Intertextuality and Relevance Theory
in t h e I n t e r d i s c i p l i n a r y A p p r o a c h
to S u r r e a l i s t L i t e r a t u r e a n d P a i n t i n g
A Case-Study: Nikos Engonopoulos' "Bolivar"
Elena
Koutrianou*
F o r some few comparatists (who have been called "traditionalists"), 1
intertextuality substitutes for the study of sources and influences,
whereas certain structuralists (Laurent Jenny and Gérard Genette, among
them) complement or replace it with other terms they devise in order to
systematize textual criticism, which normally does not differ essentially
from traditional close reading. Other theories (such as those by Michael
Riffaterre and Harold Bloom) constitute detailed but closed systems,
which usually compete with Julia Kristeva's analyses. It is for this reason
that I do not deal with them here.
Intertextuality "is a difficult concept to use because of the vast and
undefined discursive space it designates", according to Jonathan Culler,
who has expressed his doubts about the applicability of Kristeva's ideas
in literary studies. 2 In my view, her definition of intertextuality provides
a most enlightening theoretical account about the intersection of textual
surfaces (in the broader sense) ; however, I am inclined to think, it is a
serious drawback that it does not include any systematic examination of
the relationship that is established between text and writer, and is
* Ph. D. Oxford University, M.A. London University, B.A. Athens University. E-mail:
[email protected]. She is the editor of the recently published volume: Η συγκριτική
γραμματολογία
στην
Ελλάδα:
Σύγχρονες
τάσεις
[Comparative Literature in Greece:
Contemporary Trends], Ekdoseis Mesogeios & Ellinika Grammata, Athens 2005.
This paper is a short version of a longer essay on Greek Surrealism.
1. See HEINRICH F. PLETT, " I n t e r t e x t u a l i t i e s " , in Intertextuality,
e d . HEINRICH F.
PLETT, WALTER DE GRUYTER, B e r l i n 1991, p . 4.
2. See JONATHAN CULLER, "Presupposition a n d Intertextuality ", in The Pursuit of
Signs, Routledge, London 1992, p. 109.
145
ELENA KOUTRIANOU
promoted between text and reader. My aim here is to explore how
intertextuality can be studied in the interdisciplinary approach to
surrealist literature and painting, as a function of the reading process
and a property of the text, which pertains to ostensive communication.
Firstly, I will briefly present Kristeva's ideas and how they relate to and
are distinguished from Mikhail Bakhtins dialogical principle. Then, I will
discuss an example, by drawing on relevance theory, which, I believe, can
contribute considerably to the understanding of the intertextual function,
as it evolves in the intentional connection between the arts fabricated by
the surrealists. The example I have selected from (poet and painter) Nikos
Engonopoulos' surrealist poetry develops intertextual relations with both
surrealist writing and painting. Since it belongs to Greek literature,
"Bolivar" (1944) is indeed a "Greek poem", as suggested (cynically, in my
view) in the (sub-)title. 3 But it is also a surrealist poem, in which, apart
from the European and Latin-american historical, cultural and literary pretexts, pointed out by the poet in the notes accompanying the poem, Louis
Aragon s ideas about the mythifying activity of modern man (as presented
in his book Le Paysan de Paris), the technique of frottage, developed by
Max Ernst, and the paranoïco-critical method, devised by Salvador Dal£,
are also intertextually intertwined. The recovery of logical and pragmatic
presuppositions interweaved exposes the "frenzied expression of the
poem's hellenolatry " (also pointed out in the poet's notes) as a parody of
precisely this misleading acclaim of hellenolatry.
Kristevas
' theory
When Kristeva coined the term intertextuality in her 1966 essay on
Bakhtin ("Le Mot, le dialogue et le roman") for Roland Barthes'
seminar, she neither gave the notion a strictly literary frame nor
explained it with a view to using it in literary studies. In her actual
formulation in this text (which is included in Σημειωτική, Recherches
pour une sémanalyse), she maintains that:
what allows a dynamic dimension to structuralism is [Bakhtins] con3. See NIKOS ENGONOPOULOS, «Μπολιβάρ.Ένα ελληνικό ποίημα» [Bolivar. A Greek
poem], in Ποιήματα, vol. 2, Ikaros, Athens 1993, p. 7-33.
146
INTERTEXTUALITY AND RELEVANCE THEORY IN SURREALIST LITERATURE AND PAINTING
ception of the "literary word" as an intersection of textual surfaces rather
than a point (a fixed meaning), as a dialogue among several writings:
that of the writer, the addressee (or the character) and the contemporary
or earlier cultural context. 4
She c o n s i d e r s t h e i n t e r s e c t i o n of t e x t u a l surfaces as a n a b s o r p t i o n
a n d t r a n s f o r m a t i o n of t e x t s :
each word (text) is an intersection of words (texts) where at least one
other word (text) can be read; [...] any text is constructed as a mosaic of
quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another. The
notion of intertextuality
replaces that of intersubjectivity, and poetic
language is read as at least double.
Bakhtin's theory lies at t h e core of Kristeva's
conception of inter-
textuality. According to the Russian theorist, the literary text is a representation of discourses. A s with everyday communication, every word
"is directly, blatantly, oriented t o w a r d a future answer-word: it provokes
an answer, anticipates it a n d s t r u c t u r e s itself in t h e a n s w e r ' s direction". 6
The intersection of discourses is conceived of a s a struggle
between
centripetal a n d centrifugal forces, that is, b e t w e e n t h e norm (the dominant
literary system or t h e canon), a n d the parodying a n d carnivalesque, t r a n s formative tendencies of other discourses. This dialogue is conducted on a
synchronic
level, in t h e battlefield
where
the norm
a n d its trans-
7
formation(s) meet a n d intersect ceaselessly. For Bakhtin, this dialogue is
possible in the novel, which can b e either a poetic or a prose text. Kristeva,
on h e r part, claims that i n t e r t e x t u a l i t y develops in every text.
In The Revolution
poétique,
of Poetic
Language
(La Revolution
du
langage
1974), she e m p h a s i z e s on t h e composite p a r t s of t h e word inter-
textuality, in order to stress t h e difference of this notion from the study of
4. See JULIA KRISTEVA, The Kristeva Reader, ed. Toril Moi, Basil Blackwell, Oxford
1990, p. 36 (her emphasis).
5. Ibid., p. 37.
6. See M. M. BAKHTIN, The Dialogic Imagination, ed. MICHAEL HOLQUIST, trans.
CARYL EMERSON and MICHAEL HOLQUIST, University of Texas Press, Austin 1990, p. 280.
7. See MIKHAIL BAKHTIN, Ζητήματα της ποιητικής του Ντοστογιέφσκι
[Problems of
Dostoevsky's Poetics] ed. VANGELIS CHANTZIVASILIOU, trans. ALEXANDRA IOANNIDOU,
Polis, Athens 2000, ch. 1-3.
147
ELENA KOUTRIANOU
sources. I n t e r t e x t u a l i t y
is a transposition,
complements t h e function
a distinct
process
which
of t h e u n c o n s c i o u s processes identified by
F r e u d with condensation a n d displacement, a n d of the b i n a r y opposition
b e t w e e n t h e metaphoric a n d métonymie poles, p r o p o u n d e d b y R o m a n
Jakobson (in his essay "Two Aspects of L a n g u a g e a n d Two T y p e s of
Aphasie D i s t u r b a n c e s " , 1956). 8 Therefore, i n t e r t e x t u a l i t y c a n b e defined
as a p a s s a g e from o n e semiotic s y s t e m t o another, a process
which
i n t e r c h a n g e s a n d p e r m u t â t e s t h e s e systems. 9
Kristeva does not simply formulate a theory of the subject a n d of
language. 1 0 More than that, she "qualifies t h e status of the subject as a
function
of the deconstructive intertextuality
textuality is a negation or négativité
of all discourse". 11 Inter-
because it destroys texts a n d creates
new texts. It is a semiotic practice which proves that meaning (signification)
is not created b y t h e author (a genius or transcendental being). Intertextuality, i.e., the social, cultural a n d historical (con)text produces this
meaning. In the ' B o u n d e d Text', which is also included in Σημειωτική, the
text is defined a s a productive process, which is subjected to cultural
discourse. Firstly, it develops a destructive-constructive relationship with
l a n g u a g e a n d therefore:
can be better approached through logical categories rather than linguistic
ones; and secondpy], [...] it is a permutation of texts, an intertextuality: in
the space of a given text, several utterances, taken from other texts, intersect
and neutralise one another. 1 2
8. See ROMAN JAKOBSON, "The Metaphoric and Metonymie Poles", in Modern
Criticism and Theory; A Reader, ed. DAVID LODGE, Longman, London and N.Y. 1992,
p. 57-61.
9. See JULIA KRISTEVA, La Revolution du langage poétique; L'avant-garde à la fin
du XIXe siècle: Lautréamont et Mallarmé, Seuil, Paris 1985, p. 59-60.
10. See JUDITH STILL and MICHAEL WORTON, 'Introduction', in
Intertextuality;
Theories and Practices, ed. MICHAEL WORTON and JUDITH STILL, Manchester
University Press: Manchester and N.Y. 1993, p. 17.
11. See THAÏS MORGAN, "IS there an Intertext in this Text?: Literary and
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Intertextuality ", in American journal to Semiotics
3.4 (1985), p. 22.
12. See JULIA KRISTEVA, Σημειωτική, Recherches pour une sémanalyse. Seuil, Paris
148
INTERTEXTUALITY AND RELEVANCE THEORY IN THE APPROACH TO SURREALIST LITERATURE AND PAINTING
A s H a n s P e t e r M a i p o i n t s o u t t h e t e x t is u n d e r s t o o d a s :
a basic ideological w e a p o n which c a n c o n t r i b u t e directly to a revolutionary
c h a n g e in society. This " t e x t " is no longer t h e object w i t h which t e x t u a l
criticism u s e d to deal. Actually, it is n o object a t all; it is, as a w a y of
w r i t i n g ( é c r i t u r e ) , a productive (and subversive) process. 1 3
I n h i s e s s a y " F r o m W o r k t o T e x t " (1971), B a r t h e s r e j e c t s t h e w o r k , a
f r a g m e n t of s u b s t a n c e , w h i c h i s c a u g h t u p i n a p r o c e s s of f i l i a t i o n , u n l i k e
the plural Text, which is:
w o v e n e n t i r e l y w i t h citations, references, e c h o e s , c u l t u r a l l a n g u a g e s , [...]
a n t e c e d e n t or contemporary, w h i c h c u t a c r o s s it a n d t h r o u g h a n d t h r o u g h
in a v a s t stereophony. 1 4
A c c o r d i n g t o B a r t h e s , it i s n e c e s s a r y t o m a k e a d i s t i n c t i o n b e t w e e n
the i n t e r t e x t u a l e l e m e n t or quality a n d t h e origins b e h i n d a text:
T h e intertextual in which every text is held, it itself being t h e t e x t - b e t w e e n
of another text, is not to b e confused w i t h some origin of t h e text: to t r y to
find t h e 'sources', t h e 'influences' of a work, is to fall in w i t h t h e myth of filiation; t h e citations which go to m a k e u p a text a r e a n o n y m o u s , untraceable,
a n d y e t already read: they a r e quotations without inverted commas. 1 5
T h u s , p a r a p h r a s i n g J a c q u e s D e r r i d a ("Il n ' y a r i e n h o r s d u t e x t e " ) ,
Charles Grivel claims that " i l n'est d e t e x t e q u e d'intertexte",16
since
e v e r y t e x t i s c o n n e c t e d t o a u n i v e r s e of t e x t s , b e i n g a t t h e s a m e t i m e a n
a n t e c e d e n t a n d a p r e d e c e s s o r of o t h e r t e x t s .
1978, p. 52. Also in JULIA KRISTEVA, Desire
Literature
and
Art,
in Language;
A semiotic
Approach
to
e d . LEON S. ROUDIEZ, t r a n s . THOMAS GORA, ALICE JARDINE a n d
LEON S. ROUDIEZ, Blackwell, London 1992, p . 36.
13. See HANS PETER M A I , "Bypassing Intertextuality: Hermeneutics, Textual
Practice, H y p e r t e x t " , in Intertextuality,
e d . HEINRICH F. PLETT, WALTER DE GRUYTER,
Berlin 1991, p. 37.
14. See ROLAND BARTHES, Image
Music
Text,
t r a n s . STEPHEN HEATH, Fontana
Press, London 1977, p. 160.
15. Ibid.
16. See CHARLES GRIVEL, " T h è s e s
Dialogizität,
préparatoires
s u r les i n t e r t e x t e s " , in
e d . RENATE LACHMANN, Fink, Munich 1982, p . 237-248.
149
ELENA
Relevance
KOUTRIANOU
Theory and Intertextuality
; The case of 'Bolivar '
Yet, how are we supposed to study the (inter)text as a factor and at the
same time the field of a function that exceeds it? Kristeva did not take
into consideration the communicative dimension of intertextuality.
However, in literary movements such as Surrealism, in which the
alternation and permutation of literary and extraliterary surfaces is
noticed, it is necessary to study with equal emphasis all of the communicative channels used. Given that intertextuality is a property of
both literature and communication, then its study could be based on the
intertextual disposition of the text and, at the same time, on the
interaction between text and reader.
According to Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson, in every act of human
communication, the sender and the receiver share a certain degree of
mutuality. This means that they have to select a mutual cognitive
environment, which they must share in order for any assumption to
become mutually manifest. The principle of relevance foresees that
"Every act of ostensive communication communicates the presumption
of its own relevance". 17 The sender is implicit about what he assumes the
receiver can easily understand and makes explicitly manifest what he
believes he cannot understand otherwise.
In the example I have chosen to present here, Engonopoulos is not
explicit about what he has to say; he provides only implicit manifestations
of his intention. As Sperber and Wilson explain, in this way:
one can convey a much wider range of information [including information
about his attitude, his intentions, etc.] than can be conveyed by producing
direct evidence for the basic information itself.18
Engonopoulos employs weak implicatures, that is assumptions which
are implicitly communicated; weak implicatures demand the greater
participation of the reader in the construction of the text-world and, thus,
they lead to contextual effects which the two theorists call poetic effects.19
17.
See
Cognition,
DAN SPERBER
and
DEIRDRE
WILSON,
Blackwell, Oxford 1993, p . 158.
18. Ibid., p . 64.
19. Ibid., p . 182, 217-24.
150
Relevance;
Communication
and
INTERTEXTUALITY AND RELEVANCE THEORY IN SURREALIST LITERATURE AND PAINTING
Contextual effects are changes in the context, which contextualisation
brings about, when it adds new information to the context, by cancelling
certain assumptions, changing their validity, and so on.
20
The poem builds on irony and a variety of relevant tropes, such as
hyperbole and adynaton. The most challenging implication is the inherent
juxtaposition between the strange foreign name in the title (Bolivar) and
the indication in the subtitle that this is " a Greek poem". The semantic clash
is repeated by the comment about the enumeration of the countries of Latin
and Central America, which "is used here as a covering for the frenzied
expression of the poem's hellenolatry ". The word "frenzied" ("έξαλλη")
implies a state which is incompatible with the possibility or the ability to use
a covering; moreover, the poet's complaint in the poem itself that no-one can
understand what he says further confirms his ironic attitude.
The mottoes also provide weak implicatures. The vision of Theseus,
described in the first motto, runs through the poem, since Bolivar is
revealed after the poet has called and, subsequently, written his name on
the rocks of the mountains of the areas and countries that he invokes —just
like Cimon discovered the bones of Theseus on island Skyros, by watching
an eagle that was scratching the rocky earth with his claws. The act of
poetic writing is connected to the light of the sun and, metonymically, to
the life given to Bolivar. From the second motto one may infer that the
representative characteristics of Bolivar
are kindness and
bravery.
However, Bolivar's action in the poem is not what could be characterized
national or even heroic. For instance, at the time of the battle, General
Bolivar is taken over by his own narcissistic ideas, while holding in his
arm "Μια φοβερή ξυλάρα", a creature of a stick (to paraphrase the
utterance, which is difficult to translate), that is, a weapon that is rather
inappropriate for the seriousness of the situation.
Bolivar's name is stressed on the last syllable; this French pronuncia­
tion foregrounds the phonological similarities between the name and the
French word for boulevard, as well as the popular comic theatre which
was created in Parisian streets, 2 1 and also for battlements. This last one is
20. Ibid., p. 117.
21. In h e r r e a d i n g of 'Bolivar', in which she draws on Engonopoulos' essay on
151
ELENA
KOUTRIANOU
an implicit reference to the Albanian War, which gave occasion to the
writing of the poem. Therefore, Bolivar's name brings together the epic or
dramatic and the comic elements. It is also reminiscent of Bolivar St.,
mentioned several times by Aragon, in Le Paysan de Paris. Especially his
reference to the corner of Bolivar and Botsaris Streets, a name which is
reminiscent of the hero of the Greek Independence Revolution Markos
Botsaris, intersects intertextually with Engonopoulos' reference to
Bolivar and Odysseus Androutsos (another hero of the Greek Revolution).
The relevant passage appears in the third chapter of Aragon s book,
entitled "Le Sentiment de la nature aux Buttes-Chaumont". Here, the
French poet claims that modern man is endowed with an immense ability
to produce myths, he needs to do is associate the images he perceives in
the natural and urban environment with the mythifying activity of his
mind. The connection of consciousness (the faculty of perception) with the
unconscious (represented by nature) constitutes a mechanism that
resembles the function of mythical imagination and is based on the
condensation of impressions and their reconstitution:
Therefore, I was walking intoxicated amidst a thousand divine concretions.
I set myself the task to conceive of a mythology in progress.
Le Paysan de Paris was written in 1926. Two years later, in his essay
"Le Surréalisme et la peinture", André Breton defined the basic principle
of Surrealist painting, that is the idea of the interior model (modèle
intérieur).23 Around the same time, Ernst was working on frottage and
Dali (who was immersed in the study of freudian psychoanalysis) was
developing his parano'ico-critical method. Both of these techniques are
based on the idea of the condensation and assimilation of the impressions
that result from the crossing of perception (the object of consciousness)
and the unconscious.
the Karangiozis shadow theatre, ANDIA FRANTZI does not refer to the French
de boulevard
comédie
(see "Μπολιβάρ: ένα ελληνικό θέατρο σκιών. Δύο προτάσεις για μία ανά­
γνωση" (Bolivar: a Greek shadow-puppet theatre. Two propositions for a reading], Ο
Πολίτης 72 [May-July 1986]: p. 44-47).
22. See Louis ARAGON, Le Paysan de Paris, Gallimard, Paris 1990, p. 143.
23. See ANDRÉ BRETON, Le Surréalisme
et la peinture.
15^
Gallimard, Paris 1979, p. 4.
INTERTEXTUALITY AND RELEVANCE THEORY IN SURREALIST LITERATURE AND PAINTING
As far as I know, the elaboration of the above techniques is not
explicitly marked in Engonopoulos' painting. However, they are employed
in his poetry. In "Bolivar", in particular, characteristic is the intersection
of persons and places. To achieve the desired result, the poet exploits
associations by similarity (through the employment of metaphor) or
substitution (building on contiguity in space and time, through metonymy
and synecdoche). The notes at the end of the poem provide information
about the intertextual transposition, whose field the poem is. But why
does Engonopoulos offer this information, since, for instance, it does not
help to identify the surrealist pretexts? I believe that the way intertextual
relations interweave in the poem and the notes is an example par
excellence of the dynamic juxtaposition between the norm and the
carnivalesque element, the transformational tendencies of discourse.
Moreover, it confirms Kristeva's conception of the text as a negativity and,
simultaneously, a productive process. In "Bolivar", intertextuality foregrounds the surrealist ideology and aesthetic, which is governed by
precisely this attitude toward the creative process.
The notes do not offer a detailed account of the contextual environment the poet wishes to share with his reader; they only point to it. It is
then left to the latter to (re)construct the universe of the poem and to
(re)trace its intention, that is, the projection of a cynical view of the
world. I believe that the critics' reluctance to acknowledge this intention
is related, on the one hand, to the fact that they have paid little attention
to the interaction between text and reader and, on the other, to the
failure of the classical account of irony (or of its modern equivalent, that
is, Grice's account) to distinguish authentic irony from mere irrationality,
as pointed out by Sperber and Wilson. 24 As they claim, authentic irony
is echoic and its aim is to ridicule the opinion that is echoed. In literary
texts the echo is often left implicit; in this way, the writer manages to
suggest that he shares with his readers a whole cynical vision of the
world. 25
24. See
DAN SPERBER a n d
DEIRDRE WILSON, Relevance,
25. Ibid., p. 242.
153
op.
cit.,
p. 240-41.
ELENA KOUTRIANOU
Which is the view that is echoed or its echo is left implicit in
"Bolivar"? I think, it is the opinion that "For Great, free, brave, strong
men, / Deserve words that are great, free, brave, strong". This view is
only misleadingly foregrounded, whereas in reality, it is ridiculed as a
patently ludicrous opinion. The poet's cynical vision is built on the
opposition between the classical conception of heroism and its annihila­
tion in modernist literature: instead of the hero who fights for his
country, Bolivar emerges as a personality that possesses all of the
characteristics that project an individualistic
attitude. A series
of
subordinate oppositions develop in the poem: idealism / romanticism vs.
the realism of surreality; bourgeois morality and order vs. individual
freedom; and the narrow conception of Greekness vs. the broader notion
of internationalism (or, to put it in present-day terms, multi-culturalism).
"Bolivar" expresses an ideological position and casts a subversive and
parodying view over social institutions and conceptions. In a genuine
specimen of dialogism, the poem reconstitutes τον καινό δαίμονα, the
modern anti-hero, who in this sense is "handsome like a Greek" (as
Bolivar is hailed in the poem).
154