Meta-infiltration also is likely (or unavoidable) in autobiographies and memoir, from Rousseau’s spun Confessions to Klaus Kinski’s Kinski Uncut. Following in the footsteps of Seinfeld, It’s Gary Shandling’s Show and The Larry Sanders Show, self-reference and semi-biographical irony have ruled pop culture for more than several years now, particularly in mockumentary shows such as Curb Your Enthusiasm, Extras and Life’s Too Short, which feature actual celebrities who are surreal blends of fact and fiction, further blurring viewers’ handle on what is and isn’t. Then there are Ingmar Bergman, Truffaut, Godard and Woody Allen, just a few names from metacinema – which ratcheted up with Being John Malkovich at the end of the 1990s and apotheosized in Joaquin Phoenix’s and Casey Affleck’s tour de force I’m Still Here. Greek choruses are meta Chaucer is meta Puck’s closing monologue in A Midsummer Night’s Dream is too. Of course, there’s always been a lot of metaness in art. (Throughout this spiel I use this symbol □ to denote quotations taken from word balloons in the book.)Īlmost everything seems so “meta” nowadays.
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