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Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 15

Dynamic systems exist "on the edge of chaos," in a state "far from equilibrium," between rigidity and randomness. Physicist Paul Davies writes

The cosmos is poised, exquisitely, between the twin extremes of simplicity and complexity. Too much randomness and chaos would lead to a universe of unstructured anarchy; too much lawlike simplicity would produce regimented uniformity and regularity in which little of interest would occur. The universe is neither a random gas nor a crystal, but a menagerie of coherent, organized, and interacting systems forming a hierarchy of structure. Nature is thus a potent mix of two opposing tendencies, in which there is pervasive spontaneity and novelty, providing openness in the way the universe evolves but enough restraint to impose order on the products. The laws of nature thus bestow on the universe a powerful inherent creativity ("Introduction: Toward an Emergentist Worldview," in Niels Henrik Gregersen, ed., From Complexity to Life," Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2003, 10).

Successful artworks also exist between rigidity and randomness (still another way in which they "hold a mirror up to nature"). John Barrow notes, in The Artful Universe Expanded (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2005), that successful music of all kinds exhibits a mathematically calculable balance between predictability and unpredictability (271ff). And Charles H. Bennett notes

Just as the intuitively complex human body is intermediate in entropy between a crystal and a gas, so an intuitively complex genome or literary text is intermediate in algorithmic entropy between a random sequence and a perfectly ordered one ("How to Define Complexity in Physics, and Why," in Gregersen, 37).

In his book A Blessed Rage for Order (Ann Arbor: U. of Michigan Press, 1991) Alexander J. Argyros takes the comparison between system and story even further:

Using the insights offered by chaos theory, it is tempting to speculate that traditional narratives are, in fact, far-from-temporal-equilibrium dynamical systems capable of generating global order simultaneously with local randomness. . . . The fractal folds of narrative, its self-similar and frequently tangled layers of plot, subplot, monologue, and dialogue, allow a culture to store tremendous amounts of information in a stable form while simultaneously freeing that information to vary according to historical influences (319).

What Harold Bloom calls Shakespeare’s "invention of the personality" can be thought of as his capture of the right balance between simplicity and complexity in his characters. For example, John Briggs and F. David Peat write, "Where lesser Elizabethan playwrights used soliloquy to further plot and supply information, Shakespeare made it the arena of personal psychology in a way that would have been more than inconceivable a few centuries earlier—it would have been incomprehensible" (Seven Life Lessons of Chaos, New York: HarperCollins, 1999, 149).

Narratives, including at least some of Shakespeare's plays, often include a "trickster," living on a boundary and opening new, creative possibilities—sometimes by presenting obstacles to be overcome. Some of Shakespeare’s plays, including King Lear and The Tempest, include storms (complex dynamical systems) as enablers of new possibilities. And many of Shakespeare’s plays can be seen as existing in the tension of conflicting values, such as those accompanying the collapse of the medieval worldview, with its Great Chain of Being.

Could Shakespeare’s intertextual importance be partly due do the precise degree of complexity in his works, the precise way in which his works "hold a mirror up to nature"?

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 14

Some fractal systems display "self-similarity," with details similar in pattern to the whole.

In narratives, whole and parts often share the pattern of organization, through disorganization, to reorganization (see Premise 8).

Sytems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 13

Some “chaotic” systems are "fractal," with infinite detail.

Successful literary works can be thought of as having near-infinite detail (yet another way in which they "hold a mirror up to nature"). Alexander J. Argyros, in A Blessed Rage for Order, writes, "Traditional narratives are among the most complex structures known to us."

One cause of such near-infinite detail is the near-infinity of responses that readers bring to the works.

Sytems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 12

Complex systems may be "sensitive to initial conditions." The "butterfly effect" is one example. As a result, the behavior of complex systems cannot be predicted, only recorded.

In Shakespeare’s plays, as in other narratives, small causes may lead to large effects (another way in which they "hold a mirror up to nature").

In his book Investigations, Stuart A. Kauffman, MacArthur Award-winning biologist, writes

Astonishingly, we need stories. If, as I will suggest, we cannot prestate the configuration space, variables, laws, and initial and boundary conditions of a biosphere, if we cannot foretell a biosphere, we can, nevertheless, tell the stories as it unfolds. Biospheres demand their Shakespeares as well as their Newtons. (Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2000, p. 22)

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 11

Those systems that survive the cycle described in Premise 8 do so by developing new characteristics that are adapted to new environments. That is, they evolve.

Narrative can be thought of as both an enabler and a product of human evolution. Alexander J. Argyros writes

Narrative . . . constitutes one of the most remarkable and desirable inventions of biological evolution. . . . A chaotic sociobiological view of human culture suggests that narrative is both a product of, and a selective pressure for, our evolution into Homo sapiens. . . . Narrative offers an elegant solution to the problem of human information management. . . . A narrative is a hypothesis about the nature of an existing slice of reality or about the potential consequences of certain variations on a model of the world. (A Blessed Rage for Order: Deconstruction, Evolution, and Chaos, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1991, pp. 309, 310, 315, 316)

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 10

Not all systems survive the cycle described in Premise 8. An estimated 99.9 percent of the species that have lived on earth are now extinct.

Tragedies can be thought of as portraying figures who do not survive this cycle.

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 9

The cycle described in Premise 8 can result in "evolution" (at the scale of a species) or "learning" (at the scale of an individual). Paulson writes

Out of the perturbations that threaten to destabilize organisms, to modify their structure and possibly undo their organization, they produce new and more complex forms of organization. ("Literature, Complexity, Interdisciplinarity," in Hayles, N. Katherine, ed., Chaos and Order: Complex Dynamics in Literature and Science, Chicago, U. of Chicago Press, 1991, 40)

As Van Gennep shows, initiation rites, in their pattern of separation, initiation, and return, exhibit this cycle. And in his many books, Csikszentmihalyi demonstrates that learning occurs in the "flow" state between boredom and anxiety, when a person increases skills to confront new challenges.

Narratives often portray the initiation, or learning, of characters. Aristotle called this initiation "recognition." And drama can be seen as ritual (in origin and in effect).

As readers or audience members, we also move through a cycle of initiation or learning (perhaps what Aristotle meant by catharsis).

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 8

Complex systems may change in cycles, from organization, through disorganization, to reorganization.

Narrative texts often move from organization, through disorganization, to reorganization (one way in which they "hold a mirror up to nature"). Campbell’s "monomyth" is one description of this movement. "Problem and solution" is another.

Narrative texts can, in one sense, exhibit the whole movement and, in another sense, exhibit just the movement from organization to disorganization or just the movement from disorganization to organization. Northrop Frye's theory of mythoi might be paraphrased as saying that tragedies exhibit the movement from organization to disorganization; comedies exhibit the movement from disorganization to organization.

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 7

Open ("living") systems exchange matter and energy with their environment.

Texts exchange "matter" and "energy" with their discourse communities. Shakespeare’s plays have changed, and been changed by, other works. (This fact is the basis of "intertextual" criticism.)

Systems, Shakespeare, and Intertextuality: Premise 6

Systems exist in the relationships among their parts. "Systems are greater than the sum of their parts." That is, they have "emergent" properties that are not properties of their parts but emerge only at the system level.

Literary works, and their interpretive communities, exist in the relationships among their parts. William Paulson writes

Literary works exhibit the complexity of emergent systems . . . . Although texts are made of language, the passage from linguistic structure to textual effect cannot be described with anything like the regularity or predictability to be found in, say, the grammatical description of sentences. ("Literature, Complexity, Interdisciplinarity," in Hayles, N. Katherine, ed., Chaos and Order: Complex Dynamics in Literature and Science, Chicago, U. of Chicago Press, 1991, 47)

Louise Rosenblatt notes that literary works, such as plays, exist in the transaction between text and reader, or between production and audience. Similarly, theatrical productions exist in the collaborative relationships among artists and script. (Thus the concept of "faithful” or “unfaithful" productions of Shakespeare is meaningless; all productions are a transaction between script and artists.)

And Shakespeare’s plays exist in their intertextual relationships with other works.