Authorial Intent

Authorial intentionality is a concept in literary theory and criticism referring to an author's intent as it is encoded in his or her work. Not all fans assign the same importance to authorial intent, and some consider their own reader response to be the thing that determines meaning in a work.
==Authorial Intent in Source Texts==
Fans may discuss authorial intent and its importance when discussing source texts for their fandoms. In many episode reviews, fans will try to divine the intent of the creators or TPTB in the meaning of the latest plot twist or character revelation. The idea of Fan Service relies on interpreting specific motivations of the authors of a source in relationship to the fan's expected reaction to it.
When authors or creators discuss their work in public, they often make statements about their own authorial intent. Many fans regard arguments such as "Author X has stated that character Y is heterosexual" to be immaterial; what counts to these fans is the work as it stands on its own. Not all fans or fandoms follow the same rules on determining what is or is not canon, and reactions to authorial statements of intent will vary.
* J.K. Rowling revealed in a question period after a book-reading that her character Dumbledore was conceived of by her as gay. Some fans took this as justification of their queer reading of Dumbledore, while others regard Rowling's opinion on the matter as mere interesting trivia.
* Joe Mallozzi wrote in December 2008 at his blog that the character of Captain Alicia Vega in the Stargate Atlantis episode Search and Rescue asked out Jennifer Keller in a scene that was cut and never aired. The character was later killed off in the episode Whispers, leaving fans the option of accepting the blog entry as canon and retroactively creating another Dead Lesbian, or ignoring the information.
* Director John Waters wrote in the "Sort-of Famous" chapter in his 1981 autobiography Shock Value: A Tasteful Book About Bad Taste about being invited to the Berlin Film Festival: "The buffs are unbelievably serious and went crazy when I told them my films weren't political. "YES THEY ARE!" they screamed, and I backed off. I guess you can read anything you want into a screenplay."Waters, John. Shock Value: A Tasteful Book About Bad Taste. Baltimore: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1981.
The issue of an author's control of their work and how it is perceived is sometimes at the heart of creators' objections to the existence of fanworks. Many authors who express extreme displeasure at the existence of fanfic for their works are upset by their characters being used in ways that they disapprove of, often citing sexually explicit or slash works as examples of the very worst of fanfic's transgressions against them. (See The Fan Fiction Rant, Diana Gabaldon, Professional Author Fanfic Policies for more details.)
==TPTB Taking Back Authorial Control==
Sometimes fans feel a push and pull between the original creators and attempts by fans to make it their own via fanworks. This is especially true when a show, especially a "live" show, is headed in a direction that may be unpopular or suspect fannish "interference" has become to strong to ignore.
In 1989, many fans were upset about the change in the direction of the show War of the Worlds and the killing off of two main characters. One fan writes: "Still cynically, looking at how Frank Jr. chose to write Ironhorse out makes me wonder if he didn't do it as nastily as possible simply because we made so much fuss, kind of an "I'll Show The Fans Who's Boss.""
Sherlock (BBC), to some fans, has some elements of this "slap down" effect. From 2014, shortly after the third season began, cathexys wrote in response to cesperanza's post: 
==Authorial Intent in Fanworks==
The question of authorial intent also arises when fans discuss each other's works. In discussions about fanworks that may reinforce the misogyny or racism in a source text, fans may question the relevance of the author's intent in creating the work vs. the importance of individual fan's responses to it.
In the discussions surrounding Take Clothes Off As Directed and Coming Home, some fans asserted that Helen was intending to have her story viewed as a feminist critique of the original story. Other fans viewed the author's intent with what was labeled "an unauthorized homage" irrelevant, and individual interpretations of the story as a critique or as a more friendly-seeming remix were all valid. See links at Fandom Reactions.
The very practice of labeling fanworks with headers that include genres such as gen, het, slash or pre-slash, or labels such as non-con or dub-con, is an exercise in the author expressing their intent with the work.
In cases where the label is debatable (see Genre Boundaries) readers may resent having their reading of the work dictated by the header. There is also a perception among some fans that writers who don't want their friendship fic seen as slash are sometimes antagonistic to slash fans in their labeling.
In 1995, a fan wrote about a friend's reaction to fannish comments, not taking into account that readers have their own opinions: 
In 1998, a fan wondered about the "morality" of reading slash into a stated gen universe: 
In 2008, a fan wrote: 
==Further Reading/Meta==
* If the Author is Dead, Who's Updating Her Website? J.K. Rowling and the Battle for the Books (2006)
* Icon maybe appropriate: fanfic and creator's wishes; archive page 1, archive page 2, archive page 3, archive page 4, survey and four pages of comments regarding opinion about pro-canon creators' and fanworks opinions about: Robin Hobb, Anne Rice, J. Michael Straczynski , Marion Zimmer Bradley, Anne McCaffrey, J.K. Rowling, and others (2007)
* Creating Headcanons: Everyone Does It (2015)
* (2015)
==References==