What difference does it make who is speaking?

I think Foucault raises some very interesting questions about the function of an author. On the one hand he presents the 'death of the author' in literary analysis, yet on the other, he poses the desire for readers to seek individuality in authors when dealing with texts. He concludes with Beckett's question, "what difference does it make who is speaking?" After reading Foucault's article I think that viewing the author function as a 'mode of existence' rather than a geneal point of origin for a text is important because it de-emphasizes the potential & problematic possibility of finding singularity or Truth in any one particular discourse/body of knowledge. I think this distinction is made when he compares science and discourse. Scientific authorship/knowledge is 'traceable' in a historical and linear sense, which makes scientific knowledge homogeneous, static and unchanging. Discursive practices tend to be more like an act of 'mapping' in that they produce plotted points with no real coordinates. Discourse is fluid and open to possibilities. It is a producer of change rather than a keeper of sameness. I think Foucault is trying to stress the importance of not relying on the individuality of the author in discursive practices because it forecloses the possibility of producing multiple/differing applications afterwards (which seems to be the function of discourse). If we valorize the author or single out her existence outside of the text, we run the risk of totalizing a discourse rather than seeing it in relation to other ideas/ideologies etc. By de-emphasizing the author as the originator of a text, i think it is possible for the reader to become a participant (even an author) in the text because every reading by an individual is in essence, a re-construction, re-interpretation, or re-visioning of the original that can produce different discourses by re-writing the 'original.'

On a different note, in some cases it seems important to take into account the individuality of the author...I'm thinking about certain discourses on ethics/ontology produced by Heidegger. How and to what extent (if any) should his work be evaluated differently knowing that he is a Nazi sympathizer? Does his work change (or get discredited) because of his mode of existence outside of the author function? This may be an example where it's difficult to be indifferent to who is speaking. Just a thought.