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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    No, the text never exists in a vacuum, it didn't burst into existence fully formed. A person wrote it, that person and their life and informs every aspect of it. They are the ones with the final say about, well, what they actually said.
    The text ALWAYS exists in a vacuum. It was created but then exists separate from it's creator. J.R.R. Tolkien is dead, and yet his works persist onwards. The works he actually wrote. Not the works he kind of maybe thought about.

    Everyone dies one day, and your text should be able to stand on it's own without your interpretation. The Author won't always be there, and so the author should be ignored unless they write something new.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

    Non est salvatori salvator, neque defensori dominus, nec pater nec mater, nihil supernum.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Speaking only for myself. I generally don't care what an author, critic or the fanbase says about a work. I only really look at the work itself.

    Generally, if I make a comment on something and I hear a response from someone along the lines of "Well, this source outside the work says..." I disregard that as an interpretation influenced by outside context. Nothing against that approach, I just don't find it engaging nor interesting.

    I'm sure there's plenty of art I enjoy wrong or can't enjoy because of that, but I've never really been bothered by such things.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    No, the text never exists in a vacuum, it didn't burst into existence fully formed. A person wrote it, that person and their life and informs every aspect of it. They are the ones with the final say about, well, what they actually said.
    Yes, and every aspect of a reader's life informs their reaction to the text.

    And their life is different to the author, which causes the meaning they extract from the text to be different from the meaning the author had in mind, if any, when they wrote it.

    And neither are a privileged interpretation.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by druid91 View Post
    The text ALWAYS exists in a vacuum. It was created but then exists separate from it's creator. J.R.R. Tolkien is dead, and yet his works persist onwards. The works he actually wrote. Not the works he kind of maybe thought about.

    Everyone dies one day, and your text should be able to stand on it's own without your interpretation. The Author won't always be there, and so the author should be ignored unless they write something new.
    If you don't know who the author is or was sure, but if you do know who the author was and you can find out what they had to say about it they take precedent. Every time. Unless they start waffling and changing their mind to the point it becomes clear they themselves don't actually know anymore.

    Quote Originally Posted by GloatingSwine View Post
    Yes, and every aspect of a reader's life informs their reaction to the text.

    And their life is different to the author, which causes the meaning they extract from the text to be different from the meaning the author had in mind, if any, when they wrote it.

    And neither are a privileged interpretation.
    Just because you are wrong about what the author was trying to say doesn't mean you then get to turn around and just say the author is now wrong. That isn't how things work.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    If you don't know who the author is or was sure, but if you do know who the author was and you can find out what they had to say about it they take precedent. Every time. Unless they start waffling and changing their mind to the point it becomes clear they themselves don't actually know anymore.
    You don't have to ask the author what they said. It was written down. What they say in the future about it is irrelevant. The author never takes precedence over the work. The work always takes precedence over the author.

    If I make a sword. And then say that it wasn't really meant for killing, does that mean it won't cut me when used to do so? No. The created exists independently of the creator and can gather it's own meaning or use.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

    Non est salvatori salvator, neque defensori dominus, nec pater nec mater, nihil supernum.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Sigh Death of the Author, Auteur Theory, Readers Response Theory and dozens of literary (and film) criticism techniques are games of language where they pretend it is a binary thing but in reality there is usually 4 elements in tension with each other.

    I want you to think of these 3 elements and I want you to make a triangle inside your mind.


    Point 1) is the work itself
    Point 2) is the author who created the work
    Point 3) is the audience both the individual reader / viewer but also remember there are lots of these readers and viewers.

    That is a 2 dimensional shape (a triangle) with 3 relationships (the 3 sides) that connect the 3 points and form angles.




    -----

    Now lets make it more complicated, lets imagine that flat triangle and then make it 3D, the space that hovers over the work itself, the author who created the work, and the audience is the universe itself which has a collection of shared images, themes, events, facts, and so on.

    We now have a pyramid, a tetrahedron to be exact, a triangular pyramid, a triforce shape.

    But while the universe itself exist and is infinite everyone has not tasted everything in the universe, we both A) all have our shared histories where two people may have shared the same event (but from different points of view / frames of reference), B) but at the same time people do not experience the same universe, we do not share all the same events, feels, metaphor, idioms, images, and so on.

    Death of the Author is valid
    Auetur Theory is valid
    Readers Response Theory is valid
    , etc, etc is valid (I am not going to list all the different forms of literary criticism and film criticism.)

    They are just looking at different aspects of those 4 spots on the triangular pyramid, those 4 spots have 4 different sides (4 different triangles), and it has 6 different edges and 12 different relations to the relationships (6 relationships but people can feel different things about the same relationship.)

    -----





    So back to the OP. A work will always have "ambiguities" inside of it. This is a key word here, ambiguities. Even if the writter has perfect intentions he will always create a a material work that is imperfect for creating a work is both changing his material image inside his own mind into something that is formual-istic with words and images (not a 1:1 translation) but also the opposite where the reader / viewer takes that formula and recreates a new image inside of their mind.



    (The blind men parable, how they feel about an elephant depends on where they touch the elephant, limited sensory data and thus the blind men has to "extrapolate" the ambiguities to determine the essence of elephant.)

    So on the subject of ambiguities writers intent does not change the meaning the reader creates when he reconstructs an image from the formula. We are arguing the difference between intent and consequences, the writter may intend X but the consequence is Y, both are equally valid interpretations with limited data.

    But not all the stuff a writter has has ambiguities, some stuff are "factual" for they are literally stated in the text with no ambiguity. Luke Skywalker lived on Tatooine. This can not be argued, it is a literal fact inside the formula of the story and not an extrapolation / filling in the blanks / projection it is literally in the story and we are not given any reason to doubt Luke Skywalker at one part of his life lived on Tatooine.

    (In other works, often of different genres and styles, we are sometimes given contradictory formal structures that cause us to doubt the nature of the factual data we are given, this in turn creates an ambugity, do we have an unreliabile narrator problem and so on, was Tatooine all a dream...yet this does not apply to A New Hope for we are never given contradictory evidence in this piece of work, the formal structure only said one thing and nothing was presented to contradict this.

    Here is a good video about what I am talking about, it explains "reader response criticism" (not arguing for the primacy of this viewpoint) and also the concept of "interpretive communities" (groups who interpret texts similarly because they share similar social positions and experiences)

    Why We Can't Agree About The Last Jedi (Or Art In General)

    Last edited by Ramza00; 2018-11-18 at 03:56 PM.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Kitten Champion View Post
    In a recent episode of Renegade Cut - which I'll post here - Leon Thomas goes over the way homosexuality has been represented (or not) within the horror movie genre, specifically looking at A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge which has some pretty heavy homoerotic subtext to it that's transparent in retrospect (edit: and, at the time, really). This was in the script, but was magnified by choices in the production, including the main character who was portrayed by a closeted gay actor that actively resented it because it would typecast him as gay characters and led to immense emotional stress on his part.

    Point being, a fairly light critical reading of the movie can see the gay themes and how they're creatively integrated into the horror scenario with the hero being possessed by another man whose literally inside him that does increasingly sexually suggestive forms of torture while the clueless, disapproving parents look on-- among other things. However, if you subscribe to authorial intent as Author God then no, the writer and studio denied these exists - I can't think of any reason why - and simply blamed the actor for playing his role "too gay" for your misreading. So that's that. Case closed, good day sir.

    Until 2010, where, yeah, it totally was intentional according to the writer. So, the truth and the meaning of the work have been re-decided, I guess.
    This is a messy example, though, because the 'author' of a movie is a diffuse entity. Surely the lead actor is a participant in the creation of the film, and thus his intentions and impressions form part of the authorial intent, whether or not the studio and screenwriter also subscribed to that intention. Considering the script in isolation does simplify things...except that the script serves the production of the film, more so than the other way around, especially since scripts are frequently rewritten during production.

    Quote Originally Posted by DomaDoma View Post
    And now, instead, we're using this credo to bathe every work in the light of contemporary politics. After all, what other "shared cultural existence" can there possibly be? (None at all, says Foucault: nothing is ever uttered but as part of a power struggle. There's a pretty good chance that he, not Barthes, is where it all went sour.)

    To take a political example that's current, but not in vogue, for illumination purposes: We don't know the author of Beowulf, but we do know he had a pretty alien and ritualistic idea of the significance of gold, and immersion in Beowulf means aligning yourself, as far as you can, with that mentality. Interpreting Beowulf in the light of what contemporary doomsayers are saying about gold would be daft.
    What other shared cultural existence can there possibly be? Well, the author's, for a start. Obliterate the paradigm that presents authorial intent as the final significance of a text, elevate the reader to critical prominence...and then we must unavoidably confront the many readers who understand, or seek to understand, a work in its authorial context. Not to mention other contexts embedded in authorial intent, like the historical context and literary tradition the author was writing in. This stuff does not go away - it is merely no longer the last word on the subject.

    As for your Beowulf example, even as a hypothetical with no demonstrated relevance, I struggle to understand what point you're trying to make with it. What do you imagine an interpretation of Beowulf in the light of contemporary doomsaying about gold would look like?

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    Just because you are wrong about what the author was trying to say doesn't mean you then get to turn around and just say the author is now wrong. That isn't how things work.
    "Just because you are wrong about what the author was trying to say" is rather begging the question. The point is precisely to make criticism about something other than being right or wrong about authorial intent.
    Last edited by Lethologica; 2018-11-18 at 04:33 PM.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by druid91 View Post
    You don't have to ask the author what they said. It was written down. What they say in the future about it is irrelevant. The author never takes precedence over the work. The work always takes precedence over the author.

    If I make a sword. And then say that it wasn't really meant for killing, does that mean it won't cut me when used to do so? No. The created exists independently of the creator and can gather it's own meaning or use.
    Yep, its all on the page. And if your are ever confuses what it means then the author is literally the ultimate authority. If the sword was made for ornamental or ceremonial purposes and is blunt and unusable. You might want to find that out before you try to stab someone with it. Sounds to me like the author is fairly important to listen to there.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    Yep, its all on the page. And if your are ever confuses what it means then the author is literally the ultimate authority. If the sword was made for ornamental or ceremonial purposes and is blunt and unusable. You might want to find that out before you try to stab someone with it. Sounds to me like the author is fairly important to listen to there.
    You're missing the point. Almost willfully it seems.

    It's all on the page. If you are confused. You look at the page. The Author is dead, don't ask the author. If what is on the page is insufficient, then the work is poorly written.

    If I write "Joe frequently met Bob at the Market, and the two quarreled incessantly about everything from women to the right fruits to buy in which season."

    And then later claim that Joe and Bob never quarreled. That makes me wrong, even if I'm the author. The book is seperate from the author and attempting to enforce some manner of artificial canon based on that author's whims is not only unreasonable, (As it requires keeping track of everything the author ever says, and if taken to it's logical conclusion essentially abandoning the work as unreadable following their death.) it's downright nonsensical.

    Read the book. Not the Author.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

    Non est salvatori salvator, neque defensori dominus, nec pater nec mater, nihil supernum.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Lethologica View Post

    What other shared cultural existence can there possibly be? Well, the author's, for a start. Obliterate the paradigm that presents authorial intent as the final significance of a text, elevate the reader to critical prominence...and then we must unavoidably confront the many readers who understand, or seek to understand, a work in its authorial context. Not to mention other contexts embedded in authorial intent, like the historical context and literary tradition the author was writing in. This stuff does not go away - it is merely no longer the last word on the subject.
    The problem is that it often should be the last word. "Gandalf was totally toking it up for the whole Lord of The Rings series, because "pipeweed" is obviously marijuana" is not, and should not ever be treated as, an argument equally valid as "Pipeweed is obviously tobacco, but calling it by that name is incorrect, because that word derived from Spanish tabaco (from American Indian origin), would have seemed linguistically out of place in Middle-earth."

    Colors can just be colors - an author might have dozens of reasons to declare that a room has blue curtains, which could be anything from "blue curtains would have been very expensive at this time, so we can subtly show this character as wealthy" through "this character is trying to avoid offending the Red Rose or the White Rose, so he decorates with a color associated with neither" all the way to "this feels bare without some description, the curtains in the room I'm sitting in are blue, so that's as good as any". Blue doesn't automatically imply depression, or red a hot temper, or half a dozen other "obvious interpretations" I've had shoved down my throat over the years. This is particularly galling because two of the tree examples do have significance in the context of the story - focusing on assigning some other meaning actively hurts your ability to understand what is going on.


    Granted, much of this is directed at lower-level English teachers and amateurs looking to shore up their own beliefs or participate in the literary fad of the day. Actual professional analysts seem to be much better at discarding these junk theories, and who are more than willing to say "this is not what the book is intended to say, but I can use this book as a way to make my argument more comprehensible to you." I think the key point is that, like a lot of other tools of analysis (Occams Razor, Conservation of Detail, and various "representation tests" being the big ones) is seriously misunderstood and is often misused by non-experts. This is just a case where the misuse is extremely damaging, because it is extremely good at turning people away from literature and even reading in general.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by DomaDoma View Post
    And now, instead, we're using this credo to bathe every work in the light of contemporary politics. After all, what other "shared cultural existence" can there possibly be? (None at all, says Foucault: nothing is ever uttered but as part of a power struggle. There's a pretty good chance that he, not Barthes, is where it all went sour.)

    To take a political example that's current, but not in vogue, for illumination purposes: We don't know the author of Beowulf, but we do know he had a pretty alien and ritualistic idea of the significance of gold, and immersion in Beowulf means aligning yourself, as far as you can, with that mentality. Interpreting Beowulf in the light of what contemporary doomsayers are saying about gold would be daft.
    So are you just upset that looking at works through the lens of our current time brings up things you dont want to think about with your favourite authors (or, given the casual dropping of marxism as a negative adjective, something a little more insidious)

    Like obviously, context is important in discussing meaning in a text. Its literally impossible to interpret meaning without context. Even if you actively work to not think about what you know about the author, the time it was written, things you already know about the text, or about the subject of the text, or what you were doing when you experienced it, or any number of contexts and outside influences that can distort or change an interpretation.

    Again, its about how the author does not control sole ownership over interpretation and meaning. They may be able to provide insight into the production of the text, which can be used to recontextualize your own interpretation, but theirs is not more correct than anyone elses. Thats the point.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by druid91 View Post
    You're missing the point. Almost willfully it seems.

    It's all on the page. If you are confused. You look at the page. The Author is dead, don't ask the author. If what is on the page is insufficient, then the work is poorly written.
    If you are confused, and the author has something to say. Listen to the author. Sure if they start outright contradicting themselves, like I already said, all bets are off. But they are the final authority on what they write. Not you, not some over important critic. The writer. They wrote it, they know what it means.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Does what a reader comprehends from a text actually inform you much about the text? Or does it inform you about the reader. If I read a text on the history of oil painting and reached the conclusion that "the color blue was magical and that if you paint yourself blue you will be able to fly and conjure money from thin air" does that really mean anything in relation to the text?

    And for the statement that suggests Uncle Tom's Cabin and Clifford are poorly written... I wanted to come up with a point but I can't think of examples. Or maybe I can. If a work references something but we no longer know what it is referencing is that work poorly written? And what about foreshadowing? A work that is part of a larger sequence of work, say Harry Potter, can be looked at in part or in whole. So is it poorly written if each book cannot be entirely comprehended by itself?
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    Yep, its all on the page. And if your are ever confuses what it means then the author is literally the ultimate authority. If the sword was made for ornamental or ceremonial purposes and is blunt and unusable. You might want to find that out before you try to stab someone with it. Sounds to me like the author is fairly important to listen to there.
    No the author is the auctor, the originator, but the originator is not the same as authority who gets to say what happens after the original is created.

    It is like giving birth, the mother "is the origin" of the child but once the child takes its first breath separate from the umbilical cord the child's own subjectivity and its interactions with the world is separate from the mother.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Ramza00 View Post
    No the author is the auctor, the originator, but the originator is not the same as authority who gets to say what happens after the original is created.

    It is like giving birth, the mother "is the origin" of the child but once the child takes its first breath separate from the umbilical cord the child's own subjectivity and its interactions with the world is separate from the mother.
    That would make perfect sense, if a story were a living thing with a will of its own. It isn't, it is a creation wholly and totally shaped from conception to completion by the author. That author IS that authority who decides its meaning, they decided it at every level and step it its creation. Now sure there are plenty of authors who refuse to provide any intent other then the stated words and at that point we do just have to guess. But so long as they provide some kind of intent that intent is the true one.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    If you are confused, and the author has something to say. Listen to the author. Sure if they start outright contradicting themselves, like I already said, all bets are off. But they are the final authority on what they write. Not you, not some over important critic. The writer. They wrote it, they know what it means.
    Any statement by the author that is not a verbatim recreation of the text is a contradiction of the text.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by druid91 View Post
    Any statement by the author that is not a verbatim recreation of the text is a contradiction of the text.
    That is such an extreme and drastically hyperbolic statement I'm not sure how to even respond to it as if it were a real argument.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Grytorm View Post
    Does what a reader comprehends from a text actually inform you much about the text? Or does it inform you about the reader. If I read a text on the history of oil painting and reached the conclusion that "the color blue was magical and that if you paint yourself blue you will be able to fly and conjure money from thin air" does that really mean anything in relation to the text?
    That depends, can you quote specifically the things in the text that made you think that?

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman
    Colors can just be colors - an author might have dozens of reasons to declare that a room has blue curtains, which could be anything from "blue curtains would have been very expensive at this time, so we can subtly show this character as wealthy" through "this character is trying to avoid offending the Red Rose or the White Rose, so he decorates with a color associated with neither" all the way to "this feels bare without some description, the curtains in the room I'm sitting in are blue, so that's as good as any". Blue doesn't automatically imply depression, or red a hot temper, or half a dozen other "obvious interpretations" I've had shoved down my throat over the years. This is particularly galling because two of the tree examples do have significance in the context of the story - focusing on assigning some other meaning actively hurts your ability to understand what is going on.
    The same is true here. Blue might imply depression if other things in the text also do, and you have to point at them specifically. Pathetic Fallacy is a well understood literary technique (oft overused, that's why it's always bloody raining at funerals in films). If there are other aspects of a character in the text that can be specifically cited to suggest that they are depressed, then a preponderance of blue can certainly be taken to be another element of that presentation.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    That is such an extreme and drastically hyperbolic statement I'm not sure how to even respond to it as if it were a real argument.
    How so? If I write a story in which Joe walks from Village A to Village B. And include vague hints as to his reasons for doing so but never actually give the reason why.

    I may have a reason in my head, but it doesn't change that that uncertainty is a part of the text. If I were to 'reveal' that reason, I am contradicting the text, which leaves the reason as uncertain.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by GloatingSwine View Post
    The same is true here. Blue might imply depression if other things in the text also do, and you have to point at them specifically. Pathetic Fallacy is a well understood literary technique (oft overused, that's why it's always bloody raining at funerals in films). If there are other aspects of a character in the text that can be specifically cited to suggest that they are depressed, then a preponderance of blue can certainly be taken to be another element of that presentation.
    Exactly - except in lower level education where "Blue means depression. This is automatic, and if the author denies that he was depressed, he is delusional. If you disagree, you fail." I flunked a college literature class because of things like this.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    The problem is that it often should be the last word. "Gandalf was totally toking it up for the whole Lord of The Rings series, because "pipeweed" is obviously marijuana" is not, and should not ever be treated as, an argument equally valid as "Pipeweed is obviously tobacco, but calling it by that name is incorrect, because that word derived from Spanish tabaco (from American Indian origin), would have seemed linguistically out of place in Middle-earth."
    LotR is a work where authorial context looms particularly large, yet one could refer to the text for that:

    Quote Originally Posted by Fellowship of the Ring, Prologue, Concerning Pipe-Weed
    There is another astonishing thing about Hobbits of old that must be mentioned, an astonishing habit: they imbibed or inhaled, through pipes of clay or wood, the smoke of the burning leaves of a herb, which they called pipe-weed or leaf, a variety probably of Nicotiana. A great deal of mystery surrounds the origin of this peculiar custom, or 'art' as the Hobbits preferred to call it. All that could be discovered about it in antiquity was put together by Meriadoc Brandybuck (later Master of Buckland), and since he and the tobacco of the Southfarthing play a part in the history that follows, his remarks in the introduction to his Herblore of the Shire may be quoted.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Two Towers, Chapter 9: Flotsam and Jetsam
    He produced a small leather bag full of tobacco. 'We have heaps of it,' he said; 'and you can all pack as much as you wish, when we go. We did some salvage-work this morning, Pippin and I. There are lots of things floating about. It was Pippin who found two small barrels, washed up out of some cellar or store-house, I suppose. When we opened them, we found they were filled with this: as fine a pipe-weed as you could wish for, and quite unspoilt.'
    I suspect it's read as weed by some people these days largely because of the movies, which are a distinct work with a decidedly different authorial context, and make a number of stoner jokes. And also because an increasing number of people today have marijuana play a similar role in their lives as tobacco did in Tolkien's. And because LotR became associated with '60s counterculture due to its environmentalist and anti-industrial themes. All of which is a lot more interesting than "it's baccy, end of story."

    To pick another well-worn example: what color is the sky in the opening scene of Neuromancer? Different generations have parsed it as glowing gray, as black-and-white static, as harsh BSOD blue. Gibson can only have intended one of them, likely the first, and yet each of them leverages a distinct power over its audience, because of course the real meaning here is the pervasive and oppressive technological ethos of a dead-channel sky, which is the meaning directly expressed in the text.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    That would make perfect sense, if a story were a living thing with a will of its own. It isn't, it is a creation wholly and totally shaped from conception to completion by the author. That author IS that authority who decides its meaning, they decided it at every level and step it its creation. Now sure there are plenty of authors who refuse to provide any intent other then the stated words and at that point we do just have to guess. But so long as they provide some kind of intent that intent is the true one.
    In an earlier post (not the one you respond to.) I pointed out 4 things, the author, the work, the universe, and the reader / viewer.

    The work itself is static, it is a moment of time and space. But one views a work / reads a work we bring the universe and our own personal subjectivity and those are the subjective aspects I was referring to.

    A metaphor: Is Shakespeare still Shakespeare when you set it in a different time period? Is Richard the III still Richard the III when it uses 1930s / 1940s technology instead of a mid / late 1400s technology, and not the stage props of the time frame of 1593? Is Shakespeare still Shakespeare when it is Ian McKellen playing this part in this 1995 movie instead of who ever played dear Richard in 1593?

    So in the metaphor there is less co creation with watching a play or a movie vs reading a book, but when you read a book the reader is "co-creating" the world inside their mind in conjunction with the author. The reader in their own mind is adding subjectivity in conjunction with the objective formal structure of the work.

    The authors intent is not actually "co-creating" this world, only the objective formal structure at the time of writting and the subjectivity the reader inserts. Why does the author can then say in an interview I never intended X I just forgot to write down X and thus you thought Y, well Y is invalid for I meant X I just never wrote down X?

    Once an author gives birth to his work and he publishes it he is merely the originator and no longer has mastery, dominion, complete control over his work. This is the contradiction of breathing reality into being, once you do so and you share it, it is no longer just yours.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    Exactly - except in lower level education where "Blue means depression. This is automatic, and if the author denies that he was depressed, he is delusional. If you disagree, you fail." I flunked a college literature class because of things like this.
    They were trying to teach you a skill (recognising semiotic meaning in multiple aspects of a scene) and you demonstrated that you weren't able to do that.

    The other thing to realise is that authors aren't always consciously aware of using pathetic fallacy. As in the example I already gave, that it's seemingly always raining at funerals in films, rather a lot of the time it probably isn't a conscious inference of "rainy weather depressing, put in to show characters are sad".

    For instance it's raining, as ever, at the funeral at the start of Logan even though Logan himself has no emotional connection to the funeral. Because it always bloody rains at funerals in movies.

    Also, remember that we're reading the text not the author. Insistance that the text reflects anything specific about the author's mentality is as invalid as insisting that the author's personal interpretation as to its meaning is privileged over the reader's and for the same reason, because the meanings assigned to various elements by the reader are not necessarily the same as the meaning assigned to them by the author.
    Last edited by GloatingSwine; 2018-11-18 at 05:54 PM.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Lethologica View Post
    LotR is a work where authorial context looms particularly large, yet one could refer to the text for that:



    I suspect it's read as weed by some people these days largely because of the movies, which are a distinct work with a decidedly different authorial context, and make a number of stoner jokes. And also because an increasing number of people today have marijuana play a similar role in their lives as tobacco did in Tolkien's. And because LotR became associated with '60s counterculture due to its environmentalist and anti-industrial themes. All of which is a lot more interesting than "it's baccy, end of story."

    To pick another well-worn example: what color is the sky in the opening scene of Neuromancer? Different generations have parsed it as glowing gray, as black-and-white static, as harsh BSOD blue. Gibson can only have intended one of them, likely the first, and yet each of them leverages a distinct power over its audience, because of course the real meaning here is the pervasive and oppressive technological ethos of a dead-channel sky, which is the meaning directly expressed in the text.
    Regarding your first point, you'd be amazed at how many people either insist that the intro you quote was actually written by Christopher Tolkien, or else is not part of the text proper and is thus meaningless. In the second quote, that is the only time that it is referred to by that name in the text proper. Very easy to explain away as "more censorship". For your greater point, the debate is very useful in the context of analyzing the book's cultural impact. For analyzing the text itself, interpreting "pipe-weed" as marijuana instead of tobacco not only adds nothing, but runs the risk of distorting many elements of the text - it introduces the possibility of an Unreliable Narrator in places that it really shouldn't be, and is often used when manufacturing the "dark truth" about the series.


    In the second, exactly what "tuned to a dead channel" means is a major factor in how the text is received. Plain grey or static gives the (clearly intended) oppressive technology-over-all mindset, while the blue more commonly seen today gives the exact opposite impression - a bright, cheerful cloudless day. This is more of a case of "keeping the book in the context of the time it was written in" then "death of the author", because in 1984 there were few -if any- TVs that went blue without a signal.

    Quote Originally Posted by GloatingSwine View Post
    They were trying to teach you a skill (recognising semiotic meaning in multiple aspects of a scene) and you demonstrated that you weren't able to do that.
    Unless the skill was "you must always give the answer listed in my teacher's edition, because that is the only possible answer", this is not the case. The textbook said, straight up, that the color blue never means anything but depression, and that any other meaning is impossible. I didn't "fail to demonstrate a skill", I failed to regurgitate the only answer that they would accept.

    As for "the author said it without meaning to", this is an extremely dangerous road to travel down.
    Last edited by Gnoman; 2018-11-18 at 05:52 PM.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by druid91 View Post
    How so? If I write a story in which Joe walks from Village A to Village B. And include vague hints as to his reasons for doing so but never actually give the reason why.

    I may have a reason in my head, but it doesn't change that that uncertainty is a part of the text. If I were to 'reveal' that reason, I am contradicting the text, which leaves the reason as uncertain.
    No, you are only contradicting the text if you actually contradict something directly stated. If all you do is reveal or confirm some reason previously only hinted at then you contradicted nothing.

    Quote Originally Posted by Ramza00 View Post
    Once an author gives birth to his work and he publishes it he is merely the originator and no longer has mastery, dominion, complete control over his work. This is the contradiction of breathing reality into being, once you do so and you share it, it is no longer just yours.
    Not true. Just choosing to share the work with us does not rob the author of the true ownership of the story or its meaning.
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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Dragonus45 View Post
    No, you are only contradicting the text if you actually contradict something directly stated. If all you do is reveal or confirm some reason previously only hinted at then you contradicted nothing.



    Not true. Just choosing to share the work with us does not rob the author of the true ownership of the story or its meaning.
    I disagree. You're contradicting a facet of the story. It's explicitly true that the reasons for their actions are not stated. If you then go and state those reasons, you have contradicted that lack of statement.

    You can then go on to build a story around another story. Which is how I view series like, for example, Harry Potter. The first book is it's own story, whole and complete. The second book is it's own story, which includes facets and characters from that story, but ultimately is it's own. And so on, adding layers and connections.

    Ever heard the phrase 'Watch what you say because you can't take it back.'?

    This is no less true for written works. The Author doesn't have true ownership of the story or it's meaning.
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    Quote Originally Posted by AvatarZero View Post
    I like the "hobo" in there.
    "Hey, you just got 10000gp! You going to buy a fully staffed mansion or something?"
    "Nah, I'll upgrade my +2 sword to a +3 sword and sleep in my cloak."

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    Unless the skill was "you must always give the answer listed in my teacher's edition, because that is the only possible answer", this is not the case. The textbook said, straight up, that the color blue never means anything but depression, and that any other meaning is impossible. I didn't "fail to demonstrate a skill", I failed to regurgitate the only answer that they would accept.

    As for "the author said it without meaning to", this is an extremely dangerous road to travel down.
    I suspect the textbook didn't say that at all, and you're being hyperbolic to a degree depressingly common on the internet. Feel free to produce a specific quotation, preferably in the form of a picture of an actual edition of the book though.

    I suspect that you were given a chosen text with rather a lot of things which all came together to produce a reading which most critics tend to share and it was being used as an example to show you how to recognise those elements and tie them to second order meanings, and you have wilfully misinterpreted the whole course because you were young and rebellious, and so failed to pick up the skills you were being taught and so are trapped at the level of first order events.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    Regarding your first point, you'd be amazed at how many people either insist that the intro you quote was actually written by Christopher Tolkien, or else is not part of the text proper and is thus meaningless. In the second quote, that is the only time that it is referred to by that name in the text proper. Very easy to explain away as "more censorship". For your greater point, the debate is very useful in the context of analyzing the book's cultural impact. For analyzing the text itself, interpreting "pipe-weed" as marijuana instead of tobacco not only adds nothing, but runs the risk of distorting many elements of the text - it introduces the possibility of an Unreliable Narrator in places that it really shouldn't be, and is often used when manufacturing the "dark truth" about the series.
    I could indeed be amazed at how many people try to coopt authorial intent to promote their preferred interpretation of the text, but that isn't really a stance against authorial intent, is it? And your arguments against their interpretation are textual (though there are obviously authorial ones as well). If marijuana made the text richer rather than poorer, would your position change?

    I agree that the stuff I discussed about where the marijuana impression came from has more to do with cultural impact than textual analysis. I feel like part of Barthes', er, intent was to blur the two. But that discussion was poorly placed on my part, a reactionary impulse to disagreement, when I am basically in agreement that a lot of texts are at their best in their respective authorial contexts. What I take away from Barthes is to avoid taking said context as the default or only frame of reference.

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    In the second, exactly what "tuned to a dead channel" means is a major factor in how the text is received. Plain grey or static gives the (clearly intended) oppressive technology-over-all mindset, while the blue more commonly seen today gives the exact opposite impression - a bright, cheerful cloudless day. This is more of a case of "keeping the book in the context of the time it was written in" then "death of the author", because in 1984 there were few -if any- TVs that went blue without a signal.
    Bright I'll grant you. Cheerful? That's just an assumption - and a particularly odd one since you've just been contesting the notion that blue, specifically, has a fixed emotional meaning. The blue of a modern-day dead channel is not the lovely temperate blue of a summer's day.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by GloatingSwine View Post
    I suspect the textbook didn't say that at all, and you're being hyperbolic to a degree depressingly common on the internet. Feel free to produce a specific quotation, preferably in the form of a picture of an actual edition of the book though.

    I suspect that you were given a chosen text with rather a lot of things which all came together to produce a reading which most critics tend to share and it was being used as an example to show you how to recognise those elements and tie them to second order meanings, and you have wilfully misinterpreted the whole course because you were young and rebellious, and so failed to pick up the skills you were being taught and so are trapped at the level of first order events.
    Your suspicions are wrong. This same textbook insisted that Lord Of The Rings was a Cold War allegory, and that 1984 was a tract on banning computers.

    Quote Originally Posted by Lethologica View Post
    Bright I'll grant you. Cheerful? That's just an assumption - and a particularly odd one since you've just been contesting the notion that blue, specifically, has a fixed emotional meaning. The blue of a modern-day dead channel is not the lovely temperate blue of a summer's day.
    Your image doesn't seem to work for me, but "Blue" in the context of the sky has a fairly limited meaning, and the majority of people seem to find a clear blue sky pleasant. Your point about the colors not being quite the same is valid, though - I'd find it pretty disturbing if the sky were that exact tint, although it would be much more unnatural than the simple dreary overcast that makes more sense in context.

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    Default Re: The Death of the Author debate is way too blinkered in scope

    Quote Originally Posted by Gnoman View Post
    Your image doesn't seem to work for me, but "Blue" in the context of the sky has a fairly limited meaning, and the majority of people seem to find a clear blue sky pleasant. Your point about the colors not being quite the same is valid, though - I'd find it pretty disturbing if the sky were that exact tint, although it would be much more unnatural than the simple dreary overcast that makes more sense in context.
    Imgur sucks, I guess. Here, try this. And while the tints are not the same, my point was more that description makes tone, not that that specific color is unnerving.

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