Deja Vu? Or Just AP English?

All literary works are connected in some way, be it story details, themes, character names, or style. Professors and other literature analysts call this continuing interaction and intertwining of works intertextuality. One example of intertextuality that has helped me in my reading is recognizing character similarities through different works. By recognizing certain situations that characters are involved in, several conclusions can be drawn. Take for instance Harry Potter and Aragorn, two completely dissimilar characters on the surface, yet strangely alike. Both have destinies set for them before they knew themselves; both have to lead diverse groups of people in difficult tasks to accomplish a main goal; both come into close contact with their gravest enemies (Voldemort and Sauron, respectively), both revealing themselves to their enemies and overcoming them in the end. By a younger author-J.K. Rowling- giving her main character traits of another, older author's-J.R.R. Tolkien- main character, she presents familiarity that allows the reader to both embrace the story as an old friend and also find enough new themes to keep the reader interested. By having the new and the old, a reader like me will both be intrigued by the new and comforted by the old, like a favorite book just in a new cover. One of an author's hardest jobs is to keep the reader entertained while pushing the envelope, and character allusions help to accomplish this.
Another example of intertextuality is author's reworking familiar stories into new stories, often with the same characters and situations just altered in clever ways. One of the most popular examples of this treatment to a work is the movie O, Brother Where Art Thou? The movie is a take on Homer's Odyssey, just set in early 1900's Mississippi. The main character is named Ulysses, he is on a quest to reach home before suitors steal his wife, and he is attacked by a very large man with one eye- a cyclops. Same story just cleverly tweaked. By reworking the situations to translate from a Greece-setting to a Mississippi setting, allowing both new comers to enjoy the movie without a knowledge of the Greek epic. As both a reader and a watcher, this reworking helps to accentuate parts of the epic that may have been looked over originally or to enlighten the reader to certain themes they missed the first time. By looking at how all texts are connected, the reader (myself) can understand what I am reading and foster a deeper appreciation for the literary work.



In Chapter 7, Foster discusses the common practice of authors alluding to the Bible in their works, a practice that Foster illustrates with examples such as East of Eden, Pulp Fiction (oddly enough), and Toni Morrison's Beloved. One of the most prominent examples of Biblical allusion in literature that was not mentioned in the chapter occurs in C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia. This allusion allows the reader to appreciate the text on a much deeper meaning than just the story itself conveys (which is excellent by the way). In the first book of the Narnia series, The Magician's Nephew, two children, Diggory and Polly, find a door to a strange land, full of animals and people, that they see created before their eyes by a massive lion, Aslan. After the creation- see the allusion?- an evil witch finds the children and attempts to convince them to aid the witch in overthrowing Aslan. The only difference between this tale and the story of creation in the Bible is that Diggory/Adam and Polly/Eve do not help the witch/serpent to counter God's/Aslan's wishes. Now if that is not enough allusion take The Last Battle, in which Narnia is in an uproar over a gorilla parading a donkey wearing a lion skin around as Aslan, causing the residents of Narnia to take sides on their beliefs and either join with the gorilla or become rebels who stay true to Aslan, risking their lives. This parallels nearly perfectly with the book of Revelation, giving the story a mystique and threatening edge that has interested readers for centuries. By alluding to the Bible, Lewis presents stories styled like those we have heard for years since we were young children, but also transformed enough to not be repetitive and keep our interest. These parallels affect our reading by allowing the readers to delve a deeper meaning from a work and to appreciate the author's writing. These parallels help me in reading the books to have a greater understanding of the story, almost like a guide to the story to reference when certain elements twist together and the book seems to be written in Latin. I also feel intelligent when I find the allusions and know how they impact the story.