What is an Author? Summary

“What is an Author?” Summary

Foucault begins his essay by introducing the essence of an author as an individualization of many different fields including knowledge, sciences, literature, etc. Without addressing anything directly, he focuses right on the relationship between an author and a text, regarding that the text points toward the author as a figure who has created and is on the exterior of the text. Foucault begins his thesis with a quote by Beckett to summarize the theme of his essay, “What does it matter who is speaking?” He explains that this quote is an expression of the essential ethical principles of contemporary writing, in which Foucault calls “ecriture.” With this he explains that writing is not a mere tool to express the author’s ideas, emotions and knowledge, but rather that writing is its own language and operates within itself without the help of an author or reader. He ultimately explains that writing was not created to connect the author with the reader. With that thesis, he goes right into the idea of connecting writing with the concept of death. Foucault explains that writing has always been a concept of becoming “immortal” in a sense. He then points out pieces of literature to support this idea by addressing the Greek epic, where the hero dies young, and because of this he is granted immortality. Another is the Arabian narrative called “The Thousand and One Nights” where a character constantly tells stories to prevent being killed. However, Foucault explains that this is not the case anymore. The situation is reversed, where writing indeed “kills” the author. Foucault deconstructs the idea that the author is the foundation of something original, and instead states that the author is actually the function of writing and not the center of it all. Authors are trapped in the world of writing and realize their lack of freedom because they are controlled by the norm of modern literature or “ecriture.” Foucault moves onto the second idea of