History Main / DeathOfTheAuthor

Needless to say, many writers as well as many other critics, don't like this or believe that this view holds true for all authors and all works. Creator/MargaretAtwood famously remarked that if the Death of the Author theory became prevalent, then "we [writers] are all in trouble". They also disagree with the implication that the Death of the Author/Birth of the Reader means that all interpretations are equally valid or that a reader's creative sensibility (if it exists) is equal to that of a writer. Obviously, some writers are more talented and capable than others, and certain works can only be written by certain individuals. The notion also offends writers since it potentially leads to an overvaluing of the intellectual property of their works rather than the creative/legal rights of the author which has a contentious history in much legal and copyright disputes between creators and publishers. Creator/JRRTolkien acknowledged the influence of his experiences on his works (''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings''), but he denied that he had written allegory, insisting that his works simply had {{Applicability}}; this arguably makes him an early supporter of the Death of the Author, since [[FauxSymbolism pointless speculations]] about an author's allegorical ''intent'' are exactly what the concept seeks to avoid, favoring an analysis of the "applicability" of the text itself. On the other hand, Tolkien and his estate are quite protective of his works to ensure that it respects the overall basic intent of his work and restrictive over what filters in adaptations. In his essay "Creative Writing and Daydreaming" UsefulNotes/SigmundFreud broached on the concept by noting that writers who work in popular genres tend to create works more reflective of the tensions and desires of the society as a whole than more artistic writers whose works mainly reflect their own sentiments and desires, which was an early attempt at qualifying intentionality in a work of art while also providing nuanced views on which kinds of works and authors display stronger intent than others.

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canonicity for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. Nor does it mean "a creator's real-life opinions or behavior should have no bearing on whether people spend money on or enjoy their works". It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''This trope is not for literal deaths; DiedDuringProduction covers certain cases in which an author leaves behind unfinished work, while other cases fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.''

Related tropes include ShrugOfGod, TheWalrusWasPaul (when the author encourages fans and critics to find their own interpretations), and MisaimedFandom (which is what can happen when they do so). Often the driving force in FanonDiscontinuity where the fans dislike the author's interpretation to the point of ignoring it. This trope can be particularly useful and sometimes even encouraged in regard to tropes like AccidentalAesop, BrokenAesop, UnfortunateImplications, and others; see DarthWiki/WarpThatAesop. Don't confuse with AuthorExistenceFailure, which is the literal demise of the author (vs. literary)

Related tropes include ShrugOfGod, TheWalrusWasPaul (when the author encourages fans and critics to find their own interpretations), and MisaimedFandom (which is what can happen when they do so). Often the driving force in FanonDiscontinuity where the fans dislike the author's interpretation to the point of ignoring it. This trope can be particularly useful and sometimes even encouraged in regard to tropes like AccidentalAesop, BrokenAesop, UnfortunateImplications, and others; see DarthWiki/WarpThatAesop.

->"''A narrator should not supply interpretations of his work; otherwise he would not have written a novel, which is a machine for generating interpretations.''"

Death of the Author is a concept from mid-20th Century literary criticism, named after Creator/RolandBarthes's groundbreaking 1967 essay on the subject. It holds that an author's intentions and background (including their politics and religion) should hold no special weight in determining how to interpret their work. This is usually understood to mean that a writer's views about their own work are no more or less valid than the interpretation of the reader.

To us Tropers, this is a very interesting concept. We have an entire wiki full of works that list the tropes that appear therein. But sometimes, the list of tropes that we think are clearly present in the work is not the same as the list of tropes that the author ''intended'' to be there. In other words, the fact that the author intended to include or omit a trope doesn't mean they ''succeeded''. And on [[Wiki/TVTropes This Very Wiki]], the term "Death of the Author" can be used to illustrate this concept, and to point out that WordOfGod saying that a trope is or isn't present in the work doesn't mean it ''actually'' is.

But, as with many things, it's a little bit more complicated than that:

!!!Different ways to read a book

The first issue with Death of the Author is that there is more than one way to read a book. You can extract the plain meaning from the words themselves. Or you can go deeper, looking for {{subtext}}, re-reading for [[RewatchBonus something you can only catch the second time around]], putting together the NarrativeFiligree into a coherent whole. The latter is what's called ''close reading''. A trope might be present in a close reading that might not in a simple reading.

Indeed, Roland Barthes's essay refers only to close reading, specifically of a story by Creator/HonoreDeBalzac. He notes simply how in the act of writing a complex work, Balzac's voice as an author diffuses into multiple planes, so that one cannot know from a close reading if the narrative voice, character voice, and plot voice truly express the author's perspective. In other words, it is impossible to truly extract insight into the full range of Balzac's thoughts, viewpoints, and beliefs from a close reading of the work. Barthes does not deny that they are ''present'', that they might be useful to interpretation of the work, or that they can be made clear with a basic reading of the book, just looking at the fundamental plot points and story beats.

This more limited view of Death of the Author is not what most people mean when they refer to it. Most people think it means you ''shouldn't'' see what the author meant; Barthes, on the other hand, says you ''can't'', at least if you're reading closely. But we can be fair to Barthes because he was writing specifically about a 19th Century author who, while certainly popular, didn't have a vocal fanbase who had questions about everything and a medium to transmit their discussions and views to a wider community. In this day and age, it's much easier to ask the author what they meant, whether through television or the Internet. And they get asked so often that it's hard to stay consistent, meaning that authors can very well [[FlipFlopOfGod change what they "meant"]] from one year to the next. When they fail to stay consistent with respect to even the major themes or concepts, authorial intent becomes a self-contradiction, and Death of the Author -- in the modern sense, not Barthes's -- is the only way to go.

Interestingly, this leads to the delicious {{irony}} that Roland Barthes, at least once in his lifetime, had to tell people discussing his essay that their interpretation of it wasn't what he meant at all.

!!!Different media have different ways of seeing

Roland Barthes was a literary critic writing specifically about books. Does Death of the Author apply to non-books? It turns out that the material nature of the medium, and the logistics of producing a work, often require some clarity as to authorial intent.

For instance, if you're making a film, there's a lot more to it than words on a page. And in most cases the director, cast, and crew need to know everything about what they're doing. How are we going to read this line? How are we going to frame this scene? What are we going to wear? How do we light the set? Which effects are we going to use, and how much? Where are we going to film? All of these questions require more and more people to be on the same page -- cinematographers, costumers, even the hosts when filming on location. This leaves less room for the author to be ignorant of the impact and reception of their work, and Death of the Author defences in such cases can be disingenuous -- or even dangerous.

Take ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'', for example. Its director Creator/LeniRiefenstahl made it during [[UsefulNotes/NaziGermany the Nazi era]] and knew full well that she was making a PropagandaPiece. But after [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII the war]], she insisted that she herself had no political intentions and that the work should be judged purely on its artistic merits, not on its politics. But the claim is belied by the obvious logistical implications of the entire production. Rather than mere words on a page extolling Hitler and the Nazi party, Riefenstahl made use of her cinematic skill to visually exhibit them in the most flattering possible light -- which had to be a conscious directorial decision. Every scene, every draft, every script, every editing session was overseen by the Nazi political establishment, and all changes therein were publicly documented. So in looking at what changed between iterations and the process of making the whole film, it's a lot easier to discern what Riefenstahl intended than if she had just written a book.

The other thing to think about with film, and other visual media, is that it is necessarily the reproduction of an image in the artist's head -- and it will almost never be a perfect one. This leads to the phenomenon of the [[ReCut Director's Cut]], wherein a director will present a new version of the same work which is explicitly more in line with his authorial intent. In many cases, this isn't even a matter of a director [[CreatorBacklash rethinking what they did before]] (although [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion there is a lot of that]] -- as they say, "the perfect is the enemy of the good"), but rather having access to techniques, technology, or freedom from ExecutiveMeddling that they didn't have before, allowing them to get closer to their vision than they did the first time.

Poetry is another weird one, because the "plain text" of the work takes a back seat to wordsmithing, and poets are usually given freer rein to present their thoughts more artfully than bluntly. This [[OlderThanFeudalism goes back]] to the ''Literature/ApologyOfSocrates'': Socrates testifies that in his search for a wiser man than himself, he listened to the great poets. He thought their works very fine, but when they tried to explain them, he thought they were hopeless -- the dumbest spectators around would do a better job. He took this as proof that their poetic skills were a divine gift rather than an exercise of intellect, but the fact that the poets had reached such a different impact in plain text than in poetic language suggests that in this particular medium, "intent" doesn't mean very much.

When wordsmithing outside of artistic fields, though, Death of the Author is something of a hindrance. If you're in a court of law and tasked to interpret a piece of legislation, authorial intent absolutely ''does'' matter -- and indeed, a lawyer can cite evidence of legislative intent by quoting debates and speeches in the legislative chamber when the law was written. This does raise the question of whether the legislators would ''still'' have this intent if they were writing the law today (''e.g.'' modern debates about provisions of the U.S. Constitution written in the late 18th Century). This is also OlderThanFeudalism; for instance, [[UsefulNotes/{{Judaism}} Jewish sages]] have argued that the Torah is "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_in_Heaven not in Heaven]]" and that their own interpretation of the law can supplant the author's, even when the author is ''God''. This is why authorial intent takes a backseat to the plain language of the law itself. Indeed, many times authorial intent ''can'' be gleaned from the plain text of the law (after all, if Balzac wrote your laws, you live in a weird country); lawmakers are smart people, and if they ''meant'' for something to be interpreted a certain way, they're certainly capable of writing it in such a way as to leave no doubt. A well-written legal code or contract could be "artistic" in its own way if it achieves this in an elegant manner.

!!!Books are for interpretation, but there's a lot to interpret

Death of the Author raises the question of why an author writes to begin with. Are they opening their minds and souls to a greater audience, or are they giving the audience a piece of work to adapt to their own needs? It's probably a little from Column A, a little from Column B.

This is an important balance. If only the author's intent matters, much of the enjoyment of the work is eliminated; you're simply wandering around inside the author's head. People dislike {{Author Tract}}s for a reason -- it's not fun to be told what to think at every turn. But if the author's intent doesn't matter ''at all'', then you've removed the only objective standard by which to interpret a text, and every reader's insane interpretation is equally as valid as the author's.

Creator/JRRTolkien illustrated this by distinguishing {{allegory}} from {{applicability}}; allegory is what the author intended, whereas applicability is not necessarily what the author intended but is a valid way of looking at things. He did this in the context of interpretation of ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' and the extent to which it paralleled his personal experiences, such as his fighting in UsefulNotes/WorldWarI. Tolkien denied that he had written an allegory -- in other words, he didn't ''intend'' for his fictional world to parallel his own experiences -- but was okay with people drawing their ''own'' parallels between his works and what they knew about history. To some degree, he knew that people were always going to interpret his work however they liked, and if he insisted that only the author's intent mattered, readers would happily [[FauxSymbolism shoehorn his "intent" into their own view of the work]]. This arguably makes Tolkien an early supporter of the Death of the Author, but that's up for interpretation. (See what we did there?)

UsefulNotes/SigmundFreud addressed this directly in his essay "Creative Writing and Daydreaming". He noted that writers who work in popular genres tend to create works more reflective of the tensions and desires of the society as a whole, and more "artistic" writers' works mainly reflect their own sentiments and desires. This draws a sort of line between works, some of which are more tied to authorial intent than others. While there's certainly something to it, this is again the kind of thing Barthes was cautioning against; even when you have a very "artistic" work, one can't ''fully'' pick up the author's mindset from the work alone. A little from Column A, a little from Column B.

The stronger interpretation of Death of the Author argues that a work can only be judged by [[AllThereInTheManual its own words]], not by any external knowledge supplied by the author. The idea is that the work is a snapshot of the author's intent at the time he wrote it. As time goes by, the author's opinion changes, because all people change -- and eventually the author dies, because all people die, and the work will outlive the author. Therefore, while the author's intent might be important to the interpretation of a work, by the time you get to actually ''ask'' him about it, his intent has changed (whether he likes it or not)[[note]]in some cases that change can be severe, to the point of [[CanonDiscontinuity disregarding parts of the work]] or even [[CreatorBacklash dismissing it entirely]][[/note]] and his answer is no longer applicable to the work. Playwright Creator/AlanBennett claims he responded to students asking for assistance in analysing his works to "treat [him] like a dead author, who [is] thus unavailable for comment." The ''strongest'' interpretation of Death of the Author is the {{postmodernis|m}}t one, essentially saying that authorial intent is total bunk and everything is up to the reader to interpret fully. (Or at least that's how ''we'' interpret it.)

This creates an interesting question with respect to adaptations -- while it's technically the same work, the author's intent has necessarily changed between the release of the original and the adaptation, and the adaptation is usually helmed by a different author with more expertise in the new medium. However, the new author dismissing the original author's intent entirely using Death of the Author is highly frowned upon, not just for artistic reasons but also for ''legal'' reasons; allowing the new author to totally take over the work kind of defeats the purpose of copyright. This is why even though Tolkien favoured his approach of "applicability", he and his estate still exercised significant control of adaptations of ''The Lord of the Rings'' to ensure that the work did not deviate too far from his ''actual'' intent.

Indeed, authors tend to be rather insistent on the idea that while a work ''can'' be interpreted, authorial intent cannot be dismissed entirely. As Creator/MargaretAtwood famously put it, if Death of the Author became the dominant theory, "we [writers] are all in trouble."

!!!Some writers are better than others

One pitfall that adherents of Death of the Author occasionally encounter is the temptation to adopt Freud's division between popular and artistic works. This leads to two problems: first, that such a division cannot be made cleanly, and second, that works rich in interpretation can only be written by "artistic" people. This leads to a further belief that all artists must be intellectuals -- in other words, the frankly elitist claim that only the very culturally and philosophically learned are capable of writing a great work of art.

This line of thought is seen most acutely with Creator/WilliamShakespeare, considered to be one of the single greatest writers in the history of the English language, with enormous influence not only on popular culture but on the English language itself. And because [[GeniusBookClub smart people read a lot]], people who read Shakespeare and understand his work are considered particularly smart. So Shakespeare is firmly on the "artistic" side of things. But this brings up a whole bunch of problems. First, how can we known Shakespeare's authorial intent when he lived in the late 16th and early 17th centuries and so little is known about his personal life? Second, what does it mean when what little we ''do'' know suggests that he was a simple alderman's son from Stratford-upon-Avon? Indeed, the idea that "all great artists are intellectuals" led to what is known as the "anti-Stratfordian movement", suggesting that the historical entity we know as William Shakespeare could not have actually written the plays attributed to him because he was a country bumpkin who was incapable of writing such deep philosophical plays with dazzlingly complex characters. As if to further the point, most anti-Stratfordians point to a member of the nobility as the "real" Shakespeare -- most often Francis Bacon or Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford.

But modern scholarship is nearly unanimous that Shakespeare from Stratford really did write the plays history says he did. The plays' depth comes entirely from command of language, stagecraft, and dramatic intuition -- skills which can be intellectualised but are not innately intellectual. Indeed, there was a lot to suggest that the plays were ''not'' written by an intellectual (for example, their portrayals of foreign locales were often criticised by knowledgeable people as [[TheThemeParkVersion wildly inaccurate]], but Shakespeare didn't care -- they served the story well enough). Shakespeare was also a master at MultipleDemographicAppeal and in many instances threw a bone to the LowestCommonDenominator -- romance, violence, {{pun}}s, and [[GetTheeToANunnery naughty language]], all things that would place him firmly on the "popular" side of the Freudian divide.

This leads to criticism of the idea of Death of the Author as promoting the elitist view of TrueArt, when art cannot necessarily be judged by how many different ways one can look at it. Something can be elegant even in its simplicity. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, and sometimes Theatre/{{Hamlet}} really is just being a TroubledTeen.


!!!What does this mean for me as a Troper?

Having gone through all of this, it's important to keep the following things in mind when you edit the wiki:
* '''Do not use this trope to claim there's no such thing as {{Canon}}.''' Tropers who like to insist on [[{{Fanon}} their own version of events]] may cite this trope to claim that their interpretation is just as valid. On this wiki, canon is what counts. The idea that every work is technically open to interpretation does not mean that [[EpilepticTrees crazy fan theories]] are just as valid as what the work explicitly shows. Only what the work shows is what happens.
* '''Where the work does not explicitly answer a question, WordOfGod on its own is not a sufficient answer.''' This is the converse; the fact that authorial intent means ''something'' doesn't mean it means ''everything''. If the work is ambiguous about something, the author coming out later and saying what they really meant doesn't mean it actually happened in the work. Indeed, this is semi-policy for some tropes like CompleteMonster, which have [[Administrivia/CompleteMonster very strict definitions]] to prevent people from fighting over examples.
* '''This has nothing to do with OvershadowedByControversy.''' Sometimes this trope is cited in cases where an author did something really bad to say that it's okay to consume the author's work without feeling guilty, whether or not their transgressions had anything to do with the work. They very often don't, and it's a matter of debate whether or not it's really appropriate to continue reading such works, but that doesn't have to do with Death of the Author. This trope only has to do with the author's beliefs and behaviour to the extent to which they're actually present in the work.

The bottom line is that Death of the Author is a balance. A work of art is the ''sum'' of what the author intended, how they executed it, and how the author sees that intent.

See also ShrugOfGod (where the author doesn't actually have an opinion on something they wrote), TheWalrusWasPaul (where the author explicitly encourages readers to find their own interpretations), MisaimedFandom (where fans interpret it in a way the author did not intend and doesn't like), DoNotDoThisCoolThing (when something supposed to be bad or wrong ends up being presented in a very appealing way) and FanonDiscontinuity (where fans know what the author intended but choose to ignore it). Compare the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate and WordOfDante. Not to be confused with an author ''actually'' dying -- not even before they finish the work, which is covered by DiedDuringProduction. (Authors dying ''after'' production fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.)

See also ShrugOfGod (where the author doesn't actually have an opinion on something they wrote), TheWalrusWasPaul (where the author explicitly encourages readers to find their own interpretations), MisaimedFandom (where fans interpret it in a way the author did not intend and doesn't like), DoNotDoThisCoolThing (wheen something supposed to be bad or wrong ends up presented in a very appealing way) and FanonDiscontinuity (where fans know what the author intended but choose to ignore it). Compare the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate and WordOfDante. Not to be confused with an author ''actually'' dying -- not even before they finish the work, which is covered by DiedDuringProduction. (Authors dying ''after'' production fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.)

See also ShrugOfGod (where the author doesn't actually have an opinion on something they wrote), TheWalrusWasPaul (where the author explicitly encourages readers to find their own interpretations), MisaimedFandom (where fans interpret it in a way the author did not intend and doesn't like), and FanonDiscontinuity (where fans know what the author intended but choose to ignore it). Compare the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate and WordOfDante. Not to be confused with an author ''actually'' dying -- not even before they finish the work, which is covered by DiedDuringProduction. (Authors dying ''after'' production fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.)

To us Tropers, this is a very interesting concept. We have an entire wiki full of works that list the tropes that appear therein. But sometimes, the list of tropes that we think are clearly present in the work is not the same as the list of tropes that the author ''intended'' to be there. In other words, the fact that the author intended to include or omit a trope doesn't mean they ''succeeded''. And on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki, the term "Death of the Author" can be used to illustrate this concept, and to point out that WordOfGod saying that a trope is or isn't present in the work doesn't mean it ''actually'' is.

Take ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'', for example. Its director Creator/LeniRiefenstahl made it during the Nazi era and knew full well that she was making a PropagandaPiece. But after the war, she insisted that she herself had no political intentions and that the work should be judged purely on its artistic merits, not on its politics. But the claim is belied by the obvious logistical implications of the entire production. Rather than mere words on a page extolling Hitler and the Nazi party, Riefenstahl made use of her cinematic skill to visually exhibit them in the most flattering possible light -- which had to be a conscious directorial decision. Every scene, every draft, every script, every editing session was overseen by the Nazi political establishment, and all changes therein were publicly documented. So in looking at what changed between iterations and the process of making the whole film, it's a lot easier to discern what Riefenstahl intended than if she had just written a book.

Death of the Author is a concept from mid-20th Century literary criticism, named after Creator/RolandBarthes's groundbreaking 1967 essay on the subject. It holds that an author's intentions and background (including their politics and religion) should hold no special weight in determining how to interpret their work. This is usually understood to mean that a writer's views about their own work are no more or less valid than the interpretations of [[EpilepticTrees any given reader]].

Death of the Author is a concept from mid-20th Century literary criticism, [[TropeNamers named]] after Creator/RolandBarthes's groundbreaking 1967 essay on the subject. It holds that an author's intentions and background (including their politics and religion) should hold no special weight in determining how to interpret their work. This is usually understood to mean that a writer's views about their own work are no more or less valid than the interpretations of [[EpilepticTrees any given reader]].

Death of the Author is a concept from mid-20th Century literary criticism; it holds that an author's intentions and biographical facts (the author's politics, religion, etc) should hold no special weight in determining an interpretation of their writing. This is usually understood as meaning that a writer's views about their own work are no more or less valid than the interpretations of [[EpilepticTrees any given reader]]. Intentions are one thing. What was actually accomplished might be something very different. The logic behind the concept is fairly simple: Books are meant to be read, not written, so the ways readers interpret them are as important and "real" as the author's intention. On the flip side, a lot of authors are unavailable or [[ShrugOfGod unwilling]] to comment on their intentions, and even when they are, they don't always make choices for reasons that make sense or are easily explainable to others (or sometimes [[IJustWriteTheThing even to themselves]]).

Likewise, as some critics note, it is elitist to assume that all artists are intellectuals or they have to be intellectuals, i.e., that works with deep meaning and ideas come only from people who are culturally and philosophically learned, rather than deriving from instinct, observation, creative inspiration, and artistic genius. Many consider this the Shakespeare authorship fallacy, i.e., that because Shakespeare was unlikely to possess the intellectual wherewithal to write his plays, the alderman's son from Stratford cannot have been the author of deep philosophical plays with dazzlingly complex characters. The academic consensus and textual studies overwhelmingly support Creator/WilliamShakespeare as the author and they note that whatever makes the plays deep comes entirely from command of language, stagecraft, and dramatic intuition, and while these skills can be intellectualized they are not innately intellectual, and while there's great depth, power, and meaning to a number of scenes in his plays the reasons for such meaning can vary between appealing to [[MultipleDemographicAppeal different kinds of audiences]], subverting or parodying a convention that had already gotten stale way back then, or simple playfulness.

Although popular amongst {{postmodern|ism}} critics, this has some concrete modernist thinking behind it as well, on the basis that the work is all that outlives the author (hence the concept's name) and we can only judge the work by [[AllThereInTheManual the work itself]]. The author's later opinions about their work are themselves a form of criticism and analysis, and therefore are not necessarily consistent with what's written unless the author or publisher [[OrwellianRetcon actively goes back and changes it]]--and it can still be argued that, since the original work still exists, the author has merely created a different version of it. One critic's understanding of the author's background and opinions is likely to be just as accurate as another's, especially if the author has an [[MadArtist idiosyncratic]] or even [[ValuesDissonance anachronistic]] perspective on their own work. Modernists are more likely to appeal to the similar-yet-different concept of the Intentional Fallacy, which does not discount biographical information or other works by the same author. Playwright Creator/AlanBennett claims he responded to students asking for assistance on analyzing his works as part of their A-Levels to "treat [him] like a dead author, who [is] thus unavailable for comment".

Needless to say, many writers as well as many other critics, don't like this or believe that this view holds true for all authors and all works. Creator/MargaretAtwood famously remarked that if the Death of the Author theory became prevalent, then "we [writers] are all in trouble". They also disagree with the implication that the Death of the Author/Birth of the Reader means that all interpretations are equally valid or that a reader's creative sensibility (if it exists) is equal to that of a writer. Obviously, some writers are more talented and capable than others, and certain works can only be written by certain individuals. The notion also offends writers since it potentially leads to an overvaluing of the intellectual property of their works rather than the creative/legal rights of the author which has a contentious history in much legal and copyright disputes between creators and publishers. Creator/JRRTolkien acknowledged the influence of his experiences on his works (''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings''), but he denied that he had written allegory, insisting that his works simply had {{Applicability}}; this arguably makes him an early supporter of the Death of the Author, since [[FauxSymbolism pointless speculations]] about an author's allegorical ''intent'' are exactly what the concept seeks to avoid, favoring an analysis of the "applicability" of the text itself. On the other hand, Tolkien and his estate are quite protective of his works to ensure that it respects the overall basic intent of his work and restrictive over what filters in adaptations. In his essay "Creative Writing and Daydreaming" UsefulNotes/SigmundFreud broached on the concept by noting that writers who work in popular genres tend to create works more reflective of the tensions and desires of the society as a whole than more artistic writers whose works mainly reflect their own sentiments and desires, which was an early attempt at qualifying intentionality in a work of art while also providing nuanced views on which kinds of works and authors display stronger intent than others.

Some people have noted that Creator/RolandBarthes, who actually wrote the {{trope nam|ers}}ing essay, probably had to say "No, that's not what I meant at all!" at least ''once'' in his lifetime while discussing it. They have a point. In that essay, while discussing a story by Creator/HonoreDeBalzac through a very close reading, Barthes simply noted how in the act of writing a complex work, Balzac's voice as author diffuses into multiple planes, so that one cannot know from reading closely if the narrative voice, character voice, and plot voice truly expresses the author's perspective; one cannot necessarily extract insight into Balzac's own thoughts, viewpoints, and beliefs from the work through such a reading. For Barthes, the act of writing (and he meant writing only, with no hint as to how this trope applies to other media), allows the author to lose some of his conscious self and that for a work to be enjoyed, a reader has to project some of his own thoughts and views. Barthes' argument was based on close-reading i.e. the scattered random sentences in a story and other bits of detail, RewatchBonus and so on, not, as this trope is usually applied, on basic fundamental story beats and major plot points, in which the author's intent is far more conscious and clear. Barthes was challenging the assumption that the author had clear and conscious intentions about ''every'' part of his work, but was ''not'' proposing that the author had no intentions at all.

Barthes was also discussing a 19th Century author who--while certainly popular--did not write in genres with a vocal fanbase who had questions about everything and a medium to transmit those discussions and views to a wider community. Because fandom and other conventions have grown so much in modern times, prominent authors tend to be interviewed far more often than they might have been in the past, putting greater pressure on them to stay consistent. Some authors, such as Creator/RayBradbury and Creator/WilliamGibson can't be bothered to [[FlipFlopOfGod stay consistent]] when talking about the major themes or concepts in their books for more than a few years at a time.

In the case of non-literary media, some critics note that the material nature of the medium and the logistics of production often require some amount of clarity of intent. For instance, for a film to be made, in most cases the director, the cast, and the crew have to know beforehand what the story is, what a scene does, and what choices have to be made in terms of costumes, lighting, and special effects. Producers and others also need to get permission to shoot scenes at particular locations, and usually such permissions depend on the approval of the scene by the location hosts. Therefore there can be less room than in writing for the author to be ignorant of the overall intent of their work, and Death of the Author defenses in such cases can be disingenuous, or sometimes even dangerous. For instance, the Nazi era film-maker Leni Riefenstahl claimed in the post-war era that her propaganda film ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'' should be celebrated as a pure work of art independent of its politics, and that she didn't really have political intentions in making it. This claim is belied by the obvious logistics of the entire production, the level of state backing needed for the shooting of many scenes, and the fact that she went to painstaking lengths to show Hitler and the Nazi party in the most flattering possible light. The level of documentation during production--from screenplay drafts, to shooting script, to the different stages of production and editing--are also often documented publicly, with much information on multiple productions noting the variety of subtle and major changes made at different stages. As such, it's quite possible to figure out what the intent really is by noting the changes and shifts at multiple stages of productions.

An author at a later moment may come around to [[CreatorBacklash rejecting their own work]], or express dissatisfaction with [[CanonDiscontinuity some parts and not others]]. Hence, "the perfect is the enemy of the good" (a.k.a., "coulda, woulda, shoulda"). This is why some, but not all, [[AuteurLicense auteur filmmakers]] oppose the notion of a [[{{Recut}} Director's Cut]], or of the creators [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion fiddling with and updating]] a film after its initial release, on the grounds that the "real" film will always be the one people saw in cinemas in the year of release, not the ideal film in the director's head. In any case, most directors never get a chance to alter their work after it’s been released, since very few of them have the legal and financial resources to actually do this. This is a given in works where the [[GodDoesNotOwnThisWorld authors don't hold a copyright and can be replaced]], especially {{Shared Universe}}s; if a writer is fired and replaced by another, anything the old writer has stated in interviews can be (and often is) freely {{Jossed}} by the new writer.

There is an OlderThanFeudalism example about some Jewish sages having an argument about their law...and ignoring God's interpretation in favor of their own. Because you see, the Torah is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_in_Heaven not in Heaven.]] There is another in the Literature/ApologyOfSocrates: Socrates testifies that in his search for a wiser man than himself, he listened to the great poets. He thought their works very fine, but when they tried to explain them, he thought they were hopeless--and that the dumbest spectators around would do a better job. (He took this as proof that their poetic skills were a divine gift rather than an exercise of intellect.) It could be argued, however, that this hypothesis removes the only objective standard by which a text can be said to have a given meaning, or even any meaning ''at all''. For since there are few times one could back up their ''interpretation of a poem'' with evidence, this hypothesis reduces all possible interpretations to mere subjective opinions (or at best, educated guesses). It might also be asked that, if it is meaningless for someone to say "That's not what I meant" when talking about any literature they might have written, then how can it be meaningful for any other situation where one might say that? How, for example, could a general criticize an underling for getting something absurd out of a set of instructions he or she may have given them? "Sir/ma'am, what makes you think you know what the orders meant just because you wrote them?"

Bottom line: A) when discussing a fictional work with others, don't expect "Author intended this to be X; therefore, it is X" to be the end of or your entire argument; it's universally expected that interpretations of fiction ''must'' at least be backed up with evidence from within the work itself and B) don't try to get out of analyzing a work by treating "ask the author what X means" as the ''only'' or even best way to find out what X means -- [[FigureItOutYourself you must search for an answer yourself, young seeker]]. Writing is the author's job; analyzing the work and drawing conclusions based on it is ''your'' job -- if the author just gave away the answers every time, where would the fun be in that?

Related tropes include ShrugOfGod, TheWalrusWasPaul (when the author encourages fans and critics to find their own interpretations), and MisaimedFandom (which is what can happen when they do so). Often the driving force in FanonDiscontinuity where the fans dislike the author's interpretation to the point of ignoring it. This trope can be particularly useful and sometimes even encouraged in regard to tropes like AccidentalAesop, BrokenAesop, UnfortunateImplications, and others; see DarthWiki/WarpThatAesop.

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canonicity for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. Nor does it mean "a creator's real-life opinions or behavior should have no bearing on whether people spend money on or enjoy their works". It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''This trope is not for literal deaths; DiedDuringProduction covers certain cases in which an author leaves behind unfinished work, while other cases fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.''

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canon for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. Nor does it mean "a creator's real-life opinions or behavior should have no bearing on whether people spend money on or enjoy their works". It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''This trope is not for literal deaths; DiedDuringProduction covers certain cases in which an author leaves behind unfinished work, while other cases fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.''

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canon for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''This trope is not for literal deaths; DiedDuringProduction covers certain cases in which an author leaves behind unfinished work, while other cases fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnChairs.''

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canon for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''This trope is not for literal deaths; DiedDuringProduction covers certain cases in which an author leaves behind unfinished work, while other cases fall under Administrivia/PeopleSitOnClairs.''

Death of the Author is a concept from mid-20th Century literary criticism; it holds that an author's intentions and biographical facts (the author's politics, religion, etc) should hold no special weight in determining an interpretation of their writing. This is usually understood as meaning that a writer's views about their own work are no more or less valid than the interpretations of [[EpilepticTrees any given reader]]. Intentions are one thing. What was actually accomplished might be something very different. The logic behind the concept is fairly simple: Books are meant to be read, not written, so the ways readers interpret them are as important and "real" as the author's intention. On the flip side, a lot of authors are [[AuthorExistenceFailure unavailable]] or [[ShrugOfGod unwilling]] to comment on their intentions, and even when they are, they don't always make choices for reasons that make sense or are easily explainable to others (or sometimes [[IJustWriteTheThing even to themselves]]).

'''This trope does ''not'' mean "there is no such thing as canon for a work's events", which is a common misinterpretation of this theory used to justify CanonDefilement. It only proposes that questions not explicitly answered by the text of the work cannot simply be resolved by WordOfGod or by trying to guess the author's intention.''' Compare this trope with {{Applicability}} and the SugarWiki/FictionIdentityPostulate. A somewhat related trope is WordOfDante. ''Do not confuse this trope with AuthorExistenceFailure, a literal death of the author.''

In the case of non-literary media, some critics note that the material nature of the medium and the logistics of production often require some amount of clarity of intent. For instance, for a film to be made, in most cases the director, the cast, and the crew have to know beforehand what the story is, what a scene does, and what choices have to be made in terms of costumes, lighting, and special effects. Producers and others also need to get permissions to shoot scenes in locations and in many cases and oftentimes such permissions depend on the approval of the scene by the location hosts. In such cases, there is less room for the author to be ignorant of the overall intent of their work than in writing and Death of the Author defenses in such cases can be disingenuous, and at times dangerous. For instance, the Nazi film-maker Leni Riefenstahl in the post-war era claimed that her propaganda film ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'' should be celebrated as a pure work of art independent of its politics and that she didn't really have political intentions in making it. This claim is belied by the obvious logistics of the entire production, the level of state backing needed for the shooting of many scenes, and the fact that it was obviously intended for propaganda purposes. The level of documentation during production--from screenplay drafts, to shooting script, to the different stages of production and editing--are also often documented publicly, with much information on multiple productions noting the variety of subtle and major changes made at different stages. As such, it's quite possible to really arrive at what the intent really is by noting the changes and shifts at multiple stages of productions.

An author at a later moment may come around to [[CreatorBacklash rejecting their own work]], or express dissatisfaction with [[CanonDiscontinuity certain parts and not others]]. Hence, "the perfect is the enemy of the good" (i.e., "coulda, woulda, shoulda"). This is why some, but not all, [[AuteurLicense auteur filmmakers]] oppose the notion of a [[{{Recut}} Director's Cut]] or in some cases, [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion further alterations]] of a film after production even by creators, on the grounds that the "real" film will always be the one people saw in cinemas in the year of release, not the ideal film in the director's head. Others note that this is largely a ''fait accompli'' since directors in the vast majority of instances do not have a choice in the matter, since very few of them have the legal and financial resources to actually do this. This is a given in works where the [[GodDoesNotOwnThisWorld authors don't hold a copyright and can be replaced]], especially {{Shared Universe}}s; if a writer is fired and replaced by another, anything the old writer has stated in interviews can be (and often is) freely {{Jossed}} by the new writer.

An author at a later moment may come around to [[CreatorBacklash rejecting their own work]], or express dissatisfaction with [[CanonDiscontinuity certain parts and not others]]. Hence, "the perfect is the enemy of the good" (i.e., "coulda, woulda, shoulda"). This is why some, but not all, [[AuteurLicense auteur filmmakers]] oppose the notion of a [[{{Recut}} Director's Cut]] or in some cases, [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion further alterations]] of a film after production even by creators, on the grounds that the "real" film will always be the one people saw in cinemas in the year of release, not the ideal film in the director's head. Others note that this is largely a ''fait accompli'' since directors in the vast majority of instances do not have a choice in the matter, since very few of them have the legal and fiscal resources to actually do this. This is a given in works where the [[GodDoesNotOwnThisWorld authors don't hold a copyright and can be replaced]], especially {{Shared Universe}}s; if a writer is fired and replaced by another, anything the old writer has stated in interviews can be (and often is) freely {{Jossed}} by the new writer.

Needless to say, many writers as well as many other critics, don't like this or believe that this view holds true for all authors and all works. Creator/MargaretAtwood famously remarked that if the Death of the Author theory became prevalent, then "we [writers] are all in trouble". They also disagree with the implication that the Death of the Author/Birth of the Reader means that all interpretations are equally valid or that a reader's creative sensibility (whether it exists) is equal to that of a writer. Obviously, some writers are more talented and capable than others, and certain works can only be written by certain individuals. The notion also offends writers since it potentially leads to an overvaluing of the intellectual property of their works rather than the creative/legal rights of the author which has a contentious history in much legal and copyright disputes between creators and publishers. Creator/JRRTolkien acknowledged the influence of his experiences on his works (''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings''), but he denied that he had written allegory, insisting that his works simply had {{Applicability}}; this arguably makes him an early supporter of the Death of the Author, since [[FauxSymbolism pointless speculations]] about an author's allegorical ''intent'' are exactly what the concept seeks to avoid, favoring an analysis of the "applicability" of the text itself. On the other hand, Tolkien and his estate are quite protective of his works to ensure that it respects the overall basic intent of his work and restrictive over what filters in adaptations. In his essay "Creative Writing and Daydreaming" UsefulNotes/SigmundFreud broached on the concept by noting that writers who work in popular genres tend to create works more reflective of the tensions and desires of the society as a whole than more artistic writers whose works mainly reflect their own sentiments and desires, which was an early attempt at qualifying intentionality in a work of art while also providing nuanced views on which kinds of works and authors display stronger intent than others.

In the case of non-literary media, some critics note that the material nature of the medium and the logistics of production often require some amount of clarity of intent. For instance, for a film to be made, in most cases the director, the cast, and the crew have to know beforehand what the story is, what a scene does, and what choices have to be made in terms of costumes, lighting, and special effects. Producers and others also need to get permissions to shoot scenes in locations and in many cases and oftentimes such permissions depend on the approval of the scene by the location hosts. In such cases, there is less room for the author to be ignorant of the overall intent of their work than in writing and Death of the Author defenses in such cases can be disingenuous, and at times dangerous. For instance, the Nazi film-maker Leni Riefenstahl in the post-war era claimed that her propaganda film ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'' should be celebrated as [[PoesLaw a pure work of art independent of its politics and that she didn't really have political intentions in making it]]. This claim is belied by the obvious logistics of the entire production, the level of state backing needed for the shooting of many scenes, and the fact that it was obviously intended for propaganda purposes. The level of documentation during production--from screenplay drafts, to shooting script, to the different stages of production and editing--are also often documented publicly, with much information on multiple productions noting the variety of subtle and major changes made at different stages. As such, it's quite possible to really arrive at what the intent really is by noting the changes and shifts at multiple stages of productions.

In the case of non-literary media, some critics note that the material nature of the medium and the logistics of production often require some amount of clarity of intent. For instance, for a film to be made, in most cases the director, the cast, and the crew have to know beforehand what the story is, what a scene does, and what choices have to be made in terms of costumes, lighting, and special effects. Producers and others also need to get permissions to shoot scenes in locations and in many cases and oftentimes such permissions depend on the approval of the scene by the location hosts. In such cases, there is less room for the author to be ignorant of the overall intent of their work than in writing and Death of the Author defenses in such cases can be disingenuous, and at times dangerous. For instance, the Nazi film-maker Leni Riefenstahl in the post-war era claimed that her propaganda film ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'' should be celebrated as a pure work of art independent of its politics and that she didn't really have political intentions in making it. This claim is belied by the obvious logistics of the entire production, the level of state backing needed for the shooting of many scenes, and the fact that it was obviously intended for propaganda purposes. The level of documentation during production--from screenplay drafts, to shooting script, to the different stages of production and editing--are also often documented publicly, with much information on multiple productions noting the variety of subtle and major changes made at different stages. As such, it's quite possible to really arrive at what the intent really is by noting the changes and shifts at multiple stages of productions.

An author at a later moment may come around to [[CreatorBacklash rejecting their own work]], or express dissatisfaction with [[CanonDiscontinuity certain parts and not others]]. Hence, "the perfect is the enemy of the good" (i.e., "coulda, woulda, shoulda"). This is why some, but not all, [[AuteurLicense auteur filmmakers]] oppose the notion of a [[{{Recut}} Director's Cut]] or in some cases, [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion further alterations]] of a film after production even by creators, on the grounds that the "real" film will always be the one people saw in cinemas in the year of release, not the ideal film in the director's head. Others note that this is largely a ''fait accompli'' since directors in the vast majority of instances do not have a choice in the matter, since very few of them have the legal and fiscal resources to actually do this. This is a given in works where the authors don't hold a copyright and can be replaced, especially {{Shared Universe}}s; if a writer is fired and replaced by another, anything the old writer has stated in interviews can be (and often is) freely {{Jossed}} by the new writer.

Some people have noted that Creator/RolandBarthes, who actually wrote the {{trope nam|ers}}ing essay, probably had to say "No, that's not what I meant at all!" at least ''once'' in his lifetime while discussing it. They have a point. In that essay, while discussing a story by Creator/HonoreDeBalzac using a very close reading, Barthes simply noted how in the act of writing a complex work, Balzac's voice as author diffuses into multiple planes so that one cannot know from reading closely if the narrative voice, character voice, and plot voice truly expresses the author's perspective. By trying to do so, one cannot find it possible to extricate from these works some insight into Balzac's own thoughts, viewpoints, and beliefs. For Barthes, the act of writing (and he meant writing only, with no hint as to how this trope applies to other media), allows the author to lose some of his conscious self and that for a work to be enjoyed, a reader has to project some of his own thoughts and views. Barthes' argument was based on close-reading i.e. the scattered random sentences in a story and other bits of detail, RewatchBonus and so on, not, as this trope is usually applied, on basic fundamental story beats and major plot points, in which the author's intent is far more conscious and clear. Barthes was challenging the assumption that the author had clear and conscious intentions about ''every'' part of his work, but was ''not'' proposing that the author had no intentions at all.

Some people have noted that Creator/RolandBarthes, who actually wrote the {{trope nam|ers}}ing essay, probably had to say "No, that's not what I meant at all!" at least ''once'' in his lifetime while discussing it. They have a point. In that essay, Barthes discussing a story by Creator/HonoreDeBalzac in a very close reading simply noted how in the act of writing a complex work, Balzac's voice as author diffuses into multiple planes where one cannot know from reading closely if the narrative voice, character voice, and plot voice truly expresses the author's perspective. By trying to do so, one cannot find it possible to extricate from these works some insight into Balzac's own thoughts, viewpoints, and beliefs. For Barthes, the act of writing (and he meant writing only, with no hint as to how this trope applies to other media), allows the author to lose some of his conscious self and that for a work to be enjoyed, a reader has to project some of his own thoughts and views. Barthes' argument was based on close-reading i.e. the scattered random sentences in a story and other bits of detail, RewatchBonus and so on, not, as this trope is usually applied, on basic fundamental story beats and major plot points, in which the author's intent is far more conscious and clear. Barthes was challenging the assumption that the author had clear and conscious intentions about ''every'' part of his work, but was ''not'' proposing that the author had no intentions at all.

Needless to say, many writers as well as many other critics, don't like this or believe that this view holds true for all authors and all works. Creator/MargaretAtwood famously remarked that if the Death of the Author theory became prevalent, then "we [writers] are all in trouble". They also disagree with the implication that the Death of the Author/Birth of the Reader means that all interpretations are equally valid or that a reader's creative sensibility (whether it exists) is equal to that of a writer. Obviously, some writers are more talented and capable than others, and certain works can only be written by certain individuals. The notion also offends writers since it potentially leads to an overvaluing of the intellectual property of their works rather than the creative/legal rights of the author which has a contentious history in much legal and copyright disputes between creators and publishers. Creator/JRRTolkien acknowledged the influence of his experiences on his works (''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings''), he denied that he had written allegory, insisting that his works simply had {{Applicability}}; this arguably makes him an early supporter of the Death of the Author, since [[FauxSymbolism pointless speculations]] about an author's allegorical ''intent'' are exactly what the concept seeks to avoid, favoring an analysis of the "applicability" of the text itself. On the other hand, Tolkien and his estate are quite protective of his works to ensure that it respects the overall basic intent of his work and restrictive over what filters in adaptations. In his essay "Creative Writing and Daydreaming" UsefulNotes/SigmundFreud broached on the concept by noting that writers who work in popular genres tend to create works more reflective of the tensions and desires of the society as a whole than more artistic writers whose works mainly reflect their own sentiments and desires, which was an early attempt at qualifying intentionality in a work of art while also providing nuanced views on which kinds of works and authors display stronger intent than others.

Some people have noted that Creator/RolandBarthes, who actually wrote the {{trope nam|ers}}ing essay, probably had to say "No, that's not what I meant at all!" at least ''once'' in his lifetime while discussing it. They have a point. In that essay, Barthes discussing a story by Creator/HonoreDeBalzac in a very close reading simply noted how in the act of writing a complex work, Balzac's voice as author diffuses into multiple planes where one cannot know from reading closely if the narrative voice, character voice, and plot voice truly expresses the author's perspective. By trying to do so, one cannot find it possible to extricate from these works some insight into Balzac's own thoughts, viewpoints, and beliefs. For Barthes, the act of writing (and he meant writing only, with no hint as to how this trope applies to other media), allows the author to lose some of his conscious self and that for a work to be enjoyed, a reader has to project some of his own thoughts and views. Barthes' argument was based on close-reading i.e. the scattered random sentences in a story and other bits of detail, RewatchBonus and so on, not, as this trope is usually applied, on basic fundamental story beats and major plot points, in which the author's intent is far more conscious and clear. For Barthes, the idea that the author had clear and conscious intentions about ''every'' part of his work was dubious but ''not'' that the author had no intentions at all.

Barthes was also discussing a 19th Century author who while certainly popular did not write in genres with a vocal fanbase who had questions about everything and a medium to transmit those discussions and views to a wider medium. In modern times, on account of the growth of fandom and other conventions, some authors tend to be interviewed far more often than in the past, putting greater pressure on them to stay consistent. Some authors, such as Creator/RayBradbury and Creator/WilliamGibson can't be bothered to [[FlipFlopOfGod stay consistent]] when talking about the major themes or concepts in their books for more than a few years at a time.

In the case of non-literary mediums, some note that the material nature of the mediums and the logistics of production often require some amount of clarity of intent. For instance, for a film to be made, in most cases the director, the cast, and the crew have to know beforehand what the story is, what a scene does, and what choices have to be made in terms of costumes, lighting, and special effects. Producers and others also need to get permissions to shoot scenes in locations and in many cases and oftentimes such permissions depend on the approval of the scene by the location hosts. In such cases, there is less room for the author to be ignorant of the overall intent of their work than in writing and Death of the Author defenses in such cases can be disingenuous, and at times dangerous. For instance, the Nazi film-maker Leni Riefenstahl in the post-war era claimed that her propaganda film ''Film/TriumphOfTheWill'' should be celebrated as a pure work of art independent of its politics and that she didn't really have political intentions in making it. This claim is belied by the obvious logistics of the entire production, and the level of state backing needed for the shooting of many scenes, and the fact that it was obviously intended for propaganda purposes. The level of documentation during production, from screenplay drafts to shooting script, to the different stages of production and editing are also often documented publicly with much information on multiple productions noting the variety of subtle and major changes made at different stages, and as such it's quite possible to really arrive at what the intent really is by noting the changes and shifts at multiple stages of productions.

An author at a later moment may come around to [[CreatorBacklash rejecting their own work]], or express dissatisfaction with [[CanonDiscontinuity certain parts and not others]]. Hence, "the perfect is the enemy of the good" (i.e., "coulda, woulda, shoulda"). This is why some, but not all, [[AuteurLicense auteur filmmakers]] oppose the notion of a [[{{Recut}} Director's Cut]] or in some cases, [[GeorgeLucasAlteredVersion further alterations]] of a film after production even by creators, on the grounds that the "real" film will always be the one people saw in cinemas in the year of release, not the ideal film in the director's head. Others note that this is largely a fait accompli since directors in the vast majority of instances do not have a choice in the matter since very few of them have the legal and fiscal resources to actually do this. This is a given in works where the authors don't hold a copyright and can be replaced, especially {{Shared Universe}}s; if a writer is fired and replaced by another, anything the old writer has stated in interviews can be (and often is) freely {{Jossed}} by the new writer.

There is an OlderThanFeudalism example about some Jewish sages having an argument about their law...and ignoring God's interpretation in favor of their own. Because you see, the Torah is [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_in_Heaven not in Heaven.]] There is another in the Literature/ApologyOfSocrates: Socrates testifies that in his search for a wiser man than himself, he listened to the great poets. He thought their works very fine, but when they tried to explain them, he thought they were hopeless--and that the dumbest spectators around would do a better job. (He took this as proof that their poetic skills were a divine gift rather than an exercise of intellect.) It could be argued, however, that this hypothesis removes the only objective standard by which a text can be said to have given meaning, or even any meaning ''at all''. For since there are few times one could back up their ''interpretation of a poem'' with evidence, this hypothesis reduces all possible interpretations to mere subjective opinions (or at best, educated guesses). It might also be asked that, if it is meaningless for someone to say "That's not what I meant" when talking about any literature they might have written, then how can it be meaningful for any other situation where one might say that? How, for example, could a general criticize an underling for getting something absurd out of a set of instructions he or she may have given them? "Sir/ma'am, what makes you think you know what the orders meant just because you wrote them?"