Kenneth Goldsmith is a poet who transcribes radio reports from 1010 WINS & retypes the New York Times & transcribes entire Yankee games. If we relieve art of imagination, we’re left with the verity of exactly what’s in front of our noses, which, in a not-so-roundabout way, sounds similar to a good deal of contemporary photography.
I appreciate an act of documentary that’s so complete, it’s a carbon copy of what happened. What happened? The 1010 WINS traffic report happened, and here it is, exactly, as before — so why does it sound so different, so mysterious, so evocative? (Sound like photography, yet?)
Gotta love the folks out on the edge, making the rest of us furrow our brows.
Link: NPR, “Uncreative Writer Retypes the New York Times“.
Old idea. I take it you’ve read Pierre Menard, author of el Quixote by JL Borges? Such a great short story. About ten pages exploring all the limits about the concept of somebody reinventing something already done.
Required reading in High School, I hope!
Definitely not a new idea. Been done and redone, but I’ve never seen it done with 1010WINS!
Well, you don’t want your students to copy the textbook in the exam and then tell you a long story about their intelectual merits when doing so 😉