Death of the Author (feat. William White)

Roland Barthes wrote an influential essay entitled The Death of the Author back in the 60s. I wonder if you can easily do that when it comes to bad people. William White joins me to tell me how wrong I am.

Assumptions

Whatever This Is

[moondawg]

Curtains reflect upon the barrier between the author and the reader on a level of which we aren't to truly understand what the author meant by inserting such curtains, to open the curtain defeats the purpose the curtain was meant uphold.

[mattmobile]

I CANT BREATHE! "Whats love got to do got to do with it?" oh man, kyle, you have killed me, I'm ying laughing right now. thank you.

[kaysyconundrum]

Complex question I luv it. Here we go: As soon as I find someone is an abuser I immediately stop supporting their work. But! if there's something I already love, an anthem that's close to me or a movie I grew up with, I allow myself to hold it close to me still. Their abuse shouldn't take that thing away from me. If I still want to consume a piece of media made by a trash person I buy it secondhand (all my Scott card I bought used, yay!) or I pirate (arrr!). I can't in good conscience support a trash person but I sometimes allow myself to enjoy their work guilt free.

[HallsEmporium]

William! That is a tough question. I have fond memories of Bill Cosby and his stories and now he is on the stand for some awful things... but those stories are still heart warming and funny... do they get a pass because they occurred BEFORE the accusations? Before we were aware he was possibly doing something terrible? Blurg.

[IngoSchwarze]

You have proven two obviously opposite answers to the same question in the same video, and now we are all confused.

I think part of the confusion arises from the fact that the question was never asked clearly. I discern at least four questions that are being conflated here, trying to answer "Yes" or "No" as a whole, even though none of them, even asking them separately, allows an easy "Yes" or "No" answer. But three out of the four are easy to answer anyway, even though not with "Yes" or "No". Let's discuss them separately:

(1) Can i like art made by an asshole? -- Obvious answer: Well, sure you can. What you like *right now* is not a conscious and not a rational decision. Maybe you like it because you are an asshole yourself (i sometimes am, even though i sometimes don't like that fact, and even more often some specific aspect of it.) We often like things even though we know that maybe we shouldn't. Simply saying "i don't like it" is nothing short of dishonest (to yourself). If you have a bad feeling about it, you can try to understand why you like it, and whether and how that is related to the (flawed) personality of the author, and if you come to the conclusion that liking it is for some reason morally objectionable, you can try to work on developing your personality into a more healthy direction. But that's a slow and ardous process, and shortcuts don't help anybody in this respect.

(2) Is it OK to promote art made by an asshole? -- That's the tough one. Let's come back to it later.

(3) Should that asshole be allowed to become famous? -- By far not all people who deserve it are remembered by posteriority, but those that were great but get forgotten are usually ignored because of oppression (sexism, racism, and the like). From historical experience, i would judge that if somebody does one seriously innovative thing, misbehaviour - no matter whether related or unrelated - is almost never a reason to get forgotten, while prejudice of others almost always is. So, my answer is: We can maybe prevent that a black woman who creates great stuff gets ignored if we look at what she does and tell others about it. We can hardly prevent someone who already is talked about a lot from being remembered, at least not if what they did is truly innovative. So the question is kind of irrelevant.

(4) Should art be analyzed from the point of view of the artist or the viewer? -- Obvious answer: Both. Both can add to the understanding and enjoyment of the work. Depending on the context, one or the other may be more relevant. When you encourage children and youths to approach literature and art, their own experiences, and how they relate to the art, are obviously central, unless you want to make them hate art (you talked about that with respect to your own school days). When you try to study a specific historical epoch and try to understand why things went forward (or sideways) the way they did back then, it would be foolish to disregard the perspective of the author. Also, it's a matter of personal taste, character, and interest. There is nothing wrong with moderate egoism or altruism, even though both are somehow needed, and your character may influence whether you like exploring your own or the other's perspective first (but be sure not to forget the other perspective completely).

That said, is it OK to promote art made by an asshole? -- Step one: not talking about that particular art at all is not a good idea, at least not if others already talk about it a lot. That would only leave the stage to those who unthinkingly, or maliciously, excuse the author. -- Step two: talking about the art only is a bad idea, too. That might promote an uncritical, incomplete perception of the author and their work even more. -- Step three: Consequently, try to understand how the author's misbehaviour affects what you like about the works. The misbehaviour may explain what you like. In that case, you might need to be alarmed about your own inclinations. The misbehaviour might be in stark contrast to the aspects you like. In that case, publicly analysing what the author wrote about the subject in their works, and what they did about it in real life, is likely to teach substantially more about the subject, the works, and the author than analysing each separately (the whole is more than the sum of the parts). The misbehaviour might be apparently unrelated to the works. In that case, you can ask whether the area of the misbehaviour is conspiciously missing from the works, and whether that is a defect. If it is - bingo, you just found out something about the work itself. If it isn't - well, humans have so many shades of character that one can be an angel and a devil at the same time, and even if you know someone _really_ well, it's usually not at all simple to understand the relation between all parts of the personality.

Does that make sense to you?

[mjacton]

I really like your channel and agree with you, ultimately, though I'm more into the symbolism intended by the author than you are. But, I just want you to know Barthes's essay is translated into English. You can find it online.

[EWKification]

It's only 6 fucking pages. Go read it. It's garbabe.