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Horizontal intertextuality is a vague term. It is defined, among other things, by the film theorist John Fiske. He refers to horizontal intertextuality as relationships or references on the same level, for example, by one book relating to another. He then defines Vertical intertextuality as relations to other media.
In the book Television culture from 1987 he writes:
We can envise these intertextual relations on two dimensions, the horizontal and the vertical. Horizontal relations are those between primary texts that are more or less explicitly linked, usually along the axes of genre, character or content. Vertical intertextuality is that between a primary text, such as a television progam or series, and othe texts of a different type that refer explicitly to it. These may be secondary texts such as studio publicity, journalistic features, or criticism, or tertiary texts produced by the viewers themselves in the form of letters to the press or, more impotantly, of gossip and converstation.
John Fiske, "Television culture", [REF]
Other theorists have interpreted horizontal intertextuality as relationships based on conventions shared by the author and reader. In this context, one often sees the theories surrounding the model-reader. In the article Pedagogiske intertekster - Intertekstualitet som teoretisk og praktisk begrep (Pedagogical intertexts - Intertextuality as a theoretical and practical concept) Bente Aamotsbakken writes (in my translation):
The horizontal intertextuality has clear features in common with considerations obvious in several reader theories. The closest is the connection to Umberto Eco's model-reader concept, which assumes that there are text codes that the sender and receiver or author and reader must share. Close by is Wolfgang Iser's much-used term, 'the implied reader'.
Bente Aamotsbakken, "Pedagogiske intertekster - Intertekstualitet som teoretisk og praktisk begrep" [REF]
By using exactly Eco's model-reader concept, we can thus say that horizontal intertextuality is linked to conventions shared by the author and reader. The conventions depend on genre and media. I shape my text based on my idea of who you are, what kind of knowledge and experience you have, and what expectations you have for learning and understanding. For example, I use simple words and short sentences if this suits you, and I also present the text visually in an appropriate layout. You are my model reader. We should have a common understanding of the text and the conventions used. We should "play as a team". In the book Six walks in the fictional woods, Umberto Eco explains the difference between the empirical reader and the model reader and defines the latter as follows:
[...] the model reader – a sort of ideal type whom the text not only foresees as a collaborator but also tries to create.
Umberto Eco, "Six walks in the fictional woods", [REF]
Your understanding then becomes subjective based on your knowledge, experiences and expectations, but also on external influences that I, as the author, cannot predict or control.
Vertical intertextuality is defined by John Fiske as relationships to texts in other media. When a literary critic in Aftenposten gives the latest novel by a well-known author a good or bad review, this secondary text will more or less consciously influence you. If the criticism is bad, it's conceivable that you won't buy the book at all.
Other theorists use the term vertical intertextuality about the primary text's relationships and relationships with secondary and tertiary texts without specifically saying whether these are within the same work or in the same media. Such intertextuality can, for example, be related to texts in a linear structure.
Vertical intertextuality is the type of intertextuality that is most common today, i.e. the one that is referred to in different textbooks at different levels and also the one that is normally referred to in scientific literature. It is timely to point out that the vertical type of intertextuality includes both explicit and implicit intertextuality. Thus, it becomes more appropriate to operate with only two forms of intertextuality, the open and the more hidden, or the explicit and the implicit.
Bente Aamotsbakken, "Pedagogiske intertekster - Intertekstualitet som teoretisk og praktisk begrep" [REF]
Bente Aamotsbakken also summarizes the difference between horizontal and vertical intertextuality:
The directions implied in the terms 'horizontal' and 'vertical' point on the one hand to the relation text/reader and on the other hand to the relation text/texts.
Bente Aamotsbakken, "Pedagogiske intertekster - Intertekstualitet som teoretisk og praktisk begrep" [REF]
In the cartoon "M", Mads Eriksen has, on several occasions, entered relationships with other comics. Experienced readers can recognize both themes and people. He is perhaps best known for mocking drawing colleague Frode Øverli and his figure "Pondus".
Eriksen is also known for relating his cartoon strips to other media. For example, he has used "Stormtroopers" and Darth Vader from the Star Wars films on several occasions. Other relationships, for example, with children's TV on NRK, have been so difficult to recognize for ordinary readers that he has had to explain them afterwards.
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