Basically, the theory states that how the author intended for their story to be interpreted does not matter and that the reader decides the intention based on personal interpretation. Let's say, as the author, you do not want people to thirst after the evil character that has no pros whatsoever but instead of thirsting after the character you want, they go for the evil one. Another example is if you intended a scene to be sad but for some reason, everyone who reads it finds it hilarious in context. How do you feel about that as an author or reader? Is it frustrating that people don't share your intentions or are they pretty close to understanding your intentions?
Huh?
The foundation of communication is simple: It doesn't matter what I say. What matters is what you HEAR.
Let's say I say, "Booboobaroo"
You have no idea what that means.
Now, what that means is, "Remember that stupid commercial we saw like a thousand times?" And there is only one person is left alive who knows what that means.
Now, if I say, "BoobooBaroo" and I'm saying this as a way of cheering you up, and you look at me and go, "What the fuck, Eldritch?" Is it YOUR FAULT you don't cheer up? I mean, I KNOW WHAT I MEANT. You failed to understand so clearly you are to blame, right?
No.
I am to blame because I did a poor job communicating.
I am not responsible for what you take away from what I say, But I am responsible for what I give you. If I give you something you take the wrong way, mostly that's on me. Yes, your attitude is part of the equation. You could be looking for an excuse to 'read into what I say', but as the one communicating, I need to know my audience.
Now, I can say, "This is made for group A not group B. If Group B reads this and decides that what I'm saying is, 'I hate black lesbians' when all I'm saying is, 'Episode 3 of The Acolyte sucks', well, I wasn't trying to reach Group B. But if group A walks away saying, "I didn't know Bob hated Black Lesbians", then maybe I screwed up.
The "Death of the Author" only applies to the Target Audience. People outside that Audience have their own agenda and their opinions shouldn't matter. I can twist shit around to fit my goals, but I'm not the one most authors were trying to reach, now am I?
To say it's a Blanket, "THE AUTHOR IS DEAD" is the very shit that people with political agenda's use to push nonsense by corrupting other people's message. The Author is dead, to an adience that reads the story in good faith. If someone is using bad faith, then it is up to honest fans to gatekeep and tell assholes like that to go get stuffed.
Just today, I'm watching a Critical Drinker video, and someone posts, "I hate how he always says, 'THIS IS THE DEATH OF STARWARS!'" And I was like, "No. He's never declared starwars dead before. He has liked Andor. He has spoken well when part of Star Wars was good. He wants the IP to actually be good. This was the first Episode where he said, "Star Wars is Dead."
the guy replied, "He's been saying it for four years."
Now, funny thing, Did you know when you click 'like button', if you don't turn it off, that becomes public availible info? This guy hasn't had his account for more than 6 months and hasn't once clicked like on a single Video of CD. So I ask him to prove it. Show me a link.
'OH, JUST LOOK AT ANY VIDEO!" and started insulting me.
That is someone who doesn't care about the Author's intent. That is someone who wants to push an agenda and has only bad faith. Those people are ABUSING 'death of the author'. Yes, the author's message isn't what he intends, but what people hear, but there are also people who just HATE the author, so they will try to twist the message to make them look bad.
So I'd say Death of the Author is Real, but only to the target audience, and the audience needs to gatekeep assholes to stay out of the IP.
