Archetypal literary criticism and intertextuality

Kuan Syuli PhD in Cultural Studies Graduate student, St. Petersburg State University 199034, Russia, Saint Petersburg region, Saint Petersburg, ul. 5th linya V.O., 66 2322650412@qq.com Other publications by this author

Cultural text in the broad sense of understanding the term "text" is one of the key phenomena on which culture is built, in particular artistic culture. For the analysis of cultural texts, socio-humanitarian sciences have developed a huge number of theoretical and methodological tools, among which, in our opinion, two occupy the most important place: the theory of archetypes with archetypal criticism closely related to it and the theory of intertextual connections. It seems interesting to establish the nature of the relationship between these two theoretical systems.

The object of this research is archetypal criticism and the theory of intertextuality. The subject of the study is the alleged ideological relationship between archetypal criticism and the theory of intertextuality.

The purpose of this article is to conduct a comparative analysis of both theoretical systems, to prove that the theory of intertextuality in some sense can be considered a new iteration of archetypal criticism; the further purpose is to show that in order to create cultural texts designed to interest the general public, one should use the means provided by the theory of archetypes and the mechanisms of intertextuality.

To achieve this goal, it is necessary to solve the following tasks:

– to define intertextuality and archetypal criticism;

– to establish similarities and differences between these two theoretical systems;

– to prove that the theory of intertextuality goes back to the provisions of archetypal criticism.

Archetypal criticism of myth can be considered an offshoot of structuralism because both of these theoretical perspectives are based on the promise to think about things from the point of view of the totality of their interrelationships. The term "intertextuality" was first used by Yu. Kristeva in the article "Bakhtin: Word, Dialogue and Novel" (1967); in it, the researcher writes: "Intertextuality is a social whole considered as a textual whole" ^[7]. Some researchers, for example M. N. Lipovetsky ^[8], attribute the phenomenon of intertextuality exclusively to postmodern texts, however, within the framework of this article we will assume that the awareness of the intertextual nature of the text, which came with the ideas of postmodernism, is still not a key factor exclusively in this cultural paradigm.

The term "archetype" was first introduced into scientific usage by Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), but Jung is not the author of this word itself. The term "archetype" appears even in Philo of Alexandria; the idea of his influence on Plotinus is permissible. In his work "Archetype and Symbol" Jung wrote: "The expression 'archetype' is already found in Philo the Jew in relation to the unconscious in man." Let us also mention Irenaeus, whose work says: "The Creator of the world did not create it from himself, he transferred it from archetypes alien to him." In the Bible, God is called the "Primordial Light." Although the word "archetype" does not occur in Augustine, the word "idea" is used in the corresponding meaning: thus, Augustine speaks of ideas "that are not created themselves, which are contained in the divine mind." Plato also spoke about "ideas". But the term "archetype" will be more accurate and useful for the purposes of our research; using it, it can be convincingly justified that, speaking about the content of the collective unconscious, we will be dealing with the oldest, or, better to say, primordial types, i.e., images common to all human culture that have existed since the beginning of time. In all epochs, it is said about the same thing: the already primitive views of the people of the era of the tribal system were based on slightly modified archetypes. But this was no longer quite a "collective unconscious": these views had already acquired intelligible forms and were transmitted through traditional teaching or in the form of secret teachings, which was a typical way of transmitting collectively significant information originating in the unconscious ^[12]. However, unlike Plato's "ideas", which supposedly exist objectively outside of human consciousness, Jung's archetypes are purely psychological phenomena; understanding this fact is extremely important for understanding his views as a whole.

Jung's thought as the successor of the psychoanalytic school did not arise from scratch; it goes back to the works of his teacher Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939), or, more precisely, it is a polemical thesis in relation to his ideas. Jung did not agree with Freud's position that art is the result of sublimations of the artist's personal repressed desire, and desire is the source and motivation of creativity; Jung believed that the source of creativity is the "collective unconscious". This is a kind of universal set of thoughts and theses that cannot be attributed to personal experience, depends on heredity and is formed by the centuries-old accumulation of experience by our ancestors. The original images that are present in the collective subconscious are called the collective unconscious, and the content of the collective unconscious are the so-called archetypes.

The Jungian term "archetype" is thus completely tied to the theory of the collective unconscious, these concepts are inseparable. The archetype is the basic structure of the collective unconscious – just like instinct.

Since human culture is a product of the development of the spiritual world of man, it will undoubtedly be advisable to consider the development of art from the standpoint of psychology. Jung's contribution is to introduce into circulation the concept of the collective unconscious, which is hidden in the depths of human souls, invisible and intangible, and therefore not noticed by people; archetypes are so often manifested in our daily life that we get used to certain repetitive images to such an extent that we cease to recognize them. From Jung's point of view, archetypes are typical patterns of understanding, and whenever we encounter universally consistent and repetitive patterns of understanding, we are dealing with archetypes.

One of the key points emphasized in the theory of archetypal criticism is the idea of repetition. And here the connection of Northrop Fry's archetypal criticism with Jung's theory of archetypes is clearly traced. Fry used the term "archetype" to refer to a literary symbol or a group of literary symbols to which authors appeal in order to find a response from the audience, since archetypes will inevitably cause her to have the effect of recognition and a sense of involvement. Archetypal literary criticism is a critical theory that interprets text by focusing on recurring myths and archetypes. For example, the archetypal hero of ancient Chinese mythology, Nezha, was one of the most "popular" gods living among people. Literary works about Nezha were created already in the Song Dynasty. The final image of this character took shape in a classic mythological collection containing "legends about the gods of three religions", which was created in the era of the Yuan Dynasty. In the future, the description of the image of Nezhi is improved and supplemented in such novels as Feng Shen Yanyi, Journey to the West, Journey to the South, etc.; recently, with the development of technology, Nezha has become the hero of a number of films and cartoons. He can be considered a typical archetypal hero: although his character varies somewhat depending on the era and personality of the author of the work, the image of the character is constantly reproduced in Chinese culture, thanks to which he became a part of it.

In his work "The Anatomy of Criticism," Fry wrote: "Myths about gods are reborn into legends about heroes, legends about heroes – into plots of tragedies and comedies, and the latter – into plots of more or less realistic literature. But we are dealing here more with a change in the social context than the literary form, that the constructive principles of narrative art remain unchanged, although, of course, they adapt to new eras" ^[10]. 

N. Fry's statement about myths implies that, although different myths and works of fiction (displaced myths) have different looks, they all contain the same pattern.

N. Fry examines myths and archetypes from a broader point of view than Jung, he focuses on the critical method of tracing the appearance of a symbol in literary works both before and after the work he is considering. Fry argues that the tendency to follow conventions is a vital part of literature and that copyright is harmful to the process of literary creation.

Repetition is also an important element of the theory of intertextuality. For intertextuality, repetition is by no means reduced to the fact that one text "absorbs" and transforms another. Literature is the transmission of information, and precisely because it needs to be repeated, it needs to adapt the same thing to the perception of different people of different eras. This task is designed to solve specific forms of literary intertextuality: borrowing, processing of themes and plots, explicit and implicit quotation, translation, plagiarism, allusion, paraphrase, imitation, parody, adaptation, use of epigraphs, etc. ^[5].

These techniques give literature a procedural character, thanks to which literature, like history, is constantly moving forward. In a sense, this is not just a repetition – it can be likened to new shoots growing out of old branches. Quoting as an intertextual technique is also a kind of repetition; quoting and mosaic from an already written text in a new text encourage us to talk about literature as a memory that will be relevant for future generations of authors.

It is through this recreation based on repetition that the author asserts the authority of his predecessors and distinguishes himself. In intertextuality, the most noticeable and frequently used technique is a quotation, defined as the repetition of one discourse within another discourse ^[11]. However, it is worth emphasizing that this kind of repetition is not just a re—appearance: on the one hand, the appearance of old materials in a new context preserves traces of the previous text and the conditions of its appearance, and on the other hand, generates new ideas in a new context. It can be seen that repetition is the main characteristic of literature, and in this matter intertextuality and archetypal theory converge with each other.

In the book "The Anatomy of Criticism" N. Fry expounds in detail his point of view on literature as a whole, describing the patterns of the evolution of literary types and their generality. Works of fiction should be studied taking into account the cultural and social background of their origin, that is, they should be considered not as a "thing in itself", but in a broad literary and social context, in a macro perspective. Fry draws attention to the need to trace the connection of specific works with the general literary experience, to the need to take into account the deep literary history. At the same time, the depths of literary history, according to Fry, can be traced back to elements of primitive culture, such as religion, rituals, witchcraft, mythology; what precedes all the patterns and rules of literary expression can be found already in the consciousness of ancient man.

Fry considers myths and rituals as traces of the accumulation of primitive experience and archetypal images, he believed that literature is the expression of mythical rituals, the revival and resurrection of ancient myths.

Fry also put forward the famous research method "step back" (step back), which requires the analysis of literary works to focus on what preceded it, macroscopically grasp the structures and modes of the work. Undoubtedly, he opened a wide field of thought space for literary criticism. The critical point of view of N. Fry, emphasizing the integrity and interrelation of literary works, is closely related to the view of the theory of intertextuality on literature as interconnected texts. Therefore, Fry's approach is very close to the theory of intertextuality proposed by Yu. Kristeva. By Yu . Kristeva, intertextuality is a boundless, infinite text, "any text is constructed as a mosaic of citations, any text is the absorption and transformation of some other text" ^[6]. I. V. Arnold similarly defines intertextuality as "the inclusion in the text of either whole other texts with a different subject of speech, or their fragments in in the form of quotations, reminiscences and allusions" ^[1]. 

But N. Fry, as well as Yu. Kristeva has already described the connection between literary works in the form of imitation, quoting, transformations and references; according to Fry, any text exists within the framework of intertextuality and is the result of absorption and transformation of other texts. Any text is a mosaic of explicit and implicit quotations. But this is intertextuality in action, which considers literature as texts in their relation, and not as a set of texts that exist separately from each other.

It is worth noting that in the literary tradition, a text is always considered as consisting of a number of elements, and its meaning consists of the interaction of these elements with each other and with phenomena existing outside of this text. 

Both Fry's archetypal criticism and Kristeva's intertextuality view literature as a kind of memory, in connection with which any literary work is a secondary product, imitation, in this sense, all literature is secondary by definition. The correlation of imitation and innovation in works of art has always been a central problem for literature. It is known that intertextuality implies the author's "memories" not only of life, but also of works created by writers earlier. In this sense, all literature is woven from quotations. J. Genette considers intertextuality as one of the varieties of the broader concept of "transtextuality", which means "everything that includes [this text] in explicit and implicit relationships with other texts" ^[4]. Here we are talking, among other things, about the influence of the writer's memory of his past works on his current work. New works always reveal some kind of nostalgic connection with previous works, and innovations can exist only against the background of already used techniques. Figuratively speaking, the latest creations are "new tickets for old ships."

Literature as a reflection of the spiritual world of man cannot go beyond the limits of human psychology and memory; in this respect, psychology determines everything. Memory as a psychological mechanism is an eternal constant, beyond which literature will never go.

At one time M. M. Bakhtin wrote: "Even the meanings of the past, that is, those born in the dialogue of the past centuries, can never be stable (once and for all completed, final) – they will always change and be updated in the process of the subsequent, future development of the dialogue. At any moment of the development of the dialogue, there are huge, unlimited masses of forgotten meanings, but at certain moments of the further development of the dialogue, in the course of it, they will be remembered again and come to life in an updated (in a new context) form" ^[3].

The unique role of intertextuality lies in the fact that old themes enter a new cycle of their existence thanks to it; readers even with little literary experience will not deny the heredity of literature. Confirmation of this can be found in the writings of Roland Barthes. He wrote: "The concept of intertext gives the theory of text a social scope: the whole language as a whole, both previous and modern, enters the text, but does not arrive by identifiable filiation or conscious imitation, but by dissemination" ^[2]. However, the source can also be determined by filiation; it is important, however, that we are dealing with the source not when similarities are found between two or more texts, but when "writers directly repeat each other." Intertextuality presupposes the fundamental mobility of literary creativity itself, transposing previous statements to new ground.

Thus, archetypal criticism and the theory of intertextuality are certainly two independent theoretical systems that exist in line with different scientific and philosophical paradigms, but they have a lot in common. First of all, they are connected by the interpretation of cultural works mainly as products of the human psyche. Further, it should be noted that both directions of thought operate with the search for common features in various cultural texts, concentrate on repetition, constant reproduction of motives. The source of recurring motives within the framework of archetypal criticism is the collective unconscious, and within the framework of the theory of intertextuality – the corpus of already created texts as a separate, independent phenomenon, however, regardless of the alleged source, the author – consciously or unconsciously – acts as a keeper and repeater of the memory of mankind. To some extent, both theories call into question the possibility of generating new, original ideas, but do not forget that any classical motif placed in a new context is capable of playing with new colors, unexpectedly revealing its ideological potential from a new side.

The works of modern literature reveal to varying degrees the imitative nature of literary creativity, revealing the characteristics of secondary. Humanity lives by traditions, and any innovation to a certain extent can be considered only as a "breakthrough into the past." Heritage and innovation are always two sides of the literary process. Later writers, formed within the framework of the great tradition, will inevitably be influenced by the works and writers that preceded them. The influence of the past exists in the heart and head of the writer as a memory, an undercurrent ready to manifest itself at any moment. And at the right moment it comes out from under the pen of the writer, becoming an integral part of the new work.

Such a point of view confirms the words of Ecclesiastes that there is nothing new under the sun – all "new ideas" have an archetype under them.