The God Author

No, but seriously. Who is the author?

Well, that depends.

The “author” of Supernatural is hard to lock down.

You might say it’s Eric Kripke, the original creator and showrunner. But then, he left that role after season 5, and there have been several showrunners since. Plus, he wasn’t the only one in the writers room.

Or you might say it’s the vast cast and crew who produced the show over its 15 year run, which is of course inclusive of the writers, but is far more expansive.

Or you might say it’s Chuck. After all, he’s the one who wrote the books in the show. And maybe he wrote the show, too. It’s hard to say. But (spoilers) he was replaced by Jack. Is Jack the author? From what future position (if any) is the story told? Perhaps that’s where the answer lies.

Or you might say it’s the fans. They’ve certainly had a hand in the narrative, as characters and audience, sure, but also as authors—how else would Destiel have become canon? How else would the show have included “slash fiction” in its lexicon on multiple occasions?

Or you might say there is no author of the show. Can a show be “authored” really? I doubt it can truly be single-authored anyways.

But maybe you came to this page to find out who I am.

Okay, I’m Maddie Henry. As of April 2024, I’m a graduate student at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan earning my Ph.D. in English. This website is my final project for ENG 8006 “Telling Stories: Adventures in a Narrative Multiverse.” But I hope to keep building it out over time.

That’s because I’m a big fan of Supernatural, and I think that it has a lot to offer from a narrative perspective. But I also think that it has a lot to offer in terms of reflecting on the practice of writing, even academic writing, too. Because, despite Barthes’s contention that the author is dead, we still attach our names to our work, and perhaps we should interrogate why that is and what it means to do that.

So here we are. I hope you enjoy(ed) this exploration of authorship and free will, and I’d love to hear what you have to say about it.