Texte itératif et stéréotypes chez William Burroughs : de l’intertextualité à l’autostéréotypie

Abstract

The American writer William Burroughs, in his Trilogy written and published from 1960 to 1968 (The Soft Machine, The Ticket That Exploded, Nova Express) has largely used, via his “cut-up” technique of cutting/reassembling different texts, directly or indirectly, every type of texts and literatures, including popular literatures. More generally he used some techniques of repeating a continuous text, literally or incompletely. We study the way in which, book after book, William Burroughs built a network of personal stereotypes which enable him to establish a strong textual identity, according to what is essentially called “autostéréotypie” (Stephanie Orace and Jean-Louis Dufays). The application of the theory of “autostéréotypie” on “resisting” texts as the cut-up burrougshian text enable to go further than with the use of the numerous theories of intertextuality (“transtextualité”, “autotextualité”, “intratextualité”); it also enables to theorize to a more global level the use of textual rewriting on a certain kind of text.

Keywords

• réécriture
• intertextualité
• stéréotype
• autostéréotypie
• cut-up
• collage