Anna Wilczewska

Reflections upon Childhood and Adolescence - Intertextual Dialogue in The Cement Garden Anna Wilczewska

Thesis (M. A.) from the year 2011 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: -, University of Gdansk, course: British literature, intertextuality, language: English, abstract: Within the full spectrum of various literary theories offered by modern criticism, the theory of intertextuality deserves a particular attention. This ambitious concept, proposed by Julia Kristeva in the 1960's, shed new light on the understanding and approach to a literary text. Influenced by Bakhtin's theory of dialogism, the French scholar suggested a new model of communication which consists of two axes: horizontal, involving communication between subject and addressee, and vertical which is in an interaction between a text and a context. The two axes, as she claimed, coincide which stresses the fact that "each word (text) is an intersection of word (texts) where at least one other word (text) can be read" (Kristeva in: Allen: 2000, 39). She further drew a conclusion that "any text is constructed like a mosaic of quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another" (Kristeva in: Allen: 2000, 39). Consequently, we can assume that any literary text does not exist on its own, but is rather in various ways linked with other literary texts. Barthes further develops Kristeva's original concept and states that: [...] a text is [...] a multidimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash. Text is a tissue of quotations drawn from innumerable centuries of culture [...] (Barthes in Allen: 2000, 13). The text exists only in respect to other, prior literary texts, called intertexts, with which the new text enters into a discourse. Literary plots, genres, stylistic devices, different cultural symbols and images, methods of narration and many other aspects of a literary work already existing in the literary tradition become a part of new text. (Allen: 2000,11) In this way a new literary text is always enriched by its int