Would a Rose by any other Name Smell as Sweet?

In Foucault's essay "What is an Author," he provides some very interesting ideas about the significance of the author and their name. Where Barthes discusses the death of the author, Foucault stresses some alterior functions that the author holds, other than as the scriptor of a work.

Foucault asks "How does the name of an author function?" He goes on to discuss that an author's name does not simply signify that they wrote a work, but also speaks about the work itself. "[The author's name's] presence is functional in that it serves as a means of classification. A name can group together a number of texts and thus differentiate from others. A name also establishes different forms of relationships among texts." When we think of Shakespeare we think of his works as a whole. We attribute comedies, dramas and sonnets to his name, and therefore we get a sense of his works as a whole. His name in our culture means something. Through Shakespeare we have a better knowledge of the sonnet genre as a whole and works written by him are seen as credible because they are attached to his name.

This idea is relatable to the pseudonimity that bloggers assume. Ms.Bean is of course not my given name. But here, on this blog, it is my identity. Dr.Crazy discussed the reasons behind using a pseudonym on her blog. She says that, "by disconnecting one's writing identity from one's "real life" identity, one preserves first a measure of control over how one's writing is perceived and second acquires a level of protection from certain kinds of scrutiny (often gendered)." The idea of controlling the way that one is perceived is quite related to the ideas that Foucault attributes to an author's name.

A pseudonym is a safe way for a lot of people, professors in this case, to openly discuss ideas without the danger of ruining their credibility. Dr.Crazy says, however, that even under a pseudonym we develop a reputation, "one has responsibilities under this identity, through one's relationships to others in the community. You're "known" as the identity that you've created, and you develop a reputation under that name." Our work is attributed to us, and people expect certain things out of our Blogger identity. To go against these expectations would be out of character.

I am definitely no Shakespeare but I think that the ideas Foucault expresses about the relevance of an author's name fits nicely into both the world of great authors and into the bloggosphere.