There’s an old adage that goes “if a tree falls in the woods, and no one is around, does it make a noise?” Roland Barthes’ 1967 essay “The Death of the Author” asks a similar question about literature: if a reader experiences a text without knowledge of its author, does the author’s intention matter? 

Barthes argues that “literature is precisely the invention of this voice, to which we cannot assign a specific origin… [it is] the trap where all identity is lost” (p1), suggesting a piece of literature’s identity stems solely from the reader’s construction and experience of its text. However, the 2015 indie video game Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and the Terribly Cursed Emerald suggests the author’s identity can be important for two reasons: today’s interconnected world makes it hard to separate the art from the artist, and the author’s design of the experience matters as much as the reader’s construction of the experience.

The Art and the Artist Cannot Be Separated

Today’s interconnected world puts an author’s values and opinions on display, which makes it hard to separate the art from the artist. When J.K. Rowling publicly opposed trans rights, pro-trans rights Harry Potter fans faced a dilemma: continued financial support signaled that Rowling’s anti-trans rhetoric was acceptable.

If art and artist could truly be disconnected from each other as Barthes suggests, an author’s values and identity wouldn’t matter. But Dr. Langeskov exploits this connection for marketing purposes. The game’s trailer on its Steam page opens with “From the Designer of The Stanley Parable” so players who know nothing about Dr. Langeskov can immediately associate it with its designer’s previous work. Specifically, fans of The Stanley Parable know it’s a humorous meta-narrative and can thus expect similar themes in Dr. Langeskov. Additionally, fans of The Stanley Parable would likely be interested in Dr. Langeskov simply because it came from the same designer.

The author’s identity isn’t separate from the text, it’s a selling point.

Authors as Architects

Barthes claims “the true locus of writing is reading” (p5), but this ignores how authors intentionally architect the space within which readers construct meaning. Barthes argues that only classical authors “feed” their work (“he pre-exists it, thinks, suffers, lives for it”, p3) but Dr. Langeskov proves modern authors do the same thing through deliberate authorial choices of narrative, tone, and cultural references.

Narrative

The author chose to make this game a meta-narrative, which fundamentally shapes the player’s experience. The game description promises a heist:

Instead, players are dumped backstage of “the real game’s” production area, where performers and staff prepare to “put on the real game” as though it’s a play. This immediately signals to the player that their experience of the titular heist likely won’t be immersive, and gives them some mental breathing room to not take the experience seriously.

Tone

The game could have been a serious meditation on player-game interaction, much like Barthes’ essay is a serious meditation on reader-author interaction. Instead, the authors chose comedic absurdity. The player’s main interaction is with the Stage Manager, a disembodied voice guiding them with the confidence of someone who’s “run” this game before. Yet he slowly has a mental breakdown as the player wreaks havoc backstage, suggesting video-game-as-theater is perfectly normal and the player is the weird part in all of this. My favorite moment is the Stage Manager’s reaction if the player flips a switch labeled “Lasers”:

Cultural References

Barthes describes literary text as “a space of many dimensions… resulting from the thousand sources of culture.” (p4) But which cultural references make it in is the author’s choice. In Dr. Langeskov, the author references video game tropes as a shared joke between author and player. 

Players find notes detailing how guards in “the real game” should move and what they should say upon encountering the player. For players familiar with video games, these are known as enemy patrol patterns and enemy barks. The game doesn’t require these references to function, and players can enjoy the game without catching them, but including them enriches the experience for those “in the know,” a deliberate authorial decision about audience engagement.

Barthes got it partly right: readers do construct meaning from texts, but the author’s intentions matter too. The authors of Dr. Langeskov made choices about structure, tone, and reference points that guide the player experience, even if they can’t control its outcome. And in our modern, hyper-connected age, the author’s identity is inevitably tied to their work.

My intention in writing this is to argue that we can’t fully separate author from text, and I hope the way I’ve designed this piece prompts you to explore these ideas too. But what do I know? I’m just the author. What you make of this piece is up to you.