary
language. Any poem is an inter-poem, and any reading of a poem is an inter-reading. (Bloom
1976, H.)
By now, intertextuality has become the very trademark of postmodernism. One
of the most influential propagators, if not the inventor, of postmodernism, Ihab
Hassan, regards the awareness that originality in these late days in history can
only reside in a novel dealing with second-hand material, as the hallmark of a
postmodernism caught in the compulsion to repeat endlessly and in ever new
ways wh at has been thought and said before (Hassan 1982). Leslie Fiedler,
Gerald Graff and the other spokesmen in the American debate over the existence
and essence of postmodernism agree with hirn. A distanced observer from
Europe, Douwe W Fokkema, also agrees and defines postmodernism in terms
of intertextuality: "The Postmodernist is convinced that the social context con-
sists of words, and that each new text is written over an older one" (Fokkema
1984, 46). Fokkema traces this image of the palimpsest, of a text that lies hidden
beneath another one, back to Edmund Wilson's 1931 description of Joyce's
"Work in Progress" - which was to be co me Finnegans Wake - as a palimpsest
and, by doing so, he turns J oyce' s work into a postmodernist text avant la lettre;
he might also have referred to Pound's last "Canto", that apostrophizes in retro-
spect the whole cycle of the Cantos as one huge and multi-Iayered palimpsest
(Pound 1975, 797).
But, if that is the case, if, indeed, postmodernism and intertextuality are trea-
ted as synonymous these days, why then ask "How Postmodern is Intertextual-
ity?" Why disturb the consensus of writers, critics and literary historians ? WeIl,
putting this question is in any case worthwile because intertextuality, although
the concept has been coined under the auspices of postmodernism, is a
210 M. Pfister
phenomenon that is not restricted to postmodernist writing at all. From the
earliest traceable origins onwards, literary texts have always referred not only to
reality (imitatio vitae), but also to previous other texts (imitatio veterum), and
the various intertextual practices of alluding and quoting, of paraphrasing and
translating, of continuation and adaptation, of parody and travesty flourished in
periods long before postmodernism, for instance in late classical Alexandria, in
the Renaissance, in Neoclassicism and, of course, in "classical" Modernism. The
question to be asked, therefore, is whether there is a specifically postmodernist
type of intertextuality, whether postmodernism employs intertextuality in a
specific way, with specific strategies and functions, that would allow us to dis-
tinguish postmodernist intertextuality from previous forms of intertextuality,
and in particular from those of modernism. A further problem entailed in my
question is, that the concept of intertextuality is at least as much under debate as
that of postmodernism, and that we have to deal again with a number of rivalling
notions. I will, therefore, first attempt to sort out the two major schools of
thought, before laddress myself to the question of a specifically postmodernist
intertextuality. (The following chapter is based on Pfister 1985, 1-30).
2. Intertextuality: Structuralist and Poststructuralist
To startwith, one has to bear in mind that Kristeva's concept of intertextuality is
descriptive rather than programmatic. This distinguishes the original meaning of
the concept from the use made of it in the context of the American debate about
postmodernism. According to her all texts are intertextual, not only
modernist or postmodernist and her concept, therefore, aims at charac-
terizing the ontological status of texts in general. In the American debate, on the
other hand, there has been a shiftin emphasis from the descriptive to the pro-
grammatic and from the ontological to the historical: intertextuality now de-
notes an ideal norm aspired to by the postmodernist text.
In Europe, too, a refocussing of the concept has occurred, but of a rather
different kind. Here structuralist critics have remonstrated against Kristeva and
her followers that an all-comprehensive concept of intertextuality is of little use
when it comes to interpreting individual texts or specific groups of texts (Hemp-
fer 1976, 53-55; Hempfer 1983, 14-18; Kloepfer 1982; Stierle 1983). Adopting
the term, they have narrowed down its meaning from Kristeva's general princi-
pIe of texts presupposing other texts, to the set of devices with which one text
pointedly refers to another, its "pretext". Only those references count as inter-
textual that are clearly intended by the author, distinctly marked in the text and
recognized and realized by the reader. In this structuralist version of intertextu-
ality the author retains authority over his text, the unity and autonomy of the
text remain intact, and the reader does not get lost in a labyrinthine network of
possible references but realizes the author's intentions by decoding the signals
and markers inscribed into the text. Gerard Genette in his impressive study
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 211
Palimpsestes: La litterature au second degre (Genette 1982) has, so far, pursued
this structuralist approach to intertextuality with more systematic rigour
cogency than anyone else, working out a coherent classification of the various
intertextual devices and illustrating them with examples taken from a vast range
of texts from all periods and many different nationalliteratures.
Seen from the poststructuralist perspective co-inaugurated by Kristeva, such
a reduction of intertextuality to distinct and pointed references from one par-
ticular text to another runs counter to the vitally expansive nature,of this princi-
pIe. It is no more than a futile academic attempt to tarne the indomitable, a
bourgeois attempt to defuse its explosive and revolutionary potential that aims
to expose all notions of autonomy and unity of the subject and the text as
ideological fictions. After all, when Kristeva coined this term her intention was
not to provide a new heading for the various forms of allusion and quotation and
to stimulate more subtle and systematic classifications, but to revolutionize our
notions of art, literature, text and subjectivity.
This radical and explosive potential already characterized the pre-history of
the concept, its roots in Mikhail Bakhtin's concept of "dialogicity" or "dialog-
isrn" . Kristeva coined her own concept in the light of a theoretical model that the
Soviet-Russian critic had worked out during the cultural revolution of the
Twenties and elaborated in a number of historical studies on Menippean satire,
on carnival and on the novel. His primary concern here was with the "dialogue
of voices" within one text, - a dialogue that undermines the authority of any
single voice - and with the "polyphony" of each utterance, which results from
the fact that "each concrete word (the utterance) always finds the objects, to
which it refers, already overlaid by previous utterances, disputes and evalua-
tions", "overshadowed by some hazy mist of words or, on the contrary, illumi-
nated by other words said about it previously" (Bachtin 1979, 169; my transla-
tion). The polyphonic novel, for instance, sets up a "microcosm of the plurality
of voices" and as such it can encapsulate the totality of the "socio-ideological
voices of an epoch" (Bachtin 1979, 290; my translation). Therefore, the dialogue
within one text is at the same time a dialogue with all the voices outside it, from
the Billingsgate of the market and the profane and desecrating voices of carnival,
to the voices of authority and of canonized literary pretexts.
Kristeva was attracted to Bakhtin's theory because it allowed her to go be-
yond a static structural model for literary texts. In her view, such a "dynamisa-
tion du structuralisme" is only possible, if one assurnes with Bakhtin, that
le 'mot litteraire' n'est pas un point (un sens fixe), mais un croisement de surfaces textuelIes, un
dialogue de plusieurs ecritures: de l'ecrivain, du destinataire (ou du personnage), du contexte
culturel actuel ou anterieur. (Kristeva 1969,144)
Bakhtin's concept of dialogism is, for Kristeva, qu,ntessentially dynamic, even
revolutionary, and what it tried to revolutionize dynamically was not only
structuralism but cultural politics in general. Bakhtin, in propagating the relativ-
ity of each single position, the self-criticism of each word, the undermining of all
212 M. Pfister
dogmatic and official monologism, the carnivalesque profanization of all that is
sacred and the subversion of all authority, was fighting against the increasing
rigidity of post-revolutionary Soviet cultural politics and the doctrinary canoni-
zation of Socialist Realism. He was, in fact, continuing the revolutionary strug-
gle against increasing repression.
It was the explosive potential of Bakhtin's criticism of ideological monolog-
ism that fascinated Kristeva and other writers and critics of the Tel Quel circle in
the late Sixties, and they, in turn, employed Bakhtin's concept of dialogism in
their own struggle against the "bourgeois" ideology of the autonomy and unity
of individual consciousness and the self-contained meaning of texts. In that,
they even went beyond Bakhtin: Whereas for Bakhtin dialogism was a quality of
particular, and particularly valuable texts (Menippean satire, Rabelais, Shake-
speare, Dostoevsky), for them it is a feature of all texts:
tout texte se construit comme mosaique de citations, tout texte est absorption et transformation
d'un autre texte. A la place de la notion d'intersubjectivite s'installe eelle d'intertextualite, et le
langage poetique se lit, au moins, comme double. (Kristeva 1969a, 146)
Also going beyond Bakhtin, the notion of text is expanded in such a radical way
that, in the long run, everything - or, at least, every cultural formation - counts
as a text within this general semiotics of culture. It is this global notion of text
that underlies Kristeva's definition of intertextuality:
Nous appellerons INTERTEXTUALITE cette inter-action textuelle qui se produit a l'interieur
d'un seul texte. Pour le sujet connaissant, l'intertextualite est une notion qui sera l'indice de la
fac;:on dont un texte litl'histoire et s'insere en elle. (Kristeva 1969 b, 443)
Where Bakhtin still insisted on the "contact of subjects" behind the "dialogical
contact between texts" (Bachtin 1979, 353; my translation), Kristeva uses inter-
textuality as the linguistic and sel11:fotic lever to unhinge all bourgeois notions of
an autonomous subject, and as the most important tool in her deconstruction of
subject and text. In the framework of this theory the author of a text, once a
creator and a genius, dwindles in importance and his role is reduced to providing
the site or space for the interplay of texts. Creativity and productivity are trans-
ferred from the author to the text:
Le texte est donc une productivite, ce qui veut dire: 1. son rapport a la langue dans laquelle il se
situe est redistributif (destructivo-constructif) [ ... ] 2. il est une permutation de textes, une inter-
textualite: dans l'espace d'un texte plusieurs enonces, pris a d'autres textes, se croisent et se
neutralisent. (Kristeva 1969a, 113)
To the extent that creativity and productivity are transferred to the text, or
rather the interplay of texts, the individual subjectivity of the author disappears
and his authority over the text vanishes. According to Kristeva, this occurs par-
ticularly in poetry, the very type of discourse which in Romanticism was still
regarded as the last refuge of unalienated and authentic subjectivity: "Poetic
language, by employing semiotic markers and traces, dissolves the subject."
(quoted from Grbel1983, 221; my translation)
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 213
The subject that is being dissolved here is both that of theauthor and that of
the reader. Both author and reader become a mere "chambre d'echos" (Barthes
1975, 78), resounding with the resonances and the noise of other texts, and both
the author's and the reader's selves cease to be stable and pre-given entities: "je
n'est pas un sujet innocent, anterieur aux texte [ ... ] Ce 'moi' qui s'approche du
texte est deja lui-meme une pluralite d'autres textes, de codes infinis, ou plus
exactement: perdus (dont se perd)". (Barthes 1970, 16) Both reading
and writing are, therefore, "actes d'intertextualisation" and one reads and writes
- to use Charles Grivel's image reminding one of Borges' library of Babel- "a
travers la Bibliotheque [ ... ], a travers des pans entiers de la Bibliotheque"
(Grivel1982, 240).
Corresponding to the dissolving of subjects there is, at thesame time, a dis sol-
ving of the text as a coherent and self-contained unit of meaning. "There are no
texts, but only relationships between texts", wrote Harold Bloom categorically
(Bloom 1975, 3), repeating only what had been said before hirn by Michel Butor:
"11 n'y a pas d'oeuvre individuelle. L'oeuvre d'un individu est une sorte de
noeude qui se produit a l'interieur d'un tissu culturel." (Butor 1969, 2) The
metaphor of an echo chamber therefore applies in the same way to the text itself
as to the subjects of author and reader. The aptly named Umberto Eco made the
same discovery of "echos of intertextuality" when he worte Il N ome della Rosa:
Ho riscoperto cosl ein ehe gli scrittori hanno sempre saputo (e ehe tante volte ci hanno detto): i
libri parlano sempre di altri libri e ogni storia racconta una storia gia raccontata. (Eco 1983, 19)
This may smack too much of the stuffy air of libraries, as if intertextuality were
only concerned with books, dusty volumes begotten from other dusty volumes.
But, after all, Aristotle's lost second book of the Poetics, the one on comedy, is
located at the mysterious centre of Eco's novel and his Bakhtinian Aristotle
opens up, in the theory of dialogical and carnivalesque subversion, the text to all
voices, not only those of the libraries, of poetry and learning (cf. Schick 1984).
No doubt, Eco, the learned professor of semiology, would agree with his col-
league Roland Barthes, who has emphasized again and again that the intertext
"ne comprend pas seulement des textes delicatement choisis, secretement aimes,
libres, discrets, genereux, mais aussi des textes communs, triomphants" (Barthes
1975,51). For Barthes the intertext means both the text itself and the space
between all texts, in which we move, and cannot but move, all the time. As he
writes in Le Plaisir du texte:
Et c' est bien cela l'intertexte, l'impossibilite de vivre hors du texte infini - que ce texte soit Proust,
ou le journal quotidien, ou l'ecran televisuel. (Barthes 1973,59)
The "decentering" of the subject puts aside the old discourse of a "self" or of
"personal identiy" as threadbare idealist self-deceptions; the dissolution of the
boundaries of texts opens up each text to all other texts, even to the noise of the
ideologicalmachinery, the confusing din of the media and the subconscious
promptings or the clamour of consumerism. Taken together these components
214 M. Pfister
conjure up the image of a "universe of texts" (Grivel1978), in which all these
subjecdess texts refer in a regressus ad infinitum to other texts and, in principle,
to all other texts. All of them, mere fragments of the one "texte general" (Derrida
1973,310), converge with history and reality, which in turn only exist for us in
texualized form. This view precludes two notions : firsdy that of a sign referring
to reality and secondly that of reality itself existing naturally and untextualized,
independent of semiotic processes. No wonder, therefore, that the most ad-
vanced deconstructors, Derrida and his American followers, reduce the bi-polar
semiotic relationship of signifier and signified to the signifier alone, with the
consequent reduction of all communication to a free play of the signifiers (Cow-
ard/Ellis 1977, 122-126; Warning 1983, 298-300). A giddying perspective, in-
deed, an apocalyptic vision - and for that very reason so fascinating to a post-
modern consciousness, that sees itself at the end of all history, cut off from any
imaginable future that would be more than the prolongation of the ongoing
endgame, the posdude to history !
3. Postrrtodernist I ntertextuality
My thesis is: Postmodernist intertextuality is the intertextuality conceived and
realized within the framework of a poststructuralist theory of intertextuality.
With this definition the historical specificity of postmodernist intertextuality
becomes a matter of categorical, rather than quantitative distinction. If, on the
other hand, one tried to define postmodernist intertextuality only in terms of an
increase in intertextual references, tlJe difference between, say, modernist and
postmodernist intertextuality only be a relative one, and central works of
classical mdernism such as Eliot's The Waste Land, Pound's Cantos or Joyce's
Ulysses would have to be promoted to the status of postmodernist works avant
la lettre.
Postmodernist intertextuality within a framework of poststructuralist theory
means that here intertextuality is not just used as one device amongst others, but
is foregrounded, displayed, thematized and theorized as a central constructional
principle. One relevant sociological context for this auto-reflective self-con-
sciousness of postmodernist intertextuality is the unprecedented boom in liter-
ary studies, criticism and theory at most academic establishments of the Western
world, and in particular in the United States. In this context a theoretically naive,
less self-conscious literature - a "raw" literature as opposed to a "cooked" -
could hardly survive or would be marginalized as trivial. An academic system
that produces more literary theory, or even more Hamlet interpretations, than
anyone can digest, encourages a type of literary production that is equally self-
reflective and self-conscious, a literature, so to speak, that grows out of graduate
seminars and provides them again with new material for analysis and research.
The key-figures of American literary postmodernism - Barth, Barthelme,
Federman, Pynchon & Company- all belong to the academic establishment or,
r
!
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 215
at least, hai! from it. As the new University Wits these postmodern poetae docti
produce both literary and critical texts and make these reflect upon each other.
However, they go beyond the mere personal union of the tradition al poet-critic
in that they aim at a new type of text that would deconstruct all distinctions
between poetic and theoretical discourse, between aesthetic practice and
theoretical reflection. The ideal-type postmodernist text is, therefore, a "meta-
text" , that is, a text about texts or textuality, an auto-reflective and auto-referen-
tial text, which thematizes its own textual status and the devices on which it is
based. At the thematic centre of this meta-communication of the postmodernist
text about itself we again and again find its intertextuality. This does not come as
a surprise, as, on the one hand, intertextuality is one of its central devices and, on
the other, intertextuality, which always involves some interpretative and per-
spectivizing reference to other texts, has in itself a meta-textual aspect.
A few examples will have to suffice. The tide story of John Barth's Lost in the
Funhouse (Barth 1968) is about a family outing to Ocean City. The story is,
however, again and again interrupted by the narrator's reflection on his way of
narrating it, and these meta-communicative digressions threaten to prevent the
telling of it altogether. The narrator permanendy loses his narrative thread and
gets lost in ever new reflections upon the various methods and structures of
narration he might employ. Thereby, the confusions and the loss of self, which
Ambrose, the hero of the story, undergoes in the maze of mirrors in the Luna
Park, become the central metaphor for the intertextual entanglements of the
narrator. He, like young Ambrose, gets lost in a maze of mirrors : in his case they
are the mirrors of other texts - by Aristode, Gustav Freytag, Dos Passos, J ames
J oyce and many others - which are made to mirror and reflect his own narrative
options, choices and dilemmas. The collection of stories as a whole also fore-
grounds intertextuality by systematically varying from story to story the under-
lying generic matrix, from myth, epic poetry and meditation to autobiography,
novel and short story. Moreover, the two texts at the centre of the collection
have tides that refer to the two most current metaphors of the poststructuralist
theory of intertextuality: the maze of mirrors in "Lost in the Funhouse" and the
echo chamber in "Echo". The most explicit reference to intertextualist theory is,
however, contained in the text with the tide "Tide" - a text which self-con-
sciously thematizes its own "self-consciousness" (110) and loses itself so
thoroughly in the "mirror-maze" (108) of intertextual references and metatex-
tual reflections that it never gets down to telling its story. It is here, transposed
from Barth's critical writings into his fictional text, that the central tenets of his
theory of a "Literature of Exhaustion" (Barth 1982; originally 1967) are ex-
plicidy referred to and made to justify the intertextual strategies of this story
collection:
The final possibility is to turn ultimacy, exhaustion, paralyzing self-consciousness and the adjec-
tive of accumulated ... Go on. Go on. To turn ultimacy against itself to make something
new and valid, the essence whereof would be the impossibility of making something new. (106)
216 M. pfister
Using a narrative text by John Barth as an example, I have shown how explicit
meta-commentary and recurrent metaphors of mirrors and echo es can fore-
ground intertextuality and thematize it in terms of poststructuralist theory. A
further device through which this can be achieved I shall illustrate - for brevity' s
sake - with reference to a poetic text. The poem I choose is by an American
author, who is still fairly unknown in Germany in spite of repeated efforts by
Eva Hesse to draw attention to hirn (Laughlin 1966; Hesse 1986) and who has so
far only played a very minor role in the debate on postmodernism, because he
has only quite recendy "postmodernized" hirnself. I am speaking of James
Laughlin, founder of the publishing firm N ew Directions and, since the Thirties,
simultaneously poet and publisher. As the most important American publisher
of international modernism he also published the works of Ezra Pound. His
own laconic verse, however, has for a long time resisted the modernist trends
towards a highly literate and erudite intertextuality, aiming rather at the popular
American idiom favoured by William Carlos Williams, another of his authors.
Laughlin's breakthrough to postmodernism only came in 1985 with a collection
of poems, the tide of wh ich already programmatically highlights their intertex-
tuality: Stolen & Contaminated Poems. It was at this point that the latent inter-
textual entanglements of his previous poetry became first evident and that he
began to link hirns elf with poststructuralist theories.
A tide such as "The Deconstructed Man" (Laughlin 1985, 191-4) refers the
reader immediately to the poststructuralist framework of theory, which the
poem presupposes. The poem enacts the deconstruction of the speaker's per-
sonal identity and traces it back in Freudian terms to its beginnings in early
childhood, when the speaker was upder the care, both loving and strict, of his
mother:
I am the deconstructed man
my parts are scattered on the nursery Hoor
and can't be put together again because
the instruction book is lost
clean up your mess in the nursery my mother says
I am the deconstructed man (193)
Like Humpty-Dumpty in the nursery rhyme, the hero is smashed to smither-
eens beyond repair, and his adolescent and adult life, an odyssey of further
relationships with women, continues this process of disintegration and disper-
sion. The various stations of this erotic quest are modelIed throughout on liter-
ary paradigms, from Homer, Catullus, Cavalcanti and the operas of Mozart to
Pound, Eliot, Gertrude Stein and William Carlos Williams. His "Circes" are "a
list of fictions" (191), "a list of fictions of beautiful contradictions" (192), and his
erotic adventures are at the same time the adventures of areader. What I am
concerned with here, however, is not the mere density and range of intertextual
references, the polyglot plethora of quotations and the playfully learned foot-
notes identifying them. All this was already part of the modernist convention
inaugurated in Eliot's Waste Land.What I am concerned with is, rather, a par-
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 217
ticular device, which I consider to be a further specific feature of postmodernist
intertextuality and which I would like to call the "quoted quotation" (Smirnov
1983) or the "quotation to the second power".
Quoting a quotation or raising a quotation to the second power is a device that
in itself foregrounds intertextuality and substantiates the poststructuralist view,
according to which each text refers to pretexts and those in turn refer to others
and so on ad infinitum. When Laughlin, in his poem, quotes Gerard de Nerval's
"EI Desdichado" - "J'ai reve dans la grotte Oll nage la sirene" - he quotes at the
same time a famous quotation of this verse in Eliot's "Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock" - "I have lingered in the chambers of the sea". A similar superimposi-
tion of intertextual levels occurs, when Laughlin opens his poem by quoting
from Catullus' "Carmen 101" the verse "Multas per gentes et multa per aequora
vectus" ("I travelled through many countries and over many seas") and then
continues with "et multas per vias quoque aereas" ("and on the air-ways, too").
The intertextual reference to Catullus is here mediated and fractured through a
modern prism - that of Robert Fitzgerald, the American translator of Catullus,
to whom Laughlin owes this topical continuation of the original verse. Most of
the quotations to be quoted again by Laughlin come, however, from Ezra
Pound. Laughlin quotes the poems of Cavalcanti and Bertrand de Born (192,
194), translated and frequendy quoted or alluded to by Pound, and the Homeric
words "periplum" and "polumetis" are also mediated through Pound's Cantos,
where they feature as key concepts. Even Beckett's Waitingfor Godot and End-
game enter Laughlin's text through the back door of Poundian commentary:
"C'est moi dans la poubelle" (194). As the poem unfolds we realize that it is, on
one level at least, ahornage to Ezra Pound, another "deconstructed man". It is
therefore fitting that it ends with a prayer over his grave: "lie quiet Ezra there in
your campo santo on San Michele" (194). And even this final gesture opens up
whole vistas of intertextuallevels: Pound's first "Canto", which concludes with
ahornage to Andreas Divus ("Lie quiet Divus"); this Renaissance scholar's La-
tin translations of Homer; Pound' s essay on "Early Translators of Homer" and,
finally, Homer's text, particularly the nekuia-episode in the 11th canto, which,
according to Pound, reaches back to the oldest myths of mankind, to the
"hinter-time" beyond all history and all texts. This is not just "quotation to the
second power", but at least to the fourth.
Having defined postmodernist intertextuality as self-consciously fore-
grounded intertextuality, as intertextuality theoretically conceptualized within
the works themselves, we have, at the same time, defined postmodernism as a
further development and radicalization of modernism. In that, we find ourselves
in agreement with Jean-Fran<;ois Lyotard, for whom postmodernism is "un-
doubtedly apart of the modern", or, to quote Fredric Jameson's interpretation
of Lyotard, "a moment in the perpetual 'revolution' and innovation of high
modernism ( ... ), a cyclical moment that returns before the emergence of ever
new modetnisms in the stricter sense" (Lyotard 1984, 79 and xvi). Adefinition
of this kind, being entirely concerned with the immanent diachronic relation-
218 M. Pfister
ship between postmodernism and modernism, does not, however, take into
consideration the social context and the ideological affinities of postmodernist
art. We will address ourselves to this question now, looking at it again from the
angle of intertextuality.
Risking some degree of simplification, one could say that the pretexts of the
modernist text are normative. The intertextual dialogue may involve pretexts
from a wide range of epochs and cultures, but even within this wide range it is
always the canonized and "dassical" texts that are dearly privileged. If contem-
porary popular culture is referred to at all, it tends to be with a derogatory or
denigrating tone. When, for instance, T. S. Eliot in The Waste Land (lines
128-130) alludes to "that Shakespeherian Rag" "so elegant/So intelligent" - an
American ragtime song, that was a hit of the Ziegfeld's Follies in 1912 -, he does
so with the main intention of showing up the products of the entertainment
industry as trivial and banal. The song does not live up to the standard of the
other pretexts surrounding it: measured up against Shakespeare, Keats,
Baudelaire and Wagner it is dismissed as too lightweight, too shallow.
This act of granting a prerogative to the more prestigious pieces of our cultural
heritage is elegantly and resolutely done away with in the postmodernist text.
We have already seen how emphatically Roland Barthes pleaded for the inter-
textual equal rights of the noise of the mass media and the song of the muses.
American postmodernism goes one step further and even gives priority to the
myths and diches of pop culture over the time-honoured works of High Cul-
ture. The verbal garbage and the flood of images produced by an ever-growing
industry, set up to entertain our consumer society, thus become the privileged
pretexts of postmodernist art. In D9,nald Barthelme's novel Snow White, Dan,
one of the Seven Dwarfs in this tq:l.vesty of a fairy tale, lectures at large on verbal
garbage and refuse disposal, to arrive at the conclusion that "the question turns
from a question of disposing of' this 'trash' to a question of appreciating its
qualities" (Barthelme 1972, 97). This scrap heap aesthetics derives its nouveaux
frissons from the very materials which the poets of dassical had
disregarded and frowned upon in their elitist cultural claims, and which were
only discovered to have their own aesthetic attractions by the Pop Art of the
Fifties and later. "Garbage in, art out" - this is the motto given out by Barthelme
in an interview (Barthelme 1981, 202), and his own stories demonstrate bril-
liantly how garbage input can be recycled into art output.
One would, however, seriously misunderstand Barthelme, if one took his
motto to mean that under the directive of postmodernism trash is "in" and art is
"out". The question is not "Donald Duck or Dante", "tv commercials or Cor-
neille", "fast food or haute cuisine". This question is beside the point in the
context of an aesthetics that is, after all, out to deconstruct evaluative hierarchies
of this kind. It is rather a matter of "Donald Duck and Dante" , "tv commercials
and Corneille", "fast food and haute cusine", for, according to this view, the one
is refuse and waste, as much as the other. Postmodernism's serenely uncon-
cerned juxtaposition of Pop and dassics, of the media garbage of the present and
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 219
the cultural refuse of the past, has as its very aim the levelling down of all tradi-
tional distinctions between high and low. It makes no difference to an Andy
Warhol whether he uses the cliche image of Marilyn Monroe or that of Karl
Marx for his own purposes - for hirn, both are trivial icons of popular mytho-
logy, interchangeable and without historical depth. T. S. Eliot's vision of a
"simultaneous existence" and a "simultaneous order" of the great works of art
from all ages and cultures (Eliot 1953,23) is reprojected here in aperverse dis tor-
tion that obliterates not only all historical differences, but together with it, all
value distinctions. The imaginary museum of postmodernism is a random med-
ley of past and present, das sie and pop, art and commerce, all of them reduced to
the same status of disposable materials and surface stimuli.
"There is no message, only messengers, and that is the message" - this is how
Raymond Federman sums up the situation in an elegantly pointed paradox
(Federman 1981,25). Not even the medium is the message, as was still the case
for McLuhan; now the message is rather that all media and all carriers of mes-
sages are interchangeable, as their messages are no more than random and arbi-
trarily disposable constructs without any reference to reality or any bindihg
truth. It is in accordance with this view, when Paul, the poet among the Seven
Dwarfs in Barthelme's Snow White, regards the palinode, the poetic genre of
retraction, as his highest aspiration and his favourite form:
'Perhaps it is wrong to have favorites among the forms', he reflected. 'But retraction has a special
allure for me. I would wish to retract everything, if I could, so that the whole written would
be .. .' (Barthelme 1972, 13).
Such an all-comprehensive and universal palinode would rally all poetry and art
once more, only to dismiss its claims to authenticity and truth once and for all-
perhaps with a shrug of regret, but also with a sigh of relief. Thus, for instance,
the narrator makes the various items of Snow White's curriculum at a modern
college pass muster, ranging from "Modern Woman, Her Privileges and Re-
sponsibilities" through "Classical Guitar I" and "English Romantic Poets 11" to
"Theoretical Foundations of Psychology" and "Realism and Idealism in the
Contemporary Italian Novel" (25 f). The purely enumerative and additive form
of the catalogue and the heterogeneous abundance of its items suggest an image
of the American university as a huge self-service supermarket: here as there the
shelves overflow with commodities, and in both cases this does not create satiety
and tedium but the hectic euphoria of consumerism. Art is reduced to the status
of a commodity among many others and willingly submits itself not only to the
laws of "Warensthetik" (Haug 1976), demanding ever new and alluring pack-
ages for what remains essentially the same commodity, but also to the economic
laws of an ever increasing and accelerating circulation of goods. Where every-
thing has the same value, nothing is of any value in the long run.1t is consistent
with this, that Federman refuses to disclose his sources and pretexts. Such a
gesture would ascribe a special rank, an authentie value and originality to them,
220 M. Pfister
which could only be illusionary "because there are no sacred sources for think-
ing and writing" (Federman 1975/6, 566).
"Anything goes": this formula, with which Lyotard has summed up the eclec-
ticism of postmodernist intertextuality (Lyotard 1984, 76), is also written in
large letters across the "Golden Windows" of Robert Wilson's theatre. His
theatre is the theatre of Babel, the theatre of a heterogeneous plethora of diffe-
rent discourses. Therefore, his work in particular lends itself so readily to illus-
trate the nature of intertextuality in postmodernist theatre. The daydreams put
on stage by hirn are a collage of words, images and sounds taken from many
sources and put together with meticulous care. The selection of pretexts is al-
most random; their arrangement, however, is of great formal precision. After
all, Wilson does not quote or allude to them in order to engage in a dialogue with
their historical meaning or signification but to bring into play their sensuous
suggestiveness. Sensuousness, not sense is what his intertextual bricolage is con-
cerned with, and therefore the sensuous qualities ofhis materials are emphasized
through precisely calculated juxtapositions, through haunting slow-motion ef-
fects or the hypnotic stillness of tableaux. (Pfister 1985 b)
Wilson's performances represent a new kind of "Gesamtkunstwerk" and as
such they employ all art forms, genres and styles - mime, ballet, music, opera,
film and the visual arts; fairy tale, science fiction and western; high tragedy,
history play, boulevard drama and masque; Surrealism, Minimal Art, Environ-
ment, operatic spectacle and Performance. Like Andy Warhol, he likes to use
characters or motifs taken from history or the present time that have already
been transformed into myths of the popular imagination - the hero of
psychoanalysis in The Life and Timf:s of Sigmund Freud (1969), the monstrous
tyrant in Li[e and Times o[ J oseph Stalin (1973), the virtuous queen in A Letter
[or Queen Victoria (1974), the genius of science in Einstein on the Beach (1976),
the archetyp al inventor in Edison (1979) and Henry Ford and Rudolf Hess in
Death Destruction & Detroit (1979). Nothing is too sublime nor too trashy to be
received into Wilson's pop-pantheon, which competes with Madame Tussaud's
Waxworks and Disneyland in its serene disregard for historical perspective. For
instance, in the Cologne part of the CIVIL WarS project planned for the Olym-
pic Games at Los Angeles in 1984, Frederick the Great drifted on floating ice in a
setting that suggested paintings by Caspar David Friedrich, or he sang on horse-
back the "Erlknig" by Goethe and Schubert. In the Roman part, Abraham
Lincoln strolled through a crowd of Hopi-Indians dancing to folksy music by
Philip Glass, and Garibaldi, supported by a choir of animals and with the Olym-
pic torch in his hand, chanted verses by Seneca proclaiming world peace (Pfister
1988). 1986 it was Alcestis' turn: first Euripides' drama in Cambridge, Mass., in
a mise en scene that short-circuited Laser High-Tech with the resonances of
myth and showed the heroine, dressed in a neoclassical negligee, in the process
of dying on a modern marriage-bed to the accompaniment of country-and-
western music from the transistor radio; then Gluck's opera in Stuttgart, set in
some strange Bauhaus arcadia bathed in Schlemmer colours and streaked in
How Postmodern is Intertextuality? 221
Feininger patterns by a sophisticated choreography of light, and featuring
characters that move with lofty gestures in their trecento costumes, amongst
them Heracles, half uncouth country yokel, half baroque hero (or the parody of
one).
The collaboration between Wilson and the dramatist Heiner Mller- he also a
great intertextualist - since the CIVIL WarS project has further intensified the
intertextual character of his theatre work and widened the range of pretexts
brought into play. At the same time, both Mller's share in the Cambridge
Alcestis and Wilson's New York and Hamburg productions of Mller's Ham-
letmaschine (both 1986) have shown that Wilson and Mller are intertextualists
of a very different grain. In a way, their collaboration is based on a misunder-
standing, even if this misunderstanding has turned out to be extremely produc-
tive. Where Mller's collages of heterogeneous textual materials always serve a
pointed critical function in exposing ideological illusions and delusions, Wil-
son's eclecticism remains a self-enamoured l'art pour l'art of fascinating beauty
and irritating strangeness.
This difference and tension between Mller's sense and Wilson's sensuous-
ness, between Mller's acid aggressiveness and Wilso:l's suggestive charm in
their respective ways of dealing with the textual materials and discourse types,
handed down by tradition, can be understood in a wider perspective as
epitomizing the difference between the deconstructivist theory of intertextual-
-tf developed in Europe and the practice of intertextuality characteristic of
American postmodernism. While Bakhtin, Kristeva and the Tel Quel group
have evolved their theory of intertextuality in order to deconstruct the
bourgeois ideology of l.he subject and to undermine all tradition al certitudes and
authorities, the "random cannibalism" Oameson 1984) of the American post-
modernist movement has tended to spend itself in arbitrary violence and
euphoria. The carnival it stages no longer threatens any authority; on the con-
trary, this carnival is tolerated or cven welcome by those in power, as it helps to
take people's minds off those life-endangering facts which are in the meantime
eagerly brought ab out by them, backstage. Also, the dialogue of texts and dis-
courses no longer serves to playoff differences with a critical and analytic pur-
pose; it rather serves to stimulate the sophisticated pleasures of the disparate and
heterogeneous. The "Literature of Exhaustion", which still knew the sorrows of
lost authenticity and reality and suffered from the compulsion to repeat the deja
vu, the dejd, lu, the deja vecu again and again, has long since given way in Barth's
theory to a "Literature of Replenishment" (Barth 1980 and 1982), which cele-
brates the random disposability of everything and cheerfully competes in its
disparate abundance with mail-order catalogues, the shelves of supermarkets,
the channels of the media and hectically changing fashions in packaging, adver-
tising and dress. Postmodernist art threatens to decay into what postmodern
consumerism and the entertainment industry have already become - a ploy of
social engineering that helps us to repress our anxieties as regards diminishing
natural resources, through stimulating an artificial euphoria of abundance. To
222 M. Pfister
the extent, however, that postmodernist art yields itself to what it should analyse
and criticise, it will become redundant and fall back behind the project of mod-
ernism. What is necessary, therefore, is a post-postmodernism that remains
resistent to these press ures of assimilation. It would have to find new ground in
those remnants of nature which have still managed to survive around us, and in
uso Here, in the material and psychological ecology, it might, perhaps, find its
Archimedian point of leverage.
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LINDA HUTCHEON
The Politics of Postmodern Parody
Parody - often ealled ironie quotation, pastiehe, appropriation, or simply inter-
textuality - is usually eonsidered eentral to postmodernism, both by its detrae-
tors and its defenders. For artists, the postmodern is said to involve a "rummag-
ing through the ieonographie jumble of the past" (Burgin 1986 a, 50) in sueh a
way as to show the history of the representations their parody ealls to our atten-
tion. In Abigail Solomon-Godeau's felieitous terms, Duehamp's modernist
"ready made" has beeome postmodernism's "already made" (1984, 76). But this
parodie reprise of the past of art is not nostalgie; it is always eritieal. I t is also not
ahistorieal or dehistorieizing; it does not wrest past art from its originalhistori-
eal eontext and reassemble it into "a speetacle of availability" (Buehloh 1984,
123). Instead, through a double proeess of installing and ironizing, parody sig-
nals how present representations eome from past ones and what ideologieal
eonsequenees derive from both eontinuity and differenee.
Parodie intertextuality also eontests our humanist assumptions about artistie
originality and uniqueness and our eapitalist notions of ownership and prop-
erty. With parody - as with any form of reproduetion (Benjamin 1969) - the
notion of the original as rare, single and valuable (in aesthetie or 'eommereial
terms) is ealled into question. As J ohn Berger has argued, this does not mean that
art has lost its meaning and purpose, but that it will inevitably have a new and
different signifieanee and existenee: "Its authority is lost. In its plaee there is a
language of images. What matters now is who uses that language for what pur-
pose" (1972 a, 33). In other words, parody works to foreground the polities of
representation. Needless to say, this is not the aeeepted view of postmodernist
parody. The prevailing interpretation is that postmodernism offers a value-free,
deeorative, de-historieized quotation of past forms and that this is a most apt
mode for a eulture like our own that is oversaturated with images. Instead, I
would want to argue that postmodernist parody is a value-problematizing, de-
naturalizing form of aeknowledging the his tory (and through irony, the poli ti es )
of representations.
It is interesting that few eommentators on postmodernism aetually use the
word "parody." I think the reason is that it is still tainted with eighteenth-een-
tury notions of wit and ridieule. But there is an argument to be made that we
should not be restrieted to sueh period-limited definitions of parody (see Hut-
eheon 1985) and that twentieth-eentury art forms teaeh that parody has a wide
range of forms and intents - from that witty ridieule to the playfully ludie to the
226 L. Hutcheon
seriously respectful. Fredric James?n has called postmodern cita.tion
"pastiche" or empty parody, assummg that only um9-ue
styles" can be parodied and that such novelty and mdlvlduahty are ImpOSSl?le
today (1983, 115). In the light of the parodic yet individual voices of writers hke
Salman Rushdie and Angela Carter, to mention only two, such a stand seems
hard to defend. In fact it could be ignored - if it had not proved to have such a
strong following. .
For instance HaI Foster sees pastiche as the "official sign" of neoconservaUve
postmodernism (1985, 127), accusing it of disregarding the context of and con-
tinuum with the past and yet of falsely resolving "conflictual forms of art. and
modes of production" (16). But as I see it, postmodern parody does not dlsre-
gard the context of the past representations it cites, but uses irony to
edge the fact that we are inevitably separated the past - Urne and
by the subsequent his tory of those representatlOns. There lS .contmuum, but
there is also ironic difference, difference induced by that very hIS tory . Not only
is there no resolution (false or otherwise) of contradictory forms inpostmodern
parody, but there is a foregrounding of those very contradictions. !hink of
variety of parodied texts in Eco' s The Name of the Rose: J an POtOCkl' s M.
trouve ci Saragosse and the work of Borges (see Stephens 1983), wntu:gs of
Conan Doyle and Wittgenstein, the Coena Cypriani, and conventlOns dIverse
as those of the detective novel and theological disputation (de Lauretls 1987).
Irony makes these intertextual references into something more than simply
academic play or some infinite regress into textuality: what is called to our atten-
tion is the entire representational process - in a wide range of forms and modes
of production - and the impossibility of finding any totalizing model to resolve
the resulting postmodern . .
By way of contrast, it could be argued that a relatively Vlew
of historical continuity and of the context of representauon offers a stable plot
structure to Dos Passos's USA trilogy. But this very stability is called into ques-
tion in Doctorow's postmodern ironic reworking of the same historical material
in what I would like to call his "historiographic metafiction," Ragtime. Parody-
ing Dos Passos's very historicity, Doctorow both uses and abuses it. As
Foley has noted, he utilizes "the reader's encyclopedic knowledge that a hIS ton-
cal Freud, Jung, Goldman and Nesbit did in fact exist in order to pose an open
challenge to the reader's preconceived notions about what historical 'truth' ac-
tually is" (1983, 166). Postmodern parody is a kind of contesting "revision"
(Roberts 1985, 183) or rereading of the past both c?nfirms subverts the
power of the representations of history . ThlS paradoxlcal convlctlOn of the re-
moteness of the past and the need to deal with it in the present has been called the
"allegorical impulse" of postmodernism by Craig Owens (1980, 67). I would
simply call it parody.
Peter Ackroyd's Chatterton offers a good example of a postmodern novel
whose form and content de-naturalize representation in both visual and verbal
media in such a way as to illustrate weIl the deconstructive potential of parody-
The Politics of Postmodern Parody 227
in other words, its politics. Chatterton is a novel ab out history and representa-
tion and ab out parody and plagiarism. As the tide suggests, here the focus of
representation (in history, biography, and art) is Thomas Chatterton, eight-
eenth-century poet and "forger" - that is, author of poems said to be by a
medieval monk. The novel posits that, contrary to official biographical his tory,
Chatterton did not die by suicide in 1770 at the age of 18 (thus becoming the
stereotypical representation of the gifted and doomed youthful genius). Instead,
two alternate vers ions are offered: that he died, not by suicide, but from an
accident produced by his inept and inexpert self-medication for VD; and that he
did not die at 18 at aIl, but faked his death to avoid being exposed as a fraud and
lived on to compose other great forgeries, such as the ones we know today as the
works of William Blake.
The official historical record is given on the first page of the novel, so we are
always aware of deviations from it, including the actual historical ones of
WaIlis's famous nineteenth-century painting of the death of Chatterton, m
which the image of the poet' s corpse was painted from a mdel:- the writer
George Meredith. The production of this painting provides a second line of plot
action. The eighteenth- and nineteenth-century stories are then played off
against a contemporary one, also involving a poet (Charles Wychwood) who
finds a painting which he believes to represent the aged Chatterton. To add to
this already parodically complicated plot, Charles sometimes works for a writer
who is a plagiarizer and his wife is employed in an art gallery that deals in
forgeries. . .
This novel is heavy with self-reflexive moments and unresolved SUSPICIOUS
coincidences that center around plagiarism, faking, forging, and parody. Chap-
ter 6 is even narrated by Charterton, telling us how he "reproduc'd the Past" by
mixing the real and the fictive in a way reminiscent of the
ton: "Thus do we see in every Line an Echoe, for the truest Plaglansm lS the
truest Poetry" (87). In a similarly self-conscious way, the historical record is
shown to be no guarantee of veracity. As Charles reads the various historical
versions of the life of Chatterton, he discovers that "each biography described a
quite different poet: even the simplest observation by one was contradicted by
another, so that nothing seemed certain" (127) - neither the subject nor the
possibility of knowing the past in the present. The postmodern condition
respect to his tory might weIl be described as one of the acceptance of radlcal
uncertainty: "Why should historical research not ... remain incomplete, exist-
ing as a possibility and not fading into knowledge?" (213). Supposedly real
documents - paintings, manuscripts - turn out to be forgeries; the beautiful
representations of death turn out to be lies. The novel ends ,:ith po:werful
representation in words of the actual reality of death by arsemc pOlsonmg - a
death rather different from that "depicted" so beautifully by Wallis from his
(very living) model.
Many other novels today similarly challenge the concealed or unacknowl-
edged politics and evas ions of aesthetic representation by using parody as a
228 L. Hutcheon
means to eonneet the present to the past without positing the transpareney of
representation, verbal or visual. For instanee, in a feminist parody of Leda and
the Swan, the protagonist of Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus (known as
Fevvers) beeomes "no Ion ger an imagined fietion but a plain fact" (1984,286)-
"the female paradigm," "the pure ehild of the eentury that just now is waiting in
the wings, the New Age in whieh no woman will be bound to the ground" (25).
The novel's parodie eehoes of Pericles, Harnlet and Gultiver's Travels all fune-
tion as do those of Yeats's poetry when deseribing a whorehouse full of bizarre
women as "this lumber room of femininity, this rag-and-bone shop of the heart"
(69): they are all ironie feminizations of traditional or eanonie male representa-
tions of the so-ealled generie human - "Man." This is the kind of polities of
representation that parody ealls to our attention.
In objeeting to the relegation of the postmodern parodie to the ahistorieal and
empty realm of pastiehe (as deseribed by Jameson and Foster), I do not want to
suggest that there is not a nostalgie, neoeonservative recovery of past meaning
going on in a lot of eontemporary eulture; I just want to draw a distinetion
between that praetiee and postmodernist parody. The latter is fundamentally
ironie and eritieal, not nostalgie or antiquarian in its relation to the past. It de-
naturalizes our assumptions about our representations of that past: "History,
like nature, is no longer a one-dimensional value: history may eontradiet the
present, may put in doubt, may impose, with its eomplexity and its variety, a
ehoiee to be motivated eaeh sueeessive time" (Tafuri 1980, 20). Postmodern
parody is both deeonstruetively eritieal and eonstruetively ereative, paradoxi-
eally making us aware of both the limits and the powers of representation - in
anymedium.
Sherrie Levine, the parodie Pierre Menard of the art world today, has stated
her reasons why parody is for postmodernism:
Every ward, every image, is leased and mortgaged. We know that a picture is but aspace in which
a variety of images, none of them original, blend and dash. A picture is a tissue of quotations
drawn from the innumerable centers of culture ... The viewer is the tablet on which all the
quotations that make up a painting are inscribed without any of them being lost. (1987, 92)
When she photographs Egon Sehiele's self-portraits, she parodieally eites not
just the work of a speeifie artist, but the eonventions and myths of art-as-expres-
sion and points to the polities of that partieular view of representation.
Mark Tansey's parodie painting ealled The Innocent Eye Test takes on
another eanonieal form of representation. It presents the unveiling of Paulus
Potter's 1647 painting of a Young Bult, onee aeeepted as the paradigm of realist
art. But Tansey's parodieally realist reproduetion of this work is depieted as
being judged by a eow, for who better to adjudieate the sueeess of such "bullish"
realism and who better to symbolize ironieally the "innoeent eye" assumed by
mimetie theories of the transpareney of representation. (A mop is depieted at
ready, lest she "voiee" her opinion in material terms.) This is postmodern ironie
The Politics of Postmodern Parody 229
parody, using the eonventions of realism against themselves in order to fore-
ground the eomplexity of representation and its implied polities. ,
Of course, parody was also a dominant mode of mueh modernist art, espe-
in writing ofT. S. Eliot, Thomas Mann, andJamesJoyee and the paint-
mg of Pieasso, Manet and Magritte. In this art, too, parody at onee inseribed
eonvention and his tory and yet distaneed itself from both. The eontinuity be-
tween the postmodernist and the modernist use of parody as a strategy of ap-
propriating the past is to be found on the level of their shared eompromised
challenges to the institutions of representation (Barber 1983-4, 33). There are
signifieant differenees, however, in the final impact of the two uses of parody. It
is not that modernism was serious and signifieant and postmodernism is ironie
and parodie (Graff 1979, 55); it is more that postmodernism's irony is one that
"unlike the balaneed and resolving irony of modernism, refuses to fulfill the
expeetation of closure or provide the distaneing eertainty the literary [and artis-
tie] tradition ... has inseribed in the eolleetive eonseiousness of Western read-
ers" (Spanos 1987,216) - and viewers.
The unaeknowledged assumptions of that "eolleetive eonseiousness" are
what postmodernism sets out to uneover and deeonstruet: assumptions about
closure, distanee, artistie autonomy, and the apolitieal nature of representation.
In postmodernist parody, aeeording to Vietor Burgin:
modernist pretensions to artistic independence-have been further subverted by the demonstra-
tion of the necessarily 'intertextual' nature of the production of meaning; we can no Ion ger
unproblematically assurne that "Art" is somehow "outside" of the complex of other representa-
tional practices and institutions with which it is contemporary - particularly, today, those which
constitute what we so problematically call the "mass-media." (1986 a, 204)
The eomplexity of these parodie representational strategies ean be seen in the
photography of Barbara Kruger or Silvia Kolbowski with their parodie appro-
priation of mass-media images. The 1988 show entided Photographs Beget
Photographs (eurated by the Minneapolis Institute of Art) gave a good sense of
the parodie postmodern play with the history of photography - both as seienti-
fieally accurate doeumentary reeording and as formalist art. Marion Faller and
Hollis Frampton presented "Sixteen Studies from 'Vegetable Loeomotion'"
whieh (in tide and form) parodied Muybridge's famous human and animal sei-
entifie loeomotion studies by using (normally inert) vegetables and fruit as the
Other artists in the show chose to parody ieons of photography-as-
hIgh-art by Ansel Adams Qohn Pfahl, Jim Stone) or Weston (Pfahl again, Ken-
nethJosephson), always pointing with irony to how modernism eontributed to
the mystifieation and eanonization of photographie representation. Contrary to
the prevailing view of parody as a kind of ahistorieal and apolitieal pastiehe,
postmodern art like this uses parody and irony to engage the history of art and
the memory of the viewer in are-evaluation of aesthetie forms and contents
through a reeonsideration of their usually unaeknowledged polities of represen-
tation. As Dominiek LaCapra has so foreefully put it:
230 L. Hutcheon
irony and parody are themselves not unequivocal signs of disengagement on the part of an apolit-
ical, transcendental ego that floats above historical reality or founders in the abysmal pull of
aporia. Rather a certain use of irony and parody may playa role both in the critique of ideology
and in the anticipation of a polity wherein commitment does not exclude but accompanies an
ability to achieve critical distance on one's deepest commitments and desires. (1987, 128).
Postmodernism offers precisely that "certain use of irony and parody."
As form of ironie representation, parody is doubly coded in political terms: it
both legitimizes and subverts that which it parodies. This kind of "authorized
transgression" (Hutcheon 1985) is what makes it a ready vehicle for the political
contradictions of postmodernism at large. Parody can be used as a self-reflexive
technique that points to art as art, but also to art as inescapably bound to its
aesthetic and even social past. lts ironie reprise also offers an "immanent self-
consciousness about the avenues of ideologicallegitimation" (Rosler 1981, 81).
How do some representations get legitimized and authorized? And at the ex-
pense of which others? Parody can offer a way of investigating the history of
that process. In her feminist pacifist work Cassandra, Christa Wolf parodically
rewrites Homer's tale of men and war, offering economic and political rather
than romantic reasons for the Trojan war (trade access to the Bosporus and
sexual oneupmanship, not Helen) and telling the silenced story of the everyday
life of the Trojan women omitted by the historical and epic narratives written by
the conquering foreigners, the Greeks. Other texts are parodied too - Aeschy-
lus's Oresteia, the writings of Herodotus and Aristode, Goethe's Faust and
Schiller's "Cassandra" - and frequently it is the male representation of the
female (or the lack thereof) that is the focus of the rewriting. As Wolf claims in
the essay "Conditions of a Narrative" (which accompanies Cassandra in its
English translation): "How u i ~ k l y does lack of speech turn into lack of iden-
tity?" (1984, 161). This is especially true of Cassandra who, though she had
speech, is not believed. Furthermore as Wolf asks: "Who was Cassandra before
people wrote about her? (For she is a creation of the poets, she speaks only
through them, we have only their view of her)" (287). Because we only know
Cassandra through male representations of her, Wolf adds her own feminist
representation, one that is equally the "creation" of a writer, of course.
In feminist art, written or visual, the politics of representation are inevitably
the politics of gender:
The way women appear to themselves, the way men look at women, the way women are pictured
in the media, the way women look at themselves, the way male sexuality becomes fetishism, the
criteria for physical beauty - most of these are cultural representations and therefore not immut-
able but conditioned. (Malen 1988, 7)
Postmodern parodie strategies are often used by feminist artists to point to the
history and historical power of those cultural representations, while ironically
contextualizing both in such a way as to deconstruct them. When Sylvia Sleigh
parodies Velasquez's Rokeby Venus in her descriptively entided Philip Golub
Reclining, she de-naturalizes the iconographic tradition of the fern ale erotic
-.,-
I
The Politics of Postmodern Parody 231
nude intended for male viewing through her obvious gender reversal: the male is
here represented as reclining, languorous and passive. The tide alone, though,
parodically contests the representation of specific yet anonymous women mod-
els as generic mythic figures of male desire. The postmodern version has the
historical specificity of a portrait. But it is not just the his tory of high-art rep-
resentation that gets de-naturalized in postmodern parody: the 1988 Media Post
Media show (at the Scott Hanson Gallery in New York) presented mixed media
works that did parody the representational practices of high art (David Salle's)
but also those of the mass media (videos, ads). All 19 artists were women,
perhaps underlining the fact that women have more to win, not lose, by a cri-
tique of the politics of representation.
Some male artists have used parody to investigate their own complicity in
such apparatuses of representation, while still trying to find aspace for criticism,
however compromised. Victor Burgin's photography is one example of this
very postmodern form of complicitous critique. In one photo, from the series
The Bridge, he parodies John Everett Millais's Ophelia through a transcoding of
its female subject into a representation of a model in Ophelia's famous reclining
pose but portraying Kim Novak's representation of the character, Madeleine in
Hitchcock's Vertigo. This is no transparent realist representation: the water is
obviously cellophane (a parodie echo of Cecil Beaton's use of cellophane in his
fashion photography, according to Burgin [1987]) and the model is obviously
posed in a period-piece wig and dress. But this Ophelia/Madeleine/(fashion)
model figure is still represented as dead or dying and, given the context, also as
an enigma to be investigated obsessively by male voyeuristic curiosity. Burgin
admits (1987) to being a modernist-trained artist who wants to milk the density
and richness of art his tory in his photography, but he also wants to do two other
things: first, to use parody to throw off the "dead hand" of that art history and
its beliefs in eternal values and spontaneous genius; and second, to use the his-
tory of representation (here, in painting and in film) to comment critically on the
politics of the representation of women by men - including hirns elf.
The intersection of gender with class politics is a particular interest of Bur-
gin's. In aseries of photographs parodying Edward Hopper's painting Office at
Night, he reinterprets this canonical icon in terms of the organization of sexual-
ity within and for capitalism (Burgin 1986 b, 183). Hopper's depicted secretary
and her boss working late at the office come to represent all couples within a
capitalist patriarchal system of values: the man ignores the woman, whose cling-
ing dress and full figure and yet downcast eyes manage to make her both seduc-
tive and modest. Burgin says that the representation of the man ignoring the
woman allows male viewers to look at and enjoy the pictured woman while
safely identifying with the man who does not. Burgin's Preparatory Work for
Office at Night self-reflexively updates to the present these representations and
their now problematized politics - in both gender and class terms.
When parody and its politics are discussed, it is not only this kind of visual art
that should be considered. Latin American fiction, for instance, has consistendy
232 L. Hutcheon
underlined the intrinsically political character of parody and its challenges to the
conventional and the authoritative (see Kerr 1987). The politics of representa-
tion and the representation of politics frequendy go hand in hand in parodic
postmodern historiographic metafiction. Parody becomes a way of ironically
revisiting the past - of both art and history - in a novellike Salman Rushdie's
Midnight's Children with its double parodic intertexts : Grass's The Tin Drum
and Sterne's Tristram Shandy. Both parodies politicize representation, but in
very different ways. As Patricia Merivale (1985) has noted, Midnight's Children
trans codes all the German social, cultural and historical detail of Grass' s novel
into Indian terms. In addition, Saleem Sinai shares everything from litde Oskar's
physical strangeness to his withdrawn alienated position with regard to his soci-
ety. Both tell their stories to someone else and both offer literally self-begetting
novels, Bildungsromane which show how they are "handcuffed to history," to
use Saleem's phrase. The representation of politics is here achieved through the
overt politicizing and historicizing of the act of representing.
Both Saleem's and Oskar's stories have Shandian openings - or non-openings
- and both narrators echo Sterne' s much earlier parody of narrative conventions.
In Rushdie's text, however, the intertextual presence of Tristram Shandy does
more than simply work to undercut Saleem's megalomaniac attempts at order-
ing and systematizing by reminding us of the inevitability of contingency; it also
points to the Empire, the imperialist British past, that is literally apart of India's
self-representation as much as of Saleem's. The structure of the parody enables
that past to be admitted as inscribed, but also subverted at the same time. The
literary inheritance of an Indian writing in English is inescapably double, as
Omar Khayam in Rushdie's Shame comes to see so clearly. Similar political
paradoxes underlie the use of p'l-rody in black American writing as well. Ishmael
Reed has parodied the historical novel (Flight to Canada), the western (Yellow
Back Radio Broke-Down), the'detective story (Mumbo Jumbo), Dickens (The
Terrible Twos), and Uncle Tom's Cabin (Flight to Canada), but always within a
political context that points to what the dominant white traditions silence: the
representations both of blacks and by blacks - the entire Afro-American literary
tradition of the past and the present (see Gates 1984, 302, 311; Foley 1986, 259).
A similar critical contextualizing and appropriating of the past and its rep-
resentational practices can be seen in the visual arts t o ~ , for instance, in the San
Francisco Museum of Modern Art's Second Sight show where Mark Tansey
showed his painting entided The Triumph o[ the N ew York Schoo!. The parodies
operating here are multiple. The tide refers to Irving Sandler's well-known text-
book, The Triumph o[ American Painting. But the work itself ironically
literalizes this tide: members of the French army (looking like Picasso,
Duchamp, Apollinaire, and Leger) surrender their outdated arms to the techni-
cally superior American forces (whose officers represented includeJackson Pol-
lock, element Greenberg, and Barnett Newman). Tansey's overall composition
is a parody of Velasquez's Surrender o[ Breda (1634) which represents both a
specific act of chivalry in the Thirty Years' War and a more general glorification
The Politics of Postmodern Parody 233
of war through art (BeaI1986, 9). Here all that is ironically inverted and placed in
an entirely different context.
Is there a problem of aceessibility here, however? Wh at if we do not recognize
the represented figures or the parodied composition? The tide, I suppose, does
alert us to the place to look for a means of access - Sandler' s textbook. This
functions much as do the acknowledgement pages of postmodern parodic fic-
ti on (such as Berger's G., Thomas's The White Hotel, Banville's Doctor Coper-
nicus). These may not provide all the parodic allusions, but they teach us the
rules of the game and make us alert to other possibilities. This is not to deny,
however, that there exists a very real threat of elitism or lack of access in the use
of parody in any art. This question of accessibility is undeniably part of the
politics of postmodern representation. But it is the complicity of postmodern
parody - its inscribing as weIl as undermining of that which it parodies - that is
central to its ability to be understood. This may explain the frequent parodic
reappropriation of mass-media images in particular by many postmodern
photographers: there is no need to know the entire history of art to understand
the critique of these representations. All you have to do is look around you. But
some artists want to use parody to recover that high-art history t o ~ , to recon-
nect the representational strategies of the present with those of the past, in order
to critique both. As Martha Rosler puts it:
At certain historical junctures, quotation [or what I have called parody] allows a defeat of aliena-
tion, an asserted reconnection with obscured traditions. Yet the elevation of an unknown or
disused past emphasizes a rupture with the immediate past, a revolutionary break in the supposed
stream of history , intended to destroy the credibility of the reigning historie al ac counts - in favor
of the point of view of history's designated losers. The homage of quotations is capable of signal-
ling nbt self-effacernent hut rather a strengthening or consolidating resolve. (1981, 81)
Rosler's challenge to social and economic history through a parody of the his-
tory of photography does indeed offer a new way to represent "history's desig-
nated losers." The financial and artistic success of the American documentary
art of the 1930s in contrast to its subjects' continuing conditions of poverty and
misery is part of the historical context that formal parody calls up in her series,
The Bowery in Two Inadequate Descriptive Systems.
One view of such ironie appropriation of existing representations claims that
this kind of parody presumes "a widespread cultural agreement aboutwhat con-
stitutes great art" (Goldberg 1988, 24). While this might offer a context for
Picasso's parodic play with Velasquez's Las Meninas, it certainly does not ac-
count for the appropriation of mass-media and popular art forms in postmodern
photography. Does parody really assurne such an evaluative notion as a tradi-
tion of masterpieces ? Or does it simply assurne recognition of previous repre-
sentations from the hints embodied in the work? Perhaps from a modernist
poin t of view, a "tradition must be generally acknowledged if an artist is to draw
strength from it, pretend to improve upon it, or implicidy criticize it" (Goldberg
1988,24), but in a postmodern age in which all such general acknowledgements
234 L. Hutcheon
are suspect, when all institutions are under scrutiny, we must ask "generally
acknowledged" by whom? In whose interest? Why? These questions explain, I
think, the recourse to non-high-art, non- "traditional" images - that is, from
mass-media and popular art - in much photographic parody today. It is these
representations as much as those "masterpieces" that determine how we see
ourselves and our world.
American artist Barbara Kruger appropriates this kind of image and uses its
formal complicity with capitalist and patriarchal representational strategies to
foreground conflictual elements through ironic contradictions. Parody, she as-
serts, allows for some distance and critique, especially of notions such as "com-
petence, originality, authorship and property" (Kruger 1982, 90). Certain of
Vincent Leo' s works may look like derivative variations or pastiches of the work
of Robert Frank- and they are. They are cut-up collages of reproductions from
Frank's canonical book of photographs The Americans. It has been argued that
this kind of parodic play has its own complex politics of representation: it points
to the legions of contemporary photographers who unreflectively copy the ca-
nonical icons and their techniques; it undercuts the myth and mystique of origi-
nality in art; it works to recall the his tory of photography by literally using the
past as the building blocks of the present; and it comments critically on the
canonical status of photographers like Frank within the art institution (Sol-
omon-Godeau 1984, 83).
Parody in postmodern art is more than just a sign of the attention artists pay to
each others' work (cf. Barber 1983-4, 32) and to the art of the past.1t may indeed
be complicitous with the values it inscribes as well as subverts, but the subver-
sion is still there: the politics of postmodern parodic representation is notthe
same as that of most rock videos,' use of allusions to standard film genres or texts
(Kaplan 1987, 34-5). This is what should be called pastiche, according to Jame-
son's definition. In postmodern parody, the doubleness of the politics of au-
thorized transgression remains intact: there is no dialectic resolution or re-
cuperative evasion of contradiction. The postmodern recognizes that, in Craig
Owens's terms, "a certain calculated duplicity" may be indispensable today as a
"deconstructive tool" (1984, 7).
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HANS-PETER MAI
Intertextual Theory - A Bibliography
In the subject index of the MLA Bibliography for 1988 the following remark is
to the entry "INTERTEXTUAL ApPROACH": "Documents applying
speclflc approaches are so numerous that access to them is provided only in the
electronic version of the Bibliography." Accordingly the following list will not
attempt to cover everything ever written in the name of intertextuality. Rather, a
comprehensive survey will be given of studies concerned with theoretical issues
of intertextuality. Those entries which seem to deal with individual texts do
contain relevant material in this regard. Unfortunately, as there does not exist
anything like a coherent theory of intertextuality, this state of affairs cannot but
be mirrored in the entries below.
For practical purposes, related concepts such as 'context', or even 'text' in
general, had to be disregarded bibliographically. Also, the sheer magnitude of
uooks and articles on adjacent theoretical domains - such as deconstruction,
poststructuralism, postmodernism and the like - makes it impossible to include
them here, unless they expressly take intertextuality into account. Finally, this
bibliography will not consider studies which concern themselves with such
tradition al phenomena as allusion, quotation, parody, etc., only-fields of study
which, of course, are of intertextual interest.
Added to the present bibliography is a section listing several special numbers
of periodicals which contain much 'practical intertextual criticism'.
Individual Studies
Almeida,Ivan
1979 "Trois cas de rapport intra-textuels: La citation, la parabolisation, Ie commentaire."
Semiotique & Bible 15,23-42.
Altman, Charles F.
1981 "Intratextual Rewriting: Textuality as Language Formation." In Wendy Stein er, ed.
The Sign in Musicand Literature. Austin: University ofTexas Press, 39-51.
Angenot, Marc
1983 . "L'intertextualite': Enquete sur l'emergence et la diffusion d'un champ notionnel."
Revue des Sciences Humaines 60/189,121-135.
"Intertextualite, interdiscursivite, discours social." Texte 2, 101-112.
1983
238 H. P. Mai
Arrive, Michel
1973 "Pour une theorie des textes poly-isotopiques." Langages 8/31, 53-63. - German tr.:
1986
Baetens, J an
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mermann. Theorie - Literatur - Praxis: Arbeitsbuch zur Literaturtheorie seit 1970.
Frankfurt: Athenaion, 1975, 108-122.
"Intertexte et intertextualite chez Ferdinand de Saussure. " In Raimund Theis &
Hans T. Siepe, eds. Le Plaisir de l'intertexte: Formes et fonctions de l'intertextualite
(Roman populaire - Surrealisme - Andre Gide - N ouveau Roman). Frankfurt/Bernl
New York: Peter Lang, 11-31 (rpt. 1988).
1987 "Intertextualiteit (anders) bekeken." Spiegel der Letteren 29/1-2, 61-68.
Barthes, Roland
1968 "Lamort de l'auteur." Manteia 5,12-17. -Engl. tr.: "The Death of the Author." In
Stephen Heath, ed. Image - Music - Text. Glasgow: Fontana/Collins I New York:
1971
1973
Hi1l&Wang, 1977, 142-148.-Rpt. in: Barthes. The Rustle ofLanguage. New York:
Hill & Wang, 1986, 49-64. - Also in: David Lodge, ed. Modern Criticism and
Theory. New York/London: Longman, 1988, 167-172.
"De l'oeuvre au texte." Revue d'Esthetique 24,225-232. - Engl. tr.: "From Work to
Text." Image - Music- Text. Ed. Stephen Heath. Glasgow: Fontana/Collins I New
York: Hill & Wang, 1977, 155-164. - Also in: Josuev. Harari, ed. Textual
Strategies: Perspectives in Post-Structuralist Criticism. Ithaca, N. Y.: Cornell UP,
1979,73-81. - Rpt. in: Barthes. The Rustle of Language. New York: Hill & Wang,
1986, 56-64.
"Texte (Theorie du)." Encyclopaedia Universalis. Vol. 15. Paris: Encydopaedia Uni-
versalis France, 1013-1017. - Engl. tr.: "Theory of the Text." In Robert Young, ed.
Untying the Text: A Post-Structuralist Reader. Boston/London/Henley: Routledge
& Kegan Paul, 1981,31-47.
Beaugrande, Robert-Alain de & Wolfgang Ulrich Dressler
1981 Introduction to Text Linguistics. London/New York: Longman. - German version:
Einfhrung in die Textlinguistik. Tbingen: M. Niemeyer, 1981.
Bennett, David .
1987 "Wrapping Up Postmodernism: The Subject of Consumption Versus the Subject of
Cognition." Textual Practice 1,243-261.
Ben-Porat, Ziva
1976 "The Poetics ofLiterary Allusion." PTL: AJournalfor Descriptive Poetics & Theory
1979
of Literature 1, 105-128. - Polish tr.: "Poetyka aluzji literackiej." Pamietnik
Literacki 79,1988,315-337.
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et al., eds. A Semiotic Landscape: Proceedings of the First Congress of the Interna-
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588-593.
1985 "Intertextuality." Ha Si/rut 2/34,170-178 [in HebrewJ.
Bilous, Daniel
1983 "Intertexte/Pastiche: L'intermimotexte." Texte 2, 135-160.
Bjornson, Richard
1980 "Translation and Literary Theory." Translation Review 6 (Winter), 13 -16.
Blnsdorf, Jrgen
1986 "Senecas Apocolocyntosis und die Intertextualittstheorie." Poetica 18, 1-26.
Bolter, J ay David
1989 "Beyond Word Processing: The Computer as a New Writing Space." Language &
Communication 9,129-142.
Boyarin, Daniel
1987 "Old Wine in New Bottles: Intertextuality and Midrash." Poetics Today 8, 539-556.
r Intertextual Theory - A Bibliography 239
Broich, Ulrich & Manfred Pfister, eds.
1985 Intertextualitt: Formen, Funktionen, anglistische Fallstudien. Tbingen: M. Nie-
meyer.
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1985 "Formen der Markierung von Intertextualitt." In Broich & Pfister, eds., 31-47.
1985 "Zur Einzeltextreferenz. " In Broich & Pfister, eds., 48-52.
Bruce, Don
1983
1987
"Bibliographie annotee: Ecrits sur l'intertextualite." Texte 2, 217-258.
"De l'intertextualite a l'interdiscursivite." Diss. University of Toronto. - DAI 48
(1987/88),2887 A.
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1976 "ecriture" und "texte": Die franzsische Literaturtheorie "nach dem Strukturalis-
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1988 "Intertextuality and Visual Poetics." Style 22, 183-193.
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1986 "Las teorias de Ram6n Menendez Pidal ante la critica literaria post-estructuralista:
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Carron, Jean-Claude
1988 "Imitation and Intertextuality m the Renaissance." New Literary History 19,
565-579.
Caws, Mary Ann
1981 "For a Poetics of Perception: Some Strategies of the Private Eye." The Eye in the
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Claes, Paul
1987
nienia Rodzaj6w LiterackichlLes Problemes des Genres Litteraires 3111-2,89-97.
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1. Berlin/New York/Amsterdam: Mouton de Gruyter, 441-453.
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1979
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1981 "Hypogram and Inscription: Michael Riffaterre' s Poetics of Reading." Diacritics 11,
17-35. - Rpt. in: de Man. The Resistance to Theory. Minneapolis: University of
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Dembowski, Peter
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Deming, Robert H.
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tion Inquiry 10/3,32-44.
Dupriez, Bernard
1986 "The Semiotics of Rhetoric: Definition." In ThomasA. Sebeok, ed. Encyclopedic
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Eco, Umberto
1986 "Casablanca: Cult Movies and Intertextual Collage." Travels in Hyperreality: Es-
says. San Diego/New York/London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 197-211 (orig.
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Eisenzweig, U ri
1983 "Un concept plein d'interets." Texte 2,161-170.
Emberley, Julia I
1988 "The Pain of the Text-Anger: Intertextuality: Gender." Tessera 11,125-135.
Ette, Ottmar
1985
Evseev, Ivan
1983
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Special Issues o[ Periodicals
American Journal of Semiotics 3/4 (1985).
Canadian Review of Comparative Literature 11 (1984).
Litterature no. 41 (1981); no. 55 (1984); no. 69 (1988).
New York Literary Forum 2 (1978).
Pamietnik Literacki 79 (1988).
Poetica 19 (1987).
Pohique 7/27 (1976).
Revue des Sciences H umaines 60/189 (1983).
Semiotique et Bible 15 (1979).
Spiegel der Letteren 29/1-2 (1987).
Studii si Cercetari Lingvistice 36/1 (1985).
Style 23 (1989).
Texte 2 (1983).
Name Index
Abrams, M. H. 136,159
Ackroyd, Peter 226-227, 234
Adams, Ansel 229
Adriaens, Mark 38,41,52
Aeschylus 230
Albert [Albertus Magnus] 188
Alciati, Andrea 187
Allen, Don Cameron 195,204
Allen, Woody 26
Almeida, Ivan 83, 95, 237
Althusser, Louis 37,38
Altman, Charles F. 30,52,237
Ambrose (ofMilan) 188
Amrine, Fredrick 60,74
Anacreon 168
Anderegg, Johannes 156,159
Anderson, John R. 73,74
Angenot,Marc 31,52,62,74,237
Apollinaire, Guillaume 232
Ariost [Ariosto, Ludovico] 110
Aristophanes 167
Aristotle 32,213,215,230
Arndt, Ernst Moritz 172
Arrive, Michel 45, 52, 238
Augustine [Augustinus, Aurelius] 72,188
Ausonius, Decimus Magnus 167, 168, 169, 174
Austen, Jane 103
Axhausen, Kte 69,74
Babloyantz, Agnessa 60, 74
Baetens,Jan 238
Baker, Sheridan 136, 161
Bakhtin, Mikhail M. 3,10,27,33,34,70,147,
159,165,171,173,174,211,212,221,222
BaI, Mieke 79,81,95
Balzac, Honore de 112
Banville,John 233,234
Bar, Francis 67, 74
Barber, Bruce Alistair 229,234
Barkan,Leonard 181,190
Barnes,Julian 106,120
Barth, John 9,26,27, 113, 120,208-209,214,
215,216,221,222
Barthelme, Donald 214,218,219,222
Barthes, Roland 3, 6, 25, 26, 27, 30, 37, 38,
41-44,46,52,69,70,72,74,78,79,92,93,95,
146,148,160,194,196,201,202,204,213,
218,222,238
Barton,John 23
Barwise, J. 63
Baudelaire, Charles 218
Baudissin, Wolf Heinrich Graf von 21
Beal, Graham W. J. 233, 234
Beardsley, Aubrey 24
Beaton, Cecil 231
Beaugrande, Robert-Alain de 32,34,52,165,
175,238
Beckett, Samuel 18,115,217
Beethoven, Ludwig van 20, 70
Bejart, Maurice 20
Belasco, David 149, 156, 157
Bell, Robert F. 139, 160
Benet, William Rose 167, 175
Benjamin, Walter 225,235
Bennett, David 46,48, 52,238
Benoist, Jean-Marie 79,95
Ben-Porat, Ziva 135,136,137,138,139, 160,
238
Benveniste, Emile 85,95
Bergengruen, Werner 127, 128, 130, 133
Berger, D. A. 122, 125, 133
Berger,John 225,233,235
Bertalanffy, L. von 70
Bertrand de Born 217
Best, Otto F. 166, 175
Beugnot, Bernard 157, 160
Bilous, Daniel 238
Bjornson,Richard 238
Blnsdorf, Jrgen 238
Blake, William 227
Bloom,Harold 27,135,136,160,209,213,
222
Bloomfield, Morton W 17,27
Blumenberg, Hans 60,74,174
Bhm, Rudolf 122, 123, 125, 128, 133
Boheemen, Christel van 248
Boiardo, Matteo Maria 110
Boker, George H. 116
Boller, Paul F. 12,27
Bollinger, Ulrich 171
252 Name Index
Boltanski, Luc 130,134
Bolter,Jay David 50-51,52,238
Borges, Jorge Luis 26,107,120,213,226
Bormann, Edwin 171,173,175
Boswell,James 146,158
Bottomley, Gordon 22,110
Bouchard, Donald F. 195, 204
Bouissac, Paul 72, 74
Bourdieu, Pierre 69, 130, 134
Bove, Carol Mastrangelo 33, 52
Bowie, Malcolm 37, 52
Boyarin, Daniel 238
Brandt, Joan 53
Brant, Sebastian 122, 123, 126, 127
Brecht, Bertolt 25
Broich, Ulrich 32,45,53,60,62,70,74, 115,
120,146,156,160,166,175,222,239
Bronte, Charlotte 106, 109, 110, 111, 120
Brooke, Rupert 157
Browning, Robert 125
Brownson, Rohert Charles 154,160
Bruce,Donald 53,60,62,70,74,135,160,239
Brtting, Richard 36,37,38,53,239
Bryson, Norman 27,239
Buchloh, Benjamin H. D. 225,235
Buder, Guido 152, 153, 160
Bchmann, Georg 16
Bunge, Mario 71,74
Bunyan,John 109
Burgess, William 136,160
Burgin, Victor 225,229,231,235
Burnett, Frances 154
Burnett, Fred W. 80,81,95
Burns, Rohert 123, 127
Burroughs, William S. 45
Burshatin, Israel 239
Burton, Robert 14,170,172,175,187
Busch, Wilhelm 21
Butor, Michel 213,222
Byles, Torrey 50, 53
Byron, Lord George Gordon 147
Caine,Jeffrey 110
Calder, William 189
Calvino, Italo 101
Capilupus, Julius 169,170,171
Capilupus, Laelius 169,170
Carey,John 195,201,204
Carpenter, Edward 155, 157
Carroll, David 33,53
Carron, Jean-Claude 32,53,239
Carter, Angela 226,228,235
Cather, Willa 144, 153, 158
Cato, Marcus Porcius 166
Catullus, C. Valerius 216,217
Cavalcanti, Guido 216,217
Cave, Terence 182,190
Caws, Mary Ann 239
Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de 102,107,113,
115,116,117,118,120,141
Champagne, Roland A. 239
Charney, Hanna 102, 121
Chatterton, Thomas 227
Chaucer, Geoffrey 72
Cheever,John 144,158
Chomsky, Noam 8,32,38,41
Christensen, Bente 239
Cicero, Marcus Tullius 7, 167
Cieslikowska, Teresa 239
Claes, Paul 239
Clark, Eva Lee 136,160
Claudius 170
Claudius, Matthias 172
Cleland, J ohn 105
Coffler, Gail H. 136, 160
Colie, Rosalie L. 190
Colombo, J ohn Robert 14
Compagnon, Antoine 15, 27
Conde, Claude 46, 53
Conklin,Jeff 49,53
Conte, Gian Biagio 136,160
Cooke, Ebenezer 9
Coombs, James H. 136,137,138,160
Cooper, James Fenimore 112
Corneille, Pierre 218
Corns, Thomas N. 49,53,239
Courtes,Joseph 71,75,85,96,241
Coward, Rosalind 37,53,214,222
Crane, Stephen 143, 158
Cross an, J ohn Dominic 86, 95
Crusius,Otto 166,175
Cuddon, J. A. 136, 160
Culler,Jonathan 12,27,101,120,239-240
Cunliffe, Marcus 222
Curtius, Ernst Robert 64, 74, 190
Cyprian 188
Dllenbach, Lucien 23,27,31,53,240
Dali, Salvador 69
Dante Alighieri 116, 123, 126, 181,218
Daudet, Alphonse 115
Davey, Frank 69
Davidson, Michael 33,53
Davis, Richard Harding 155
Defoe, Daniel 24, 113
De la Mare, Walter 109,120
Delepierre,Octave 167,169,170,175
Delorme, J. 240
Dembowski, Peter 240
Deming, Robert H. 240
Derrida,Jacques 3,34,37,38,69,74,79,81,
82,89-92,93,94,95,200,214,222
Dickens, Charles 145,232
Didymus, Paulus 171
Dilthey, Wilhelm 80
Dion, Robert 64,74
Dionysus the Carthusian 188
D'Ippolito, Gennaro 240
Divus, Andreas 217
Doctorow, E. L. 226,235
Dorfmller-Karpusa, Kthi 68,74
Dos Passos,John 215,226
Dostoevsky, Fyodor M. 212
Douglas, Lord Alfred 24
Doyle, Sir Arthur Conan 112,114,144,226
Dreiser, Theodore 113, 157
Dressler, Wolfgang Ulrich 32,34,52, 165,
175,238
Drucker, Steven M. 59
Duchamp, Marcel 225, 232
Ducrot, Oswald 190
Dumas, Alexandre 113
Duncan, Francis 124, 134
Dupriez, Bernard 45, 53, 240
Dylan, Bob 143, 152
Eagleton, Terry 62,74
Eco, Umherto 11,27,61,62,63,65,68,74,
122,134,187,190,193,204,213,222,226,
235,240
Eichendorff, J oseph von 172
Eigen, Manfred 73, 75
Eisenzweig, Uri 240
Eliot, Thomas Stearns 11,26,105, 115, 123,
140,143,144,146,152,158,160,214,216,
217,218,219,222,229
Ellis,John 37,53,214,222
Ellison, Ralph 146,147,159
Emherley, Julia 240
Engels, Friedrich 13
Erasmus, Desiderius 16,170,175,181-189,
190
Ernst, Max 26
Ernulphus of Rochester 14
Ette,Ottmar 26,27,30,53,181,190,240
Eudokia 171
Euripides 18,220
Even-Zohar, I. 64
Evseev,Ivan 240
Eykman, Christoph. 157,161
Name Index
Fabri, Andreas 170, 175
Faller, Marion 229
Fauconnier, G. 63
Faulkner, William 112
253
Federman, Raymond 209,214,219,220,222
Feininger, Lyonel 220
Fenelon, de Salignac de La
Mothe 110
Feral,J. 33;41,54;240
Fiderio, Janet 49,54
Fiedler, Leslie A. 207,209,223
Fielding, Henry 103,104,105,108,109,116,
120
Fillmore, C. J. 72
Firmat, Gustavo Perez 240
Fish, Stanley 140, 161
Fiske, Donald W. 63, 75
Fitzgerald, F. Scott 140,142,143,144,146,
148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156,
157, 158, 159
Fitzgerald, Robert 217
Flaubert, Gustave 46,106,116
Fokkema, Douwe W. 209,223
Foley, Barbara 226,232,235
Foley, Richard 63, 75
Frster, Leonard 190
Foster, HaI 226,228,235
Foucault, Michel 26,37,79,81,89,95
Fowler, Roger 166,175
Fowles,John 146,159
Fox, John, Jr. 155
Frnkel, Hermann 181,190
Frampton, Hollis 229
Frank, Armin Paul 240
Frank, Robert 234
Franklin, Benjamin 150
Franklin, Carl 49,54
Frawley, William 240
Freadman, Anne 46, 54, 240
Frederic, Harold 157
Freedman,Sanford 41,54
Freese, Peter 207,224
Frei, Hans 80, 95
Freud, Sigmund 32, 38, 72, 226
Freytag, Gustav 215
Friedrich, Caspar David 220
Frisch, Max 118
Frow,John 37,46,54,241
Frye,Northrop 80,96,136,142,161
Fuchs, Catherine 21,27
Fger, Wilhelm 45,54
Fuhrmann, Manfred 167,175
Furetiere, Antoine 64, 67
Fuseli, Henry 20
254 Name Index
Gadamer, Hans Georg 35
Galan, F. W. 31,54
Galsworthy,John 22,112
Gardner,John 101,106,110,115,120
Garson, Barbara 105
Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. 232,235
Gay,John 25
Geidt, J eremy 105
Geier, Manfred 241
Genette, Gerard 21,22,27,49,54,62,64,65,
67,69,70,75,106,110,113,114,120,122,
129,134,135,137,140,146,161,192,201,
202,204,210-211,223,241
George, Charles 114
George, John 12,27
Gerber, Gustav 173,175
Gietema, Erika 241
Gilbert, Sir William S. 25
Ginsberg, Allen 144
Giustiniani, Vito R. 146, 161
Glass, Philip 220
Glowinski, Michal 241
Gluck, Christoph Willibald 220
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang 20,22,60,101,104,
108,113,115,116,172,220,230
Goetsch, Paul 102,116,120
Goldberg, Vicki 233, 235
Gottsched, J ohann Christoph 64
Goyet, Francis 241
Grabbe, Christian Dietrich 101,114
Graciin, Baltasar 64
Graff, Gerald 207,209,223,229,235
Grass, Gnther 232, 235
Greenberg, Clement 232
Greene, Graham 115, 116
Greene, Thomas M. 181,182,190
Greimas, AlgirdasJulien 63,65,71,75,85,96,
241
Grimm,Jacob 166
Grimm,Jrgen 37,38,54
Grimm, Wilhelm 166
Grivel, Charles 17,25,28,32,54,62,70,72,
75,127,134,213,214,223,241
Grbel, Rainer 32,54,212,223,241
Guareschi, Giovanni 115
Gnther, H. 33, 54
Guillerm, Luce 241
Haan, Bernard J. 59
Habermas, Jrgen 35
Hrtling, Peter 104, 120
Halasz, Frank G. 50,54
Hall, Peter 23
Halliday, MichaelA. K. 48,71,72,75
Hambridge,Joan 241
Hand, Sein 241
Harland, Richard 37,38,54
Hartman, Geoffrey 36, 54, 241
Hartmann, Victor 20
Harty, E. R. 28,32, 54,241
Hassan, Ihab 46,54,207,209,223
Hatten, Robert S. 241 .
Hauff, Jrgen 35, 55
Haug, Wolfgang F. 219,223
Hausmann, Raoul 26
Heartfield, J ohn 26
Heath, Stephen 17,28,43
Hebel, UdoJ. 135,140,161,241
Heckscher, WS. 188
Heger, Klaus 69, 75
Heim, Michael 50, 55
Heine, Heinrich 24
Helm, Rudolf 168,175
Hemingway, Ernest 143,152,159
Hempfer, Klaus W 38,48,55,210,223,242
Henry, O. 155
Herget, Winfried 115,120
Herodotus 230
Hersey,John 105
Herzog, Reinhart 167,169,171,175
Hesiod 168
Hesse, Eva 216,223
Hewlett, Richard G. 124,134
Heyndels, Ralph 242
Hicks, Deborah 46, 59
Hieronymus 170-171,175,188
Hill, Christopher 195,196,198,199,204
Hirst, Graem 61,75
Hitchcock, Alfred 231
Hjelmslev, Louis 62,72
Hhler, Gertrud 139,161
Hoek, Leo H. 122,127,128,129,130,131,
134, 152, 153, 161
Hlderlin, Friedrich 104
Hogarth, William 105
Hohendahl, Peter Uwe 35, 48, 55
Holbein, Hans 182
Holland, Michael 242
Hollander,John 102,187,190
Holman, Hugh 136, 161
Homer 113,167,171,181,216,217,230
Hopper, Edward 231
Horace 10, 181
Horan, Chris 45-46, 55
Hosidius Geta 167
Houdebine, J ean-Louis 242
Houppermans, S. 242
Howells, William Dean 144, 159
Hunger, Herbert 168,171,175
Husserl, Edmund 32,38,64
Hutcheon, Linda 193, 194,204,225, 230,235,
242
Huxley, Aldous 9
Huysmans, Joris K. 24
Huyssen, Andreas 43, 55
Idt, Genevieve 242
Ille, Hans-Jrgen 242
Inge, M. Thomas 149,161
Innocent III 188
Ionesco, Eugene 105
Irish, Peggy M. 50, 55
Iser, Wolfgang 141,161,174,175
J ackendorff, R. 63
J acobi, Daniel 46, 53
Jacques, Francis 62,75
Jakobson, Roman 84,85,96,158,161
Jameson, Fredric 15,28,35,37,55,208,217,
221,223,226,228,235
J ardine, Alice 55, 242
Jau, Hans Robert 156,161
Jefferson, Ann 101, 120,242
Jenny, Laurent 10,28,44-45,55,192,194,
202,204,242
Jens, Walter 26,28
Jensch, Fritz 136, 161
Jensen, Svend Beggild 242
St.John 197
Johnson, Anthony L. 136,138,161
Johnson, Christopher M. 242
Johnson, Oakley C. 148,149,161
Jones, (Everett) LeRoi 126
J ong, Erica 104
Jose, Nicholas 195,205
J osephson, Kenneth 229
Joyce,James 15,23,26,101,106,113,147,
159,202,209,214,215,229
Junker, Hedwig 242
Justinian 170
Juvenal 188
Kablitz, Andreas 242-243
Kant,lmmanuel 14,71,94
Kao, Shuhsi 37, 55
Kaplan, E. Ann 234,235
Kapp, Volker 243
Karbusicky, Vladimir 243
Karrer, Wolfgang 122, 126, 134, 166, 175,243
Keats,John 143,"146,218
Kellett, E. E. 15,28
Kemeny, T. 77
Name Index
Kermode, Frank 187,190
Kerr, Lucille 232,236
Kibedi Varga, Aron S. 243
Kierkegaard, Seren Aabye 103, 104, 115
Kipling, Rudyard 155
Kleinert, Annemarie 102, 120
Kloepfer, Rolf 165, 176,210,223,243
Klotz, Volker 11,28,139,161
Knops, Mathieu 186
Kolbowski, Silvia 229
Konstantinovic, Zoran 243
Koppenfels, Werner von 243
Koritz, Lester S. 66, 67, 68, 75
Krause, Wolf-Dieter 249
255
Kristeva, Julia 3,28,30,32,33,36,37,38-41,
44,45,47,48,50,55,62,70,71,75,79,137,
139,140,161,165,193,199-200,201,205,
208-209,210,211,212,221,223,243-244
Krouse, F. Michael 202, 205
Krger, Horst 104
Kruger, Barbara 229,234,236
Krysinski, Wladimir 244
Kuhn, Thomas 80, 96
Kuhnen, Johannes 128,134
K yd, Thomas 117
Labarriere, Pierre-Jean 62,75
Lacan,Jacques 37,38,73
LaCapra, Dominick 33, 56, 78, 96, 229-230,
236
Lachmann, Hedwig 24
Lachmann, Renate 32,56, 139, 142, 162, 165,
176,244
Lactantius 188
Lafay, Henri 244
Laforest, Marty 64,74
Lakoff, G. 63
Lamacchia, Rosa 166,170,176
Lamb, Charles 22
Lamb, Mary 22
Lamy, Bernard 64,66,67,75
Landow, George P. 50,56,244
Laughlin,James 216,217,223
Lauretis, Teresa de 226, 235
Lazarevic, Laza 101
Leblanc, Maurice 114
Lefever, R. 72,73,76
Leger, Fernand 232
Lehmann, Hans-Thies 244
Lehmann,Jrgen 33,56
Leitch, Vincent B. 6,28,31,41,56,96,244
Lemke, Gerd 154,162
Lemke, J ay L. 32, 48, 56, 244
Lennox, Charlotte 101,115,116
256 Name Index
Lenz, Bernd 244
Leo the Philosopher 168
Leo, Vincent 234
Leps, M.-C. 12,28
Lernout, G. 244
Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim 12
L'Estrange, Anna 110
Levi, A. H. T. 244
Levine, Sherrie 228, 236
Lewalski, Barbara K. 195,201,205
Lewis, Philip E. 44, 56
Lewis, Sinclair 143,150,151,153,154,155,
158, 159
Lievsay,JohnL. 188, 190
Lincoln, Abraham 220
Lindner, Monika 32,45,56,245
Link, Jrgen 245
Lipsius, Justus 170, 172
Liszka, J ames Jakob 84, 96
Liszt, Franz 20
Livingston, Paisley 71, 75
Locke, J ohn 14
Lodge, David 158,162
Logan, Marie Rose 245
Loos, Adolph 207
Lotman,Jurij M. 174,176
Low, Anthony 195,199,201,205
Lucian 168,176
Ludwig, Hans-Werner 146,162
St. Luke 82
Lyotard,Jean-Fran<;ois 207,217,220,223 /,
Mackensen, Lutz 166,176
Magritte, Rene 20, 229
Magureanu,Anca 245
Mahler, Gustav 26
Mailer, N orman 148
Mailloux, Steven 31, 56
Malen, Lenore 230, 236
Malherbe, Fran<;ois de 67,68
Mallarme, Stephane 19, 89
Malory, Sir Thomas 11
Malraux, Andre 25
Man,Paulde 46,53,79,240
Manea, Dana 245
Manet, Edouard 229
Mann, Thomas 101,106,229
Mao Tse-tung 13
Marciszewski, Witold 71,75
Markiewicz, Henryk 245
Marks, Jonathan 105
Martens, Gunter 36, 56, 245
Martin, Loy D. 193, 205
Martindale, Charles 181, 190
Marvell, Andrew 143, 152, 156
Marx, Karl 13,32,38,39,41,219
St. Matthew 188
Mazzaro, J erome L. 46, 56
McLuhan, Marshall 70,219
Melville, Herman 146,150,151
Meredith, George 227
Merivale, Patricia 232, 236
Merrell, Floyd 68, 76
Metschies, Michael 150,162
Meyer, Herman 137,150,162,172,176
Meyer, Reinhart 129, 134
Meyrowitz, Norman K. 59
Mihaila, Ecaterina 245
Mihaila, Rodica 245
Millais, J ohn Everett 231
Miller, Karl 101, 120
Miller,Owen 17,28,245
Milton,John 9,27,105,192-204,205
Moi, Toril 37,56
Mommsen, Theodor E. 190
Monod, Jacques 72,76
Monroe, Marilyn 219
Montaigne, Michel Eyquem, Seigneur de
171-172,176,182,187
Montandon, Alain 116,120
Montemayor,Jorge de 117
Moore, Charles 26
Morawski, Stefan 13, 14,28, 137, 162
More, Sir Thomas 24
Moreau, Gustave 24
Morgan, ThaIs E. 26, 28, 30, 46, 56, 62, 63, 76,
245
Morhof, Daniel Georg 170
Morris, Charles William 6, 28, 85, 96
Morson, Gary Saul 3,28
Mortimer, Armine Kotin 46,56
Motiramani, Mahesh 154,162
Moure, Erin 3
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus 115,216
Mller, Heiner 221
Murner, Thomas 126
Musus,Johann KarlAugust 101,106-107,
118,120
Mussato, Albertino 170
Mussorgsky, Modest 20
Muybridge, Eadweard 229
Nabokov, Vladimir 145, 146, 159
Nadel, Alan 139,162
Nathan,Jacques 136,162
Nebeker, Helen 111,121
Nerval, Gerard de 217
Net, Mariana 245
Neugebauer, Wilhelm Ehrenfried 115, 116,
118
Neumann, Peter Horst 137, 162
Neumeier, Beate 107,121
Newman, Barnett 232
Nichol,John W. 151,162
Nicolaisen, W. I. H. 245
Nies, Fritz 167,176
Nietzsche, Friedrich 50, 72, 165
Nth, Winfried 32, 56
Nolan,E.P. 190
Nolan, Rita 21,28
Norris, Frank 157
Novak, Kim 231
Nubert, Roxana 245
Nye, Andrea 31,56
Nye, Robert 103, 107, 121
Oates,Joyce Carol 115,144,148,153,154,
159
Offenbach, J acques 25
Olivi, Terry 246
O'Neill, Eugene 105
Ong, Walter J. 16,28
Oppenheimer, Fred Eugene 137,162
Orr, Leonard 26,28,245
Orwell, George 45,46, 152, 159
Ovid 32,61,62,76,170,181,183,184
Owens, Craig 226, 234, 236
Pabst, Walter 102, 116, 121
Parret, Herman 63, 76
Patrikios 171
Patte, Daniel 80, 86, 96
Paul, Fritz 104, 121
Paulson, William R. 34,48,49, 57,245
Pavis, Patrice 245
Pechey,Graham, 33,57,245
Peer, W. van 249
Peirce, Charles Sanders 64,79,82,83-86,89,
93,94,95,96
Pepusch, J ohann Christoph 25
Perkins, George 136,161
Perri, Carmela 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140,
162,245
Perrone-Moises, Leyla 201,205,245
Petitot-Cocorda, J. 65
Petfi,Janos S. 246
Petrarch 188
Petronius 11
Pfahl, J ohn 229
Pfister, Manfred- 30,32,45,53,57,60,62,70,
74,115,120,139, 144, 145, 156, 160, 162, 166,
176,210,220,222,224,239,246
Name Index 257
Phillips, Gary A. 79, 80, 83, 89,96
Phillips, Margaret Mann 183, 185, 186, 190
Picasso, Pablo 26,229,232,233
Pindar 168
Ping Hui, Liao 30, 57,246
Plato 32, 72, 126
Plautus 166
Plenzdorf, Ulrich 102,104
Plett, Bettina 137, 162
Plett, Heinrich F. 8,9,28-29,32,57,62,63,
64,66,76,103,104,105,121,126,134,137,
142,150,151,156,163,166,176,181,191,
198,205,246
Pliny (the Younger) 185
Plottel, Jeanine Parisier 102, 121
Poe, Edgar Allan 104,114,141,159
Poirion, Daniel 246
Pollak, Vivian R. 139,163
Pollock, J ackson 232
Pope, Alexander 21
Popovic, Anton 30,57,246
Porter, Dennis 111,121
Porter, Katherine Anne 122,123
Potocki, J an 226
Potter, Paulus 228
Pound,Ezra 9,10,11,61,209,214,216,217,
224
Preisendanz, Wolfgang 148, 163,246
Preminger, Alex 136,163,167,176
Priessnitz, Horst 105, 114, 121
Prigogine, Ilya 71, 72, 73, 76
Proba 167, 168, 170-171, 176
Propertius, Sextus 181
Proust, Marcel 46,213
Ptz, Manfred 207,224
Pugliese, Abel Orlando 31,35,57,246
Puttenham, George 64
Pynchon, Thomas 141,159,214
Quine, Willard Van Orman 63
Quintilian 183
Rabelais, Fran<;ois 182,186-187,191,212
Radzinowicz, Lady Mary Ann N evins 195,
199,201,205
Rathjen, Friedhelm 136,163
Ravel, Maurice 20
Ray, William 41,57
Raymond, Darrell R. 50,57
Reed, Ishmael 232, 236
Reis, Carlos 246
Reiss, Timothy J. 64, 76, 90, 96
Rembrandt van Rijn 182
Rewar, Walter 40,48,57,246
258 Name Index
llhys,Jean 106,110,111,121
llicardou,Jean 246
llichardson,Samuel 103,104,105,106,108,
113
llicoeur,Paul 34,35,36,57,80,97
lliddel, Joseph N. 93,97
lliffaterre, Michael 10, 18,29,46,57,62,70,
76,138,139,140,163,193,194,197,200,205,
246-247
lliley, James Whitcomb 155
llinggren,fIeImer 79,97
llobbe-Grillet, Alain 20
lloberts, David 226, 236
llodi, Fritjof 136,140,163
llodriguez, Luz 247
llder, Petra 39, 57
llokeach, Milton 62, 76
llommetveit, llagnar 58,247
llosaeus, Alexander 171
llosler, Martha 230,233,236
lloth,Philip 113,118-119,121
llothe, Arnold 122, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129,
131,133,134,152,153,163
llothfield, Lawrence 46, 58
llovenla(-Frumuani), Daniela 29,247
lludat, Wolfgang E. fI. 142,163
llhm, Gerhard 22
llulewicz, Wanda 247
lluprecht, fIans-George 29,32,58, 62, 63, 69,
72,76-77,247
Schlegel, August Wilhelm 21
Schlemmer,Oskar 220
Schlieben-Lange, Brigitte 32, 58
Schmeling, Manfred 70,77,247
Schmid, W. 167,176
Schmid, Wolf 32,58, 135, 137, 138, 140, 157,
163,224,247
Schmidt, Arno 15
Schmitz, P. F. 247
Schoeck, llichardJ. 32,58,182,184,186,191,
247
Schpp, Joseph C. 208,224
Schubert, Franz 220
Schulte-Middelich, Bernd 32,58, 156, 163,247
Schwanitz, Dietrich 105,248
Schweikle, Gnther 136, 163
Schweikle,Irmgard 136,163
Scott, Sir Walter 116
Scott-Craig, T. S. K. 195,201,205
Seamon, lloger 33,58
Searle, John ll. 138,152,163
Segermann, Krista 122, 125, 127, 133, 134
Segre, Cesare 62,70,77,248
Seidl, J ohann Gabriel 172
Selden,John 30,58
Seneca, Lucius Annaeus 192, 205, 220
Seung, T. K. 37,38,40,43,58
Shakespeare, William 12,20,21,22,23, 101,
103,105,107,113,114,115,116,125,133,
143,149,152,212,218
llushdie, Salman 226, 232, 236
llusinko, Elaine 30,58,247
llussell, Charles 58
,. Shaw, George Bernard 10, 105, 106, 115, 125
Shawcross, John T. 203,205
lluthven, K. K. 32,47,58
Sabry, llanda 247
Sadler, Lynn Veach 201,205
Salinger, Jerome D. 103,141,145,149,154,
159
Salle, David 231
Samuel, Irene 195, 196, 201, 205
San'al-Mulk, Ibn 69
Sandler,Irving 232-233
Sartre, J ean-Paul 60, 72, 77
Saussure, Ferdinand de 8, 32, 79, 83, 138, 163
Scaliger, Julius Caesar 64,167-168,170,176
Scarron,Paul 64,65,66,67,68,77
Schaar, Claes 136, 138, 139, 140, 163,247
Schabert,Ina 31,32,58,247
Schendel, Michel van 247
Schick, Ulla 213,224
Schiele, Egon 228
Schiffer, Stephen ll. 68, 77
Schiller, Friedrich 230
Shelley, Percy Bysshe 133
Shepard,Sam 149,159
Shipley, Joseph T. 166,176
Shukman, Ann 33,58
Shweder, llichard A. 63, 75
Silesius, Angelus 71
Simon, fIans-Ulrich 137,150,157, 163
Sinclair, Upton 124
Sleigh, Sylvia 230
Smirnov, Igor P. 15,29,217,224
Smith, S. F. 125
Smolak, Kurt 171,176
Sollers, Philippe 37,248
Solomon-Godeau, Abigail 225,234,236
Somekh, Sasson 248
Somville, Leon 62,77,248
Sondheim, Moritz 127, 134
Spanos, William V. 229,236
Spee, Friedrich 71
Starobinski,Jean 248
Starosta, Stanley 72, 77
Statius, Publius Papinius 170
T
Stein, Arnold 195,205
Stein, Gertrude 216
Steinbeck,John 123,128
Steiner, Wendy 248
Stempel, Wolf-Dieter 32,58,140,163,164,
224,247,248
Stengers, Isabelle 71,76
Stephens, Walter E. 226,236
Sternberg, Meir 12,29
Sterne, Laurence 14,103,172,232,236
Stevenson, llobert Louis 101
Stierle, Karlheinz 32,58,137,139,146,164,
210,224,248
Still, Judith 3,29,248
Stone, Jim 229
Stonum, Gary Lee 48, 58
Stoppard, Tom 9,19,22,23,101,104,110,115
Strau, Botho 208,224
Strauss, llichard 24,25
Stravinsky,Igor 26
Stckrath,Jrn 102,116,121,157,164
Suchman, Lucy A. 50, 59
Sullivan, Sir Arthur Seymour 25
Swift, Jonathan 109
Swinburne, Aigernon Charles 143,144
Swingewood, Alan 33, 58
Tabori, George 18
Tafuri, Manfredo 228,236
Tallis, llaymond 31, 58, 2 4 ~
Tansey,Mark 228,232
Taylor, Carole 41,54
Tennyson, Lord Alfred 147
Teodorescu, Anda 248
Terence 183
Tetzeli von llosador, Elisabeth 137,164
Thom, llene 65,67,68
Thomas Aquinas 188
Thomas, D. M. 233,236
Thompson, Francis 144
Thornton, Weldon 136,164
Threadgold, Terry 48, 59,248
Tieck, Ludwig 21
Tilborg, Sejf van 79, 97
Todorov, Tzvetan 70,77,146,190
Tolstoy, Leo N. 20, 155, 157
Tompa, Frank W 50, 57
Toro, Fernando de 62, 77
Tracy,JamesD. 188,191
Trger, Claus 166,167,176
Trigg, llandall fI. 50, 55, 59
Trygaeus 167
Turk, fIorst 248
Turkle, Sherry 37,59
Tyler, Stephen A. 248
Tzara, Tristan 23
Name Index
UImer, Gregory L. 41,59
Ulreich, John c.,Jr. 193,205
Updike,John 113,143,152,158,159
Valla, Lorenzo 188-189
Vasiliu, E. 249
Velasquez, Diego llodriguez 230, 232, 233
Verdaasdonk,fIugo 249
Veron, Eliseo 249
Verrier,Jean 194,205
Verweyen, Theodor 173, 177
259
Virgil 10,66,67,68,77,125,169,170,171,181
Voigts, Manfred 139,164
Volkmann, fIerbert 126, 128, 130, 134
Voltaire 155
Voss, Lieselotte 137, 164
Vultur, Smaranda 249
Wagner, llichard 218
Wallis, fIenry 227
Walser, Martin 113
Warhol, Andy 219,220
Warning, llainer 32,58,164,214,224,248
Weill, Kurt 25
Weimann, llobert 33,36, 59
Weinert, Erich 172, 173, 177
Weinrich, fIarald 72, 77
Weisenburger, Steven 136,164
WeHs, fIerbert George 155, 157
Weston, Edward 229
Wheeler, Michael 137,148,149,164
White, Allon 33.59
Whitman, Walt 155, 157
Wieckenberg, Ernst-Peter 123,125,128,129,
134
Wieland, Christoph Martin 118, 148
Wilde, Oscar 23,24, 116, 157
Wild gen, Wolfgang 65,67,68,77
Wilke, fIans-Jrgen 128, 129, 134
Wilkinson, Lancelot P. 181, 191
Williams, William Carlos 216
Wilpert, Gero von 136, 164
Wilske, Ludwig 249
Wilson, Edmund 209
Wilson, llobert 220-221
Wittgenstein, Ludwig 226
Witting, Gunther 173,177
Wittreich,JosephA. 195,196,199,201-202,
205
Wolf, Christa 230, 236
Wolf, Dennie 46, 59
260 Name Index
Wolpers, Theodor 102, 121, 157, 164
Wood, Derek N. C. 197,206
Woodhouse, A. S. P. 200, 206
Woolf, Virginia 103
Wordsworth, William 19,109
Worton, Michael 3,29,248
Wuthenow, Ralph-Rainer 102,116,121,145,
157,164
Yankelovich, Nicole 49,59
Yeats, William Butler 72, 77,208,224,228
Zander, Horst 249
Zappa,Frank 30,59
Zeeman, E. C. 65
Zeleny, Milan 70,72,77
Zepp, Evelyn H. 59,249
Zilberberg, Claude 68, 77
Zima, Peter V. 224, 249
Zincgref, Julius Wilhelm 170,172
Ziolkowski, Theodore 102,107,108,121
Zumthor, Paul 249
Zurbrugg, Nicholas 30,59,249
Zurowski, Macie; 249
Subject Index
accumulation (see enrichment, semantic)
actualization 6,21,137, 138, 140, 141, 142,
144,147,151,152,154,156,200
adages 16, 17, 182-183, 185-187
adaptation 23,105,127,166,172,210
aemulatio 117 (see also imitation)
aestheticism 43,221
aesthetics 19,43,47,62,218
alienation 16,35,48,212,232,233
5,78,171,226
allusion 4,15,31,36,66,67,78,104,135-158,
165,181,182,184,187,197,200,201,208,
210,211,220,233,234,237
- covert (see allusion, unmarked)
- cultural 148
- diegetic 137
- explicit (see allusion, marked)
- generic 148
- implicit (see allusion, unmarked)
- intertextual 141, 142
- localization of 145-147
- marked 12, 136, 137, 141, 142, 143, 144, 146
- onomastic 138, 142-143, 144, 145, 150,
151-152,153,155,156 (see also names)
- overt (see allusion, marked)
- paratextual 146
- pseudo-intertextual 141,142,147
- quotational 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 150,
151, 152, 153, 156
- Scriptural 184
- sources of 148-149
- spatiality 148
- temporality 148
- textual 148
- titular 142,144,145,150,151,152-153
- toponymic 143
- unmarked 136,137,141,142,143,144
amalgamation 104,115
ambiguity 12,61,129,153,193,194,199,200,
202,203,204
ambivalence (see ambiguity)
analogy 34,60,71,104,106
annotation 49 .
antecedent 101,108,110,117 (see also source)
anti-intertextual(ists) 3,4-5,18
anti-novel 24
appropriation 33,41,44,47,51,78,93,225,
229,232,233,234
archi-intertextualist 18
architecture 26, 187, 207
archive 26,47,50,52 (see also library; musee
imaginaire)
assimilation 11,44,69,146,194,222
association 8,46,51,72,84,111,138,140,141,
143, 151, 152 (see also connotation)
authenticity 50, 158, 186,212,219,221
author 5,15,16,17,25,26,31,34,35,43,45,
47,48,51,65,67,68,80,92,107,110,111,
112,113,128,133,144,145,148,151,192,
193-194,196,197,198,200,201,203,210,
212,213,230,234
authority 13,14,33,47,50,85,93,94,124,
133,174,198,210,211,212,221,225,230,
232
autonomy 6,16,22,31,34,48,50,174,209,
210,211,212,229
auto texte 31
avantgarde 3,27,36,37,48
bibliotheque generale 25, 62, 213
border (see boundary)
borrowing 67, 107, 108, 126, 129, 188
boundary 5,23,61,69,89,90,91,92,94,95,
102, 116,213
bricolage 220
burlesque 65,66,67,114
canon 19,25,78,92,133,165,182,186,193,
211,212,218,228,229,231,234
capitalism 47,48,129-130,133,193,194,225,
231,234
caricature 173
carnival 208,211,212,213,221
catastrophe, semantic 65,67,68,70
cento 4,23,126,165-174
chambres d'echos 25,26,213,215
chaos (see catastrophe, semantic)
character 101-119,155
Ciceronianism 7
cinema 24,26,62,129,149,231,234
262 Subject Index
citation (see quotation)
classification (see taxonomy)
cliche 61,219
closure 61,153,201,229
code(s) 7,11,12,26,31,50,125,127,128,129,
130,131,133,174,198,213
codification 129, 165
cognition 63, 65, 72
coherence 5-6, 112, 169
collage 4,11,19,22,23,174,208,220,221,234
combination 20, 115
comment(ary) 12,13, 17,22,49,78,93, 139,
146, 147, 151, 154, 157, 172, 181, 182, 186,
197, 198,217 (see also meta-commentary)
- authorial 146
- pseudo- 12
commodity 39,129,219
commonplace books 16,128,183,184
commonplaces (see topoi)
communication 5,6, 12, 13, 14, 16,23,32,34,
35,37,40,42,43,128,144,196,214
comparative studies 4, 102
compendium 140, 187
competence 8,12,16,18,71,79,92,117,140,
141, 143, 144, 145, 152, 153, 155, 156, 234 (see
also reader)
computers 7,16,46,49-51,65,69,128,129
(see also hypertext)
condensation 22, 23, 25
connotation 37, 138, 139, 153
conservatism 44,45 (see also tradition)
consumerism 46,129,130,208,213,218, f19,
221
contamination 115 (see also
context (general) 10,11,14,31,63,80,82,91,
154,237
- allusive 142
- culturallsocial 26,33,40,42,68, 128, 133,
181,209,211,214,218
- fictional (see world, fictional)
- historical 33, 79, 90, 128,225,226,233
- intellectualltheoretical 32,36,37,41,65,79,
81,193,208,210
- political 232
- quotational 11, 12, 14, 16,64,66,67, 103
- textual 81,85,88,90,91,92,94,105,123,
126,197,230,231 (see also cotext)
contingency 63,65,67,208,232
continuation 113,210,217 (see also serializa-
tion)
contradiction 48,226,227,228,230,234
contrafacture 172,173, 174
control 31,32,47,65,95,140,187,197
convention 31,226,228,229,232
- communicative 13
- cultural 19
- evaluative 17
- modernist 216
- poetic/literary 64,67,126, 127, 128, 129,
141,145,146,148,153,157,181,226,229,
232
- scientific 40-41
conversion (see transformation)
cotext 130, 150, 152, 154, 157
cotextualization 141,145,154-156,157,158
counter-blazon 24
creativity 17,48,88,89, 194, 196,208,212,
228
critic 65,67,68,215
criticism
- biblical 78-95
- literary 3-5, 32, 33-38, 40, 42, 44-48, 50-52,
71,72,133,139,165,192-194,214-215
- philological 36,151
- textual 37
cross section (see intersection)
cybernetics 48, 73
database 16,49,51
decentering 213
decoding 6,16,141,186,192,193,210
deconstructionl deconstructive 3-4,31,34,
41,42,48,51,60,79,81,82,89,92,93,94,
194,212,214,215,216,217,218,221,226,
228,229,230,234,237
deferral 31,91,93
delight (see pleasure)
demarcation 45,89,125 (see also markers)
denotation 37,138,140
derivation 7,9,10,22
dialectic 40,42, 128
dialogism/dialogue 10,15,23,26,33,34,139,
156,157,158,165,187,193,198,209,211,
212,213,218,220,221
differance 31,69,78,82,89,90,94
difference 17,31,61,64,82,89,90,91,92,93,
94,225,226
digest 22, 185
discontinuity 25,26, 70, 89,93, 94
dis integration 6, 16,216
disjunction 126
dispersion 94,216
displacement 17,40,43,68,93
disruption 16,25,48,138
dissemination 31,91,92,94
double 125,192,212,232,234
dream work 39,40
duplicate 108, 109 (see also double)
echoes 31,184,189,196,198,201,203,207,
213,216,227,228,231,232 (see also cham-
bres d'echos)
ecriture 27,37,69,90,93,172,174,192,204,
211
Einzeltextreferenz 166 (see also referent)
elitism 3,4,218,233
embedding 11,23,85,92,123,141,155
encoding 10,15,186,194
encyclopaedia 65,187,226
enonce 201,212
enrichment, semantic 5, 16,44,45,47,48, 127,
130, 138, 139, 142, 152
entropy 68, 72, 73
epistemology 42,43,47,62,63,65,67,71,79,
82
epitext 22
evocation 103,104,135,137-138,139,140,
141,142,143,144,145,147,150,152,155,
156,157,158,165,184,202
exegesis 13,46,78,79,80,81,82,89,90,92,
93,200 (see also interpretation)
explication de texte 37
extratextual 89, 90, 91
fabric (see texture )
feminism 81,194,228,230-231
fiction(ality) 116,117,118,119,130,195,202,
211, 216, 227 (see also world, fictional)
figure (see character)
- onloan 102,107,108
- re-used 107-114
film (see cinema)
fissure 48
Fliegleichgewicht 70
footnotes 22,49,146,216
formalism 35,80,81,92
formulas 12, 118, 128, 129
Freudianism (see psychoanalysis)
game 43,73,126,181,189,208
genius 193,212,227,231
geno-text 41
genre 21,24,25 (see also intergenericity)
gloss 12,22, 196, 198
grammar 8,31
- generative (transformational) 9,19,41,127
- intertextual 8
- prescriptive 7
- secondary 9
harmonization . 25,44,48,201
hermeneutics 17,30,34-36,39,40,42,47,48,
79,80,93-94,156,194,201
Subject Index 263
heterotopia 61
heuristic 30,46,63,68,69, 153
hierarchy, semantic 21,32,64,69, 123, 125,
126,129,130,133,218
history 25,26,40,42,43,44,47,64,65, 79, 82,
90,91,92,93,94,122,139,140,181,201,202,
207,208,209,211,214,217,219,220,226,
227,228,229
- economic 233
- literary 15, 18,64,69,70,93,118,128,129,
150,158,193,208,209,210,232
- of art/representation 225,226,230,231,
232,233,234
- social 230, 232, 233
hypertext (computer) 30,49-51,52
hypertext (Genette) 49,69,202
hypo-text 69, 192,202
identity 6,9,17,18,63,94, 103, 104, 106, 107,
108,109,110,111,112,113,116,119,130,
150, 174,213,216,230 (see also similarity)
ideology 13,14,34,36,37,39,41,45,48,69,
79,81,101,107,130,133,139,193-194,195,
208,211,212,213,218,221,225,229,230
imitationlimitatio auctorum (veterum) 5, 19,
32-33,102,110,115,116,117,126,127,169,
171,173,174,181,192,194,198,200,201,
202,210
independence (see autonomy)
individuality 35,48, 111, 128, 193, 194,209,
212,226
infiltration (see subversion)
influence 11,14,27,31,36,149,181,186,189,
209 (see also source)
information 14,16,49,50,51,52,72,73
innovation 47,126,130,133,174,193,215,
217,226
inscription 69,165,192,210,228,229,232,
233,234
instability 67,68,69,70,73,213
institution(s), culturallsocial 13,25,37,67,70,
81,181,229,234
integrity 5, 194 (see also authenticity)
intention(ality) 6, 13, 15, 16,30,34,45,68,81,
85,90,93,94,111,113,114,150,193,208,
210,211,218
I nterauktorialitt 31
intercontextuality 30
interdisciplinarity 63,79,182
interdiscursivite 31, 70, 73
interference 8, 11, 12
interfictionality 119
interfigurality 101-119
intergenericity 21,24,25
264 Subject Index
intermediality 20
internymic 102,103,104,105,106,111,112,
114,115,119
interplay 17,93,212
inter-poem 209
interpretant 83-86,87-89,93
interpretation 16,35,36,43,45,49,51,68,72,
78,79,80,81,82,90,91,92,94,117,124,
135-158,194,203,210
inter-reading 209
intersection 33,40,44,110,114,118,139,203,
231
intersemanticity 135
inter-semioticity 30
intertext (definition) 5-8, 194
intertextual
- communication 8
- deviation 9
- erosion 140,148,152,153
- formant 72
- frame(work) 8,61, 128, 149-150
- functive 72
- identity 9
- meaning 200
- operations 10
- semiotics 3,6-8,20,26
- space 157,192,200-201,204,213
- weaving/web 61,78,93, 145, 182, 183, 184,
185,186,187,196
intertextualist 3,4,5,46,47,48,50,63,70,184
(see also intertextuality, applied)
intertextuality
- affirmative 19
- applied 44-46, 49
- cross-art (see intertextuality, inter-art)
- decreasing 6
- definition of 5,6,31-32,40,45,51,182,
193,194,201,209,210-211,212
- diachronic 25-26
- erudite 216
- etymology of 32,62,183
- fields of 62
- formal 188
- generalizing (see intertextuality, structural)
- generic 21,24 (see also intergenericity)
- holistic 19
- horizontal(syntagmatic) 23-24,141
- hybrid 21,25
- increasing 6
- intended 6
- inter-art 181,182,188
- intercultural 26
- intratextual 118, 119
- inverted 19, 23, 25
- linguistic 188
- literary 182
- material (particularizing) 7,8,24,25
- material-structural (particularizing-generaliz-
ing) 7
- medial 20 (see also intermediality)
- multiple 25
- negated/negative 6,19,23
- non-verbal 8,20,24,26
- paradigmatic (see intertextuality, vertical)
- particularizing (see intertextuality, material)
:- pseudo- 26,142
- relativistic 19
- restricted 31,32
- segmental 9, 19
- structural (generalizing) 7,21,24,25
- structuralist 210-211
- synchronic 25
- syntagmatic (see intertextuality, horizontal)
- verbal 8,20,24,26
- vertical (paradigmatic) 23,25,138,141,
158
intertextualization 23,71, 72, 73
intertitularity 122
intratextual 5,9,12,30,34,117,118,119,138,
154,156,157
inversion 19,24,25,61,64,65,115, 143, 145,
233
irony 12,25,26,31,66,105,143,150,151,
155,157,225,226,228,229,230,232,233,
234
isotopy 10, 25, 63, 65
langue 8
library 91,213 (see also archive)
linguistics 6,19,32,33,36,38,41,42,45,48,
80,8i
literature (examples discussed) 9-26,61-62,
64-66,69,82-89,101-119,141-158,168-174,
183-189,194-204,215,216-217,218-219,
226-228,230,232
logic 38,43,45,60,63,85
logocentrism 81
markers 5,8,11-12,15,45,85,115,123,126,
127,128,131,136,137,138,141,142,146,
198,210,212
- explicit 12
- graphemic 10,12,127,129,141,142,143,
144
- implicit 12
- intratextual 12
- phonemic 12, 127, 143,151
- pseudo- 12
Marxism 3,37,42, 194
mass media 207,208,213,218,229,230,231,
233,234
meaning 10,11,31,34,35,41,42,43,47,48,
60,61,65,67,71,72,79,80,81,82,84,86,88,
90,91,92,93,94,95,103,122,138,141,142,
151-153,154,158,182,188,193,196,200,
201,202,204,209,212,213,220,228,229
memory 15-16,18,25,40,72,73, 128, 137,
187,193,229
meta-commentary 216
metafiction 226, 231
meta-intertextual 61
metatext(ual) 22, 140, 144, 145, 147, 148, 149,
151,156,157,158,215
mirror 15,126-127,182,208,215,216
mise en abyme 23
misreading 31
mobile 189
model 19,32,104,109,115,116,117,173,192,
198,201,203,211,231
modernism 19,25,26,48,207,208,210,214,
216,217,218,222,225,229,231,233
montage 11, 19,26,46, 165
motto 11,22,122-133,145,187-188
musee imaginaire 25,208,219 (see also ar-
chive)
mUSlC 24,25,26,62,149,152
names 102-107,108,110,111,112,113,114,
115,119,128,131,133,136,138,142,143,
144, 145, 148, 150, 151-152, 153
negentropy (see entropy)
Neoclassicism 210
neo-conservatism 226,228 (see also conserva-
tism)
network 33,49,50,63,67,69,90,92,101,119,
133,155,209,210 (see also intertexual web)
noise 65,201,213,218 (see also cybernetics)
normativity 13,14,18-19,64,66,81,173,174,
218
ontology 44,81,82,107,109,210
openness, semantic 15, 140, 142, 145, 153, 156
orality 16,128
organicism 9,45,187
organism 60, 70, 71
origin(ality) 11,17,19,84,91,93,105,107,
108,109,111,194,208,209,217,219,225,
228,234
otherness 79,90
overcoding 6 1 ~ 122, 123, 125, 126, 127, 128,
129,133
ownership (see property)
Subject Index
pamtmgs 24,62,144,227,228,230-231,
232-233
palimpsest 69,200,209
paraphrase 21,22,169,210
paratext 22,106,146,154,203
265
parody 4,17,19,24,25,26,32,64,65,104,
105,107,108,109,114,126,165,167,168,
172,173,174,193,208,210,221,225-234,
237
parole 8,146, 165
pastiche 172,225,226,228, 229, 234
perception, modes/stages of 13,15-17,51,
124, 137, 193
pedormance 8
peritext 22
permutation 23,40,42,212 (see also transfor-
mation)
persiflage 172
pheno-text 41
philosophy 3,4,37,38,39,81,90,94
photography 26,228,229,231,233,234
plagiarism 122, 129, 172,209,227
play 19,31,39,41,42,43,50,89,92,93,94,
119,141,145,189,208,209,214,216,225,
226,229,233,234 (see also interplay)
pleasure 14,25,31,72,221
plurality 14,211,213
politics, cultural 31,34,35,36,37,39,41,43,
44,47,51,81,90,211,212,225-234 (see also
ideology)
poly-isotopy 10,25
polyphony 10,70,211
polysemy 150,151
popular culture 149,207,208,218,219,233,
234
positivism 19,40,47, 79, 80, 90
postmodernism 4,19,26,48,70,80,81,117,
118,142,186,207-210,214-222,225-234,
237
poststructuralism 3,4,31,32,33,34,35,36,
37,38,43,44,45,48,50,51,62,69,72,80,81,
135, 138, 210, 211, 214,215,216,217, 237 (see
also deconstruction)
post-text 17,22,23
practice, semiotic/textual 30,31,33,37,39,40,
41,42,43,44,46,48,49,61,65,67,69,78,79,
81,82,85,89,94,95,181,186,187,192,210,
215,229,231,232
pragmatics 6, 8 (see also quotation, pragmatics
01)
praxis (see practice, semioticltextual)
presupposition 5,6,12, 18,64,65,71,81,82,
90,91,140,141,148,150,153,156,158,197,
202,210,216
266 Subject Index
pre-text 8,9,10,11,12,15,16,17,19,20,22,
109, 110,111,112,
113, 114, 115, 123, 124, 138, 150, 172, 173,
174,192,197,198,202,210,211,217,218,
219,220,221
process, semiotic 17,19,23,37,39,61,63,65,
67,68,70,71,73,78,82,83,84,87,88,91,92,
93,94,95,137,138,140,181,182,186,226,
230 (see also semiosis)
production 6, 39,40,42, 65,226
productivity, semantic 37,40,42,43,69,71,
212
property 31,51,65,67,68,111,129,193,225,
234
proverb 123,143, 152, 185
psychoanalysis 3,37,38,39,41,42,44,46,80,
81,90
quotation 4,7,8-17,18,19,23,26,27,31,64,
66,78,86,93,103,104,122,123,124,125,
126, 127, 128, 129, 136, 137, 139, 142, 143,
144, 145, 146, 147, 150, 152, 157, 165, 168,
172,173,174,182,184,186,187,188,198,
200,208,210,211,212,216,217,220,225,
226,228,233,237 (see also allusion)
- argumentative 14
- authoritative 13, 14
- competence 12
- covert 12
- cryptic 137, 152
- definition of 8-9, 10
- erudite 13-14,18
- faked (see quotation, pseudo-)
- functions of 13-15
- gramm ar of 8-12, 18
- marked (see allusion, marked)
- ornamental 13, 14
- overt 12
- perceptions of 15-17
- poetic 13,14-15
- pragmatics of 12-17
- pseudo- 12, 127
- quoted 217
- thresholds 16
- unmarked (see allusion, unmarked)
- verbal 8
- within-a-quotation 15
reader 5,10,12,13,15,22,23,24,26,31,34,
35,36,41,43,44,47,48,51,62,78,80,81,82,
85,86,88,89,90,91,92,93,94,105,106,108,
111,112,117,123,124,128,130,133,140,
141,143,144,146,150,152,153,187,192,
193,194,196,197,198,200,201,204,210,
213,216,226,229
- ideal 18,92
- implied 145,148,150,153,156
- informed 15,18,140,141, 156
- literaryfigureas 102,116-117,157
reader-oriented criticism (see reception theory)
reading (see reception; inter-reading)
- close 35,46,80,165
reality 8,15,18,26,35,90,94,116,118,141,
142,157,194,207,208,214,219,221,227
realityeffect 148, 157 (see also verisimilitude)
reception 6,10, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, 31, 42, 68,
92,140,148,155,188,192,193,202,204,213
reception theory 44,80,156.
recipient (see reader)
recollection (see memory)
recycling 113,208,209,218
reduction(ism) 6,32,71,82,211,214
referent(s)/references 7,8,13,19,25,26,27,
31,32,38,49,50,61,62,85,90,92,102,103,
104,106,107,111,125,126,127,128,
135-158,165,172,184,186,188,192,196,
200,203,209,210,211,214,215,217,226
referentiality 6, 19,22,34,35, 73, 89, 90, 137,
138,144,197,214,219
regressus ad infinitum/infinite regress 214,226
relativity 19,42,47,211
reminiscence 186 (see also memory)
Renaissance 32,64,71,181-189,192-204,210
representation 42,62,63,68,94, 139, 147, 194,
225,226,227,228,229,230,231,232,233,
234
resonances 188 (see also echoes)
revenant 107, 109 (see also figure on loan;
duplicate)
revolution 3,37,38,39,48,208,209,211,212,
217,233
reworking (see rewriting)
rewriting/rt?-ecriture 23,27,30,31,101,103,
106,110,188,200,226,230
rhetoric 10,19,31,45,64,78,80,87,106,126,
151,183
science 7,8,33-34,35,38-39,40-41,42,47,
63,70,71,94
scriptible 69, 194,204
self 34, 119, 188,213,215 (see also subject;
individuality)
self-contained 6,19,34,43,209,212,213 (see
also autonomy)
semiosis 7, 8, 44, 61, 63, 67, 82, 83, 84, 88, 94,
214 (see also process, semiotic)
semiotics 3,4,6-7,18,20,31,32,36,38,39,
41i42,43, 63, 65, 70, 71, 79, 81,82,87
- cultural 40,42,44,212
sender 12, 13, 18
sequel 110, 111, 112, 113 (see also serializa-
tion)
serialization 22,23-24,106, 112, 113, 128, 129
sign 6,7,18,20,21,23,25,26,36,78,83,84,
85,86,87,88,89,91,93,214
signification/signifiance 42,65
similarity 32,64,103,104,106,109,143,195
(see also identity)
skepticism 26,35,36,47,63
society 40,43,47,48,130-131
sociology 4,42,44, 63
source 7,8,12,17,18,22,33,49,80,85,93,
107,111,119,135-158,172,182,185,186,
187,219,220
source-influence studies 44,47
speaker (see sender)
speech 34,35,40,90,230
stereotype 112
structuralism 31,33,34,35,36,38,39,41,42,
62,69,70,72,79,80,81,146,210,211
structure
- deep 9,10,41,60,103
- surface 9,41,60,103,127,142,144
subject 35,43,84,85,88,92,95,140,193,200,
209,211,212,213,221
sub-text 12,185, 186
subversion 31,32-33,37,38,40,41,48,65,81,
108,211,212,213,221,226,229,230,232,
233,234
superimposition 25,50,115,217
supplement 15,22,93,110
syllepsis 139,200
syntactics 8
Systemreferenz 166
target text 8,9,49,136,137,139
taxonomy 4,6,32,39,41,42,45,47,52,130,
135,146,148,149,194,211
teleology 39,91 .
text (models) 5-6,17,30,31,34-35,36,37,40,
42,45,47,50,60,79,80,81,82,84,86,88,89,
90,91,92,93,94,95,193,194,197,202,208,
209,210,211,212,213,214,217,237
- absolute 34
- as activity 36
- communal 213
- etymology of 183
- infinite 31
- pO'itmodernist 215
- social 40
texte general 40, 135, 148,214 (see also con-
text)
Subject Index 267
textuality 6,19,31,36,37,38,40,50,60,62,
90,92,93,94,165,215,226
textualization 31,36,214
texture 24,51,61,63,90,93,183,189,213,
228 (see also intertextual weaving/web)
theatre 23,24,62, 129, 149,220-221
thesaurus 7,16,185
tissue (see texture )
tide 9,10,11,22,89,105,106,113,122-133,
136, 141, 142,144, 145, 146, 150, 151,
152-153,231,232-233 (see also allusion, titu-
lar)
topicality 148,157
topicalization 66
topoi 146,184,185
topology 65, 66, 67, 68
totality 6,211
trace(s) 25,61,90,123,136,140,141,187,188,
200,212
tradition 4,5,31,32,35,37,38,41,61,67,80,
81,82,85,91,94,95,109,114,126,128,129,
133,145,165,181,201,203,207,208,209,
218,219,221,228,229,230,232,233
traditionalists 3,4,25, 192
trajectory 71,73,82,83,85,86,88,89,93,95
transcoding 11,61,66,231,232
transformation 9-10,17,19-25,40,41,64,80,
81,91,103, 104,
194,212,220 (see also permutation)
transgression 230, 234
trans-individual 18
translatability 84, 85, 88, 89,92, 194
translation 4, 11,20-21,24,69, 105, 122, 185,
210,217
trans-linguistic 34,40
transposition 19,23,40,44 (see also transfor-
mation)
transstylization 21
transtextual(ity) 7,61,68,69,70,71,135,192
travesty 4,19,23,24,25,64,65,67,172,173,
208,210,218
truth 31,39,50,63,68,79,90,94,95,202,219,
226,227
typology 13, 127
- biblical 5, 78, 195, 201
uncertainty 64, 71, 227
undecidability 200
uniqueness 17,193,225,226
unity 16,47,48,84,85,89,210,211,212
universe of texts 17,65,140,189,214
utopia 43
validity 13,14,19,42,43,67,202,203
------------------------------------------------.......... -------
268 Subject Index
variation 10, 126, 127,234
verification 16,140,141,142,147
verisimilitude 42
vertical context systems 138
voice 93,198,199,201,204,211,213,226 (see
also dialo gisml dialo gue)
work (of art) 16,45,47,48,62,89,93, 102,
118,193,
194,201,213 (see also text)
world
- fictional 15,35,68,104,107,108,110,114,
117,118,142,143,146,147,157,158
- possible 65
RESEARCH IN TEXT THEORY
UNTERSUCHUNGEN ZUR TEXTTHEORIE
Discourse and Communication
New Approaches to the Analysis of Mass Media
Discourse and Communication
Edited by Teun A. van Dk
Large-octavo. vm, 367 pages. 1985. Bound DM 160,-
ISBN 3 11 0103192 (Volume 10)
Literary Discourse
Aspects of Cognitive and Social Psychological
Approaches
Edited by LdszlO Haldsz
Large-octavo. VI, 242 pages, 12 tables, 6 figures.
1987. DM 112,- ISBN 3 11 010685 X (Vo)ume 11)
Connexity and Coherence
Analysis of Text and Discourse
Edited by W. Heydrich, F. Neubauer, J.S. Petji, E. Szer
Large-octavo. XII, 404 pages. 28 illustrations, 5 tab)es.
1989. Bound DM 198,- ISBN 311 0111020 (Vo)ume 12)
Prioca IlI'C subjcct 10 change