What's the point of an author referencing previous works of literature? It seems lazy to me.
>>7420803
It's to keep the plebs out.
>>7420803
the whole system of 'literature' kinda depends on reference and meaning being assigned retroactively
Conversation.
It's fun. When one of characters calls the other a niggard, folks will think I'm being a racist when I'm really just quoting Shakespeare.
>>7420815
So it's like inside jokes? Repetition rather than originality?
>>7420803
You can't totally avoid influence anyway, and reference is just a gentlemanly way to acknowledge a strong influence. Like another anon said, literature is conversation, sometimes between generations.
>>7420803
Where is this?
OP, best to avoid T.S. Eliot.
I always feel great later on when my students tell me that they started to get references in movies, tv, and in other books they'd read after I exposed them to a pile of Shakespeare and novels. Feels good, man. It widens your scope. Also, yes, being an e/lit/ist who gets the full point of a literary allusion is like being in a special club.
Because "with a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship" sounds better, is more elogent and more fun than explaining his reasons in plain literal words.
>>7420862
Wilmington, NC. Took it earlier this year. Sorry for the late reply.
>>7420804
this is the only purpose. if you cant understand a single Harry Potter reference then please leave reading to the big guys.
>>7420803
No work of fiction is an island. Every author is a product of those that came before him, building off the ideas, theses, characters and themes of the Greats of the Western canon. References are often a mere homage or head-nod to the writers that the new writer thinks he owes tribute to.
Sometimes (especially when used as a title), references function as "hints" to the literate reader. For example, Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom is a reference to the Bible's 2 Samuel 19:4
>The king covered his face and cried aloud, "O my son Absalom! O Absalom, my son, my son!"
after King David found out his rebellious son Absalom had been slain by Absalom's half-brother. Faulkner uses the title as a hint to the central mystery of the novel (only available, of course, to reader's In The Know). Other examples include Things Fall Apart and Slouching Towards Bethlehem, as both writers of these works wanted to make damn clear their writing is about the metaphorical coming of the antichrist/Apocalypse.
When used best, references function as a shortcut, in the same way that a mathematical proof cites an earlier mathematical proof as a shortcut, before going on to build off of it. If someone has accomplished the exact same thing that you are trying to accomplish, why not reference them instead of trying to do it from scratch yourself? The most common example of this is whenever a writer uses "Sisyphean", a reference to either the Hellenic fable of Sisyphus or Camus's Myth of Sisyphus. When we come across this word, we the readers are meant to instantly *get* the nature of the task described, which is to say: repetitive, hopeless, absurd, unending and mind-blowingly monotonous. All that and more summed up in one word, due to the power of a literary reference! The best writers skillfully deploy allusions in order to efficiently and effectively convey themes, emotions, descriptions etc. etc.
But yeah, sometimes authors just include douchey references just to pat themselves and literate readers on the back.
