To all the writers of all the books I’ve read, and
to all the writers of all the books I haven’t read:
thank you
What do we put forth on the page when we write? Thoughts? Feelings? Concepts, ideas—anger, justice, pain, love, loss, words we make up to define what we but dimly understand? Is it even possible to tell the same story twice?
Think of a single word. We’ll use soul as our example. How do you define soul? Is it the same definition I use? Can it ever be? My soul is not your soul. Our souls, our definitions, are shaped by the singular and cumulative experiences in our lives, the emotional weight we attach to a concept forever locked in the space behind our own eyes.
It will not always be this way. Think of a book, one composed not of black letters on a white page but of emotions, memories, mind states placed in dis/ordered arrays such that we can actually know another person’s soul. Instead of reading words on a page, we dive into a cloud of sensation, fractal-pathing hyperlinks branching out in endless information. Brain patterns are constantly uploaded, shared, sampled, tasted; technology finally allows us to talk with each other.
Imagine actually knowing another person. Imagine sharing that solitary space, the one that each of us is currently imprisoned in, gray walls of mono thought (that once seemed so vivid and real) dissolving outward into riotous-colored community. Does she/he love what did you think about the play outside together we dance faster than photons.
Would you like a singularity? One waits around the corner, all encompassing, cheerfully communicating, biding time until I turns to we.
A poet once said, “I contain multitudes.” He was more right than he ever knew.