HTRLLAP: The deep intertextuality of it all...

We as readers always have the tendency to wonder at the astounding creativity and originality of authors, or at least we did. Without a doubt, authors are still master storytellers, but Foster makes clear in chapter five of How to Read Literature Like a Professor that authors, like everyone else, pull details, plots, and story lines of past "greats" to make a whole new work of literature, a masterpiece in itself. The technical name of this art is intertextuality, or the ongoing interaction between poems and stories which brings multiple layers of meaning to the text, some of which readers may not even consciously notice.

One of the main examples intertextuality that pops into my mind is Shakespeare's tragic love story, Romeo and Juliet. Boy meets girl, boy likes girl, parent's don't see eye to eye, boy and girl plan escape, confusion, tragedy, death/separation. When put in these simple terms, this has become the standard plotline of almost every tragic romance published to this day.
Another work that is very frequently referenced is Tolkien. Almost every story of overcoming one's own evil self for the greater good of the whole can be linked back to Tolkien's works.