September 5, 2012
Death of the Author
"To write, is to reach that point where only language acts, 'performs,' and not 'me.'" (Barthes) It intrigues me that Barthes find an author worth only a side but not a voice is his work. To kill an author off is to kill the language the context and even the structure in some cases. I have sided with various other scholars such as McGann in thinking that writing is co-constructed. In his book, The Textual Condition, he proves this point clearly. "If texts are to be produced critically, whether through writer, reader, or editor, the texts must emphasize their relations, and their relativities." (McGann) No one work is truly original, only influenced by everything you have crossed. To hide one's voice is to hide those that you built your argument on. Text itself is ephemeral and so is the process of making it. The author, whether their fame over powers the writing, or creates expectations is no greater or less than him whom wrote it.
1 comment:
(This response is from Jess Weaver who had trouble posting it to the blog ...)
I completely agree with the statement" to hide one's voice is to hide those that you built your argument on." As students, we study Rhetoric- the art of delivering written work in a specific way (or however one chooses to define it) for a reason. We are encouraged to write and speak our minds, if we write but don't speak, do you really trust the words that we have written? Our work is a collaboration of many other works but the processing of our ideas allows for each reader to pick and choose from other in order to create a bigger and better idea. Thus, we get different idea because no one person thinks the same- we each take different avenues to come to a conclusion. Some could argue that writing is half the battle with the spoken word as the other half. Those who speak about their own writing have the ability to delve deeper into the meanings simply because it was their written idea. Making the meaning behind the word much more powerful. In essence, what I am trying to say is- it's one thing to have an opinion however it's another to develop and speak it.
-Jess Weaver
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