September Theme: The Stories We Carry
Big Question: Why do certain stories stay with us?
Week 4: The Stories We Tell Others
This month, we’re exploring The Stories We Carry, and this week we’re exploring The Stories We Tell Others, which prompted Monday’s question: Is it possible for a writer’s public work to remain separate from their private life?
While I didn’t receive a ton of responses to this week’s question, the responses I did receive were immensely thoughtful and indicative of a much more prominent issue in the twenty-first century: Writers are no longer expected to have, maybe not even permitted to have, fully private lives. Which not only ends up complicating Monday’s question but might make it obsolete.
Autofiction is on the rise, blurring the literal and imaginary lines between an author’s fiction and lived reality. Pen names are no longer viable for complete privacy, as it’s getting easier and easier to suss out a writer’s real identity online. Besides, writers seem to be using pen names primarily as marketing tools and not to mask their identities now anyway. Which might also be linked to how writers are receiving more and more pressure to ‘brand’ themselves and offer behind-the-scenes details about their work and personal lives in order to sell more books. Not to mention that while Fantasy and Sci-Fi genres are growing in popularity, so are the calls for more ‘realistic’ fiction that anchors readers to real-world people, dates, and events.
Data surveillance, social media, and AI are already systematically working together to flatten and homogenize writers’ distinct voices, as well as facilitate those aforementioned trends. And no one seems to be safe from this algorithmic blending of authentic identities that were once perceived as distinct, not even those creators fiercely trying to opt out. We’re already seeing the inevitable counterculture against these technologies and how it is simply giving birth to its own now-predictable writing trends, including everything from deliberate misspellings and abysmal grammar to awkwardly inserted colloquialisms and catchphrases in places that don’t seem to fit, making one wonder whether this will also lead to just another form of homogeneous, perhaps even more confusing, writing.
The ultimate irony? Human creators and writers are now also feeling forced to use the very surveillance tools and ‘proof of work’ and ‘proof of identity’ apps they are desperately trying to avoid just to validate their human authenticity and output, which will inevitably end up with a machine-trackable digital trail of some kind at some point. And the cognitive dissonance this behavior requires and elicits is both alarming and potentially more damning to trusting our own human instincts and skills when reading and writing in the long run.
In other words, the question worth asking this week may not be whether a writer’s public work can remain separate from their private life, but centered on how we should understand and engage with a writer’s work when the gap between their public and private life is getting narrower and becoming practically nonexistent due to the technology now pervading every facet of their identities and creative lives.
First, let’s remember that AI was trained on work that was stolen from highly trained and adept literary artists and their works, those human writers who were producing everything from books to online content and listicles and how-to posts, and all the online writers in the margins. Which means that we can’t treat AI like it is fully and autonomously responsible for the writing it’s generating (creatively or logically speaking), or that it ever was, as it is literally programmed on the human-generated stories it is carrying and passing off as its own, not the other way around.
Second, let’s remember that AI is not only the supreme plagiarizer of the twenty-first century, it is also actively working to homogenize that human-generated language and writing it is plagiarizing and regurgitating in such a way that risks stripping all distinctly human artistry and emotions out of it…
Which could be a good thing?
Because once AI has fully homogenized the human-generated language it stole in the first place, we will start becoming even more adept than we already are, as humans, at identifying its boring, predictable regurgitations as we compare it to how our human language is evolving in the real world, while creating all the new art and writing that generates as a result. Won’t we? Machines aren’t the only entities that produce and recognize patterns. So do humans. Which might be why we programmed them to recognize complex patterns on our behalf, right?
Or do we really want to prematurely reconcile that our human-generated identities and writing will not continue to evolve outside of how their data points are currently being surveilled, tracked, stolen, homogenized, exploited, commodified, then regurgitated to us via something distinctly not wholly and authentically human without our full consent or approval?
Regardless of what we know, and have yet to know, I want to believe there is some level of choice in how we decide to move forward as creators and writers in the age of linked minimal privacy and maximum AI, which is already killing what our existing concept of an author is and or should be. And I want to remain open to the possibility that this massacre could also be what leads us toward a sorely needed twenty-first century human renaissance, if we let it or demand it.
What I’m really wondering, then, is where this ‘Death of the Author’ will ultimately lead in the age of AI. Because that is what we’re ultimately talking about here, isn’t it? Or some form of it anyway.
If we’re assuming AI will confiscate, absorb, homogenize, restrain, and ultimately control our authentically distinct human language and voices, aren’t we also assuming a paradigm shift in what we think and feel about authorship itself? Or that it might, at minimum, be imperative for us to revisit what the ‘Death of the Author’ could mean in the age of AI?
In Monday’s post, we briefly mentioned what the ‘Death of the Author’ literary theory is and how it’s directly linked to some of the responses to this week’s dialogue question. But I think it’s time we unpack it a little more in today’s post, as it pertains to the concerns that are naturally evolving as we expand this week’s dialogue.
Join this dialogue at any time.
Redefining ‘Death of the Author’ in 2026
Barthes’ Classic ‘Death of the Author’ (1967)
The ‘Death of the Author’ was an intellectual liberation of sorts, and an act of radical literary critique put forward by Roland Barthes in 1967. In this classic framework he introduced, the ‘death’ being referred to is a metaphorical and deliberate separation of the written text from the person who wrote it. To define a text by its creator’s intent, biography, or psychological state is seen as a limitation that tyrannizes its content and narrative and meaning. So, by declaring the author ‘dead’, the text is freed from the constraints of its origins, transforming literature into an open space where meaning is perpetually constructed by whoever is reading it instead. The ‘death of the author’ then essentially leads to the ‘birth of the reader’ and their interpretation and understanding of a text.
AI ‘Death of the Author’ (2026)
While this definition is still being grappled with, fine-tuned, and certainly requires more reflection and attention, the ‘Death of the Author’ in 2026 essentially entails a systemic liquidation and algorithmic erasure of an author’s human identity. In the AI era, the ‘death’ being referred to is no longer a strictly metaphorical choice made to liberate the meaning of a text a reader encounters but refers to the more literal side effect of twenty-first century technology absorbing, homogenizing, and commodifying human language and identities. The author is therefore seen as being displaced or ‘killed’ when their unique voice, lived experiences, and creative output are scraped, digested, and blended into a massive, homogenized data pool (often without their knowledge or consent), signaling a paradigm shift where authorship is no longer seen as fully authentic but automated and sometimes entirely annihilated, stripped of its human elements and distinctiveness altogether.
Who kills the author?
Barthes’ Classic ‘Death of the Author’ (1967)
The executioner of the author under the original theory is the reader. Barthes argued that a text is not a line of words releasing a single, static theological meaning dictated by a lone ‘Author-God’. Instead, he argued, literature is a multi-dimensional space where a variety of words and text and forms and literary devices (none of them truly and wholly original to one person or author alone) blend and clash and come to life when a reader encounters them on the page. The true unity and meaning of a text lie not with who wrote it then, or in its supposed origin, but is deciphered when a reader is encountering it and bringing their own experiences to it, essentially bringing life to the text. Therefore, to give a text its true power and potential life, the author must ‘die’ first so that the reader can finally be ‘born’ as the ultimate, active creator of the text’s meaning and purpose.
AI ‘Death of the Author’ (2026)
The executioners in this new paradigm shift are the algorithms erasing authors’ distinct identities and voices. The modern author is not willfully stepping aside or ‘dying’ so that a human reader can give their text meaning. Instead, they are being forcefully displaced or ‘killed’ by large language models, crawlers, automated scrapers, and other technologies driven by algorithms, namely AI, that work to diminish their distinct identities or the fact that they exist in the real world at all. This algorithmic executioner systematically strips away individual agency and authorship by confiscating human language without broad consent or recognition, let alone compensation. The concept of the author is itself essentially ‘killed’ when most authentic human text is digested by a machine that treats human artistry as nothing more than raw, commodifiable training data to be recycled then regurgitated as one homogenized voice, arguably stripping true human meaning and authorship from a text before a reader ever even encounters it and has the opportunity to be ‘born’.
What happens to the text?
Barthes’ Classic ‘Death of the Author’ (1967)
The text is completely liberated and opened to multiple possibilities underneath this classic literary theory. When the author’s biography, intent, and assumed psychological hang-ups and views are removed from the equation, the text is freed from a singular, restrictive interpretation determined by an ‘Author-God’. A piece of writing can then become a fluid canvas where language plays endlessly, and no single reading is deemed ‘correct’ or ‘incorrect’ based solely on who wrote it. The text ceases to be a historical artifact tied to a person and is instead transformed into an ongoing, living affair that renews itself every single time a fresh pair of eyes engages with it.
AI ‘Death of the Author’ (2026)
The text is stolen, flattened, and thoroughly homogenized underneath this emerging theory. Because generative AI and its algorithms operate strictly on mathematical probabilities, it’s programmed to predict the next word of a text based on what it calculates as being the most statistically average (or predictable) next word. This algorithmic architecture essentially functions as a linguistic blender, aggressively smoothing over and homogenizing the eccentricities, raw human friction, and emotional anomalies that have up to now contributed to defining great human-generated literature. Rather than being liberated into a space with potentially nuanced meanings, the text is flattened into a predictable, sterile corporate-sounding baseline, threatening to strip away the very essence of human voices and their artistic distinctions.
The Public vs Private Gap
Barthes’ Classic ‘Death of the Author’ (1967)
The gap between public and private is rendered entirely irrelevant to the art under this theory. Barthes asserts that the author’s private life, historical context, tastes, and personal vices should have zero bearing on how a piece of writing or literature is understood. And by severing the umbilical cord between the creator’s private biography and their public text, the work can stand on its own, waiting to be born when a reader encounters it. The audience’s sole aim should not be to discover the author’s real-world identity or intent, which is primarily a minor footnote to the text and language itself.
AI ‘Death of the Author’ (2026)
The gap between public and private is on its way to being completely erased in the twenty-first century, forcing a defensive and perhaps ironic shift toward autofiction and more ‘realistic’ fiction. Authors face immense pressure to ‘brand’ themselves and offer behind-the-scenes access to their lives just to sell books, while internet sleuthing makes true anonymity impossible. And to defend against this growing lack of privacy accompanied by AI mimicry, many writers are increasingly moving toward various forms of autofiction, likely banking on the idea that a machine cannot replicate their authentically lived realities, even if those authentic realities are being fictionalized. Yet this survival tactic traps authors in an emerging paradox where they must also strip away their own privacy and commodify their real-life experiences to prove their authentic voices and viability, often using invasive ‘proof of work’ and ‘proof of identity’ and surveillance tools just to validate their human authenticity. And this is a profound paradox that we desperately need to study closer.
The Ultimate Goal
Barthes’ Classic ‘Death of the Author’ (1967)
The goal under this classic theory is to birth the autonomous reader and democratize the meaning derived from a text. By overthrowing the tyranny of the ‘Author-God’, Barthes sought to hand ultimate interpretive power over to the reader and what the language of the text itself was conveying to them, where the text is no longer only a puzzle for them to solve by uncovering its writer’s hidden secrets, but to become a more open, democratic playground of the reader’s intertextual making. This paradigm shift was designed to revolutionize literary criticism, freeing society from the rigid, academic obsession with an artist’s personal history.
AI ‘Death of the Author’ (2026)
The goal as of now is mostly unknown but could include triggering a twenty-first century human renaissance of language amidst an algorithmic feedback loop that serves to eradicate authors’ identities and work. As AI models increasingly ingest text that was already generated by AI, human language risks suffering from automated degradation, collapsing into a recycled slop of homogenized corporate clichés and boring, predictable text. However, because humans excel at pattern recognition and creativity, readers and audiences will rapidly grow exhausted by these sterile, formulaic regurgitations devoid of true human authenticity. And this collective fatigue might force human language to evolve in interesting ways in the real world, potentially inspiring creators to write things that are weirder, rawer, and intentionally unpredictable to stay defiantly ahead of the machines eradicating their authentic identities and voices.
Reimagining the ‘Death of the Author’ for a New Literary Renaissance
Ultimately, revisiting the ‘Death of the Author’ in the age of AI shows us that our relationship with the written word, and how we evaluate texts, might simply be entering a new chapter.
While technology may absorb and smooth out our language, the current shifts we’re experiencing don’t necessarily mean the end of human artistry and authenticity. Instead, they might be inviting us to participate in a much-needed twenty-first-century human-generated renaissance.
As predictive models become more adept at generating familiar language patterns, human writers will naturally find new ways to grow and evolve their own language outside of those boundaries, moving toward language that is more personal, unvarnished, and beautifully unpredictable, as they are hardwired to do.
And rather than succumbing to the strictures modern technologies are placing on us, or getting trapped in the ironic loop of using tracking tools just to prove our authenticity, we will inevitably outgrow the algorithm’s predictable regurgitations by doing what humans do best— tell our stories in ways that only we humans can tell them, evolving our language in real-time, in ways that machines will never be able to emulate.
This evolution and potential literary renaissance are fundamentally shaped by The Stories We Carry and are directly tied to our broader monthly exploration of the internal experiences, memories, and narratives that form who we are.
An algorithm can analyze public data points about our identities, but it cannot replicate the complex, lived realities and stories that humans carry and tell. And it is from this deep, internal reservoir that we draw inspiration for The Stories We Tell Others, our focus this week.
In a world of shrinking privacy and constant connectivity, sharing our work becomes less about managing an online brand and more about practicing authentic human language and connection. And by honoring our distinct voices and leaning into the parts of writing that a machine cannot predict or ever replicate, we won’t just redefine and reshape authorship, we will remember what made it so meaningful in the first place.
The landscape of storytelling is changing, but the heart of what makes a story meaningful still belongs to the lived experiences we carry and the unique ways we choose to share them.
What do you think?
I’m now turning the dialogue over to you and look forward to your next comment or chat reply!
Please don’t forget to like and share this post to keep this conversation going. Thank you!
Continue Exploring September’s Theme, The Stories We Carry
This Week: The Stories We Tell Others
Writing Prompts About The Stories We Tell Others
Is it possible for a writer’s public work to remain separate from their private life?
Reading Notes: The Blind Assassin
Week 3 Popular Posts: The Stories We Tell Ourselves
Can you write great work without challenging your own beliefs?
The Story of My Flaws Sounds Like Death Metal
Historical Fiction that Challenges the Stories We Tell Ourselves
Week 2 Popular Posts: Memory and Storytelling
Writing Prompts About Memory and Storytelling
The Art of Autofiction: Memory, Markets, and the Modern Confessional
Week 1 Popular Posts: The Books That Changed Us
Writing Prompts About Books That Changed Us
What My Favorite Books Say About Me
20 Banned Books That Have Changed Us
Go Deeper with Daily Drafters Exclusives
This month: The Stories We Carry Writing Collection
This collection offers a month of guided writing exercises, mini workshops, and creative writing experiments designed to take you beyond a single prompt and into a deeper creative practice. It gives you the creative spark and space you need to explore memory, identity, inheritance, perspective, voice, and the stories we tell ourselves and others. It will also encourage you to consider how those stories shape the work we create and the creative lives we lead.
Inside this collection, you’ll find 30 original writing prompts (designed as mini writing workshops) across five sections with focused themes, craft-focused exercises, curated reading suggestions, reflective questions, and three optional month-long writing challenges designed to help you develop your ideas, explore your personal material and stories, and build a consistent writing practice.
You can follow the prompts in order, choose the exercises that speak to you, or return to a section whenever you need a new way to explore your writing craft. As a paid subscriber, you will also be able to come back to the collection throughout the month or any other time you feel like exploring The Stories We Carry in the future.