Hello, everyone good morning and welcome to
yet another session of the NPTEL course Postmodernism
and Literature. Today's lecture is title Intertextuality,
Kristeva and the study of Postmodern Text.
And at the outside of the lecture let me draw
your attention to this in which where we can
see a movie poster referring to a 16 century
painting by Michelangelo. The movie poster
released in 2003 of the movie Bruce Almighty.
We can find that is a very direct allusion
to a painting by Michelangelo has creation
of Adam with which was painted around 1511,
if we can talk about two two kinds of relationships:
the first one operates at the horizontal level
between the reader and the author.
And, this is also a very conventional way
of understanding the reading of text, which
we have also noted that has been completely
dismantle kesavan hump completely rejected
by a number of postmodern theories beginning
from barthe. And the second kind talks about
a vertical relationship, which is between
text and text they could be a single text
referring to just another text. I could also
be one take suffering to multiple kinds of
text from different sites and intertextuality
is this vertical relationship between text
and text which also contributes to a meaning
making process which also contributes to the
reading a process which conventionally involved,
only the reader and the text or the reader
and the author and it is in this context;
that we need to locate all the discussions
related to intertextuality in this lecture.
And again a connecting this aspect with Barthes
essay the death of the author we are we are
also reminded that no text x axis in a bubble;
and then literature and all other kinds of
text also exist in the network relation a
relationship of a network with each other
and there is a way in which every text also
alludes to refers to all and draws from another
text which sometimes could be a deliberate
effort from the author and sometimes it could
also be an accidental coincidence that the
reader begins to to identified by way of his
or her own experience or his or her own familiarity
with particular kinds of text in contacts
and if you recall the discussions on death
of the author in the is one of the earlier
sessions, but noted particularly that a text
unity lies not in its origin, but in its destination
hey he was also drawing her attention to the
absence of originality.
That there are no original text that everything
that which is which we could identify within
a text is already been written or it already
has a relationship with other existing text
and context and this is a very postmodern
thing to begin with that we I have already
noticed and intertextuality.
Also in that sense it is a very postmodern
phenomenon though there are works that pre
date the postmodern movement. Though there
are number of theorist who have also identified,
the aspect of post the aspect intertextuality
in text, which are not always a readily seen
as ah postmodern it is important to notice
that the the elements that intertextuality
foregrounds it maintains close ah continuities
with the idea of the postmodern.
The primary focus of this lecture is on understanding
how intertextuality has been theorized particularly
by Julia Kristeva; who also coined the term
in the 1960s though there has been allusions
to this aspect this a phenomenon a literary
text. Nobody, has a really use the term intertextuality
it is such an extent as Kristeva had done
from the 1960s onwards and Kristeva had also
drawn inspiration from the ideas ah of a bakhtin
and also from saussures posting of the systematic
features of language. And here we also find
that like many other poststructuralism theorist
her work also coincides with the transition
from structuralism to post structuralism.
So, like Barthe we can locate Kristeva also
at city seminal point where transition could
be noted from one movement to the other. And
this movement from structuralism to post structuralism,
as we have noted is also transition towards
postmodernism and to quota Kristeva who was
cited by toril moi intertextuality is a mosaic
of quotations any text is the absorption and
transformation of another.
The notion of intertextuality replaces that
of inter subjectivity and poetic language
is at least double. And when we talk about
intertextuality as a literary phenomenon as
something that, we can see in different texts
and contexts. There are also particular intellectual
figures that would help us identify the presence
of intertextuality intex are it could be allusions
quotations plagiarism which is a really not
seen as a flow, but kind of a, but a certain
kind of use of intertextuality, translation,
pastiche and parody which are also essential
features of post modern writing.
So, who is Julia Kristeva she is a Bulgarian
theorist and a key proponent of French feminism
born in 1941 and her a status in the in in
the of a French feminism is the longs along
with Simone de Beauvoir, Helene Cixous, Luce
Iragaray. She is also or she is also been
seen is very controversial particularly forehead
denunciation of identity politics which is
also seen as ah as a key feature of all kinds
of feminist or thoughts and ideology.
Ah, but Kristeva on the other hand also believed
in maintain; that it is harmful to posit collective
identity above individual identity. She it
also drawn a lot of critical flag on the count
of that and interestingly she is also associated
with the Tel Quel group in Paris.
Tel Quel was an avant-garde French literary
magazine; which run its course from 1960 to
1982 and a number of key theories of a French
structuralism and also postmodernism had been
associated with the; this magazine Tel Quel
such as Barthe Foucault Deriida .
And Gerard Genette and the term Tel Quel means
as such or unchanged. So, this she does a
play a very key and prominent role in both
in French feminism and also in French post
structuralism.
And Kristevas work I could be identified in
two different ways: though she is written
prolifically and how works could be seen as
a foundational aspect of French feminism itself.
There are the two ways in which we can alocate
how work. Firstly, as an inflection of psychoanalytic
theory into feminism and. Secondly, as ah
as a set of works which can identify the revolutionary
potential of women writers in society.
And her significant works in this regard ah
the revolution in poetic language published
in 1974 and design in language published in
1980. And it was particularly in the essays
that she published in the late 1960s such
as the bounded text and word dialogue and
novel that she spoke extensively and also
in a move focused way about intertextuality.
And like many other friends oppose structuralist
she also had derived lot of inspiration from
socios linguistics tem and we can find in
it her work she seeks to connect the linguistic
with the ideological thus eventually is also
becomes a political reading.
She draws extensively on Bakhtin and Medvedev
and it is in this context has we have muted
we locate Kristeva's departure from structuralism
and most of his most of her earlier works
just like Barthes could be seen as more structurist
in nature the idea of intertextualiyt had
already been engaged with by many other theories
been including. Bakhtin and it also refer
to the intersection of a given textual arrangement
with a broader set of exterior texts or the
text of society and history, but the Kristeva,
who popularized the notion of intertexttuality;
particularly focuses on the relationship between
text with other texts and the term intertexts
inter text.
And the term intertextuality also has a latin
origin latin etymology the term intertexto
meaning to intermingle while weaving. Having
said that Kristeva draws extensively from
Bakhtin into popularized into formulate the
aspect of intertextuality. It is important
to understand; what Mikhail Bakhtin who is
a rational theories in scholar who also left
from 1895 to 1975 how he contributed to the
idea of the novel and how he engaged with
the aspect of intertextuality. Interestingly
the terms does not appear in any of his writings
his never used the term intertextuality to
talk about the various aspects of novel, but;
however, when he survey his reading its ah
rather evident that he was fond of this concept
he was a fond of identifying aspects of intertextuality
and that he was also one of the earliest earliest
a theories to talk about novel in a more superior
sense.
In the sense it according to bakhtin the novel
noble also referred to the discourse of history
of literary texts and of social conditions
like; a poverty of a social conditions like
a poverty and also of philosophy and theology.
in that sense he also a presents the novel
in contrast with various other monophonic
genres it is epic and poem and Bakhtin also
believe to that the novel embodies other voices
that it gives a space to the other or to the
different and it encourages.
The dialogue between discourses. So, it was
this notion of seeing the novel as a space
which promotes other voices and encourages
are different kinds of discourses across text
and across sites and across cultures that
influenced Kristeva and others.
And it was in this context that Bakhtin also
coined the term Heteroglossia, because he
argued that even in the most realist of text
such as that of Dickens or of Balzac's in
which are traditionally and apparently the
narrator supposedly controls the lives of
the characters it is possible to see that
the author uses term suggest I think or as
I suppose when he is un sure of a I certain
moral stance as which have been ah foregrounded
in the novel.
And the Bukhtin argues that the narrator on
the author is first used the term such as
I think or I suppose because he is not rigidly
and strictly in control of the characters
and of the events and instance in the novel
as we perceive it to be because a male moral
stance with most of the realist novels foreground
or they propagate its also undermine many
other voices and opinions that circulate through
the text.
So, in order to talk about this aspect bakhtin
used the term Heteroglossia which also had
become extremely popular in the transition
phase with ah in the transition phase from
structuralism and post structuralism and to
quote Bakhtin I hear voices and everything
and dialogic relations among them and this
could be termed as intertextuality which Kristiava
extensively theorized and popularized and
Kristiva was not the only one to talk about
intertextuality in the contemporary.
There are different types of intertextual
relationships could be identified and the
most important and three types of intertextual
relationships which could be identified in
ah text. In context the first one is obligatory,
the second one is optional and the third one
accidental and most of these terms are rather
self explanatory as well and it is also important
to remind ah and it is also important to highlight
that intertextuality does not always require
deliberate kind of highlighting or even ah
referencing or punctuation and its not to
site the intertextual reference and it is
not seen as , but it seen as a play of intertextuality
and also the the use of intertextuality is
not always intentional and sometimes it could
be and in advert and use of a certain reference
from the past or even from the contemporary
across disciplines in the post genres.
The first kind in the first kind of intertextual
relationships the obligatory one it could
be seen as the more deliberate approach by
the author. And in this type there is also
requirement that the reader should also be
ideally familiar with the text that is being
a in order to understand one particular text
the something important examples would be
Tom Stoppards play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern
are dead Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are
two main a characters from Shakespeares a
play hamlet.
And unless point understands are the contacts
and the plot structure of hamlet it could
be impossible to appreciate Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern are dead in the deliberate use
of a intertextuality. And it also requires
that the author the readers are also familiar
with this context and familiar with this allusion
and its yet another interesting fact that
shakespeares a hamlet also includes a lot
of intertextual references from the legend
of hamlet because it was also inspired from
ah from the legend of hamlet.
And. So, there is more intertextuality at
work over here and this sort of an identification
of one text being intertextual of the other
and that takes being intertextual of some
other text it is a not. So, uncommon phenomenon
that one could notice. Similarly from the
modernist period we can also talk about Joyces
Ulysses which has an intertextual relation
with homers odyssey.
And also from the contemporary there is ah
lot of fan fiction could also be identified
as an obligatory or a deliberate kind of intertextual
deliberate kind of use of intertextuality
or 50 shades of grey was originally written
as a fan fiction for the twilight series.
When we talk about the optional or the latent
display of intertextuality the ah one of the
examples that would come to a mind is the
harry potter series which has a lot of a references
direct and indirect from the lord of the rings,
but this is a could be seen is more like an
optional kind of display of intertextuality.
Because, it is not imperative and the part
of the read it to understand the law to to
be familiar with the lot of the lot of the
rings trilogy in order to appreciate harry
potter series and in the accidental kind of
intertextuality; the reader connects a text
with another text cultural practice or experience
So, it could be very in in the author may
or may not be aware of these experiences that
the author that the reader has it a very personal
level it is also possible for intertextuality
to operate across genres and across disciplines
and even across edges one of the examples
that we could think about is the way in which
Nietzsche the existence of philosopher how
he was influenced by Richard Wagners early
operas. So, here we find even a connection
between philosophy and music operating at
the level of intertextuality there are also
two ways in which one could approach intertextuality
there is a structuralist approach and also
post structuralist approach.
In this lecture we shall be focusing and highlight
in the post structuralist approach as a postmodern
phenomenon, but it is also important to get
a sense of how the structuralist approach
differs. Radically, from the post structurilist
approach because though all this host and
most of our discussions we also locate postmodernism
as an extension of post structuralism and
how it departs from the structuralist modes
of thinking and structuralist frameworks.
One of the key proponents of structuralist
a theory is a Gerard Genette was born in 1930
he is his his more popular for his work on
narratology and was interest in the forms
of narrative that occupy the awkward undefinable
places in the main narrative and this could
also be seen in connection with his work on
intertextuality. According to intertextuality
is a system of relationships that link text
to other text or parts of the same text.
What makes his approach to intertextuality
different is that he adopted a structuralist
approach to intertextuality. So, in this approach
the critic believes that the criticism has
the ability to locate and describe, a text
significance in other words the significance
of a text can be fully explained by describing
the basic units that form the text and their
relation to other text. So, structuralism
focuses on how this analysis; how this identification
of intertextuality essence and the meaning
freaking process and how it also takes the
leader and takes the the critic to a journey
which takes us to the final destination the
final meaning.
But, in the post structuralist approach that
is no such thing as the final meaning in.
In fact, the celebration of unfinalizability
of meaning in the post structuralist approach
we begin to identify and locate the intertextual
aspects we locate the text significance in
the in the way in which eludes to it refers
to other text, but that does not necessarily
a lead to a final meaning it also it is only
leads us to and unfinalizability of meaning
because one text could lead to the other.
And that text could be a reference to another
text or other cultural context or even a personal
experience and this there could do this no
particular formula in which one one in which
one could do this and there is no finality
to this either.
So, in the post structuralist approach there
is a rejection of a particular kind of intertextuality,
but the structuralist use intertextuality
in order to make a complete a sense or unified
sense of the work which they also think is
a doable and then approachable thing, then
it also spoke about 5 types of transtextuality
that was a term that he used to talk about
this aspect such as paratexts which is also
a 1977 work by ah and intertextuality, architextuality,
metatextuality and hypertextuality.
And in intertextuality he refers to the allusions
the references to other works the echoes the
quotes and citations and even plagiarised
sections of a work in order to lead us to
the final meaning of a text or even the core
of a text. So, coming back to our discussion
of intertextuality as oppose structuralist
of phenomenon how do we defined text.
A text is a permutation of text and intertextuality
and of how in the space of a given text several
utterances taken from the other texts intersect
and neutralize one another.
So, we the challenging definitions about text
is something that could be seen as a common
feature across postmodern thinkers across
post modern writings and this discussion is
not different from that it also important
to briefly 12 upon Kristevas work again Kristeva
who popularized the notion of literary texts
as exercise the intertextuality.
Ah she first and foremost the emphasize the
connections between text and also sog text
not as a closed systems what is dynamic processes
open to the world. And in this notion we also
identify a close a connection with that of
a Barthes that of the author and also about
the various things that who was spoke about
in his what is an author. So, as K Kristeva
puts it how does a text work as a dynamic
process?
So, in when we apply intertextuality when
we make use of intertextuality to understand
a text we are searching for the signifying
phenomenon for the crisis or the unsettling
process of meaning and subject, then for the
coherence or identity of either one or a multiplicity
of structures. So, we we need to focus on
how Kristeva approach the idea of the subject
can and how her approach and when to change
during the transition from a structure listen
towards post structuralism. Kristeva provides
an entirely new approach to the subject and
idea of subjectivity. She was also influenced
by Derrida and in this aspect and you also
find that she rejects the humanist idea of
engaging with the subject and also subjectivity.
The humanist idea particularly liberal humanism
a believed in seeing a text seeing a subject
as a unified, coherent, object and we find
question of moving away from this aspect using
her feminist frameworks alongside the psychoanalytical
ah framework of looking at objects looking
as at subject positions and looking at a text
and she there by argues that the subject need
not be a unified coherent side the subject
could also be fragmented, contradictory, indefinable
and also multiplied and undefined and and
also multiplied in unfinalizable.
In that since she is focusing on the subject
as the; decentered 
an eccentric site and this is very a important
to bring to the four the connections between
text and not to close of a text to leave the
text open for multiplying interpretations
and also the various other possibilities that
the text generates including intertextuality.
So, when Kristeva rebels against the liberal
humanist approach of locating the subject
or locating the coherence and the unitary
within a text. What she also does us to foreground?
The unconscious the radically other and the
incoherent within a text or within a context
or even a range of texts; and here by focusing
on the subject as a and unstable shifting
and a conflict ridden site she is also trying
to suggest that the the one could never print
out of work to its essence.
There is no way in which one could close the
reading by locating the core or identifying
the essence of the text and declaring the
final meaning. So, this is how the this is
how intertexuality works in the post structuralist
sense by moving away from all kinds of an
all kinds of final meaning by also taking
liberating. The subject away from this restricting
away from this ah rigid form of ah understanding
with locate the subject is a coherent as a
unified site and this is also significantly;
I reiterate move away from all kinds of liberal
humanist ah critical practices.
So in that sense how we began to see the connections
between intertexuality and postmodernism.
In a very typical way the clear of intertexuality
in the postmodern is argues and maintains
and foregrounds at no text is an island because
every text is a frame by other text and a
constructed more by their intertextuality
than by their authors. Here, we also a reminded
to the absence of originality and also the
fake claims to originality the Barthe and
Foucaults spoke about when the way deconstructing
the idea of the text and in the idea of the
author. One could think about the number of
examples in this context and there are even
works which allude to other works even in
the titles is William Faulkners novel Go Down,
Moses; on the sound and the fury.
And also John Steinbeck's a novel East of
Eden-which is based on the biblical story
of Cain and Abel and you know also. Extensive
works which is Umberto E cos 1980 novel name
of the rose which explores the explicit connection
between critical theory and fiction and eco
was also one such postmodern write up who
love to experiment with different kinds of
critical theory and also use it rather deliberately
and actively within his work of within his
works of friction.
Evolves the taken and look it how he engaged
to with the idea of hyper reality in the form
of a travelogue. And ah Umberto eco particularly
in his work particularly in his frictional
works he defined postmodernism by its intertexuality
and knowingness and by its relations to past.
And and in the way in which eco engages with
a fast also is very postmodern its in not
in a very nostalgic way it is not in a in
in the way that historical fiction traditionally
had engaged with past.
But postmodernism revisits the past with iron
and Raymond Seddon also extensively talks
about how ecomax use of a intertextuality
to engage with the ah various aspects of knowing
which is particularly more challenging and
more complex within the postmodern framework.
We other significant example as on Borge'
has ah short story "The library of Babel"
in which he concedes of a universe in the
form of a vast library.
There have been many graphic descriptions
of this idea of conceiving university library
and also search and contemporary thinkers
have even identified this with that of Google.
Which is in fact, also universe conceived
in the form of a vast digital library or vast
virtual library.
And to quote Borges words which is everything
which which is present in the short story
the certitude that everything has been written
negates us or turns the center phantoms. So,
third absence of originality also takes away
the aspects of reality and turns, knows it
is a text and the author, but also the readers
and to phantoms just illusions. So, this is
also a celebration of the absence of the ultimate
meaning which is again at the crux of a postmodernism.
And the other example would be Nabokovs Lolita
which was which was also a very controversial
text as you would know, but this text was
you can also be seeing as postmodern this
playing various facets of intertextuality,
because it engages with different genres within
this a structure of novel at engages will
detective fiction memoir romance satire a
fairy tale realism the tragedy and even psychological
case studies within the an atom structure
and there are also a number of references
to the other writer such as Edgar Allan Poe,
James Joyce, Laurence Sterne, Lord Byron,
and T S Eliot at some point in this course.
We should be again coming back to these text
to talk about the various aspects of postmodernism.
And another contemporary work published in
2001 by Ian McEwan novel title atonement which
is also made into a movie later on. It could
be seen as a self aware novel in which we
we can find a number of intertextual references
to text from across cultures in across a literary
edges such as Gray's Anatomy, Woolf's Virginia
Woolf's the Waves, Thomas Hardy's Jude the
Obscure, Henry James' The Golden Bowl, ah
Jane Austens Northanger Abbey, Richardson's
Clarissa, Nabokovs Lolita, Rosamond Lehmann's
Dusty Answer, at even Shakespeare's the tempest
Macbeth, Hamlet.
And 12th ah 12 night there there also be in
controversies about these many and allusions
that Ian McEwan did and some also had a rising
from certain other historical memo us. Nevertheless
this is a supreme example of how intertextuality
is it worked in the postmodern age in particular
works or ranging from literature and as we
have seen right at the beginning even in movie
posters.
So, as we begin to wind up this lecture let
me also highlight, how postmodernism could
be located at work in the playoff intertextuality?
Quite similar to intertextuality postmodernism
also problematizes the idea of a text having
boundaries. Itertextuality is about addressing
the complexity of the questions that a separate
the inside from the outside in the in in in
with regard to a text or a context or a site
which is even read as a text.
So, there is also confusion about when the
text beginners and where it ends whether it
ends at all, because in many examples that
we have seen that there are these allusions
the references that which all which would
also lead us to other text making the process
of reading and engagement with a network of
ideas a network of text which cannot be located
to a single language a single culture or even
a single age.
So, this reading this network which takes
is across text which takes us across cultures
and even requires an interplay of text with
experience is a text with the other other
kinds of contentions its in this aspect that
we find post modernism at work and this is
also make a intertextuality key feature in
understanding postmodernism a literature and
various other culture and literary artifacts.
So, having said that; we also need to be alert
the various criticisms which have been ah
fore grounded against postmodernism the ubiquiti
of the term any have a felt that it is cloud
down related terms and even particular ones
us and a linda hutcheon particularly had a
drawn attention to the excessive use of intertextuality
which had completely reject at the idea of
the author ah.
But I wouldn't know whether this is a good
thing or a bad thing because postmodernism
is also about rejecting the conventional ideas
about the author and moving that an and taking
the text away from what the author initially
had intended it to me. So, we can also begin
to loot as a lot of into dialogue across these
various ah concepts and phenomena that we
have been discussing in the context of postmodernism
and encouraging you to stay tuned and stay
alert to these various interconnections and
various networks when the postmodern structure
we also wind of this lecture.
Thank you for listening and I look forward
to seeing you in the next session.
