Mythe et intertextualite dans le théâtre de BernardMarie Koltes : approches intertextuelle et mythocritique
Myth as Intertext in Bernard-Marie Koltès’ Drama: Intertextual and Mythocritical Approaches

Summary/Abstract: Myth in literature is an enunciative matter that lends itself to twointerrelated studies. On the one hand, one should analyse the way a textrewrites and reinterprets mythical themes and motives. This is the object ofthematology. On the other hand, one is also supposed to bring to light theworkings of the imagination in its anthropological dimension and see how itis embodied in a significant writing process based on a palimpsestuousreading in which myth functions both as intertext (quotation, allusion,plagiarism) and hypertext (imitation, transformation). This is the object ofmythopoetics. The interpretation of “myth as intertext” thus requiresanalytical approaches that combine and reconcile the tools ofmythocriticism with Genette’s theories of transtextuality. This inter-/transdisciplinary approach is particularly appropriate in the study of B.-M.Koltès’ plays. Not only does the French playwright’s production echo andre-actuate biblical and ancient myths, but the haunting recurrence of awhole array of mythemes and mythologemes also generates “Figures” – inDeleuze’s definition of the term – that are truly mythical in the sense thatthey appear as universal singulars, as symptoms of the forces that pervadeour universe.

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