Professor of Comparative Literature Peter J. Rabinowitz has published "The Rhetoric of Reference; or, Shostakovich's Ghost Quartet" in the May 2007 issue of Narrative, a special issue devoted to the legacy of Wayne C. Booth.
The article has a double aim. As a contribution to rhetorical narrative theory, it offers a taxonomy of the ways that works of art refer to other works of art, with particular attention to a new category that Rabinowitz calls "ghost references." At the same time, as a contribution to Shostakovich studies, the article uses this narrative model to explore the function and meaning of the self-quotations in Shostakovich's Eighth String Quartet.
