本文以歷史和年代為研究路徑論述西方傳統中有關作者、權威和著作權概念的五個關鍵議題：（1）在古希臘文中，文本和文本來源（神話的、或實際的）之間的關聯性；（2）羅馬文“auctoritas”的概念，以及作者與著作權之間的密切關係； （3）歐洲中世紀在聖經文本與世俗文本的詮釋中浮現的作者形象；（4）（17、18世紀間）版權和「作者權」的出現：作品作為作者個人的財產、或作為公共財；（5）20世紀文學批評中的作者概念與1960年代法國新浪潮電影中的作者論的困難問題。

The article follows a historical and chronological path and addresses five critical issues regarding the notions of author, authority and authorship in the western tradition: 1- the nature of the link between a text and its source (mythical or real) in ancient Greece; 2- the Roman concept of auctoritas and the close relationship between author and authoritiy; 3- the Emergence of the figure of the author in the interpretation of texts, sacred and profane, during the European Middle Ages 4-, the Emergence of copyright and “droit d’auteur” (XVII-XVIII centuries): the work as property of his author or as a public good; 5- the problematic concept of the author in twentieth-century literature criticism vs Auteur theory in the French New Wave cinema in the 1960s.