’n Aspek van intertekstualiteit in die poesie van Breytenbach: Francois Villon en die Middeleeuse Franse literere tradisie.

Abstract

Apart from biographical correlations marking the poetry of Breyten Breytenbach and Francois Villon (imprisonment and exile) there is an ongoing intertextual dialogue between the two authors on which this article focusses. Thematic correlations indicate that both oeuvres link up with the age-old literary tradition of the ubi sunt and the danse macabre. Stylistic correlations, such as word-play, the polyvalent nature of the text and the use of paradox as creative principle appear to be symptomatic of the existential insecurity characterizing historically and culturally transitional periods. This implies inter alia that the parallel between the two oeuvres is not merely anecdotal, but that the Breytenbach discourse has validity in a context far broader than South Africa and ties in with a universal literary tradition where master data of the text unfold in a wholly different dimension than a first level meaning might suggest.