由于研究兴趣的关系，我曾读过一本书 The Death and Return of the Author: Criticism and Subjectivity in Barthes, Foucault and Derrida (Edinburgh University Press, 2nd edn, 1998)，作者是 Seán Burke。最近又找到一本主题相近的书 The Ethics of Writing: Authorship and Responsibility in Plato, Nietzsche, Levinas (and Derrida) (Edinburgh University Press, 2008)，准备读一下，发现作者也是 Seán Burke。于是不免有点好奇，想了解一下这个作者。在后面这本刚出版不久的新书封底上，对于作者是这样介绍的：

Seán Burke was Lecturer, then Reader in English Studies at the University of Durham for thirteen years. His academic publications include The Death and Return of the Author: Criticism and Subjectivity in Barthes, Foucault and Derrida, and the critical edition, Authorship: From Plato to the Postmodern. His first novel, Deadwater (2002), has been published in France as Au bout des docks (2007).

好一个“was”！现在呢？就 Google 一下他吧。结果令人意外的是，除去同名者之外，网上能找到的这个 Sean Burke 的资料很少。其中比较有用的是 elberry 写的一则短文 “Sean Burke, Irishman”，读来令人感到几分伤感。The Ethics of Writing 是今年才出版的，想来 Burke 应该还在人世吧。God bless him!