The Death of the Author
text is “explained:’ the critic has conquered; hence it is scarcely surprising not only
that, historically, the reign of the Author should also have been that of the Critic, but
that criticism (even “new criticism”) should be overthrown along with the Author. In
a multiple writing, indeed, everything is to be distinguished, but nothing deciphered;
structure can be followed, “threaded” (like a stocking that has run) in all its recurren-
ces and all its stages, but there is no underlying ground; the space of the writing is to
be traversed, not penetrated: writing ceaselessly posits meaning but always in order
to evaporate it: it proceeds to a systematic exemption of meaning. Thus literature (it
would be better, henceforth, to say writing), by refusing to assign to the text (and to
the world as text) a “secret:’ that is, an ultimate meaning, liberates an activity which
annaabi.ee 
