Editing Self-reference (section)

==In art==
[[File:高機模様裂-Textile fragment with incomplete repeating pattern of loom, weaver, and drawboy MET DP11389.jpg|thumb|[[Drawloom]], with drawboy above to control the harnesses, woven as a repeating pattern in an early-1800s piece of Japanese silk. The silk illustrates the means by which it was produced.]]
[[File:Paradox.jpg|alt=graffiti art on a wall stating "SORRY ABOUT YOUR WALL"|thumb|A self-referencing work of [[graffiti]] apologizing for its own existence]]
[[File:Eron_biennale_dozza_bologna.jpeg|thumb|Self-referential [[graffiti]]. The painter drawn on a wall erases his own graffiti, and may be erased himself by the next facade cleaner.]]

Self-reference occurs in [[literature]] and [[film]] when an author refers to his or her own work in the context of the work itself. Examples include [[Miguel de Cervantes]]' ''[[Don Quixote]]'', [[Shakespeare]]'s ''[[A Midsummer Night's Dream]]'', ''[[The Tempest]]'' and ''[[Twelfth Night]]'', [[Denis Diderot]]'s ''[[Jacques le fataliste et son maître]]'', [[Italo Calvino]]'s ''[[If on a winter's night a traveler]]'', many stories by [[Nikolai Gogol]], ''[[Lost in the Funhouse]]'' by [[John Barth]], [[Luigi Pirandello]]'s ''[[Six Characters in Search of an Author]]'', [[Federico Fellini]]'s ''[[8½]]'' and [[Bryan Forbes]]'s ''[[The L-Shaped Room]]''. Speculative fiction writer [[Samuel R. Delany]] makes use of this in his novels ''[[Nova (novel)|Nova]]'' and ''[[Dhalgren]]''. In the former, Katin (a space-faring novelist) is wary of a long-standing curse wherein a novelist dies before completing any given work. ''Nova'' ends mid-sentence, thus lending credence to the curse and the realization that the novelist is the author of the story; likewise, throughout ''Dhalgren'', Delany has a protagonist simply named The Kid (or Kidd, in some sections), whose life and work are mirror images of themselves and of the novel itself. In the sci-fi spoof film ''[[Spaceballs]]'', Director [[Mel Brooks]] includes a scene wherein the evil characters are viewing a VHS copy of their own story, which shows them watching themselves "watching themselves", ad infinitum. Perhaps the earliest example is in [[Homer]]'s ''[[Iliad]]'', where [[Helen of Troy]] laments: "for generations still unborn/we will live in song" (appearing in the song itself).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Homer |others=Translated by Robert Fagles |title=Iliad |year=1990 |publisher=Penguin Books |isbn=1-101-15281-8 |page=207}}</ref>

Self-reference in art is closely related to the concepts of [[fourth wall|breaking the fourth wall]] and [[meta-reference]], which often involve self-reference. The short stories of [[Jorge Luis Borges]] play with self-reference and related paradoxes in many ways. [[Samuel Beckett]]'s ''[[Krapp's Last Tape]]'' consists entirely of the protagonist listening to and making recordings of himself, mostly about other recordings. During the 1990s and 2000s filmic self-reference was a popular part of the [[rubber reality]] movement, notably in [[Charlie Kaufman]]'s films ''[[Being John Malkovich]]'' and ''[[Adaptation (film)|Adaptation]]'', the latter pushing the concept arguably to its breaking point as it attempts to portray its own creation, in a [[Story within a story#Fractal Fiction|dramatized version]] of the [[Droste effect]].

Various [[creation myths]] invoke self-reference to solve the problem of what created the creator. For example, the [[Egyptian creation myth]] has a god swallowing his own semen to create himself. The [[Ouroboros]] is a mythical dragon which eats itself.

The [[Quran]] includes numerous instances of self-referentiality.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Madigan |first1=David |title=The Qur'ân's Self-Image. Writing and Authority in Islam's Scripture}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Boisliveau |first1=Anne-Sylvie |title=Le Coran par lui-même}}</ref>

The [[surrealist]] painter [[René Magritte]] is famous for his self-referential works. His painting ''[[The Treachery of Images]]'', includes the words "this is not a pipe", the truth of which depends entirely on whether the word ''ceci'' (in English, "this") refers to the pipe depicted—or to the painting or the word or sentence itself.<ref name="NöthBishara2007">{{cite book |last1=Nöth |first1=Winfried |last2=Bishara |first2=Nina |title=Self-reference in the Media |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NBOFIdchEQYC&pg=PA75 |year=2007 |publisher=Walter de Gruyter |isbn=978-3-11-019464-7 |page=75}}</ref> [[M.C. Escher]]'s art also contains many self-referential concepts such as hands drawing themselves.