The ChatGPT-generated image depicts a hand holding a pen, with a cloud of chaotic thoughts represented by a variety of symbols, objects, and snippets of text swirling around. These thoughts are funneled toward the pen -- or the act of writing, which is transforming the disorganized cloud into a linear, structured flow of text.

Unscripted story

In this story, I reminisce about my experience at the Svirzh Festival (Ukraine) when I was 19. I recall the sense of adventure as my friends and I traveled to a small Ukrainian village, where we enjoyed local food, volunteered for festival entry, and were completely swept away by the energy of the crowd. Despite the festival’s early closure due to financial issues, the incredible sense of community left me with lasting memories.

Voice to text

Fluidity vs finiteness

One concept that stands out when reflecting on my experience with writing is its materiality (Haas, 2013). Journalling has been a consistent source of comfort and reflection for me over the years. Writing, whether by pen or keyboard, acts as a grounding practice that captures thoughts and emotions, cementing them in language. This act of writing provides my snippets of existence a sense of permanence, even if the process sometimes feels painstakingly slow compared to the rapid pace of my thoughts. As Olson in Gnanadesikan (2013) suggests, writing and not speech allows for self-reflection and meaning-making that is often overlooked in the rush of daily life. In my case, slowing down to write my story of the Svirzh Festival allowed me to feel more deeply connected to my past self and the experience. Yet, as I reflect on the story, I realize how unreliable memory can be. I vividly recall the festival as lasting three days, yet the reality was that it only lasted two, an important detail that was not the focal point of my experience. This discrepancy demonstrates how writing may prompt us to confront the gaps in memory, as it did when I compared my personal recollections with the more objective account I found on Wikipedia.

The act of narrating this story also brings to mind the concept of the temporality of speech, as explored by Gnanadesikan (2011). Unlike the enduring nature of written text, spoken words are fleeting. As I narrated the festival experience, it felt like I was temporarily reliving it, almost like sculpting the memory from the marble of my mind. This metaphor of "unearthing" a slab of marble, cleaning it gently, polishing the crevices, and discovering hidden details in the cracks echoes the process of narrating unscripted stories -- it is fluid and unexpected. experience of narrating, much like speech itself, is inherently temporary, vanishing as soon as it is spoken. Writing, on the other hand, is like a marble statue—while the final product appears seamless and complete, the process of shaping, chiseling, and refining is invisible, just like the time and effort that go into crafting a written piece.

In contrast to writing, which can be revisited, edited, and polished, speech—fluid, somewhat unpredictable, fleeting—offers a momentary glimpse into the raw, unrefined nature of our experiences. While writing allows for reflection, revision, and permanence, speech is more ephemeral, capturing a fleeting moment that may not fully reflect the depth of the original experience.

Speech vs writing

So much is communicated through facial expressions, intonation, tone, and speed, and so much of that is lost in writing. When reading, the reader only sees the text, which can strip away the nuances of voice and emotion that a speaker conveys. As I reflect on my unscripted storytelling, I notice that I often repeat myself or reiterate certain points for emphasis, particularly to highlight a word or concept. I also tend to digress, focusing on inconsequential details that, in the moment, seem to add depth to the story and its context. However, in writing, these digressions might appear as unnecessary, and I can see how they would need to be refined to avoid overwhelming the reader with extraneous information.

Reflecting on this made me think about how different our experience is when listening to a story versus reading a text. The acts of reading and writing are always dialogical, a concept I draw from Mikhail Bakhtin's theory of dialogism. Writing, much like speaking, involves a continuous interaction between the writer (the self) and the reader (the other), whether real or imagined. Our perceptions and understandings are shaped by specific contexts of time and space, and the writer's words may be influenced by the anticipated reactions of the audience. Writing is not a solitary act but a network of interwoven statements and anticipated responses.

If I were to script my story, I would likely engage in a more detailed examination of my memories, especially of my 19-year-old self. What was she like back then? In hindsight, I might feel a sense of gratitude for that carefree freedom—jumping on a train, existing in a space designed solely for enjoyment. Through writing, new details might emerge, and I would tweak the narrative to make it more coherent, refining it to create a sense of unity and wholeness. This self-reflection offers an opportunity to revisit the past, allowing for new insights and perspectives to emerge in the process of shaping the written word.

References

Gnanadesikan, A.E. (2011). The first IT revolution. In The writing revolution: Cuneiform to the Internet (pp. 1-12). John Wiley & Sons.

Haas, C. (2013). The technology question. In Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy (pp. 3-23). Routledge.