I'm sure the answer to this is "it depends"... But do you think this discourse is still happening with the same degree of vigor offline? I asked this because in my last few semesters of teaching undergrads at SLC, I've been surprised how open to transgressive and morally un-edifying work the students have been, both in their own fiction and in their reactions to published work and the writing of their classmates. One of them even said something about a this-teaches-the-wrong-message critique of Twilight being "so 2007" in a recent conversation (which, although I am not a fan of the Twilight books, filled me with something resembling hope). Obviously my sample size here is vanishingly small but I feel like a lot of the young people who are serious about writing are not participating in Twitter or Twitter clone discourse around literature that was so dominant a decade or less ago... Or if they are participating in it, they consider it a bit of a joke.
That's nice to hear! I also don't see this attitude that much in my students (sometimes but not that often) when we read other people's work. I do think it's a mindset more for people who see themselves as consumers of art than those who want to create it. But my students do express a fear about their work being misinterpreted by others. And a fear of the various levels of gatekeepers in publishing not liking transgressive or ambiguous work.
Yeah the closer they come to publishing/professionalizing their careers, the more this probably comes into play for writers.
Again anecdotally, I also wonder about the influence of TikTok rather than Twitter or Facebook being the main source of my students' social media consumption. I cannot for the life of me figure out how to make TikTok interesting, but somehow these younglings have used it to discover stuff like Jack Stauber's Opal and other super weird media, which I think definitely keeps them in a better headspace for creativity than reading infinite threads about how not to offend. It's fascinating to me how much the format of a platform can inform how people think both on and off that platform.
I think you're very right. I'm not well-versed enough in BookTok to say, but anecdotally it does seem there's more celebration of if not ambiguous work than at least dark and intense work. Something about recording yourself crying or experiencing real emotion from a reading experience that works in video more than text? I can't find it right now but there was a viral tiktok of someone GOING THROUGH IT reading A Little Life the other day. Moshfegh is also big on booktok. Hmm.
The Barthes essay is always so interesting to re-read, thank you for providing the link. The part I had forgotten was how he linked the author's death with the end of thinking of a book as something that comes "after" a life - but that way of thinking is still present everywhere when people talk about books. (One look at BookTok is enough - if there's a counterforce to the death of the author, it seems like it's "telling my story".) It's weird that of all Barthes' different futuristic promises - all texts will be writerly texts, everything will just become a flow of signs - this is the one that's caught on.
Also: both here and in S/Z, Barthes uses a trans woman as his key metaphor for textual coding and decoding. I don't know what to make of that, but it is interesting.
I'll be perfectly frank. Roland Barthes' Death of the Author has no intellectual value. It is deceptively written. I see no reason to replace the word "author" with the word "scriptor".
Thank you for sharing this. It's incredibly interesting. I particularly love your take on the "Undeath of the Author." It reminds me of Margaret Atwood's answers to anyone asking if the Handmaid's Tale is a feminist novel.
Having to guard our work from bad interpretations terrifies me though.
PS, I absolutely loved Tiny Nightmares. It's constantly on my nightstand.
I'm sure the answer to this is "it depends"... But do you think this discourse is still happening with the same degree of vigor offline? I asked this because in my last few semesters of teaching undergrads at SLC, I've been surprised how open to transgressive and morally un-edifying work the students have been, both in their own fiction and in their reactions to published work and the writing of their classmates. One of them even said something about a this-teaches-the-wrong-message critique of Twilight being "so 2007" in a recent conversation (which, although I am not a fan of the Twilight books, filled me with something resembling hope). Obviously my sample size here is vanishingly small but I feel like a lot of the young people who are serious about writing are not participating in Twitter or Twitter clone discourse around literature that was so dominant a decade or less ago... Or if they are participating in it, they consider it a bit of a joke.
That's nice to hear! I also don't see this attitude that much in my students (sometimes but not that often) when we read other people's work. I do think it's a mindset more for people who see themselves as consumers of art than those who want to create it. But my students do express a fear about their work being misinterpreted by others. And a fear of the various levels of gatekeepers in publishing not liking transgressive or ambiguous work.
Yeah the closer they come to publishing/professionalizing their careers, the more this probably comes into play for writers.
Again anecdotally, I also wonder about the influence of TikTok rather than Twitter or Facebook being the main source of my students' social media consumption. I cannot for the life of me figure out how to make TikTok interesting, but somehow these younglings have used it to discover stuff like Jack Stauber's Opal and other super weird media, which I think definitely keeps them in a better headspace for creativity than reading infinite threads about how not to offend. It's fascinating to me how much the format of a platform can inform how people think both on and off that platform.
I think you're very right. I'm not well-versed enough in BookTok to say, but anecdotally it does seem there's more celebration of if not ambiguous work than at least dark and intense work. Something about recording yourself crying or experiencing real emotion from a reading experience that works in video more than text? I can't find it right now but there was a viral tiktok of someone GOING THROUGH IT reading A Little Life the other day. Moshfegh is also big on booktok. Hmm.
If they are "readers" yes. We take some time to figure out who the "readers" are.
I feel posting this here is obligatory.
https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/002/386/534/fd2.jpg
Ha I actually just added that to the post 2 minutes before you posted here. Yes, sadly always relevant these days
A great mind thinks alike!
The Barthes essay is always so interesting to re-read, thank you for providing the link. The part I had forgotten was how he linked the author's death with the end of thinking of a book as something that comes "after" a life - but that way of thinking is still present everywhere when people talk about books. (One look at BookTok is enough - if there's a counterforce to the death of the author, it seems like it's "telling my story".) It's weird that of all Barthes' different futuristic promises - all texts will be writerly texts, everything will just become a flow of signs - this is the one that's caught on.
Also: both here and in S/Z, Barthes uses a trans woman as his key metaphor for textual coding and decoding. I don't know what to make of that, but it is interesting.
This was so illuminating, especially the part about the moralising behind the "Undeath of the Author". That is so true!
I also wondered while reading this if the author could also be considered a reader, especially if they read something they wrote years ago.
I'll be perfectly frank. Roland Barthes' Death of the Author has no intellectual value. It is deceptively written. I see no reason to replace the word "author" with the word "scriptor".
The Art of Death, and NO punches pulled
https://bilbobitch.substack.com/p/black-medicine-the-black-arts-of
Thank you for sharing this. It's incredibly interesting. I particularly love your take on the "Undeath of the Author." It reminds me of Margaret Atwood's answers to anyone asking if the Handmaid's Tale is a feminist novel.
Having to guard our work from bad interpretations terrifies me though.
PS, I absolutely loved Tiny Nightmares. It's constantly on my nightstand.
"If you’re always guarding against your worst reader, you’ll never create work that appeals to your best reader."
Unless your best readers already know your worst readers.
Also, it’s a funny thing about Barthes — he IS dead.
I had this in mind as a point of my novella "Bomb Cyclone and its Effects on Harvard" on the point of "narration."