Misused: Author Avatar

The description of Author Avatar says:

"A fictionalized version of an author who appears as a character in the events of the story is often called upon to comment upon the situation, deliver the author's verdict, and possibly break the Fourth Wall in a self-deprecating fashion. The author character will usually not influence the plot and may be only loosely tied to the goings-on, their appearances being quite random. The highfalutin literary term for a character designed to express the author's preferred opinions is the raisonneur—here at TV Tropes, the preferred term is Author Avatar.

How this "random" character knows the characters and their minor issues is rarely explained within the context of the series. Very often, it is stated or implied that the avatar is the Narrator."

Almost none of the examples fit this, however; instead the trope name is used for any character who has similar traits to the author or is based on them, especially if they're the protagonist, who of course has a narrative value in their own right.

Wick check:

Edited by nw09 on Apr 11th 2021 at 6:59:53 AM

Opening.

I feel that part of the problem is the description of "author appears in the work to explain things" is too narrow. I think that it should be broadened to "any character who's clearly meant to represent the creator of the work", and then the examples should get cleaned up. As for the significant amount of misuse where the character is kinda like the author, it could be moved to a Just for Fun page about similarities between authors and characters.

Maybe expand the definition as idonom suggests to cover all author stand-ins and make Raisonneur a trope to cover the original (current) definition.

If you look at the very first page of the Get Help with English thread, there's a troper who's thinking of the word raissoneur" (or reszeznór'' in their native Hungarian) and people responding describe it as somewhere between Author Avatar, Meta Guy, and First-Person Peripheral Narrator. It might be a distinct enough concept for us to do a Trope Transplant.

Edited by ccorb on Apr 15th 2021 at 10:38:57 AM

I like this idea.

Sure, why not.

So, if I'm understanding correctly, the difference between correct use and the more common form of misuse is "Author adds a character to provide author commentary" and "Self-Insert Fic, but it's really an original work"

Made a crowner.

Edited by nw09 on Apr 22nd 2021 at 3:12:30 AM

...You'll wanna post the link here too mate

Can we also start a clean-up thread to remove misuse and shoehorns?

I suppose I support broadening. The on-page examples include both cases where the avatar's authorial powers are role are explicitly mentioned as well as more Self-Insert Fic-like examples.

I agree we should broaden this to include "self-insert" characters, and create a separate trope for characters that just are the author, without any pretense (like Andrew Hussie in Homestuck).

Not sure if Raisonneur needs to be the title for that latter one given it's the first time I've heard that term used, and looking up the definition, it doesn't just refer to literal author stand-ins, but seems closer to Author Tract. Maybe something like In Universe Author Appearance?

Edited by mightymewtron on Apr 23rd 2021 at 3:38:49 PM

Edit: Never mind. This was already covered (plus I'm tired due to being up past 4 AM).

Edited by GastonRabbit on Apr 23rd 2021 at 4:18:37 AM

Did anyone holler the crowner?

Why is that a Single Prop crowner?

Because there are no more actions people really thought of? If they're not needed, just accept it.

Meh, hooked it then.

So if we're expanding this to allow instances where the author avatar is a Write Who You Know kind of deal, what is the scope of this? Would it have to be unambiguous to the audience that the character represents the author? For example, Dipper in Gravity Falls is based on creator Alex Hirsch, but you wouldn't know that just by watching it unless you knew him personally.

I think it should need to be obvious that it's the author's self-insert in some way. There's a difference between basing a character off of yourself and making yourself into a character.

What are some examples of a character that would be an Author Avatar and still come across as being their own character?

Duplicate post.

Edited by nw09 on May 13th 2021 at 12:20:13 PM

Marius from Les Mis (by Victor-Marie Hugo) comes to mind as a classic example. Much of his life as a poor student draws from Hugo's own experiences. Yet he's clearly not intended to be The Author Himself, he doesn't write any books about the experience or commentate, and as a self-portrait it's overall rather self-deprecating.

I just discovered we have Author Guest Spot. It's limited to webcomics for some reason, and it says Author Avatar is "a sillier and less Fourth Wall-threatening version" of Author Guest Spot.