Epigraphs:NotesTowardaTheory

I t may be t rue , as the cr i t i c WayneC . Booth has

observed, that ep igraphs and t i t les assumea

part icu lar importance in modern is t wr i t ing ,

where " . . . . they are o f ten the on ly exp l ic i t

commentary the reader i s g iven . . . . " A l l the

same, they are hokey; one more b i t o f w indow‐

dress ing before weget to the goods .

John Barth , "Ep igraphs ," The Fr iday Book

(quoted f romJ . B . : "Ep igraphs ," in The Fr iday Book)

Though co l lect ing quotat ions cou ld be cons idered as mere ly an i ron ic

mimet ism . . . i t was [Walter ] Ben jamin 's conv ic t ion rea l i ty i t se l f

inv i ted—andv ind icated—theonce heed less , inev i tab ly destruct ive

min is t rat ions o f the co l lector . In a wor ld that i s we l l on i t s way to

becoming one vast quarry , the co l lector becomes someoneengaged

in a p ious work o f sa lvage . The course of modern h is tory hav ing

a l ready sappedthe t rad i t ions and shattered the l iv ing whole in which

prec ious ob jects once foundthe i r p lace , the co l lector may now in good

consc ience go about excavat ing the cho icer , more emblemat ic

f ragments .

Susan Sontag , On Photography

Whydoes i t make us uneasy to knowthat the

map i s w i th in the mapand the thousand and

one n ights are w ith in the book of A Thousand

and OneN ights? Whydoes i t d i squ iet us to

knowthat Don Quixote i s a reader o f the

Quixote , and Hamlet i s a spectator o f Hamlet? I

be l ieve I have foundthe answer : those

invers ions suggest that i f the characters in a

s tory can be readers or spectators , then we,

The Collected Works of David Lavery 2

the i r readers or spectators , can be f i c t i t ious . In 1833 Car ly le observed

that un iversa l h is tory i s an in f in i te sacred book that a l l menwr i te and

read and t ry to understand, and in which they too are wr i t ten .

Jorge Lu is Borges , "Part ia l Enchantments o f the Quixote"

I

In John Barth 's The Fr iday Book , a co l lect ion of the occas iona l wr i t ings o f that

qu intessent ia l modern is t , we f ind , as part o f the book 's protracted f ront matter

(which inc ludes—in typ ica l Barth ian fash ion—select ions ent i t led "The T i t le o f Th is

Book," "The Subt i t le o f Th is Book," an "Author 's In troduct ion ," in add i t ion to the

usua l "Tab le o f Contents" ) , a sect ion ent i t led "Ep igraphs ." I t i s not , o f course ,

unusua l for an author to inc lude a s ign i f i cant quotat ion or twoas a pre lude to the

text to fo l low. But Barth 's "Ep igraphs" are not typ ica l .

They beg in , in medias res , w i th an e l l ips i s :

. . . shou ld be avo ided. There i s someth ing hokey about an ep igraph,

even a s t ra ight forward ep igraph: a posture of awebefore somepa l impsest ic

Other Text ; a k ind of rhetor ica l a t t i tud in iz ing .

An ep igraph which argues that ep igraphs shou ld not be used ( la ter in a footnote

Barth o f course cr i t i c i zes the use of footnotes) i s obv ious ly se l f ‐ re ferent ia l , but

Barth 's ha l l o f mirrors does not s top there . The ep igraph goes on to der ide ep igraphs

as "one more b i t o f w indow‐dress ing before weget to the goods" ( see the ep igraph

above) . Ep igraphs , we are to ld , on ly remind the reader that "he might better spend

h is t ime" with the "super ior author" whopennedthe ep igraph rather than with the

author o f the text i t se l f . Thus ep igraphs become"ta i l s that wag the i r dogs , but f rom

in f ront , l i ke an awkward f igure of speech." Barth 's appendedquotat ion i ron ica l ly

s ing les out for spec ia l c r i t i c i sm"comic i ron ic ep igraphs ."

A secondep igraph goes on to in formus that the on ly th ing worse than a

s ing le ep igraph i s "a brace of ep igraphs , espec ia l ly whenthe second i s employed in

Tanta l i z ing I ron ic Counterpo int to the f i r s t , as i t a lmost a lways w i l l be ," and judges

themto be annoy ing and need less " throat c lear ings and instrument tun ings" which

on ly prevent the author f romgett ing on with the work at hand.

Nows ince the source of these ep igraphs , we are in formed, i s " J . B . :

'Ep igraphs , ' in The Fr iday Book" (a f ter the secondep igraph, Barth mere ly p laces an

The Collected Works of David Lavery 3

" Ib id" ) , we must o f course judge Barth h imse l f to be gu i l ty o f many of the fau l ts the

ep igraphs themselves name: o f employ ing ep igraphs in the f i r s t p lace , o f us ing

comic‐ i ron ic ep igraphs , o f o f fer ing a "brace of ep igraphs ," o f de lay ing gett ing on

with the s tory . And yet he cannot be accused of postur ing in awebefore "a super ior

author"! A l l in a l l , these Mobius‐s t r ip ep igraphs , l i ke a double negat ive , add up to a

pos i t ive test imony in favor o f the i r use , whatever the i r words exp l ic i t ly say . These

are ep igraphs which b i te the i r ta i l .

When I f i r s t d iscovered Barth 's p layfu l exerc ise , before I rea l i zed the i r

humorous intent , I was momentar i ly taken aback , indeed insu l ted . In fact , I took h is

seeming cr i t i c i smof ep igraphs qu i te persona l ly . As an inveterate user myse l f , I

w inced at h is compla ints aga inst themand wondered i f I was not myse l f gu i l ty to

somedegree of the postur ing he d iscerns in the obsess ive ep igrapher . When I

g radua l ly rea l i zed that Barth was g iv ing back with one hand what he was tak ing away

with the other , I fe l t somewhat better about mycraf t . But the need to defend

myse l f , and in so do ing to exp la in myse l f , remained.

The fo l lowing thoughts might a l so have been ca l led "The Confess ions o f an

Ep igraph Addict ." Though myu l t imate mot ives are theoret ica l , these "notes toward a

theory ," however whims ica l they may seem, shou ld be understood as wel l as part ly

apo log ia . For myownobsess ion with the ep igraph—I nowf ind i t very d i f f i cu l t to

wr i te an essay , or even a poem, without beg inn ing with severa l—has , to mysurpr ise ,

insp i red many a sarcast ic comment (not un l ike Barth 's compla ints ) f rommy

co l leagues , and I would thus l ike to take th is opportun i ty to engage in a formof

d iscourse wemight ca l l "ep igraphy"1 to v ind icate myse l f aga inst myaccusers .

I I

I have of ten joked with f r iends about s tart ing a profess iona l ep igraph serv ice .

P lac ing ads (or "author 's not ices" ) in The Chron ic le o f H igher Educat ion , PMLA,

Wr i ter ' s Market , Publ i sher ' s Week ly , and The NewYork T imes Book Rev iew , I would

then of fer myserv ices to f ind the proper ep igraph (or ep igraphs) for that a lmost ‐

complete scho lar ly ar t ic le about to be sent out to a target journa l . Or , for a much

larger fee , I would orchestrate the ep igraphs for an ent i re book, w i th spec ia l rates

1The word "ep igraphy," o f course , or ig ina l ly re ferred to the h is tor ica l s tudy of

inscr ipt ions appear ing on monuments or ru ins , but i t would seemto be the proper name for the act iv i ty in which I amengaged here .

The Collected Works of David Lavery 4

for the complete package: ep igraphs for the f ront isp iece , parts , chapters , and

sect ions .

I would promise to f ind , a f ter actua l ly hav ing read the art ic le or book in

quest ion , the exact ly r ight "short quotat ion or p i thy sentence p laced at the

commencement o f a work , a chapter , e tc . to ind icate the lead ing idea or sent iment"

( I amquot ing the OEDdef in i t ion) to serve as a br idge and/or extrapo lat ion f romthe

exact ly r ight t i t le to the about‐ to‐ fo l lowappropr iate introduct ion . Myguarantee to

subscr ibers would promise that the quotat ion(s ) prov ided would do what every good

ep igraph shou ld . They would act as mottoes , prepar ing the reader for the text to

fo l low, pav ing the way for the author 's thes is , or announc ing the mind‐set w i th

which the pages ahead shou ld be read. I f asked to supp ly themfor an ent i re book, I

would see to i t that they showthe i r owndeve lopment , the i r ownr i s ing act ion ,

c l imax , and denouement , echo ing , enhanc ing , counterpo int ing , and fu l f i l l ing one

another in a ver i tab le fugue. Myep igraphs would be more that " throat ‐c lear ings"

and " instrument‐ tun ings ." Myep igraphs would have resonance.

No doubt there i s a need for such a serv ice . A f ter a l l , a co l league of mine was

recent ly asked by a un ivers i ty press , to which he had submitted a book manuscr ipt

for cons iderat ion , to f ind ep igraphs for h is chapters pr ior to i t s i s su ing a contract for

the book. The press 's readers had recommendedthe book for pub l icat ion , but not

unt i l i t had ep igraphs!

Myconsu l t ing serv ice would be espec ia l ly appea l ing to l i terary c r i t i cs . For my

market research c lear ly ind icates the use of ep igraphs i s on the r i se among th is

segment o f the populat ion . Both the o ld guard and the avant‐garde use them

l ibera l ly . M. H . Abramsand Frank Kermode, for example , would not th ink o f do ing

without them. Both usua l ly beg in a chapter w ith severa l ( somet imes no less than ha l f

a dozen in Natura l Supernatura l i sm and an equa l number in The Sense o f an End ing ) .

The works o f Gaston Bache lard , to c i te another example , would lose

much of the i r d is t inct iveness w ithout h is ec lect ic and of ten en igmat ic

mottoes , drawn f romh is w ide read ing in the poetry o f severa l

languages .

The Collected Works of David Lavery 5

And Jacques Derr ida , not surpr is ing ly , i s an inveterate ep igrapher ,

though h is quotat ions , l i ke h is ownprose , are o f ten unreadab le and

p lead for deconstruct ion themselves .

Every t rendy art ic le or book shou ld certa in ly have ep igraphs . Ass is tant

professors would be wise to master the art in order to he lp thembreak into the

pages o f the prest ig ious journa ls but , fa i l ing that , they can a lways re ly on meto

supp ly the correct , c lever , eye‐opening ep igraphs necessary to get the i r work

not iced . Hav ing mastered many of the nuances o f the art , I o f ten look on d ismayed at

the amateur ishness , the c lass ic mistakes , o f other , na ive ep igraphers : a t ep igraphs

which are bor ing and unent ic ing ; a t books which use ep igraphs for somechapters but

not for a l l ( thereby v io lat ing the reader 's need for symmetry and pour ing co ld water

on h is or her a l ready aroused ep igraph ica l expectat ions) ; a t authors whorefuse to

exp lore the end less poss ib i l i t ies o f ep igraphs at a l l , o r ep igraphers who l im it

themselves , w i th excess ive t id iness , to on ly one quotat ion whenobv ious ly there

ex is ts , in th is Borges ian un iverse o f ours , an in f in i te number o f poss ib le ep igraphs

for any essay , chapter , or book.

Myc l iente le would not be l im ited to academics however . Many t rade non‐

f ic t ion works—fromMar i lyn Ferguson 's The Aquar ian Consp i racy to Car l Sagan 's

Cosmos and Fr i t jo f Capra 's The Tao of Phys ics ( to namebut a few, chosen at

random)—also use ep igraphs prominent ly , o f ten qu i te creat ive ly . But sure ly not a l l

the authors o f these pro l i ferat ing , t rendy, "NewAge" books—onthe newphys ics and

Eastern wisdom, or consc iousness ra is ing , or futuro logy , or b io feedback , or space

exp lorat ion—find the numerous ep igraphs which decorate the i r pages themselves .

Sure ly both pub l i sher and author would need myexpert ass i s tance .

I m ight even make myserv ices ava i lab le , I suppose , to c reat ive wr i ters as

wel l , those who, in the t rad i t ion of T . S . E l io t , have rea l i zed that an ep igraph ica l

a l lus ion (perhaps in Lat in ) a t the beg inn ing of an obscure poemor s tory i s abso lute ly

de r igger . 2

2A favor i te example of a recent l i terary ep igraph: a co l lect ion of Woody

A l len 's wonderfu l short p ieces bears the t i t le Without Feathers , an en igmat ica l cho ice unt i l we d iscover the book 's ep igraph ( f romEmi ly D ick inson) : "Hope i s the th ing with feathers ." A l len 's t i t le thus consp i res w ith h is ep igraph to he lp lay the foundat ion for the book 's character i s t ic comic pess imism. Obv ious ly Mr. A l len wi l l not need to employ myagency .

The Collected Works of David Lavery 6

Myqua l i f i cat ions for mastermind ing such a serv ice are c lear . A f ter a l l , I have

been a fanat ic quotat ion gatherer for years , keeper o f a commonplace book which

nowf i l l s three , three hundred page Ch inese d iar ies , s tu f fer o f a ha l f ‐dozen

shoeboxes o f 3 x 5 notecards on each of which appears a p i thy quote ( I se ldomseem

to take notes , or to paraphrase , but on ly to quote)—each long ing to be someone's

ep igraph. In a sense , I read in order to search for l i ke ly quotat ions and ama lways

de l ighted when I d i scover a book fu l l o f ep igraph ica l potent ia l , wh ich I then set

about gutt ing .3And I pract ice what I preach , o f course , expert ly us ing ep igraphs in a l l

my ownwr i t ing . A f ter read ing a pub l i shed essay o f mine , which synerg is t ica l ly

combined quotat ions f romAdr ienne R ich and the Tao Te Ch ing , an astute co l league

commented that a l l my essays seemto have the i r incept ion , the i r insp i rat ion , in my

ep igraphs , as i f I wrote the essays themselves to fu l f i l l the i r ep igraphs ' potent ia l .

(Would i t surpr ise you to knowthat when, as an undergraduate , I read Moby‐D ick , I

ident i f ied not w ith Capta in Ahab or w ith I shmael , but w ith that " la te consumpt ive

usher to a grammar school" whogathered those ten pages o f ep igraphs concern ing

whales ca l led "Etymology" which precede that s tupendous nove l? Were he s t i l l a l ive ,

I would make a h ima fu l l partner in myep igraph serv ice . )

Pr ior to open ing mydoors , o f course , I would need to input (and complete ly

c ross ‐ indexed) myowncommonplace books into a computer , and mybook she lves at

the company of f ice would need to be f i l led with the proper re ference l ibrary :

Bart let t ' s , the Penguin D ic t ionary o f Modern Quotat ions , Se ldes ' The Great Ideas ,

Auden 's A Certa in Wor ld , The Oxford Book of Aphor isms , and the l ike . But th is work

would be a labor o f love , and of course I ownmost o f these books a l ready .

I would love to share with you a l l o f my ins ights in to ep igraphy, in the hope

that I m ight prevent you f romgo ing astray in the future , but to do so would be to

pu l l the rug out f romunder myown future smal l bus iness enterpr ise . I don ' t want to

d isc lose a l l my t rade secrets I w i l l have to l im it mycomments to a fewmodest

observat ions on the s tate o f the art . I w i l l be content i f I manage to shed l ight on the

t rue meaning of the ep igraph.

I have d iscovered that I amnot a lone in th is preoccupat ion: the great Germancr i t i c Walter Ben jamin was s imi lar ly obsessed. H is f r iend Hannah Arendt has observed that "noth ing was more character i s t ic o f h im in the th i r t ies than the l i t t le notebooks w ith b lack covers which he a lways carr ied with h imand in which he t i re less ly entered in the formof quotat ions what da i ly l i v ing and read ing netted h imin the way of 'pear ls ' and 'cora ls . ' On occas ion he read thema loud, showedthemaround l ike i tems f roma cho ic and prec ious co l lect ion ." For Susan Sontag 's exp lanat ion of Ben jamin 's mot ives , see the secondep igraph at the head of the present essay .

The Collected Works of David Lavery 7

I I I

Whydoes an author use an ep igraph? When I f i r s t learned the art , my mot ives

were s imple : I w ished to impress my teachers . When I put that quote f rom

Dosto ievsk i a t the head of mypaper on Moby‐D ick , I hoped myAmer ican l i terature

professor would th ink , pr ior to read ing mysophomor ic thoughts on "metaphys ica l

rebe l l ion" in the nove l , that the paper had been wr i t ten by a qu i te erud i te

undergraduate . Myep igraph was thus both a boast and a s ignature ; i t would , I

hoped, beg the quest ion of the d is t inct iveness o f a qu iet s tudent 's mind. Certa in ly

the rat iona le for myundergraduate ep igraphs a lso l ies beh ind many a sophomor ic

scho lar ly ep igraph today . Ep igraphs are o f ten used pedant ica l ly to spec ia l p lead in

advance for the author 's w ide read ing . ( I , o f course , have outgrownsuch

pretent iousness . )

A secondposs ib le mot ive : authors o f ten use quotat ions out o f context in

ep igraphs as arguments‐ f rom‐author i ty on the beha l f o f the i r own, about‐ to‐be‐

presented thes is . When James H i l lman ( in Re‐V is ion ing Psycho logy ) quotes f rom

Wi l l iamBut ler Yeats ' "Sa i l ing to Byzant ium"—"man i s but a pa l t ry th ings ,/A tat tered

coat upona s t ick , un less/Sou l c lap i t s hands and s ing . . . "—the reader , he

presumes, w i l l in fer that Yeats has thereby sanct ioned the very spec ia l meaning the

archetypa l psycho log is t w i l l la ter breathe into the word "sou l . "

A b latant , and reprehens ib le , example of such a pract ice comes to mind. An

astrophys ic i s t namedT . A . Heppenheimer uses the fo l lowing l ines f romE l iot ' s "L i t t le

G idd ing" ( in Four Quartets ) as an ep igraph to Towards D is tant Suns , a book‐ length

paean to space exp lorat ion and co lon izat ion:

Wesha l l not cease f romexp lorat ion

And the end of a l l our exp lor ing

Wi l l be to arr ive where wes tarted

And knowthe p lace for the f i r s t t ime.4

NowHeppenheimer intends , o f course , that we interpret E l io t ' s poet ic v i s ion as

support for h is ownextraterrestr ia l ambit ions : man's t rue home, h is p lace of or ig in ,

4These part icu lar l ines may wel l be the most "ep igraphed in a l l modern

l i terature . I have seen themquoted as ep igraphs in at least a dozen books and art ic les in the last f ive years .

The Collected Works of David Lavery 8

weare supposed to th ink , i s in fact the cosmos. In h is zea l to support h is argument

w ith prefatory ev idence , thus imply ing that both s ides in the war betweenthe " two

cu l tures" are at least in agreement about chas ing a f ter d is tant suns , Heppenheimer

bad ly misreads , indeed betrays , E l io t ' s very Chr is t ian and earthboundwisdom, as the

l ines which fo l lowthose he does quote—descr ib ing the g lor ies o f " the last o f earth

le f t to d iscover"—clear ly show. But Heppenheimer , whoprobab ly foundE l iot ' s words

a l ready quoted—out of context—in a book of toastmaster 's quotat ions and not in the

actua l poem, ev ident ly d id not expect that an Eng l i sh professor would be read ing h is

text and b lowing the cover o f f h is fa l lac ious ep igraphy.

Yet a th i rd , re lated , mot ive i s d iscern ib le . As Haro ld B loomhas chron ic led for

us ad nauseum, wr i ters suf fer f romthe "anx iety o f in f luence ," and th is i s , I suppose ,

as t rue of scho lars as i t i s o f poets . Compuls ive ep igraph ing (not to ment ion

compuls ive footnot ing) may thus be the resu l t o f a bad dose of such anx iety . A fra id

o f speak ing for themselves , scho lars o f ten resort to ep igraphs in order to estab l i sh

up f ront the i r ped igree , to showthey are not a lone in th ink ing as they do , to evoke

precedent for the i r somet imes dub ious pass ions . Whereas ,

accord ing to B loom, every poet seeks to pretend he i s not

p lay ing ventr i loqu is t ' s dummyto the vo ice o f a greater poet ic

fa ther in the t rad i t ion , scho lars , however , seemto embrace

that vo ice whenthey a l low i t a homeat the beg inn ing of the i r

text in an ep igraph.

Ep igraphs may a lso prove to be creat ive in the i r own

r ight , o f fer ing ins ights which cou ld be comeupon in no other

way. In Susan Gr i f f in 's Womanand Nature : The Roar ing Ins ide

Her , a rad ica l femin is t re ‐ read ing of the Western inte l lectua l t rad i t ion , the author 's

juxtapos i t ion of ep igraphs i s centra l to her unusua l modeof inqu iry . For example , a t

the top of a sect ion ent i t led "Terr i tory" (which dea ls w i th the conquer ing of the

"v i rg in land" o f the Amer ican cont inent) , she br ings together quotat ions f romthree

seeming ly d isparate sources : 1 ) the inventor o f the specu lum, 2 ) a patr i s t ic

theo log ian , and 3) S i r Walter Ra le igh :

I saweveryth ing as no manhad ever seen before . . . I fe l t l i ke an exp lorer in

medic ine who f i r s t v iews a newand important terr i tory .

Mar ion S ims, M.D. (on the invent ion of the specu lum)

The Collected Works of David Lavery 9

Cons ider H imwhochose to be born of a v i rg in . . . . F ree ly he penetrates

v i scera knownon ly to H imse l f and with greater joy enters paths where none

has ever been. These l imbs , He fee ls , a re H is own: unso i led and unshared by

any man. . . .

Fortunatus (b ishop of Po i t iers 530‐609) , Opera Poet ica

. . . a countrey that hath yet her maydenhead, never sakt , turned. nor

wrought .

S i r Walter Ra le igh , "D iscovery o f Gu iana"

The reader i s immediate ly s t ruck by the pattern of sex ism—theub iqu i tous metaphor

o f the wor ld o f knowledge as a v i rg in female in medic ine , theo logy , geography—

revea led by the meet ing of these quotat ions . In th is case ep igraphs have becomefor

Gr i f f in a revea l ing means of psychohis tor ica l exp lorat ion .

Whatever the rat iona le for the i r use , i t seemsc lear that ep igraphs are now

very much " in"—aminor but revea l ing passage in the labyr inth of post ‐modern is t

l i terature—andour c r i t i ca l understand ing wi l l l i kewise need to deve lop i f we are to

comprehendthe meaning of th is evo lv ing subtext (or shou ld I say "ep i text"? ) .

IV

Have you not iced that ep igraphs f romDerr ida , Foucau l t , Lacan , et a l a re very

much the order o f the day? In the 1970s Derr ida was a v i s i t ing professor at mya lma

mater . S ince then, I have du ly noted, the scho lar ly ar t ic les o f a number o f i t s facu l ty

are headedwith ep igraphs f romthe arch‐boa‐deconstructor (as Geof f rey Hartman

has ca l led h im) , in one instance fo l lowedby an introductory paragraph which began

( i f memory serves mer ight ) , "As Jacques Derr ida sa id to me . . . " Obv ious ly my

former professors knowvery wel l howto get pub l i shed in these days when"the

French d isease" ( the term—andthe insu l t—is James H i l lman 's ) a f f l i c ts the scho lar ly

estab l i shment .

Or cons ider the example of a recent ar t ic le on movie mus ica ls which featured

a quotat ion f romFoucau l t ( someth ing about the incapac i ty o f language for captur ing

rea l i ty ) fo l lowedby a comparab le observat ion f romA l Jo lson in The Jazz S inger : "You

a in ' t heard noth ing yet ." Thereby imply ing , or so I fe l t f ree to in fer , that Foucau l t ' s

ins ights are not that or ig ina l a f ter a l l . Such a use of what Barth ca l l s "comic‐ i ron ic

ep igraphs" ca l l s to mind the rad ica l juxtapos i t ion of d isparate th ings which

The Collected Works of David Lavery 10

surrea l i smhad patented. "As beaut i fu l as the chance encounter o f a sewing mach ine

and an umbre l la on a d issect ing tab le ," wrote Lautreamont in Maldoror . Miche l

Foucau l t meets A l Jo lson i s a no less s t range encounter . But the art ic le was pub l i shed

in a good journa l , and I suspect that i t s s t r ik ing ep igraphs had much to do with i t s

appearance there .

Another s t r ik ing ep igraph ica l techn ique—andan emerg ing t rend in the

genre—is to leave the ep igraph un ident i f ied , even in a footnote . A var iat ion on the

o ld E l io t s t ratagemof leav ing the Lat in or Greek untrans lated , th is gambit , o f course ,

sets us to wonder ing about the ident i ty o f the ep igraph 's author and not

concentrat ing very much on the text a t hand. A permutat ion of

th is techn ique might , o f course , be an un ident i f ied quotat ion

in a fore ign language—thebest o f both wor lds . Other

permutat ions are l ike ly to becomecommon: f i c t iona l

ep igraphs , for example , as p ioneered a l ready by Borges and

Doug las Hofstadter , a re an emergent t rend. Or perhaps

ep igraphs in which an author quotes h imse l f . . .

As an ep igraph to h is Where the Waste land Ends ,

Theodore Roszak quotes Ephes ians 6 : 12 : "For our content ion i s not w ith the f lesh

and b lood, but domin ion and author i ty , w i th the wor ld ‐ru l ing powers

o f th is dark age , w i th the sp i r i t o f ev i l in th ings heaven ly ." Certa in ly

ep igraph ica l quotat ion f romthe NewTestament i s noth ing new. But

Roszak appends a note a f ter h is c i tat ion which reads : "quoted by

Wi l l iamB lake on the t i t le page of Vala . " Thus Roszak intends h is

ep igraph to be a double a l lus ion—tothe b ib le and to the Romant ic

v i s ionary—thereby summoning the support o f both for Roszak 's

about‐ to‐unfo ld exp lorat ion of "Po l i t i cs and Transcendence in Post ‐

Industr ia l Soc iety ."

The reference induces a k ind of in te l lectua l vert igo , however , s imi lar to what

we fee l in read ing Barth 's ep igraphs , but a l l the more perp lex ing for i t s seeming lack

o f se l f ‐consc iousness . For the thought occurs : what i f I were to nowuse Roszak 's

(B lake 's [Ephes ian] ) ep igraph as an ep igraph in an essay o f myown—this one for

example? Would I not then have to note that the quotat ion had been used by Roszak ,

and thus make i t Lavery 's (Roszak 's [B lake 's {Ephes ian} ] ) ep igraph? Fromsuch an

i l lusory ha l l ‐o f ‐mirrors there may be no escape. I t was inev i tab le , I suppose that

The Collected Works of David Lavery 11

epigraphs in our t imewould—l ike the nove l , f i lm, and drama—becomese l f ‐

re ferent ia l , oroboro ic . Are not ep igraphs about to beg in b i t ing the i r ownta i l s?

But the oppos i te tendency—away f rom invers ion and toward complete

autonomy for the ep igraph—cana lso be observed. Af ter a l l , Walter Ben jamin , Susan

Sontag in forms us , had env is ioned ha l f a century ago a work o f c r i t i c i smwhich would

"cons is t ent i re ly o f quotat ions , and would thereby be devo id o f anyth ing that might

betray empathy ." The work was never completed , but the insp i rat ion remains , for

here l ies yet another poss ib le newd i rect ion: such a work , a f ter a l l , would be pure

ep igraph, do ing away with the need less bothersometask o f c reat ing a text .

And yet , i f Car ly le/Borges i s correct , i f "un iversa l h is tory i s an in f in i te sacred

book that a l l menwr i te and read and t ry to understand, and in which they too are

wr i t ten ," the art o f the ep igraph, whatever metamorphoses i t undergoes , remains a

revea l ing formof express ion . For as metonymous windowsopening into the other

pages o f the in f in i te book of humanthought , ep igraphs acknowledge, a lmost

apo loget ica l ly , the part ia l i ty o f the add i t iona l pages nowabout to be addedto i t

wh i le excavat ing the "emblemat ic f ragments" o f a co l loquy—what R ichard Rorty has

ca l led " the conversat ion of mank ind"—in which the present author recogn izes

h imse l f to be but one smal l vo ice .