Wilson, A. (2004)
Foucault on the ‘question of the author’: a critical exegesis.
The Modern Language Review, 99 (2). pp. 339-363
Perhaps it would be best to talk around the ideas of Barthes and Foucault rather than take a completely divergent strategy.
Seems after the death was proclaimed in 1960s, revived in 1990s
1992 - Sean Burkes The Death and Return of the Author
reveals a range of strengths and troubles in their arguments (barthes, foucault, derrida)
Sean Burke rephrased Foucaults 'What is an Author to 'What (and who) is an author?'
"As we shall see in due course, this reformulation prove to be apt indeed; and I hope to show that a straegy akin to Burke's yields still further fruits when applied anew to 'What is an Author?' p339
1. Foucault's 'What is an Author?' and its Contexts p340
context for Foucault's paper was Barthes essay The Death of the Author.
Barthes developed a little history of writing and authorship, fell into three phases:
-primordial grace
-subsequent fall
-future redemption
Meant the death of the critic as well p341
'birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author
------------
"Foucault proposed to examine the author 'as a function of discourse', replacing the conventional figure of 'the author' with what he called 'the author function' - a concept which sought to capture the discursive role played by that figure." p341
people like Marx and Freud were not just authors but "'initiatiors of discursive practices'" p342
Foucault suggests this author function applies to them as well
Foucault quotes from Beckett 'What does it matter who's speaking?'
The figure of the author as turned from a 'who' into a 'what'
similarities to Barthes:
-The author's death was an authored event
resemblances are misleading
Foucault criticised the traditional concept of the literary 'work' (Barthes left intact)
p343
Firstly, barthes sought to supersede author-figure
Foucault problematised that figure and made him a site of enquiry
Secondly, Foucault was extending the problem from imaginative literature to the domain of non-fictional writing
Thirdly,new figure of the 'text'
Is this really relevant at this point?
Simon Johnson
www.thephilosophicalphotographer.co.uk
On Foucault
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