Cirrus@Austlit

'When creative writing is discussed in the context of AI, the discussion is often about copyright, authorship, writers’ livelihood, and generating content; but creative writing, which has always modelled and evoked varying visions of consciousness in fictional and nonfictional forms, could both contribute meaningfully to understandings of the social change that accompanies AI, and could itself be changed meaningfully by those social and technological advancements. Through analysing two different contemporary dramatisations of AI, the grounded sci-fi novella The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang and the experimental short story ‘According to Alice’ by Sheila Heti, this paper identifies issues underpinning discussions of creative writing and AI beyond ‘what is told’ and suggests implications for how we might conceive of creative writing elements like voicing, focalisation, materiality or substrate, and form – and particularly their interdependence.' (Publication abstract)