He's an easy target. I've been guilty of it myself and it's something I wholly regret.

Back OT, the most explosive I ever saw someone get about this was when I mentioned the original final chapter in Burgess' "A Clockwork Orange". As far as I know, this chapter was taken out of American releases (evidently Kubric had no idea it even existed till after he finished making the movie) and I was lucky enough to snag an English one, so read the book with the chapter. I liked it, but when I describe the chapter to other people, they go fucking nuts, cursing Burgess a blue streak, like 'who is he to change the whole point of the novel!?'

For starters, the deleted chapter DOES NOT change the point of the whole book, but more than that, HE'S THE AUTHOR! He can change whatever the hell he wants to! XD

Death of the author is an extremely useful tool. The author obviously knows a lot about his own work,* but at the same time, humans are really, really complicated. People basically never have a full understanding of everything that goes on inside their own heads, much less everything in the world around them. So while they are an authority on their own work, they are not the ONLY authority on their own work.
* In the case of long and complicated series, there's often a continuity director (and sometimes a whole continuity staff) that tends to know more about the work in question than the author does.

Ultimately, a work should be able to stand on its own merits. If an author wants a particular interpretation to be the "correct" one, they really should find a way to put that into the work itself.

What Breja said. I have been guilty of Lucas bashing too ... and it's something I don't regret at all. The only good decision he made since that awful Episode I was to sell the entire franchise. Netted him 4 billion and gave someone else the chance to do better than he did. Since there was hardly any way of doing worse.

And I actually think that Disney did quite a good job with Rogue 1. Episode VII was just a hommage (or re-run) of Episonde IV, but Rogue 1 was original and entertaining.

I really need to stay out of this thread. :P

I don't like what Lucas did, I despise it, but it is, or was at the time, his baby. He wrote, he produced, he can do whatever he likes to it.

I like to take a "creator's word is law" approach within the first couple years when the work is still fairly new, but perspectives and motivations shift over time, so after a few years, any further insights they have are on equal footing with the analyses of others and have to stand on their own merit.

It strongly depends on who is the author ;-))
For example, J.R.R.Tolkien's definitive statement about Middle-Earth mythology can count as canon, because he was erudite scholar who put lot of thought in his lifetime's interest.
On the other hand, anything Joss Whedon says in regards of Buffy should be took with a truckload of salt, because lot of things in the series was made up on the fly (often out of necessity) and he just LOVES to troll and torment his audience. Besides, he can be with all his passion for blunt allegories sometimes wonderfully clueless about their implications. Ignoring his Word Of God is at times for better (if you want to enjoy the show, that is).

This. Work that needs clarification to be understood correctly is like a videogame that needs patching to be correctly playable: something that was published/released prematurely.
Applicability is a great thing. I prefer to make my own conclusions, even if incorrect, thank you very much.

Flip side of this is sad tendency of (part of) the audience to demand definitive answers - no loose ends, no ambiguity, no moral grey areas, "please, tell us directly, did he choose the lady or the tiger?!".

That's just the thing - that's not true. Star Wars is a superbly important piece of cinema history. It doesn't even have anything to do with being a fan. It's a fact. It's an incredibly influential movie. Does Lucas have the right to make new edition of it? Sure (the one he directed). Does he have the right to state that the new version is the "correct" one? Sure. But to remove the original, historicaly significant movie from distribution and leave only the altered versions is effectively cutting people off from a piece of history? No way. That's just wrong.

Also - no movie is work of only one person. That's always a team effort. Especialy with something like Star Wars. Lucas isn't the only "author". He didn't make the special effects. he didn't make the costumes and make-up. He didn't act in it. The people who did desrve to have the work they are the "authors" of respected, not just replaced willy-nilly.

EDIT: Here's a nice article about some of those other "authors" of Star Wars.

He chose the goat, because the creator is a twisted bastard.

The Death of the Author idea strikes me as lazy and simplistic, there are nuances to artistic interpretation and this idea just does away with nuances.

It's basically saying that when someone is talking to you, then you just go ahead and interpret that as you want. The intention of the person speaking to you doesn't matter. It's just loony.

I have no idea what the phrase means, but a quick Google said that

- Because all culture is mostly a remix of previous stuff, who "wrote" it doesn't matter much.
- Something about the author's own interpretation not mattering much 'cause he's dead?
- Because the "voice" of a novel isn't supposed to originate from any human speaker, focusing on the author spoils the story.
- Various practical considerations regarding whether or not to focus on the author in criticism.

Color me confused!

Well, I could link you to a wikipedia page but where would be the fun ?

Therefore : http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DeathOfTheAuthor

I subscribe to death of the author. While the original message is interesting what people read into and focus on changes with time. As ideas and norms change so do the interpretations. If new ways of interpreting something are rejected and forbidden then it slowly starts to carry less relevance as time goes on.

I can think of an interesting case: the game SaGa Frontier 2 (some spoilers for Gustave's story may follow).

In this game, there is very strong evidence that one of the major characters, Gustave, is gay. He never marries (and the game covers his entire life, plus the aftermath of his death), and he spends his later life with another man, Johan the Assassin, as his bodyguard. There is also the semi-hidden event "Gustave and the Pirates", at the end of which is a scene in which Gustave hits on the (male) leader of the pirates, so there is definitely plenty of in-game evidence that Gustave is gay.

Yet, apparently a book later published by the game's creators claims that Gustave is not gay, and that he might have had a relationship with some other minor character (which, of course, produced no children).

In this case, I am inclined to believe my interpretation of the game's events over what the creators said in a later game, especially since games could use more (tastefully done) LGBT representation.

(It's also worth noting that he wouldn't be the first LGBT character in a SaGa game, or even the first major LGBT character; it's also worth noting that the SaGa series, while generally classified as JRPGs, has always been unconventional (except for the original SaGa 3).)

While I think most works are open to interpretation, imo the author's vision of his works remains more important than anyone else's, if only because he's the only one who can make revised editions or sequels.

Then again, I'm kind of biased against the Death of the Author theory, because I know lots of arrogant, pompous academics who routinely use it to tout their pet theories about famous works, no matter how ridiculous they are.