i am talking about a writing technique
i have been experimenting with
i'm calling it metrical transcription
what is the technique?
it is the cut i exercise in the literal copying of a speaking voice
it is the binding of the voice in this cut to a mnemonic segment
to what set of words can be remembered in a strict one-to-the-next contiguity
it's a variable measure
a chain a line a verse
what fastens the words together in this chain—
why do some words rather than others stick together in this writing while listening?
the technique is first and always as transcription a literal adherence
a discipline
a fidelity to what is spoken
especially to what is spoken without the support of writing
that is to improvised speech
every word that is copied is literally the word of the speaker
the technique follows a failure
to fully capture speech
talk to anyone with this job
transcription requires painstaking labor
long hours
it is dull repetitive mechanical
the tape must be stopped rewound and listened to again
while the speech is always surging forward
as extension (or reference) and quality (or accent) and velocity
as waves on a swell not points on a line (nancy)
the full conversion of speech to text is never self evident
the copyist must always make an interpretation to make speech into prose
to punctuate into discursive sense
what is being talked about?
what is the name that was said? how is it spelled?
is that a french phrase? a latin phrase?
people are speaking at the same time
speaking blurs the word
people cough
words are said and heard at the same time
In this open and above all opening presence, in acoustic spreading and expansion, listening takes place at the same time as the sonorous event, an arrangement that is clearly distinct from that of vision...
is that a citation?
was that sarcasm?
is that the word here or the word hear the word x or the word y?
there is never in the first place a stable or differentiated corpus of speaking
from these conditions
the axiom from which the technique of metrical transcription proceeds
is
that the time of the transcription is equal to the time of the transcribed
that is the transcription can only take place within the time of the speech
the speech cannot be paused
it is copied exactly in the time it happens
the line is cut at the end of what can be remembered together
example 1
in this constraint
this prosody
every non phonemic and asemantic element disappears
there is no punctuation in speaking
only words
(or that is a constraint i declare: to exclude non phonemic sounds
like a machine)
when a machine hears a voice speaking it cannot add a comma or quotation marks
the machine is an irresistible figure for this activity
there is no punctuation
and words too are always left out
but which words
the writing is always a technique of reduction
an elimination
[a push to sobriety
this is an ascetic technique
a training of the attention through constraint
it is a technique for understanding
but understanding is not at all the right word
the technique is founded in the prohibition of understanding
it is a technique
to cultivate an acute attention to the singularity of the word
of the phrase
in the practice of this technique
the big picture of what is being spoken must recede
in order for the writing to take place
it is hard work to hear and copy the word exactly
to not correct to not fill in what wasn't said
to not ignore the stuttering and anticipation and slips of spontaneous speech
the drift of the meaning
the drive of the argument is lost in the granularity of the speech
in the sound of the voice and the molecular sense of the words
the transcription only renders in succession the bits which vibrate
without connection to an underlying sequence
what does this produce?
what sense shows thru the protocol?
example 2
a discussion of set theory
what is this
i'm not sure
can we call it a form of didactic poetry
but by an ignorant instructor
by a teacher who doesn't know his subject
by a typist after all
but an interested outsider
but what is the interest
didactic poetry
proverbially instructs it doesn't entertain
what is being taught?
what sense shows thru the protocol of the metrical cut?
to conclude
here's a last example
this is one voice heard and metrically copied by 5 anonymous people
contracted through amazon mechanical turk
people with no stake in what was said
and who were not there
people for whom any deictic marker in the speech is lost
i spliced their verses together in the order of what was spoken
example 3
in this context and at last
i would like to propose this metrical copying of the voice
the metrical copying of the voice
in conditions which prohibit a full transcription
as a new form of writing as verse
as a simple formula for understanding
as a model for an emancipatory poetics