Whether we notice them or not, allusions appear in literature very often. These allusions can range from either references to other works, people, or an event. Today in class, we specifically discussed historic and biblical allusions that Percival Everett included in Zulus. This got me thinking a lot about my past knowledge and how authors use allusions to allow their readers to dive into much more information outside of the text.
In his, Interdisciplinarity, Moran writes, “like English, history was seen as a cultivated activity for gentlemen because it offered the possibility of a non-specialist, humane education and had a mediating relationship with the other disciplines, since everything could in theory form part of historical inquiry” (Moran 106). Moran compares English and history as a discipline, explaining how both of them allowed humans to look away from specific disciplines such as science or math. He also wrote, “everything could in theory form part of historical inquiry,” meaning, even works in the English discipline can allow a search for new and historical information.
This historic search can equate to the exercise we did in class today where we looked at Everett’s allusions in the beginning of each chapter. Specifically, the group who looked into the chapter, “B,” caught my attention. They looked into the meaning of, “B is bound to have a revolution,” as well as, “B is for the Boston Massacre which was a media event” (Everett 21). They discussed how the Boston Massacre was an example of the American/British tension that led to the American Revolution. They then equated the historic context to Zulus, saying how Alice could be starting a revolution.
Their statement and mention of the event reminded me of when I was in high school studying the Boston Massacre. Our study was based on the analysis of multiple perspectives of the incident. Regardless of what I learned from that exercise in high school, I still refered back to my past knowledge on this topic and the extent to which I studied it. I relied on my past knowledge of this event to help me understand something that my peers and Everett brought up. The mention of Boston Massacre wasn’t the only allusion that sparked my memory. Other allusions such as, “divine right” and Walt Whitman, instigated my exploration into the archives of my own knowledge. If I was unable to reach the information within my own archives, I depended on the archives of the internet.
Each one of us looked into a different allusion of Everett’s, whether it was biblical, historical or intertextual. Everett’s worked allowed us to delve into the archives of the internet or our own minds to find the origin of the allusion he made. Moran’s point that the English discipline brings about some sort of historical question is very true. This revelation is not only true for Zulus or other works we go over in class. So many other works provoke discovery and research into different archives. Literature does not only have to provoke meaning within the text by itself, it can take us out of the entire text as a whole to help us understand meaning and importance in an even better way.