THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

3.2 Double Whammy: Mixed Doubles The Avatar in Panamaand influences. This repetition of texts may range from consciouselaboration of others’ works or snatches of conversation typical of thehistorical or political context. Secondly, texts are available only througha reading process and what is produced during this process is due tothe cross fertilisation of all the readers’ previously read texts. Anallusion to a work unknown to the reader will go unnoticed; it “will havea dormant existence in that reading”. On the other hand, the readers’experience of something new may bring a fresh interpretation to thework. 94 The point here is that all writers are first readers and are allsubject to influence and that all texts are necessarily criss-crossed byother texts (30). Intertextuality, however, refers to far more than theinfluences of writers on each other. Its fundamental concept remindsthe reader that each text exists in relation to others; that no text is sooriginal and unique-in-itself; rather it is a tissue of inevitable, and to anextent unwitting, references to and quotations from other texts. Likepostmodernism, it is simpler to say what intertextuality is not: it shouldnot be a reference to literary relations of conscious influence; norshould it be used to refer to the intentional allusion to, overt or covert,citation or quotation of previous texts in literary texts.A text may be considered intertextual when its meaning is notcontained within itself but exists between texts. Thus a text’s meaningexists in its relation to other texts which make up the multiplediscourses of culture. Kristeva and Barthes place a great deal ofemphasis on the between-ness of the text; that the meaning existsbetween rather than inside texts. When they are read intertextually thereader will go outside of them in search for meaning since the inside ofa text considered intertextually comes from that which exists on theoutside. Intertextuality is not to be confused with influence, allusion andother intentional ways in which one writer refers to or quotes fromanother. Influence signifies that the meaning of literary works stemsfrom the author’s intention. Intertextuality involves the recognition thatmeaning lies between texts. 95Beyond FictionPatricia Waugh defines metafiction as a term given to fictionalwriting which:systematically draws attention to its status as anartefact in order to pose questions about therelationship between fiction and reality. Inproviding a critique of their own methods of94Still and Worton, introduction, 1-2.95 Whilst the term intertextuality would normally be used to refer to allusions to othertexts, a related kind of allusion is what might be called 'intratextuality' - involvinginternal relations within the text.211