ABSTRACT
The Ambient Literature research project is funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) in the UK and is a collaboration between the University of the West of England, Bath Spa University, and the University of Birmingham. The project is aimed at exploring new forms of literature deploying technology; in particular, location-based technologies. A key outcome of the project is the commissioning of three experimental creative works including It must have been dark by then by Duncan Speakman and Breathe by Kate Pullinger. These two creative works represent the cutting-edge of new media narratives and their relationship to place. Speakman’s work is essentially an audio-narrative experience combined with a physical book, though it is much more than that. The audience are guided to walk and find particular – but also generic – landmarks in their own environment while listening to a series of meditations on climate change and human global movements. Through the merging of the local and the global, Speakman’s work is incredibly thought-provoking. Breathe by Kate Pullinger illuminates the potential for text-based stories to intersect uncannily with locative media. It is truly a literary work which also shapes itself through the personal data on your mobile device to envelope the reader into the protagonists’ world. Without the leveraging of personal data, it would be an innovative and exciting reading experience as the text disappears or reveals itself in unexpected ways on the screen. With the inclusion of your personal data, however, it is a deeply moving story about grief and how it insinuates itself into your daily life. These two recent works require a thoughtful analysis to provide insights into the ways in which our individual communication devices become storytelling machines.
