On Intertextuality
and My First Lesson in Writing
One of the first lessons in writing I ever learned was from my dad. After reading one of my stories, he gave me some advice.
“Pay attention to intertextuality.”
This happened when I was about eleven or twelve.
As pre-teen me would have asked, what is intertextuality? In writing, it is refers to the relationship between texts, particularly in borrowing from or referring to other writings.
When he gave me this advice, my dad used as an example Tolkien’s way of referring to his own writing within his books.
At the time, I had written a story in which the Main Character researched a magical animal in a thick glossary. The original entry from the story went as follows:
Rything, she read, (RYE-thing) is a mythical bird that is said to emerge out of water. It’s cousin is known widely as the Greibryd, or in other languages, the phoenix (see pg. 387).
Unfortunately, this nesting time only comes once every 247 years, and many rything eggs are destroyed by greedy hunters (see “De’loi’s Book on Hunting Trips” pg. 35) or poachers (see “How to Guide for Young Men” pg. 59)…. A more hostile relative of the rything is a harpie (see pg. 79).
When my dad read this, he suggested that I change the page numbers in the fantasy textbook. Did you catch the reason why?
It’s because of the animals Greibyrd / Phoenix (who’s entry was on page 387) harpie (on page 79). My dad pointed out that in the english alphabet, “g” comes before “h,” and therefore by common textbook order, the Greibyrd’s entry should be several hundred pages before the harpie’s.
I explained, with all my eleven or twelve year old sense, that the textbook was organized by how powerful the creature was. Obviously!
My dad, ever patient, maintained his suggestion for the sake of intertextuality.
His feedback impacted me in the best way possible, and ever since that day, I’ve been hyper-aware of the writings within my writing.
💗Love this!!!
Thank you, dear daughter! I have learned so much from you, too. I am thankful to be a life-time learner-disciple. Intertextuality is interesting in writing and in cinema as well. There is much to be learned about the intertextuality of Scripture with God the Holy Spirit being the ultimate Author, and in writers like yourself, and even in directors who are creative auteurs such as Hitchcock and Christopher Nolan who have a large body of works. In fact, recently, many are misunderstanding some of what Nolan is attempting in his interpretation Homer's 'Odyssey' because they are missing the intertextuality of his interpretation with his other works (especially 'The Prestige'). Blessings, and love you much, my sweet daughter. -Daddy