Paul's Writings Underpin Western Thought

[Minimalist]

From Peter Kirby's excellent "Early Christian Writings" site.

http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/2corinthians.html

Second Corinthians is one of the four letters of Paul known as the Hauptbriefe, which are universally accepted to contain authentic Pauline correspondence.
Werner Georg Kummel would like to view the letter to be a whole composed by the apostle Paul on one occasion (Introduction to the New Testament, pp. 287-293).
However, there are difficulties that have suggested to several commentators that 2 Corinthians has been compiled from several pieces of correspondence. Since the "sorrowful letter" mentioned in 2:4 does not describe 1 Corinthians, we know that Paul had written at least three letters to the Corinthians. A quite reasonable suggestion is that the last four chapters contain the "sorrowful letter" that is mentioned in 2:4.

So this "authentic" pauline epistle (?!) was actually a mish-mash of a series of letters put together by a later editor into what we have now.  So who is the actual "author?"  The purported paul - who may well be legendary - or the unknown editor who rammed all this bullshit together into one bag?