Saulembek G.R.
PhD student of M.O. Auezov Literature
and Art Institute and Al-Farabi Kazakh National University, Almaty, Kazakhstan
Intertextuality and intermediality
methods in literature: On the base of stories of T. Asemkulov “Treasure of
Bektori” and “Meeting in the forest” written by A. Baybol
Annotation
The article is aimed to identify the intertextuality and intermediality
methods in the stories of T. Asemkulov «Treasure of Bektori” and A. Baybol “Meeting
in the forest”. Creativity of the authors is closely related to traditional
literature but the stories in a new form show the method of postmodernism.
During the investigation we could prove that stories «Òreasure of Bektori” and
“Meeting in the forest” are written in intertextual allusion, reminiscence
methods. We analyzed that intertextuality of the story
“Meeting in the forest” is irony the story “Treasure of Bektori” is contains
parody description.
Key words: Intertextuality,
Intermediality, allusion, carnival, allegory, precedent text.
Introduction
In this article we consider the
practice of using new methods through intertextuality in postmodern
era. Despite that the stories «Òreasure of Bektori” written by Talasbek Asemkulov
and “Meeting in the forest” written by Alibek Baybol were influenced by
postmodernism but they are not fully considered as a postmodernism work. The
authors tried to write in a new way using some of postmodernism methods, thus,
they could change usual shape of traditional literature. But they could not out
of the influence of traditional literature; nevertheless it is still a fruit of
postmodernism era. That is why, we should investigate it taking into account
the mediators role of the text.
Methods
In order
to show the intertextual relations in the works we need to do the following
analysis:
1) identify “extrinsic” texts
(intertextual references);
2) systemize intertextual references
3) identify how the references in the
texts are used;
4) analyze the role of intertextual texts
and their interpretation.
The result
We could reach
the following:
In the story of
A. Baybol “Meeting in the forest” is used intermedial method which is relevant
to postmodernism poetics.
In the story
“Meeting in the forest” we identified the reference to political documents of
“Kazakhstan-2050” to reach developed countries strategy”.
Intertextuality
in the text is realized by allusion and precedent names methods;
The text has
carnival, irony, allegory description;
The author of
the story “meeting in the forest” wrote it to readers;
In the story «Òreasure
of Bektori” of T. Asemkulov we identified the reference of “Ertostyk” the
Kazakh fairytale;
“Faustian
bargain” motive is used as a main text of intertextuality and it is realized by
reminiscence method;
Precedent names
and text were travestied in the text “Treasure of Bektori”
Analyze
«Òreasure of
Bektori” of T. Asemkulov and “Meeting in the forest” of A. Baybol are spotted
by their novelty and theses text are elegant with practice of using
intertextuality and postmodernism methods.
Intermediality type of
intertextuality is used in the story “Meeting in the forest” of A. Baybol.
“World text”
system or the system of references of art of aesthetics of Intermedial
postmodernism laid out a road to the art texts that contain text synthesis.
The author in
his turn used this synthetics method, picked up external texts from political
documents and mass media in the story “Meeting in the forest”,
For example: the
story is started by the following “Today at 11.00 we are going to hold a
meeting of animals. The agenda is to reach 50 develop forests. All animals are
welcome who are conscious of having a combined forest” – was written in each
tree in the forest [1, 152] describes the strategy of reaching
50 developed countries of Kazakhstan with some irony, allegory and carnival
description. It makes an impression of irresponsibility of authorities, corruption,
adulation, falseness within the community of animals. Yes, it makes an
impression, because the author did not show the real life as we usually do in
traditional texts. Readers automatically come to the same conclusion.
Animals are
leisurely coming to the forest. As soon as they reach the seats some of them
start to sleep. Others are seating in drowse mood [1, 152-153]
- Now we have
democracy, liberalism, feminism that are borrowed from American jungle and
having a chance to enjoy its results. Animals behave freely and they can do
whatever they want. Yesterday, mister quail craped on mister bear’s head [1, 153].
We are so
soft-hearted. Last month strange Puma wasted all wealth of our forest and run
hometown away [1, 153].
All these
segments of the texts are can be seen in daily news, magazines.
However, it is
hard to find the main allusion.
According R. Barthes statement “The
basic principles of the texts are <...> the entrance
into another texts, codes, signs’’ [2, 428], “all searching
of “sources” and “impacts” are responding to a myth on filiation of works but
the texts are made up from anonymous, elusive quotations – without quotation
marks” [2, 418]” the text of the story “Meeting in
the forest” merged with external texts.
Every reader can perceive the text individually
according to the happening situation in Kazakhstan in the last twenty years.
For example: According to our research when we first read the text as a reader
we started to combine and compare the text with news we heard recently:
1.
Tanatar Tabanuly “journalism is a
bridge between authority and people” http://old.abai.kz/node/15653 [3]
1.2. The
assistant of Bebit Atamkulov fell on sleep during his speech https://www.nur.kz/kk/1282381-atamqulovtynh-komekshisi-manhyzdy-zhiyn.html
[4]
1.3. Bureaucrats of Aktobe
rejected to follow the speech of Saparbayev fell on sleep http://so-l.ru/news/show/saparbaevti
_ti_da_isi _kelmegen _a_t_bel_k_ sheneun_kt_5
[5]
4.
Berikbol Dukeev
“political regimes of central Asia: dream democracy or totalitarianism?” http://old.abai.kz/node/41054 [6]
5.
“The debts of foreign companies to
Kazakhstan are more than 6 billion tenge” www.youtube.com [7])
In such case
you spontaneously recall all social and political weaknesses of authorities in
your memory.
H.G. Gadamer statement says: ‘‘all sayings contain not only the truth but
also have allusion for untold future sayings… Only when, told sayings combine
with untold one the utterance become understandable
[8, 333] the text can enlarge its
territory only when it reaches it own reader and the reader can understand all allusions used in the text. Development
of a text is directly depending on perception of the reader. The author wrote
the story relying on communicative relation with reader. The deference from
tradition literature it needs third participant-reader without whom the main
idea cannot be understandable. The peculiarity is that here author-text-reader
are involved than in traditional where involved only author-text.
Above given conclusion is a theory of structuring and
interpretation of the text made by 2 principles.
As soon as
author finishes his story the text starts its own life. Today’s reader can
understand only actual problems, but future reader will evaluate the story by
themselves. When we combine the main text with the secondary text it can
totally change the meaning and also has changeable mood according to perception
of readers. But it is also possible to miss intertext meaning while reading. In
order to emphasize main event – historical document in the history of
Kazakhstan, A. Baybol expressed it by “to
reach 50 developed forests of the world”
The story can be divided into two parts. The story
which is included into the collection “Train station” contains all above
mentioned descriptions and continuing grim humor, irony from page 152 to 163
pages. Here, the author gives hesitancy to the works of political elite,
authority. We can see similarities between the works of V. Pelevin “Hermit
and Sixfinger” and A. Baybol
“Meeting in the forest” using the same methods to show unfairness in society
turning it into a fable. In “Meeting in the forest” the environment described
as a forest, in “Hermit and
Sixfinger” the
environment is described as a bird complementary industrial plant. The main
characters in the first story are animals of the forest, in the second story
are hens. The peculiarity of both stories is having an allusion description and
overtones and is destined for all and erudite readers. Due to perception of
each person several variant of the story can appear only erudite reader can
catch the meaning of overtones of the text.
The difference
of the texts are, in «Hermit and
Sixfinger» irony is given with overtone, in
“Meeting in the forest” it is given in mockery way. For example: the author
shows his own attitude with statements like: “you are looking just like
“demanding an equal rights”, “That is all vain pursuit – do not tauten your
voce” and etc. By its structure and using methods the story is referred to postmodernism
but this story is in the middle of traditional and postmodernism. Page 163
describes hunting; page ends with the episode of hunters killed all animals in
the forest. The hunters are described in usual way but animals are in allegory
description and here we can see the wrong use of “author’s playing and
simulacrum” methods by the author. For example: the segment: “The wolf that
left the meeting was walking far away, it advisedly let the group of animals
pass that were heading to the forest, it was offended for something but then he
went back to warn arguing animals” [1, 164-165] is damaged the
situation. If he had described the situation simpler we would have accept it as
a simulacrum method. Secondly, each could make own conclusion but the author
who could not out from traditional cognition, education and ethnics did not
give a chance to make a conclusion mentioning hidden moral “The hunters killed
animal because of absence of unity
between animals” [1, 165]. In other words, the story is close
to postmodernism style by its shape but the author could not save the style
“author’s death” of R. Barthes.
T Asemkulov in
the story «Òreasure of Bektori” intertext method is effected through
reminiscence. Author gives a definition of reminiscence in literature studies
dictionary: “Reminiscence is a process of borrowing segments of other
literature works, even from folk works that creates new treatments ; but
sometimes borrowed utterances can be changeable”
(Ì.Lermontov
– « Splendid
city, poor city» (about St. Petersburg) –F.Glinky
« Splendid city, oldest city» (about Moscow) [9].
Thus,
reminiscence is a process writing in a new style mentioning words; phrases, the
name of a famous works, authors or characters from other works. The difference
from quotation is lack of inverted commas and is based on creativity. There are
a lot of examples of using reminiscence: German writer German Gessen “The Glass
Bead Game”(1943), Irish author James Joyce «Ulysses» (1922), English
writer Anthony Burgess «A long trip to teatime», American poet Ezra Pound are evidences
for that.
According to
the term theory, let’s make a detailed analysis:
“His famous
fairytale of childhood was Er Tostyk” His grandmother used to end the fairytale
with the words “how difficult was that time” – here T. Asemkulov alluded the
relations with the famous Kazakh fairytale “Er Tostyk” “Ernazar in his night
dreams saw that Bektori was torturing him nearby water well. As soon as he
waked up, told everything to his grandmother.
-
That was jinn, do not worry about
it, - trying to make her grandson to be calm, - save God from facing with
Bektori” [10], - here author mentioned the
relations of character and Bektori. In spite the fact that he used names from
fairytale, he wrote the story in a new way.
The key of reminiscence and the
difference from plagiarism is that the author reanimated the motive of
“daughter of bad fairy”, hence avoiding repetition and tried to give
philosophical conclusion with the utterance of Bektori: “People do not know how
do they reach these days, because of the lack of sense. These days were not
built in one day. People, Insan were absolutely different from all eternity.
Oppositions like white and black, truth and false, ill and benevolence were
made by mad philosophers. Every word or
activity according to it accomplishment can turn into bad or good. Even falls
words of a witch-doctor can be a
remedy. Clear truth used by bad people can turn into falls. Where can we find a
truth?”
Faustian bargain motive is also
implemented in the works of Goethe
“Faust”, T.Mann “Doctor Faustus”, M. Bulgakov “The Master and Margarita”, F.M.
Dostoyevsky “The Brothers Karmazov”.
In “Er Tostyk” fairytale:
If you are not satisfied with this,
I can give my treasure
Favorite among the other of eight
sons
Former support when I was lonely
Former wing when I was without wings
I can give my little son with a lot
of grief,
Just let me go, mother! – asked
Ernazar an old witch to let him go [11].
Ernazar in the fairytale “Ertostyk”
promised to witch who was sent by Bektori give his one son for his life. Here
the author makes an allusion to motive of an agreement.
In the story «Òreasure of Bektori” Kayrboldi
who was an orphan and suffered agonies of life was incited to give his heart –
“Every who is stronger than you tortures you. You were tortured by bays in the
restaurant where you work. You cannot make a reply. Why? Because of your heart
that did not let you speak. That means that you have and do not have a heart.
Your life is consist of revenge, pipe dreams” [10].
Agreement motive which is used in
the story “Ertostyk”is developed in the story “Treasure of Bektori”. Here we
can see intertextual relations with Goethe’s “Faust” where both motives were used. The evil in the
story «Òreasure of Bektori” is played by Bektori, in “Faust” is characterized
by Mephistopheles who is bargaining for the soul:
Stop playing with grief,
That feeds, a vulture, on your
breast,
The worst society, you’ll find, will
prompt belief,
That you’re a Man among the rest.
Not that I mean
To shove you into the mass.
Among ‘the greats’, I’m
second-class:
But if you, in my company,
Your path through life would wend,
I’ll willingly condescend
To serve you, as we go.
I’m your man, and so,
If it suits you of course,
I’m your slave: I’m yours! [12].
The reason for making an agreement
with evil for Kayrboldi was that he had a poor social life; doctor Faust was
interested in discovering new things in the world. The reason that they sold
their soul is different but motive is one.
“Part of the
Power that would Always wish Evil,
and always
works the Good” [12].
Bektori says «– I understand
what you want to say. Are the any benefits from bad
things? If you did not face with bad, how
would you understand what is good? How would you recognize the truth if you
have not faced with lie? The aim of road is to go astray and then find a way. All these grief
are made by jinn» [3].
Now, we need to
discuss about postmodernism description of the texts. The fairytale “Er Tostyk”
was changed, motives and characters were used in intertextual base and it was
written in parody description. As we can see from the examples above the evil
character Bektori was absolutely written in a new way. The stories develop the
idea not to use classical object and subject according to paradigm of
postmodernism philosophy. The author mentioned that all categories bad, good,
lie, truth can exist in one space even in one person in the dialog of Bektori.
Conclusion
We could prove
that A. Baybol and T. Asemkulov put new zest into the Kazakh literature of
expressing new forms of idea and that they used some methods of postmodernism
that is living more than sixty years and influencing on world literature.
Furthermore, we investigated that both authors avoided missing the ethnical
functions of traditional literature in their works. We think that all
experiments mentioned in both stories should be appraised by these
peculiarities.
The main
criteria of postmodernism poetics of A.Baybol is closely related to the
intermedial allegory description and successfully implemented but he does not
mention any implications that are being used in traditional literature. The
value of his works is trine function author-text-reader and the way of his aspiration
to form an elite, mass texts.
The story «Òreasure
of Bektori” is a successful work full of new methods, that has deep philosophical
allusion. Intertextuality, metafiction, absolute denials of postmodernism
poetics were successfully implemented in writing a new style.
References
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3.http://old.abai.kz/node/15653
4.
https://www.nur.kz/kk/1282381-atamqulovtynh-komekshisi-manhyzdy-zhiyn.html
5.http://sol.ru/news/show/saparbaevti_ti_da_isi_kelmegen_a_t_bel_k_sheneun_kt_5
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qazınası» http://www.otuken.kz/
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– Twla, 2013. – 204 s.