Event

Speaker: Joseph Farrell, Professor of Classical Studies, University of Pennsylvania

Abstract: Among classicists, canonical genres, and particularly epic poetry and its close relatives, have played a dominant role both in theorizing intertextuality and in intertextually-driven criticism. Certain broadly shared assumptions about the relationship between intertext and genre have led to positive results; at the same time, these same assumptions have probably limited the breadth of perspective that many practitioners have allowed themselves. To illustrate what I mean, I will offer some thoughts on the applicability of intertextual criticism to a pair of genres that stand largely or entirely outside the classical canon, namely, Aesopic fable and martyr narrative. In brief, my argument will be that such works constantly make intertextual gestures that are very different in kind from those typically found in canonical genres (along with a few that are similar). As a consequence, it seems unproductive to make the usual assumptions about intertextuality in trying to understand these genres, which nevertheless are manifestly intertextual, perhaps even to a higher degree than any canonical genre. From the subject literatures on these genres it is clear that specialists share their own assumptions about intertextuality within them, and have articulated at least some of those. I infer from this that a fuller articulation of those assumptions and a comparison of them to those that are prevalent among students of classical poetry would be instructive. I also infer that a consideration of this material tends to reinforce the idea that the concept of genre-specific intertextuality has some validity.