Verdurin Recitations: Three

LLM pattern recognition carves out stories from the chaos of data. For us this appears like a miniature of the calculus that we employ as we narrate our lives. Storytelling is often understood to be the essence of human memory; it allows us to temper the chaos of experience and thus grants us self-awareness if not a modicum of freedom. However fictitious these narratives are (and they must always be so) they are what we point to when we discuss our exceptional position in the natural world. 

Now that the uniqueness of our abilities has been challenged how should we read authorless stories? However closely AI imitates narration its lack of authorship means that we cannot trust its output in the way we believe the work of a writer. Tech optimists and tech pessimists alike focus on the future role of human agency or lack thereof. But belief itself is perhaps the core of the issue.

Is the biography of a writer then the only serviceable quality he has left? Do we cynically accept that our stories are nothing but the same mechanical process? Do we accept that it is only the reader’s projection of ‘personality’ onto the author that distinguishes literature from machinic content? Is a radical investment in spectacle warranted if we wish for’ literature’ to continue? If so the author might only be necessary insofar as he can draw a curtain around the cold procedural truth of the matter.

Recitations is organised with Maia Béar. This edition will feature a reading by Oliver Bennett.

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