A Metacritical Analysis on Authorial Intention and the Meaning of a Work

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the author’s role in the meaning of a work as well as how a work can continuously develop through readers’ interpretations. This thesis uses Jorge Luis Borges’ short story “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” to illustrate and examine the ways in which the author creates the meaning of a work and the reader seeks to understand the meaning. Theoretically, two seemingly identical fictional texts can be different works. The definitive and functional meaning of a work goes beyond the tangibility of its text. However, two identical texts cannot be acknowledged as two separate works by our society. Our real world, day-to-day life, requires readers to acknowledge only one author for each work. Although a reader might not understand the exact intention of the author, an approximately accurate understanding will allow the reader to apply the interpretation to her environment