ABSTRACT
In free indirect discourse (FID) a word uttered by an original speaker which has a reference determined by its origin with that speaker speaking at a particular time is nonetheless retained in the discourse of a third person. The so-called writer or author can come to be thought of as a scriptor of words which do not issue from a single source, which are not the expression of a single voice, and are not to be understood by reference back to their authorial origin. The writer yet is understood to have its reference determined by its original circumstances of utterance. The upshot is that people get articles like the famous one by Roland Barthes entitled 'The Death of the Author'. Free indirect discourse was remarked as a phenomenon present in literary texts as long ago as 1887. In the work of Mikhail Bakhtin the idea of FID is the springboard to a more generalized concept of heteroglossia.
