The focus of this study is provided by the concept of ‘authorship’ and its significance for the interpretation of literary texts. After reviewing various, at times controversial, conceptions of ‘author’ and ‘authorship’, the study develops the thesis that the concept of author performs a decisive function in the historical positioning of a literary work, and that the recourse to the author is necessary whenever the conformity of literary texts to a norm plays a role in the hermeneutic process.