The Dynamics of the Mediating Processes in Literature
Lučka Urbanija
Ljubljana
luckaurbanija@yahoo.com
In the article I discuss various processes of production and reception on the basis of literary works that, due to their influence, function as an authority and thus open up new intertextualresponses. My researchfocuses on the concepts of "influence"and "intertextuality", as well as on the concept of "literary reception", which integrates both aforementioned concepts.
The theme linking the literary works in question and their intertextual relations is that of evil and guilt as it emerges in reading the Book ofJob.1 I will highlight the motif of sin and the figure of Satan. The emphasis will be on the literature of Thomas Mann and Goethe's masterpiece Faust. A detailed analysis of these works also reveals the history of the approaches with which we are confronted during the process of reading.
Keywords: literary theory / intertextuality / literary influence / literary reception / thematology
UDK 82.091
International Literary Processes - "Influence" and "Intertextuality"
The notion of "influence" is one of the oldest literary processes. The term first referred to astrology, as the influence of stars on people, and it is later also found in literature. Gvozden Eror discusses this in the book Genetički vidovi inter(literamosti) (The Genetic Aspects of Inter(literariness) (2002), where his findings are summed up in the following words: "The concept of literary influence has been generally accepted since the end of the 19th century; predominantly it was defined as the 'form of appearance', i.e. the manifestations of interrelations between different literatures and grasped through the aspect of causal relations on the genetic level." (Eror 92) The most significant attribute of an instance of literary "influence" is causality, which is understood as the developmental process of individual themes, motifs, literary figures, etc. The author receives foreign ideas, motifs and themes, and weaves them into his work, remodelling them in his own way, and thus assuring them their own value. Perhaps the best known
example of such influence is found in Dante's The Divine Comedy (La Divina Commedia), which was strongly influenced by Virgil with his style and understanding of the world:2
Tu se' lo mio maestro e ' mio autore;
tu se' solo colui da cu' io tolsi lo bello stilo3 che m' ha fatto onore.
{Injerno I, 85 - 87).
Dante was mainly influenced by Virgil's choice of themes,4 but in his poetry we also find other kinds of influence; in addition to conceptual influences (religious, philosophical, aesthetic) we also find influences on material, form and style5 (summarised from A. Ocvirk: Teorija primet^c^lne lit^er^arne zgodovine (Theory of Comparative Literary History (1936). Today, Dante's poem still influences many poets and writers, who discover in The Divine Comedy new possibilities for representing the afterworld or the afterlife, and with its help also analyse society, the world and history.
According to Harold Bloom's definition, we can talk about an influence only when there are two strong poetical authorities involved in the process: "Poetic Influence always proceeds by misreading of the prior poet, an act of creative correction that is actually and necessarily a misinterpretation. The history of fruitful poetic influence is a history of anxiety and self-saving caricature, of distortion, of perverse, wilful revisionism without which modern poetry as such could not exist." (30)
A poet's partial misunderstanding of his predecessors is a function of time, distance, ignorance of language, etc.6 Thus, the newly made work has its own identity. We become aware of that when we compare Goethe's and Mann's Faust / Doctor Faustus-: "Mann's swerve away from Goethe is the profoundly ironic denial that any swerve is necessary. His misinterpretation of Goethe is to read precisely his own parodistic genius, his own kind of loving irony, into his precursor." (Bloom 54) Everybody who is under the influence of someone weaves into his work not only the ideas and themes of his model, but he also interlaces — sometimes on purpose, and sometimes, again, unintentionally — the spirit of his own epoch, time and place. Thus, each literary work depends on many viewpoints of the context that influenced its formation.
We can say that a literary work is a consequence of various causes. However, we must ask ourselves whether Hermeren's definition of "influence" still applies: "A influences B with a". As Jay Clayton ascertains: "Once the chain of influence extends beyond one link, should we not begin to talk of intertextuality rather than influence?" (38) The answer is in no way simple, and for this reason I will provide a thorough presenta-
tion of the concept of "intertextuality" and certain problems that appear with it. Finally, I will return to the question raised and offer a fundamental distinction between "influence" and "intertextuality".
The notion of "intertextuality" in literature appeared very late. We can trace it back to the works of Julia Kristeva, who introduced the term in literary science with the assistance of Bakhtin's theory of dialogue and Saussure's research of anagrams.7 The author understands "intertextuality" as each "inter-action textuelle qui se produit ä l'interieur d'un seul texte. Pour le sujet connaissant, l'intertextualite est une notion qui sera l'indice de la fagon dont un texte lit l'histoire et s'insere en elle" (Pfister 212), which underlies the dynamism of mediatory processes. Kristeva reveals that literary works mutually complement each other and that we can understand them correctly only with a good knowledge of the literary tradition. In her theory, Julie Kristeva understands all texts as intertex-tual relations, and is interested in the ontological characteristics of texts: their structure, meaning, historical attachment, etc. According to Kristeva, every text is built as a mosaic of quotations; every text is the absorption and transformation of another text (see Eror 239).
Thomas Mann's Joseph and His Brothers (Joseph und seine Brüder) is a great deal less understandable if we are not familiar with the author's reading of and transferral of ideas from the midrashim (Micha Josef bin Gorion). In Mann's novel, Joseph represents a person who can resist temptation — Potiphar's wife — not because of his own strength (he is not the image of a Greek hero), but only when he sees in a vision his father's disappointed face. As Terry R. Wright ascertains: "The midrash provides a mediating narrative framework between the terse verses of Genesis 39 and Mann's elaborated novel." (Wright 153)
Marko Juvan uses the term "intertextuality" as a general expression; for a particular, explicit form of intertextuality the term "citation" is used. Citation is thus "a strategy of writing, that with its figures and genres consciously relies upon activating of cultural memory" (Juvan 285). In Juvan's opinion, a literary text that would "without attachment to foreign background lose its semantics and aesthetic figure" is classified as citation (245). There are many different indices that suggest a citation, while the phenomenon of general intertextuality is more difficult to define as it is not externally recognisable. A text is a "citation" only when it can be confirmed with certainty that the author wilfully referred to some other text, while also counting on the reader's ability to recognise the reference to the original text.
A citation can be popular or elitist. Elitist-hermetic citation represents an attachment, where the message is — because of its imprecise, even
obliterate pointers — more difficult to understand. Most postmodernist metafiction is written in this manner. On the other hand, a popular citation is more easily recognised by the reader, as it takes material from classic repertoire known to everyone: In his poem Dante frequently summarises events described in the Holy Bible:
O Saul, come su la propria spada
quivi parevi morto in Gelboe, che poi non sentipioggia ne rugiada!
{Purgatorio XII, 40-42)
Based on his research and explanation of the relationship between "intertextuality" and "citation", French author F. Goyet concludes that the term "inter-text" refers to another text which never appears by itself: the hidden text, the text beyond the text; while the quotation explicitely refers to a text which appears in its presence. Thus, the quotation appears in its explicitness, while the inter-text functions as the implicit textual-ity (see Eror 262). We notice that the term "intertextuality" defines concealed characteristics of texts, while "citation" is presented as an obvious characteristic of texts. Once again we can stress that 'literary texts have always referred not only to reality (imit^atio vit^d), but also to previous other texts(imitation veterum)"8 (Pfister 210). What is, therefore, the fundamental distinction between "influence" and "intertextuality"?
The significant difference between the terms arises from the relationships to which the texts are subjected. An "influence" indicates every oneway effect of text A on text B, while "intertextuality" can be illustrated with a model of a dialogue (Bakhtin), indicating two-way interactions between texts A and B. The relationship between them is the following: "influence" implies the necessity of temporal sequence, while this is not a requirement of "intertextuality".
A very important characteristic of "influence" is causality: features in text B are the effect of a cause in text A (A being the primary text). Thus, "influence" links causality with the hierarchical superiority of the primary text. On the other hand, in "intertextuality" causality is deconstructed - text A is appropriated and/or implicated by text B.9
The difference between the two expressions originates from the understanding and research of methods that transfer elements (ideas, motifs, themes) from one text to another. An "influence" recognises the diversity and originality of text B, but in so doing does not analyse the process of how the newly arising text reworks elements of the original text. In this way, an author adapts foreign elements according to his needs, his literary work. Unlike "influence", "intertextuality" analyses all of the methods,
forms and functions that are taken by text A into text B. "Intertextuality" is primarily concerned with the reception of elements from the primary text (text A) in its new transformation (text B).
A very important distinction between "influence" and "intertextuality" is brought about by the relationship between the author and the readers. The author is not a "guarantee for an identity of text" anymore (from Roland Barthes onward); this role is taken over by the reader, who is de-subjec-tified.10 "Influence", on the other hand, tries to re-establish intersubjective relations: the author of text A influences the author of text B. We notice that in this case the "guarantee for an identity of the text" is the author.
A significant difference between both terms is often dependent upon a different view of the primary text (text A). With "influence" text A is "writing with a signature", meaning that we know the author of this literary work.11 A different aspect is revealed when we study "intertextual" literary work; in this case, text A can be anonymous codes, conventions, assumptions.12
The Shift from Author to Reader - the Beginning of a New Literary Paradigm
The terms "influence" and "intertextuality" define a particular mode of writing texts. At the same time, they analyse the role that the author and the reader have in a literary work. Along with the study of both concepts changes in the relationship author—work—reader appear, which represent the beginning of a new literary paradigm in literary science.
While traditional literary science was primarily concerned with the author, modern literary science has stressed the role of the literary work as a text.13 Thus Julie Kristeva understands "intertextuality" as a way of writing and not as much as a way of reading (see Rajan 61). Consequently, in Kristeva the reader does not possess a particular value, which indicates her interest in and treatment of the text itself (its originality is, however, already problematic — see note 9). In devoting attention only to the text, Kristeva overlooks one special characteristic of text: every text has active and passive intertextual relations. Passive intertextual relations are formed by a "historically and culturally different reader who situates what claims to be an autonomous representation of reality on the horizontal and vertical axes14 of its own intertextuality" (Rajan 69).
Studying "intertextuality" enables Kristeva a deeper insight into the structure and history of the text but at the same time, due to her narrow scope of research, her reflections on literature remain somewhat unrealised.
In contrast to Kristeva, Roland Barthes recognises the significance of the reader and therefore focuses his research on the study of the reader's role: Barthes's theory of "intertextuality" is therefore based on "the reader as the organizing center of interpretation" (Clayton and Rothstein 21). Thus the new literary paradigm places the third factor of the triad in the spotlight: the reader or receiver, along with his circumstances of reception. Barthes shifts the emphasis from the "writing subject" to the reader and his cultural identity.15 The significance of Barthes's work lies in emphasising the reader rather than the work.16 As he says: "A text's unity lies not in its origin but in its destination. Yet this destination cannot any longer be personal: the reader is without history, biography, psychology" (Barthes 23).
With Barthes declaration about "the death of the author" we witness the disappearance of the reader. According to Barthes, reading is therefore understood as a process that takes place "nowhere and to no one" (Rajan 73). The author sees a significant factor in anonymous citations, stereotypes, etc., which refer to (inter)textuality rather than to a person.
Michael Riffaterre follows this and defines "intertextuality" as "general characteristics of texts and their reception" (Juvan 143). Riffaterre thus limits the expression "intertextuality" to literature, for only through inter-textual links can we understand the meaning and particularities of texts. Riffaterre understands "intertextuality" as a "means of force" — with its aid the literary work guides the reader's interpretation of the text. Riffaterre demands that the text be read hermeneutically, because only this way does the literary text have a precisely defined meaning. With his study of reception, Riffaterre had an important influence on the theoreticians of the "Constance School", whose adherents dedicated their attention to the research of the reader's creative reading of the text. Amongst the most visible representatives of this school were Hans Robert Jauss and Wolfgang Iser.
In Jauss's view: "Der Sinn eines literarischen Werks ist nicht mit dem Werk selbst einfach gegeben, sondern konstituiert sich erst in der Rezeptionsgeschichte" (qtd. Bürger 139). His study of literature and the aesthetics of reception led Jauss to the following conclusion: the influenced author is always also a reader, and "influence" is therefore a special form of creative reception. The term "influence" is conditioned by the author's horizon of expectations, his social, existential and aesthetic needs, as well as his perceptions of national literature. In Jauss's opinion, the newly arising literary work can therefore "ein literarisches Werk kann Probleme voraufgegangene Werke aufnehmen und neue Lösungen vorschlagen, es wird von Zeitgenossischen Rezipienten im Rahmen bestimmter Erwartungen rezipiert (oder nicht rezipiert), und es kann über die Epoche seines Entstehens hinaus wirksam bleiben"17 (Bürger 140). At
this point, Jauss introduces the concept of the "horizon of expectation", including the communicative and social-formative function of art, i.e. the interrelations between work and reader: "The social function of literature manifests itself in its genuine possibility where the literary experience of the reader enters into the horizon of expectations of his lived praxis, performs his understanding of the world, and thereby also has an effect on his social behaviour" (Die Mythe 39). Moreover, "a literary work with an unfamiliar aesthetic form can break through the expectations of its readers and at the same time confront them with a question, the solution to which remains lacking for them in the religiously or officially sanctioned morals (Die Mythe 44). As we shall see, this questions posed in the literary works articulate the way of the human emancipation.
It is precisely in the process of reading that the "secluded reader"18 is enabled to become a "historical power". In this way, Jauss significantly modifies the role of the "secluded reader", because he represents him as an active link in the process of the beginning and formation of the literary work.
The Significance of Mediation in the Formation of the Literary Work
By using the terms "influence" and "intertextuality" we research various relationships between texts, and in so doing we must take into account the many factors that influence the formation of a new literary work. Here mediators19 play an important role (see Eror 214).
Translation is the most frequent agent for the extension and mediation of literary works between linguistic communities. Here we must pay attention to the fact that a translation can never entirely replace the original. Nonetheless, translations must preserve the essential characteristics and features of the original. Modifications made through many translations and adaptations influence the success of some literary works in the world. We should point out that with the term "mediation" we most frequently refer to the functioning of "a certain literature and its readers in another (linguistic) community including the writers in the role of readers"20 (Eror 221).
In his book Genetički vidovi inter(literarnosti), Gvozden Eror summarises Daniel-Henry Pageaux, stating that the mediator acts as a transporter of ideas and knowledge, disposing of a wide scope of literary genres, subgenres and forms (see Eror 218).
Mediation therefore enables ideas, themes and motives, as well as literary forms, styles and genres, to decant from one literary work to another, or to establish intertextual relations. The expression "mediation", there-
fore, occupies the central passage in the intertextual relation of two texts: text A - mediator (e.g., translation) - text B.
Thematology - the Dynamic of Motifs and Themes between Literatures
The meaning of the literary work is formulated with the help of other literary works. Motifs and themes are therefore not immanent components of one text, but are formed through interpretative treatments. This is why thematology is connected with the terms "influence" and "inter-textuality" in a special way. Every literary work has its own characteristics, but one literary work follows the original more precisely, and another less precisely.21 Marko Juvan distinguishes two types of citation perspectives: assimilation22 (in accordance with the source material) and dissimilation23 (a digression from and rejection of the source material).
Yves Chevrel ascertains that the myth is characterised by its ability to be modified through the centuries, staying at the same time the same story (see Chevrel 18). His thought leads us to the conclusion that literary works are ^"holders of myths" (as motifs, themes and materials24) because they take them over, set them forth and even give them their primary form. At the same time, however, our engagement with them is important for understanding the individual culture.
While Chevrel understands "myth" as "material" (German: "Stoff) for formation, Jauss's interpretation of myth is somewhat different. Thus Jauss recognises myth already in Genesis, where, in his opinion,
handelt es sich [^] zweifellos um eine Mythe, wenn darunter nicht nur eine denkwürdige geschichtliche Tat, sondern eine Erzählung verstanden wird, die ein Ereignis vor aller Geschichte verewigen soll, das in seinem Ausmass das Ganze der Welt betrifft, das Verhältnis des Menschen zu Gott einschliesst und eine elementäre Frage damit beantwortet, dass sie durch jenes anfängliche Ereignis ein für alle Mal vorentschieden worden sein. (Toward 26)
Therefore, the myth that is told by Genesis is, according to Jauss's definition, "antwortet offenbar in erster Linie auf die nahegelegte Frage, wie und um welchen Preis der Mensch das Wissen von Gut und Böse erlangt haben mag"25 (Toward 26).
Aber der erste Mensch ist noch nicht, was er erst warden soll: das 'animal quarerens cur'. Sieht man darin eine Bestimmung seiner zukünftigen Mündigkeit, so kommen ihm auf dieser Bahn seiner Emanzipation wenigstens drei gute Feen
zu Hilfe: die Philosophie, die Wissenschaft und [^] die ästhetische Erfahrung.
{Der fragende 551)
The path of emancipation leads from Adam to Job, more precisely, to the inter-relations between the main figures of the Book of Job.
Die Erzählung von der ersten Übertretung eines Gebots durch den ersten Menschen und ihren unabsehbaren Folgen antwortet offenbar in erster Linie auf die nahegelegte Frage, wie und um welchen Preis der Mensch das Wissen von Gut und Böse erlangt haben mag. Die grossen Fragen nach den Bedingungen des Menschlichen Daseins jenseits des Paradieses sollen gleichwohl allesamt mite in und derselben Antwort autoritativ zum Verstummen gebracht warden. Die lapidare Antwort von Gen. 3 hinterlässt indes den stärksten Anreiz, wei-terzufragen, sei es in dem legitimen Bedürfnis, zu erfahren, welcher Sinn denn nun dem menschlivhen Tun unter den verhängten Bedingungen zukommen soll, sei es in der illegitimen Neugier, Frage zu stellen, die von der mythischen Antwort unterdrückt werden, wie zum Beispiel: Warum hat Gott dem ersten Menschen gerade das Wissen von Gut und Böse vorenthalten? (^Toward 26-27)
In the continuation the article will demonstrate how particular exam-ples26 from world literature answer this question.
The Function of Question and Answer
Asking - posing questions and searching for their answers - is a fundamental principle that brings us to the path of understanding.27 The beginnings of asking are associated with overcoming the fears and horror with which humans are faced. Job's lamentations to God are certainly to be understood in this way: "Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul;Which long for death, but it cometh not; and dig for it more than for hid treasures" (Job 3:20-21). In the end, God's omnipotence and benevolence are revealed to the Old Testament patriarch; Job addresses God in chapter 42, verse 4, where he admits his own ignorance, on the one hand, and God's divine wisdom and inconceivability, on the other hand: "Hear, I beseech thee, and I will speak: I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me" (Job 42:4; my emphasis).
Bultmann's assertion — with which Jauss also agrees — is that "Verstehen ist kein kontemplativer Akt, in dem der Interpret nurmehr seine Subjektivität auslöschen und seinen geschichtlichen Standort vergessen müsste, um zu der objektiven Erkentniss einer Sache zu gelangen. Verstehen is stets an einer bestimmten Fragestellung, an einem 'Voraufhin der Befragung' orientiert und mithin vor einem Vorverständnis der Sache
geleitet, das in einem Interesse der Fragenden begründet ist" (Toward 468). The comprehension of a literary work is thus an active process that is directed through asking. Posing questions already indicates the expectations that an interpreter or reader has of a text. This is why expectations and prejudices participate in the formation of an interpretation/comprehension of an artistic work.
The Book oj Job foregrounds the problem of theodicy, according to which divine justice is concealed behind the cruel reality of the world. Theology, on the other hand, rejects human argumentation in favour of God and his (incomprehensible) deeds; furthermore, amongst other things it rejects the canon of justice and recurs to the irrational nespoznavnost of the God's will (see Jauss, Est^et^sko 271).
In the biblical text God asks the first question of Satan: "Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?"(Job 1:8). The question instantly indicates that the relationship between God and Job is that of a master and his subject, while at the same time also putting God's attitude towards Satan, one of "the sons of God", into the same relationship.
At this point it would make sense to pose the question as to what place Satan has here, and whether perhaps Satan at this very point becomes "a being which puts questions".28 Here the Bible highlights the role of Satan for the first time and raises him above the other angels by means of putting him in an equal dialogue with God. This can be clearly observed in his counter-question, which later on triggers a bet: "Doth Job fear God for nought?" (Job 1:9). Satan's fall, which is only hinted at in The Book of Job is thus in a certain sense linked to the beginning of asking. Therefore, Jauss is entirely justified in changing Satan's name from a common name to proper name.29
The Book of Job presents the central question of theodicy along the lines mentioned above: "Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul?" (Job 3:20). The Bible does not provide a precise answer to this question anywhere, but instead raises new questions about even more intrinsic relations between the God's will and the evil (see Jauss, Est^et^sko 273). The extensiveness of this questions is reflected in the conversations of Job's friends about guilt: "Who ever perished, being innocent? or where were the righhteous cut off?" (Job 4:7). From this line, one can draw the conclusion that everyone who suffers must be guilty of something. In the end Job also apparently accepts this conclusion: "If I be wicked, why then labour I in vain?" (Job 9:29).
The questions of evil and guilt that are raised in The Book of Job therefore remain unsolved and leave room for various interpretations.
Eccl^esiastes (1:18) links wisdom to pain and suffering: "For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow", but nevertheless "the desire for knowledge" still remains. In his Confessions, Augustine states that longing for knowledge and experience is the greatest of all temptations:
Beyond the lust of flesh there is in the soul a certain vain and inquisitive greed that works through all the senses	This greed cloaks itself in the name of
'research' and 'knowledge'. As this greed exists in the desire to become acquainted with things it is named in the Word of God the lust of the eyes'30 Pleasure pursues things that are beautiful, that sound or smell or taste agreeable, or are smooth to the touch; whereas curiosity seeks both these things and their opposite, wishing only to try them out, not driven by a desire to undergo the unpleasant sensation but by a lust for personal knowledge and acquaintance. (249)
The sin and punishment that arise from the desire for knowledge are best illustrated by the myth31 of Faust. Ziolkowski states that the first change in understanding of the myth of Faust was brought about by a work of an unknown author Historia von D. Johann Fausten, the Notorious Sorcerer and Nigromancer "Faust is driven initially by the desire of knowledge. In earlier stories it was simply assumed that Faust must be in league with the devil in order to gain his magical power" (Ziolkowski 56). In this work for the first time certain motifs emerge that are characteristic of later works: a pact with the Devil, signed in blood; the name of the devil (Mephisto); Faustus's desire to understand the basic elements on which the world is built, a task in which only Satan can help him, etc.
In the continuation we will see how these elements were taken over by Goethe and Thomas Mann in their masterpieces, we will link them to the Old Testament story of Job and see how they respond to the question raised about evil and guilt.
The influence of The Book of Job on Goethe's dramatic masterpiece Faust is above all evident in numerous key elements that form this pre-ro-mantic poem. Many researchers of Faust have drawn attention to the similarities of the prologue in heaven and The Book of Job. Both protagonists are innocent, as they do not know about the bet between God and Satan/ Mephisto. At the same time, one further detail should be pointed out: in both Faust and The Book of Job the Lord is above Satan and Mephisto. He is the one who sets the rules of the game — in The Book of Job Satan is only allowed to act in a limited way (Job must not die), whereas God allows Mephisto only as much "destructiveness, inasmuch as it is in benefit of man and thus whole mankind" (Janko 35).
It is also interesting that in both works God provokes Satan. As we have already observed, in The Book of Job God asks Satan a question: "Hast
thou considered my servant Job?" (Job 1:8). In Faust, too, one can see that it is God who asks about Faust: "Kennst du den Faust?" (Goethe 20). From their dialogue we can notice that "in this prologue God (Lord) and Mephisto are equal dialogue partners"32 (Križman 23). The same applies to the relationship between God and Satan in The Book of Job, as discussed above.
Further similarity between both books is also seen in the fact that God appoints Job/Faust as his servant. In The Book of Job this is even more evident than in Faust, where God says: "Mein Knecht!" (Goethe 20). Even if Faust serves God despite being "verworren", God is satisfied with him since "[e]s irrt der Mensch, solang er strebt" (Goethe 21). Through the latter words the reader can anticipate one of the possible answers to the theodicy question that emerges in The Book of Job.
Goethe's drama on humanity therefore offers an answer to the newly posed Mephistophelean question: This world - was it created for the good fortune of a human kind? (see Jauss, Est^et^sk^o 276). The answer to that question is given at the end of the drama, where Faust utters the following (for Mephisto fatal) words: "Im Vorgefühl von solchem hohen Glück / Genieß ich jetzt den höchsten Augenblick" (Goethe 515). Hasselbach's assertion that "bei Goethe [ist] der aus sträflicher Lebens- und Neugier handelnde Faust zum Wahrheitssucher geworden" (Hasselbach 41) corresponds to the views of Hans Robert Jauss: with Faust's fate the possibility of human self-fulfilment appears and with it also the concealed ideal of the created divine world (according to Jauss, Estet^sko 277), and because of this Faust can only find redemption in his infinite longing.
A new interpretation of a Faustian theme (as well new views of the problem of guilt and evil) is seen in the modernist33 work of Thomas Mann, Doctor Faustus?^ The notion of "sin" is placed in the framework of the idea of the self-responsible individual: "Im Faustus ist vorgeführt, wie sich die Idee des selbstverantwortlichen Individuums in allen Bereichen der bürgerlichen Kultur auflöst" (Hasselbach 44). Therefore, in the novel Satan never appears with a proper name, yet his origin does not remain unknown, since he describes himself with the words: ^'Wenn ich bin so kann ich nur Einer sein" (Mann 307). With these words the author depicts Satan's arrogance and presumptuousness, as such expressions are usually used to describe God and his all-embracing presence. The protagonist of the novel, Adrian Leverkühn, perceives him as a cunning man, which can be observed in their only dialogue (Chapter XXV).
In spite of this, Satan is present throughout the masterpiece in a quiet, and thus even more meaningful, way.
Thomas Mann — in a slightly comic manner — highlights another important quality of Satan: the dreadful chill surrounding him: "Könnt Ihr denn das Unwesen nicht abstellen, diesen eisigen Zug?! — Leider nicht. Es tut mir leid, dir hierin nicht gefällig sein zu können. Ich bin nun einmal so kalt" (Mann 309). Most likely Thomas Mann was influenced by Dante's depiction of hell, where Lucifer is surrounded by eternal ice. In Mann's novel Doctor Faustus cold metaphorically points to the lack of warmth between human beings and shows the state of the individual in contemporary society. Satan does not know love and mercy: for a long time he seduces Adrian to his path (for example with the prostitute). For that very reason Mann condemns him to eternal cold and to dreadful heat at the same time: "[I]hr Wesen [Wesen der Hölle] oder, wenn du willst, ihre Pointe ist, daß sie ihren Insassen nur die Wahl läßt zwischen extremer Kälte und einer Glut, die den Granit zum Schmelzen bringen könnte" (Mann 336).
Adrian's choice of profession has a decisive influence on his links to Satan, as "his journey into the depths of musical creativity is a journey into the ultimate profanity, into that which lies altogether outside language and which is beyond communication. In short, it is a journey into the demonic, a journey into hell. For hell has, like music, the quality of being unspeakable" (Pattison 9). The continuous seeking of perfection in his creations in the end drives Adrian to madness. The artist's illness meaningfully hints at the decay of the modern subject and his self-destruction, which is why Leverkühn's last work of art has the telling title: The Lamentation of Doctor Faustus.
The novel by the German novelist provides a different answer to the question of evil and guilt. Goethe's Faust finds a solution (he never fully satisfies his wishes), whereas Mann's Faust never finds one. As Hasselbach summarises: "die künstlerische Produktivität [ist] die Befriedigung seiner (Leverkühn's) irdischen Lust, und der Wahnsinn seine Strafe" (Hasselbach 42). "The possibility of human "self-fulfilment" (as indicated in Goethe's Faust), and consequently Leverkühn's salvation, remains unfulfilled, as the author — according to Theodor Ziolkowski — describes "the self-destructive course of Germany in the early twentieth century" (Ziolkowski 149).
According to Bloom's interpretation, every literary work is an incorrect interpretation of the original text, yet his assertion can not fully hold true for the literary works discussed. The Book of Job does not answer the theodicy question of evil and guilt, whereas Goethe and Mann engage in a search for possible solutions and offer them to the reader.
Conclusion
The article deals with processes that form a literary work. The analysis of three books (The Book of Job, and Goethe's and Mann's Faust) indicates how at least two significant literary processes interweave in these works: "influence" and "intertextuality". "Influence" appeared early in literature (we discussed the influence of Virgil's poetic style on Dante), but it is also noticeable in contemporary German literature (Thomas Mann modelled an image of hell according to Dante's 32nd canto of Inferno).
A more contemporary understanding of relationships between (literary) texts is "intertextuality". The term appeared for the first time in the works of Julie Kristeva, who pointed out that literary works complement each other and that we can only understand them properly with a good knowledge of the literary tradition. One form of intertextuality is citation, which appeared in the literature discussed in the title of Mann's novel Doktor Faustus?'^ At the same time, the novel can not be understand without reference to Historia von D. Johann Fausten, the notorious Sorcerer and Nigromancer, from which the author summarises all of the crucial elements (in this case we talk about extended intertextuality)
Research of literary works indicates that the reader's reception of a text essentially affects the comprehension of particular literary works (reception aesthetics). We looked closely at questions that originate in the reading of Job (questions of evil and guilt) and answers that are offered by Goethe (the possibility of the hero's salvation) and by Thomas Mann (Leverkühn's desire to succeed drives him to insanity). Both literary works offer dissimilar answers because of a differing understanding of the individual, who attains independence in Mann's novel (written in the middle of the 20th century) and thus becomes a self-sufficient subject, while in so doing jeopardising his own basis.
NOTES
1	The Holy Bible is quoted from the King James Version (1913).
2	In his poem Dante consciously takes recourse to Virgil, who was regarded in the Middle Ages as an authority in this field. From its beginning, the expression "authority" has been strongly connected with the term "auctor", as it indicates an author whose words are respected and valued (e.g., Cicero, Aristotle, Roman and Greek poets). Their works have thus gained in worth and efficacy, and in the Middle Ages the relationship between them and the world was allegorical. As Donald E. Pease ascertains: "to experience an event in allegorical terms was to transpose the event out of the realm of one's personal life into the realm of applicable authority. Following such a transposition, the event became impersonal" (Pease 106). With the discovery of the New World the meaning of "auctor" was lost — the "new man" appeared, who. in contradiction to the medieval "auctores" (whose
authority was based on God's revelation), named himself as the authority of his own words and wove part of his personality into his stories.
3	As Barthes states, medieval rhetoric was drawn from Cicero's and Quintilian's essays. In its discussions it dealt with ornaments and figures, "colors", and later also with poetics (artes versificatoriae); style was divided into the three types of ^'Virgil's cycle" (representing the figurative classification of three styles): gravis (sublime), humilis (plain/simple) and me-diocrus (middle); with regard to two types of ornaments, style is further divided into facile and difficile. For the sublime style medieval artists modelled themselves on Virgil's Aeneid, where the ruling warrior is foregrounded (Hector, Ajax, etc.); representative of the plain/ simple style is the idle herdsman, as found in Bucolics (Tityrus, Meliboeus); Georgics, with its narrative of the peasant (Triptolem), creates the middle style (Barthes 39—40).
4	In the first canto of the Aeneid, Virgil foretells the famous ascension of Julius Cesar ("Then Caesar from the Julian stock shall rise / Whose empire ocean, and whose fame the skies / Alone shall bound; whome, fraught with eastern spoils, / Our heaVn, the just reward of human toils, / Securely shall repay with rites divivne; / And incense shall ascend before his sacred shrine. / Then dire debate and impious war shall cease, / And the stern age be soften'd into peace" (Aeneid I, 468—474)) which influences the description of Christ's greatness in Dante's Comedy.
5	In the Divine Comedy, the influence of the Roman poet the most evident in the imitation of the epic (sublime) style. At the same time, Virgil's influence on Dante grows stronger, in the words of Colin Burrow, at the moment when Virgil abandons Dante at the end of Purgatory (Burrow 81).
6	Hegel understands world history as the progress of universal spirit through the elementary stages to absolute spirit. The essence of this progress is that the spirit is also aware of itself in the other existence and that he always retains identity with himself. World history is paralleled, in Hegel's opinion, by the history of individual forms of absolute spirit: art, religion and philosophy. The content of these three forms is the same (absolute spirit / truth / idea / God), they differ only in the manner of description of their object — the Absolute. In summary, we can say that Hegel observes sameness in variety (identity in differences).
As a method, Foucaulf s archaeology reveals an absence of sameness. The history of a concept, in the author's opinion, is not a history of its progressive improvement, but a history of its heterogeneous field of constitution and validity (see Foucault 1969). From this point of view, Foucault reveals that modern historiography functions with "creative corrigendum". One of the most significant traits of new history is, therefore, the removal of the discontinuous, which includes mutations, transformations, incisions and ruptures.
7	The author treats this in more detail in the discussion Semeiotike: Recherches pour une semanalyse (1969).
8	The authors or texts were proclaimed as authorities, and so their way of interpreting reality is taken as commonly valid.
9	It is necessary to point out that authority (of influence) therefore no longer functions as authority — the author or text that is used again in another text loses his/its authority.
10	The author, who, along with the reader, creates the vehicle for intertextuality is also de-subjectified.
11	We talk about the influence of Virgil's Aeneid on Dante's Divine Comedy.
12	The extreme example of this possibility is reference to nonexistent texts, mystifications, perhaps the most beautiful example of which is found in Borge's prose (e.g., in La
biblioteca de Babel).
13	When the text prevails in its intertextual structure and reception, the number of receptions multiplies to infinity and it is not necessarily for the text to be understood as a
(concluded) literary artwork/work: on the contrary, comprehension goes from "the work to the text" (Barthes); the text is no longer a concluded work - it becomes discourse. We notice, therefore, that we arrive at a transformation of the understanding of text: the 'literary artwork' thus here already becomes a problematic (and questionable) expression.
14	When imitating historical and social realities, the text (which is characterised by passive intertextuality) destroys both itself and the reality that it presents. Thus a gap arises between reality and imitation, in which the text can behave as "a reading and the object of its reading" (Rajan 68). A literary work formed in this way by intertextual relations thus encourages its own reading anew.
15	With identity is linked the autonomous consciousness of the individual, which is the source of all events and thinking. The concept of subjectivity deals with the relation between the individual and language; at the same time - by means of ideology, dialogue or language - the concept of subjectivity substitutes human nature with the concept of people. As ideology, dialogue and language are the decisive factors in constituting the identity of the individual, identity becomes a consequence of these factors and not the reason for them.
16	At the end of the 1960s, the field of philosophy underwent changes; one of the first philosophers to introduce these changes into his treatises was Hans-Georg Gadamer (Wahrheit und Methode; Truth and Method). According to him, the interpretation of any literary work is always predetermined by our preliminary understanding. He stresses that understanding is always historical and that prejudice — the interpreter's preliminary understanding — is something that can not be eliminated. Thus, in a certain way, the reader participates in the creation of the work, adding personal or historical subjectivity. In his work, Hans Robert Jauss has recourse to Gadamer, and in collaboration with Iser's aesthetics of effect establishes reception aesthetics. Roland Barthes, however, includes himself in the third methodological paradigm - the reader - with his essay "The Death of the Author" (1968).
17	Jauss's theoretical work Aesthetic Experience and Literary Hermeneutics (1998) discusses the functions of question and answer in the example of The Book of Job, as in his
opinion besides the three components of the hermeneutic process (understanding, interpreting and application) these functions have a decisive influence on the understanding of a literary work.
18	In Jauss's opinion ((Estetika 450), the reader does not stand just like a reading individuum, isolated in the social space; on the contrary, it is through the experience gained during reading that he participates in the communicative process. (ibid.)
19	From the point of view of the previous chapter, a mediator is not a subject, but simply a point where intertextuality takes place.
20	Eror understands the "interliterary" as an area with obvious terminological similarities. In his opinion, we can therefore observe, for example, that the word "plagiat" (English: plagiarism) in every language indicates a small group with an equivalent, but not synonymous, Latin stem.
21	Here it is again necessary to stress that an "influence" (as in Bloom's definition mentioned above) represents a creative correction of an earlier work on the basis of its incorrect interpretation.
22	John Milton predominantly uses the assimilative perspective in Paradise Lost, a poem that is a biblical tale of the banishment from paradise based on the Holy Bible.
23	Dissimilation, or a total deviation from the biblical tale, is observed in the work by Isolde Kurz, Die Kinder der Lilith.
24	In Genesis the myth of the creation is connected with the motifs of paradise lost, forbidden fruit and the desire for knowledge (Gn 3,5: in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil"). These motifs
are of crucial significance for all of the subsequent treatments of this myth (Milton: Paradise Lost, etc.)
25	In connection with this, in Paradise Lost Milton ascertains that the first great realisation should be "seem I to thee sufficiently possessed / Of happiness, or not, who am alone / from all eternity? for none I know /Second to me or like, equal much less. / How have I, then, with whom to hold converse, / Save with the creatures which I made, and those / To me inferior, infinite descents / Beneath what other creatures are to thee?" (Paradise Lost VIII: 404—411) (Milton 2003 208)
26	The problem of evil will be addressed in the case of The Book of Job, which raises some questions to which we will seek answers in Goethe's masterpiece Faust and Mann's novel Doktor Faustus.
27	In Genesis (Gn 1-3) only God has the right to ask, Adam being in the role of a servant. Adam becomes an equal partner in the dialogue only when he rises from his role of servant into a position equal to God: thus Adam opposes God and is consequently exiled from paradise.
28	In the Bible, Satan has many synonyms: most frequently he is referred to as "snake", "satan/Satan", "devil", while writers also use the synonym Lucifer in reference to him. "Satan" denotes the fallen angel, the rebel and the tempter — Satan as a proper name is used for the first time in the Bible in the First Book of Kings (1 Kings); "a satan" as a common name may denote a rebellion of an angel of God, but in such cases Satan's acts are still within the framework of God's actions and plans (as is evident in The Book of Job: 2, 1).
The name Lucifer means "Light-Bringer" — writers perceived Satan as one of God's sons/angels, but Dante already uses this name to depict a rebellion in heaven and Satan's final defeat (Inf^erno XXXI, 142).
29	The change from a common name to a proper name in Jauss's work is not as obvious as it is in Slovene and English translations because of a particularity of German grammar.
30	At this point, Augustine uses the expression curiositas, for which the Slovenian translation — radovednost — is not entirely suitable. The word originates from the Latin word cura ("care") and therefore curiositas is the opposite of carefreeness. In antiquity, the expression had a negative connotation, and for this reason the motif of punished curiosity is often present in the literature of the time (e.g., Apuleius: Lucius and the Donkey in Metamorphoseis).
31	The Faustian myth developed in a different manner than other myths (the creation of the world, Prometheus, etc.), as it is based on the life of a real person. According to the facts, he was born around 1480 and was of ill repute. He was also known as a sodomite and a magician (see Ziolkowski 43— 49).
32	This is only a seeming equality, which appears on the level of the dramatic-dialogic form. In the form of an exchange of messages it is, in fact, created by God; he starts the conversation and sets "the rules of the game".
33	Thomas Mann's novel Doctor Faustus was written in 1947 and belongs to the period of modernism, yet it evidently also comprises certain preoccupations of the expressionist movement and its literary innovations. According to Thomas Anz, expressionist works from the 1920s are characterised by a vision/utopia of a better world and a new man (a consequence of WW I), and later also by "Erfahrungen der Ohnmacht und Orien-tierungslosigkeit, der Isolation und Entfremdung, des Ekels und der Angst" (Anz 135). These are also the qualities of Mann's hero, Adrian Leverkühn.
34	Mann bases his novel on the literary work Historia from the 16th century, and not on the Goethe's dramatic poem Faust.
35	Mann quotes the title of Goethe's literary masterpiece (Latin "Faustus"), even though he does not actually take recourse to the work in his novel.
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