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For other uses, see Author (disambiguation).
"Authorship" redirects here. For the use in academia, see Academic authorship.
An author (sometimes, in reference to a woman author, authoress) is defined both as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. The second entry goes on to clarify that, when using the term "author," the "anything" which is created is most usually associated with written work.

Contents

Author of a written work

Legal significance

In copyright law, there is necessarily little flexibility as to what constitutes authorship. .The United States Copyright Office defines copyright as "a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U.S. Code) to authors of "original works of authorship".[1] Holding the title of "author" over any "literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, [or] certain other intellectual works" giverights this person, the owner of the copyright, exclusive right to do or authorize any production or distribution of their work.^ On January 4th, 1943, Slovenian-American author Louis Adamic wrote the following heartfelt letter to ex-President of the United States, Herbert Hoover.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ It seems like something for “other people.” It seems like they’d need a personality transplant to make it work for them.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 Any person or entity wishing to use intellectual property held under copyright must receive permission from the copyright holder to use this work, and often will be asked to pay for the use of copyrighted material. After a fixed amount of time, the copyright expires on intellectual work and it enters the public domain, where it can be used without limit. .Copyright law has been amended time and time again since the inception of the law to extend the length of this fixed period where the work is exclusively controlled by the copyright holder.^ I never copy, since I find by experience that the work I spend the least time… .
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 However, copyright is merely the legal reassurance that one owns his/her work. Technically, someone owns their work from the time it's created. An interesting aspect of authorship emerges with copyright in that it can be passed down to another upon one's death. The person who inherits the copyright is not the author, but enjoys the same legal benefits.
Questions arise as to the application of copyright law. How does it, for example, apply to the complex issue of fan fiction? If the media agency responsible for the authorised production allows material from fans, what is the limit before legal constraints from actors, music, and other considerations, come into play? As well, how does copyright apply to fan-generated stories for books? What powers do the original authors, as well as the publishers, have in regulating or even stopping the fan fiction?

Literary significance

In literary theory, critics find complications in the term "author" beyond what constitutes authorship in a legal setting. In the wake of postmodern literature, critics such as Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault have examined the role and relevance of authorship to the meaning or interpretation of a text.
Barthes challenges the idea that a text can be attributed to any single author. He quotes, in his essay "Death of the Author" (1968), that "it is language which speaks, not the author".[2] The words and language of a text itself determine and expose meaning for Barthes, and not someone possessing legal responsibility for the process of its production. Every line of written text is a mere reflection of references from any of a multitude of traditions, or, as Barthes puts it, "the text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture"; it is never original.[2] With this, the perspective of the author is removed from the text, and the limits formerly imposed by the idea of one authorial voice, one ultimate and universal meaning, are destroyed. .The explanation and meaning of a work does not have to be sought in the one who produced it, "as if it were always in the end, through the more or less transparent allegory of the fiction, the voice of a single person, the author 'confiding' in us".[2] The psyche, culture, fanaticism of an author can be disregarded when interpreting a text, because the words are rich enough themselves with all of the traditions of language.^ A few years back I worked on the team that wrote the text for the interpretive display at the Hoover Dam Visitor Center.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ But, I’ve always suspected there was something more at work.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ (Some articles from Christine on the how and why of working with one word listed below.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 .To expose meanings in a written work without appealing to the celebrity of an author, their tastes, passions, vices, is, to Barthes, to allow language to speak, rather than author.^ Teleseminars are spoken rather than written.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]
Michel Foucault argues in his essay "What is an author?" (1969), that all authors are writers, but not all writers are authors. .He states that "a private letter may have a signatory—it does not have an author".[3] For a reader to assign the title of author upon any written work is to attribute certain standards upon the text which, for Foucault, are working in conjunction with the idea of "the author function".[3] Foucault's author function is the idea that an author exists only as a function of a written work, a part of its structure, but not necessarily part of the interpretive process.^ On January 4th, 1943, Slovenian-American author Louis Adamic wrote the following heartfelt letter to ex-President of the United States, Herbert Hoover.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ A few years back I worked on the team that wrote the text for the interpretive display at the Hoover Dam Visitor Center.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 The author's name "indicates the status of the discourse within a society and culture", and at one time was used as an anchor for interpreting a text, a practice which Barthes would argue is not a particularly relevant or valid endeavor.[3]
.Expanding upon Foucault's position, Alexander Nehamas writes that Foucault suggests "an author [...] is whoever can be understood to have produced a particular text as we interpret it", not necessarily who penned the text.^ I wouldn’t necessarily posit that ALL writing is tantamount to spilling one’s blood on the page.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ We have many visitors to this site who are interested in writing children’s books as well as numerous seasoned authors… The Adventurous Writer .
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 [4] It is this distinction between producing a written work and producing the interpretation or meaning in a written work that both Barthes and Foucault are interested in. Foucault warns of the risks of keeping the author's name in mind during interpretation, because it could affect the value and meaning with which one handles an interpretation.
.Literary critics Barthes and Foucault suggest that readers should not rely on or look for the notion of one overarching voice when interpreting a written work, because of the complications inherent with a writer's title of "author."^ You should be looking for new opportunities every day regardless of how much work you have on.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ I’ve written about it on several occasions and I truly believe that it is one of the best tools out there to get your writing work noticed.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ The story should be one where the reader is drawn into it and has a reasonable expectation of fear that something bad is going to happen….
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 They warn of the dangers interpretations could suffer from when associating the subject of inherently meaningful words and language with the personality of one authorial voice. Instead, readers should allow a text to be interpreted in terms of the language as "author."

Relationship between author and publisher

The publisher of a work might receive a percentage calculated on a wholesale or a specific price and or a fixed amount on each book that is sold. Publishers, at times, reduced the risk of this type of arrangement, by agreeing only to pay this after a certain amount of copies had sold. In Canada this practice occurred during the 1890s, but was not commonplace until the 1920s.
.
  • Commissioned: Publishers made publication arrangements, and authors covered all expenses (today the practice of authors paying for their publications is often called vanity publishing, and is looked down upon by many publishers, even though it may have been a common and accepted practice in the past).^ It may be the greatest of ironies that the problems facing publishers today have nothing to do with finding people who want to read.
    • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

     ^ I’m not content to let others tell me how my books are going to look or even if they get published.
    • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

     ^ Last weekend I was cleaning out my file cabinet and came upon hundreds of past published clips.
    • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

     Publishers would receive a percentage on the sale of every copy of a book, and the author would receive the rest of the money made.

Relationship between author and editor

The relationship between the author and the editor, often the author’s only liaison to the publishing company, is often characterized as the site of tension. For the author to reach his or her audience, the work usually must attract the attention of the editor. .The idea of the author as the sole meaning-maker of necessity changes to include the influences of the editor and the publisher in order to engage the audience in writing as a social act.^ This is a book with a history that deserves some brief explanation, as it’s a great example of an author using social media technologies in an innovative way to both write and publish a book.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]
.Pierre Bourdieu’s essay “The Field of Cultural Production” depicts the publishing industry as a “space of literary or artistic position-takings,” also called the “field of struggles,” which is defined by the tension and movement inherent among the various positions in the field.^ Yet it’s the writers behind the blog that position it at the top of an industry and gain so-called “A-list” status.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 [5] Bourdieu claims that the “field of position-takings [...] is not the product of coherence-seeking intention or objective consensus,” meaning that an industry characterized by position-takings is not one of harmony and neutrality.[6] .In particular for the writer, their authorship in their work makes their work part of their identity, and there is much at stake personally over the negotiation of authority over that identity.^ It seems like something for “other people.” It seems like they’d need a personality transplant to make it work for them.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 However, it is the editor who has “the power to impose the dominant definition of the writer and therefore to delimit the population of those entitled to take part in the struggle to define the writer”.[7] As “cultural investors,” publishers rely on the editor position to identify a good investment in “cultural capital” which may grow to yield economic capital across all positions.[8]
.According to the studies of James Curran, the system of shared values among editors in Britain has generated a pressure among authors to write to fit the editors’ expectations, removing the focus from the reader-audience and putting a strain on the relationship between authors and editors and on writing as a social act.^ This is a book with a history that deserves some brief explanation, as it’s a great example of an author using social media technologies in an innovative way to both write and publish a book.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ I’ve written a blog series around the web about how to write for each of three different audiences: new readers, regular readers, and experts.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 .Even the book review by the editors has more significance than the readership’s reception.^ Dear Literary Ladies,A book that I've toiled on and believe in with all my heart has been rejected by more than a dozen publishers.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 [9]
.Good relationships between authors and editors are largely found to be the product of an awareness of writing as a social act, and an effort to create a balance wherein the authority over the text is negotiated among all of the positions in the industry, so that the meaning is effectively carried from the meaning-maker to the readership.^ I found the comments in yesterday's post particularly enlightening, so thanks to all of you who posted about where your industry news comes from.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ This is a book with a history that deserves some brief explanation, as it’s a great example of an author using social media technologies in an innovative way to both write and publish a book.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

 ^ I wouldn’t necessarily posit that ALL writing is tantamount to spilling one’s blood on the page.
  • Alltop - Top Writing News 31 January 2010 14:22 UTC writing.alltop.com [Source type: General]

Wages

There are no normal wages for authors. The pay for authors is normally based on provisions after standard contracts with companies.

See also

References

  1. ^ Copyright Office Basics, U.S. Copyright Office, July 2006, http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html, retrieved 2008-03-30 
  2. ^ a b c Barthes, Roland (1968), "The Death of the Author", Image, Music, Text (published 1977) 
  3. ^ a b c Foucault, Michel (1969), "What is an Author?", in Harari, Josué V., Textual Strategies: Perspectives in Post-Structuralist Criticism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979 
  4. ^ Nehamas, Alexander (November 1986), "What An Author Is", The Journal of Philosophy (Eighty-Third Annual Meeting American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division) 83 (11): 685–691 
  5. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. “The Field of Cultural Production, or: The Economic World Reversed.” The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993, 30.
  6. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. “The Field of Cultural Production, or: The Economic World Reversed.” The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993, 34
  7. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. “The Field of Cultural Production, or: The Economic World Reversed.” The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993, 42
  8. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. “The Field of Cultural Production, or: The Economic World Reversed.” The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 1993, 68
  9. ^ Curran, James. “Literary Editors, Social Networks and Cultural Tradition.” Media Organizations in Society. James Curran, ed. London: Arnold, 2000, 230

Further reading

  • Hix, H. L. Morte d'Author: An Autopsy. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1990.
  • Westfall, Joseph. The Kierkegaardian Author: Authorship and Performance in Kierkegaard's Literary and Dramatic Criticism. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter Press, 2007.
The book publishing process
Copy preparation
Submission: author or literary agent - Contract negotiation: intellectual property rights and royalty rates, format, etc - Editing
Prepress
Book production

Simple English

An author is a person who writes a book, story, poem, or other written work. Their writing can be truth or fiction, short or long. Often, author is a word for a person whose job is to write. (A person whose job is writing is also called a writer.)

Sometimes, a person who creates something but is not a writer is called an author. Someone who writes music may be called the author of that piece of music, though we would usually call that person a composer. The French word for author, Auteur, is another name for the director of a movie.

In biology, the first person to write an article that gives a name to and describes a type of living thing is the author of that name.

Other pages

Retrieved from "http://yak.rapint.com/wiki/Author"

Citable sentences

Up to date as of November 30, 2010

Here are sentences from other pages on Mary Shelley, which are similar to those in the above article.








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