Did Cane really address Euripides’ The Bacchae? Did Toomer have the text in front of his as he wrote? Were the connections between texts intentional, or did Toomer make these connections subconsciously? Are these connections we see even real, or is that our inherent need to make sense of things showing through?
It seems that it is part of the human condition to try to get inside the head of any given author. When I read something I find myself desperate to understand what the author was thinking when he chose the words that he did. On some level I believe that it will enrich my reading experience. I hold that authors want us to ask these questions about their work. The thing that will give us a better reading experience is finding connections that maybe the author didn’t even have in mind when he/she was writing.
This is where the idea of intertextuality meets interdisciplinarity. Before readers can begin to look across disciplines they need to make connections between texts. Finding these connections between not only different texts but across texts that existed in a different time period (like Cane and The Bacchae)is the start to understanding interdisciplinarity.
Toomer wants us to look at his texts and ask what the meaning is. He wants us to want to get inside his head. Trying to understand connections and immerse oneself in a text is the key to enriching the reading experience.