How It Is in Common Tongues was composed by searching for the text of Samuel Beckett’s How It Is using a universally accessible search engine, attempting to find, in sequence, the longest common phrases from How It Is that were composed by writers or writing machines other than Beckett. These phrases are quoted from a portion of the commons of language that happens to have been indexed by a universally accessible engine.
URLs (all pointing to non-Beckett uses of the phrase "how it is") that are printed on the cover of the book:
www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/171842 www.howitis.org.uk/ www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFvr0sU46C8 science.discovery.com/tv/how-its-made/ www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/.../unilever-series-miroslaw-balka-how-it www.howstuffworks.com/ www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId... www.ssa.gov/pubs/10070.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFvr0sU46C8 science.discovery.com/tv/how-its-made/ science.discovery.com/tv-shows/how-its.../videos www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IDqj0YYa9g www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/keith.../thats-not-how-it-is-10136.html www.lyricsmania.com/thats_how_it_is_lyrics_paul_freeman.html www.facebook.com/pages/Enjoy-the...how-it-is...-/374223870316 www.socialsecurity.gov/pubs/10070.pdf www.sing365.com/.../748822C3797D9DAC48256DA00006FE7E www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IDqj0YYa9g www.bicworld.com/en/products/how-its-manufactured-stationery/ www.amazon.com/How-It-Is-American-Philosophy/dp/0816526494 www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/rush/howitis.html www.uapress.arizona.edu/Books/bid1863.htm xkcd.com/385/ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That's_How_It_Is science.discovery.com/tv-shows/how-its-made/videos www.stlyrics.com/songs/t/twarres3975/thisishowitis188965.html www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/shakurwip.html www.dwillard.org/articles/artview.asp?artID=58 vimeo.com/14062859 sciencehack.com/videos/category/8 www.sqlite.org/testing.html www.amazingribs.com/tips_and.../zen_of_charcoal.html www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/billytalent/howitgoes.html peanutbutterlovers.com/pb-lovers/pb101/how-its-made/ https://twitter.com/yarotrof/status/260964040329789440 www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15978028 www.space.com/12033-spacex-dragon-space-capsule-infographic.html en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Is_How_It_Is orangette.blogspot.com/2011/04/how-it-is.html www.searchquotes.com/search/I_See_How_It_Is/ www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19673819 www.myspace.com/.../that-s-not-how-it-is-album-version-146230 zinelibrary.info/files/women_in_prison%20FINAL.pdf www.zoltek.com/carbonfiber/how-is-it-made/ 9gag.com/gag/5122796 www.stlyrics.com/songs/c/casual760/thatshowitis35271.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=9z3PtFs85Wc www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL502677BE06C2C818 www.ssa.gov/pubs/10070-08.pdf cparmycentral.com/2012/09/21/recruiting-how-its-used/ www.sing365.com/...How-It-Is.../CFDFE014C226C1574825760B00... www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL18AF94AC1A5860B9 https://www.facebook.com/about/privacy/your-info www.amazon.com/Thats-How-It-Is/dp/B004F1H73I www.bicworld.com/en/products/how-its-manufactured-lighters/ www.metrolyrics.com/thats-how-it-is-lyrics-coolio.html www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/nakedbrothersband/thatshowitis.html science.discovery.com/tv-shows/how-its-made/videos/sports.htm www.metrolyrics.com/how-it-is-between-us-lyrics-sara-groves.html www.metrolyrics.com/how-it-is-lyrics-rush.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKOAGRXGFiU www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRqy_obORjU www.facebook.com/full_data_use_policy www.ebaumsworld.com/video/watch/80973980/ www.eplf.com/en/laminate/howitismade.html soundcloud.com/lu10records/sets/enigma-dubz-how-it-is-ep-out/ amyoscar.com/awareness/how-it-is/ www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/b/billy_talent/this_is_how_it_goes.html www.riverwalking.com/component/content/article/53.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8o2Z8yN0gA www.usp.org/usp-nf/development-process imgur.com/gallery/gDZlb www.facebook.com/pages/Oh-i-see-how-it-is/270639104358 front.moveon.org/harriet-tubman-tells-it-how-it-is/ www.metrolyrics.com/thats-how-it-is-lyrics-lee-evans.html www.metrolyrics.com/thats-not-how-it-is-lyrics-toby-keith.html www.bicworld.com/en/products/how-its-manufactured-shavers/ www.youtube.com/watch?v=6e_8j-kACrk www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHc-6EB80Xw www.ssa.gov/pubs/10070-09.pdf computer.howstuffworks.com/bittorrent.htm www.metrolyrics.com/this-is-how-it-goes-lyrics-billy-talent.html www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8629616ACDD7C82E www.youtube.com/watch?v=22WbTZiaHFQ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science vimeo.com/9177725 imgur.com/gallery/gYDox thusandsuch.wordpress.com/ www.jennybjones.com/2012/08/27/how-it-is/ www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pr2K5RSnnr4 venturebeat.com/2012/04/26/vimeo-festival-awards-2012/ gizmodo.com/5377138/this-movie-theater-tells-it-how-it-is www.amazon.com/What-It-And-How-Done/dp/B000OFRK7M www.discogs.com/Casual-Thats-How-It-Is/release/820527 www.facebook.com/pages/i-say-it-how-it-is...-/311830242719 imgur.com/gallery/y7BBN en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popcorn en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras www.ssa.gov/pubs/10070-10.pdf vimeo.com/28792961 www.tiobe.com/content/paperinfo/tpci/tpci_definition.htm www.toycrossing.com/lcr/ www.lyricstime.com/venke-knutson-is-it-how-it-is-lyrics.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUFme91RklE cirrie.buffalo.edu/encyclopedia/en/article/268/ howitisbyjuniorjunior.blogspot.com/ www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Abortion/Pages/How-is-it-performed.aspx www.marinij.com/lifestyles/ci.../how-it-is-whats-age-really-got-do rt.com/news/us-egypt-relations-morsi-833/ www.oxfordcroquet.com/coach/capubs/index.asp itunes.apple.com/us/app/how-it-is/id346192408?mt=8 vimeo.com/7232542 www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YEa7QWzm3c www.discogs.com/Biohazard-How-It-Is/release/1264217 www.isaca.org/Journal/Blog/Lists/Posts/ViewPost.aspx?ID=129 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rice www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNdwm4GYpA8 www.nrmca.org/aboutconcrete/howproduced.asp www.cdc.gov/hand-foot-mouth/index.html www.metrolyrics.com/how-it-is-lyrics-biohazard.html www.hark.com/clips/gkrzjsbzxq-so-thats-how-it-is-in-their-family eo.ucar.edu/rainbows/ www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9322409 www.imdb.com/title/tt0091042/quotes www.wordsinarow.com/seo.html americancensorship.org/ sethf.com/anticensorware/general/google-censorship.php europa.eu/about-eu/institutions-bodies/index_en.htm en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Assigned_Numbers_Authority www.cdbaby.com/cd/figueroa3 www.youtube.com/watch?v=TV74MHNrUpI en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_boom www.math.utah.edu/~keener/lectures/diffusion/diffusion.pdf www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/ www.1stwebdesigner.com/inspiration/modern-surrealism-and-history/ www.discogs.com/Biohazard-How-It-Is/release/1239612 www.lyricsmania.com/how_it_is_lyrics_rush.html auto.howstuffworks.com/bugatti.htm reality-2012.blogspot.com/ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-card_Monte soundcloud.com/shelvingmusic/jeremy-juno-tell-it-how-it-eigenwijs www.buttonsmcsweet.com/2012/09/how-it-is.html soundcloud.com/shelvingmusic/jeremy-juno-tell-it-how-it-original www.enterpriseefficiency.com/radio.asp?doc_id=249946 vimeo.com/40940376 www.beatport.com/release/tell-it-how-it-is-remixes-part-1/954231 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumer_Confidence_Index soundcloud.com/shelvingmusic/jeremy-juno-tell-it-bruze soundcloud.com/shelvingmusic/jeremy-juno-tell-it-daniel www.naturalnews.com/032358_fracking_gas_drilling.html www.marinij.com/lifestyles/ci_21805079 soundcloud.com/shelvingmusic/jeremy-juno-tell-it-how-it-alvaro www.flickr.com/photos/blech/galleries/72157622593125784/ www.arabnews.com/how-it-live-us-story-huma-mahmood-abedin www.youtube.com/user/ItsGottaBeFuckinSaid https://stuartnye.com/how-it-is-done www.allmusic.com/album/how-it-looks-how-it-is-mw0000083169 islamqa.info/en/ref/9412 www.writerswrite.com/journal/oct04/keegan34.htm www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0wYpzGq0rM spiritcloth.typepad.com/.../its-been-chilly-but-now-it-is-warmer.html www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858541532/ oll.libertyfund.org/title/786/79314 www.maybemcqueen.com/saying-it-just-how-it-is/ www.okehdokee.com/thats-how-it-is-on-the-range.html www.techdirt.com/ home.comcast.net/~jpittman2/pacman/pacmandossier.html www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbUBmcWvrDY www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdoOPuJC42o www.religioustolerance.org/easter3.htm www.firstpeoplesnewdirections.org/book.php?id=1022 www.imdb.com/title/tt0837378/ futurewewant.org/2012/show-me-how-it-is-done/ https://twitter.com/chargers/status/259075313131200512 kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/texts/assata_wip.html www.militaryspot.com/enlist/asvab_how_it_is_scored/ www.ministryofrum.com/article_how_rum_is_made.php www.ssa.gov/pubs/10070-11.pdf mashable.com/2012/09/20/apple-maps-app/ bible.cc/deuteronomy/15-2.htm bitsum.com/virtual_memory_facts_and_memory_optimizer_scams.php imgur.com/gallery/B4XX1 9gag.com/gag/1795419 www.orangebeautiful.com/blog/post.php?post_id=1568 www.naturalnews.com/035399_stupid_humanity_relationships.html www.google.com/policies/privacy/ melner.blogspot.com/ books.google.com/books/about/Pottery.html?id=Oe0YAAAAYAAJ www.avert.org/hiv.htm www.dudelol.com/yes-thats-really-how-it-is/ www.songlyrics.com/toby-keith/that-s-not-how-it-is-lyrics/ www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,876018,00.html www.mp3lyrics.org/b/biohazard/how-it-is/ www.pangea3.com/legalblog/how-predictive-coding-works-html library.thinkquest.org/J0110012/made/made.htm heatherhensonbooks.com/?page_id=86 www.goodreads.com/book/show/12567775-health-care-reform www.thaifoodandtravel.com/features/fishsauce1.html www.sundriesshack.com/2011/07/27/heres-how-it-is/ www.theursulines.org/2012/06/17/this-is-how-it-is/ psysociety.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/algebra-is-necessary/ www.ischool.berkeley.edu/newsandevents/events/dls20091104 www.electroboy.com/electroshocktherapy.htm www.weatherwizkids.com/weather-climate.htm soshable.com/social-business-and-how-it-is-used-today/ www.metrolyrics.com/thats-how-it-is-lyrics-marvin-gaye.html www.discogs.com/Biohazard-How-It-Is/release/631516 science.howstuffworks.com/csi.htm www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111004151635.htm www.energyattic.com/tx/how-radiant-barriers-are-installed/ francoistremblay.wordpress.com/2012/05/29/thats-just-how-it-is/ www.prweb.com/releases/2012/10/prweb9987104.htm www.water-pollution.org.uk/nuclearwaste.html www.specialolympics.org/ www.facebook.com/pages/i-see-how-it-is/118862408135357 www.uncommonforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=76819 mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/ www.strategypage.com/htmw/htpara/articles/20120125.aspx code.google.com/edu/parallel/mapreduce-tutorial.html en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirteenth_floor howtosmile.org/record/5553 www.emdrnetwork.org/description.html pinterest.com/mslori77/just-how-it-is/ www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,842759,00.html forums.adobe.com/message/4797288 forums.adobe.com/thread/1087547 www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,850173,00.html en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Jazeera en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge www.patheos.com/blogs/getreligion/ www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=594062n www.flickr.com/photos/jo_underground/4614812751/ howitisguide.blogspot.com/ news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4694513 www.youtube.com/education www.flickr.com/photos/edsweeney/7009937999/ blog.sfgate.com/teensinkenya/2006/03/22/just-how-it-is/ itmeansnothingtome.blogspot.com/ parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/ www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/jan-june03/sb_03-21.html contrailscience.com/ www.cashforipads.com/ allthingspropertymanagement.com/ henryjenkins.org/ unclutterer.com/ johnaugust.com/ answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20121024102642AATueid onraasch.com/blog/css-rounded-corners-in-all-browsers barfblog.com/ us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/6933915899?page=2 mashable.com/2012/07/05/ipad-min-bad/ www.uvm.edu/~dguber/POLS234/articles/page1.pdf us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/6933876108 us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/3354989/ www.blackfive.net/ ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/publications/publication746_en.pdf www.ihollaback.org/ www.freedomdisability.com/ obamacarewatch.org/ www.talktomeinkorean.com/ chronicle.com/article/Bitten-by-the-Online-Bug/135260/ www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos blacklight-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=4736141 www.dailyblogtips.com/ veryaware.com/2010/09/catfish-real-or-fake-its-a-fake-sort-of/ www.tv.com/shows/pretty-little-liars/ www.wcit2010.org/Program/May%2025%20-%20Day%201/37 pinterest.com/bzzzd/how-it-is/ cumulus.tnetweather.com/webcam/howitisdone www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2011/wp1131.pdf serversideguy.blogspot.com/2004/12/google-suggest-dissected.html www.bitpipe.com/detail/RES/1320254637_515.html mysneaker.livejournal.com/ pinterest.com/fir3bansh33/how-it-is/ soundcloud.com/selassieisthechapel/you-know-how-it-is www.av8n.com/how/htm/aoa.html www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/268478 ericwhitacre.com/blog/the-virtual-choir-how-we-did-it www.harpers.org/archive/1945/12/0032576 www.reinventingaging.org/diet/sensa/sensa/ www.flickr.com/photos/eschipul/4458330496/ www.harpers.org/archive/1872/08/0042970 technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc772774(v=ws.10).aspx www.bbqaddicts.com/blog/recipes/bacon-explosion/ www.uppity-negro.com/2002/10/oh-i-see-how-it-is.html www.cbsnews.com/2100-500158_162-526322.html www.amazon.com/How-It-Is/dp/B00261646A treeshadowfarm.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-it-is.html reggaelunch.blogspot.com/2007/02/1987-06-24-thats-how-it-is.html blacklight-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=4736141 www.dailyblogtips.com/ veryaware.com/2010/09/catfish-real-or-fake-its-a-fake-sort-of/ www.tv.com/shows/pretty-little-liars/
The notes at the bottom of each page give the shortest url (often one of many) that we were able to retrieve for each phrase cited. The first in a sequence of citations provides, in parentheses, the date when we found the phrase on the web page given, and immediately subsequent citations will have ‘id.’ instead of a date, where this is the same as that last provided. The number following the date (or ‘id.’) is the total number of occurrences found for the phrase, as searched on that date and for the search engine we used. Note numbers are hexadecimal.
How It Is in Common Tongues is produced on demand and hors de commerce, in an edition limited to 256 copies, numbered 0-ff. The first f copies are signed by the artists.
Common Tongues remediates practices and processes of reading, and addresses, critically, the commodification of reading itself, and the proprietary enclosure of a growing portion of our linguistic cultural commons.
Common Tongues emerges from the artists’ collaboration on The Readers Project (http://thereadersproject.org). Processes that were developed in this framework and that are based, in part, on previous manifestations of the Project are applied to a reading of Samuel Beckett’s How It Is and used to generate new poetic texts, remediating social reading.
The traces and consequences of others’ readings are accessible to us over the internet and, more recently, through networked ebook readers. The indexing and statistical analysis of everything that has been inscribed into the realm of big data allows us to search and retrieve textual fragments from a vast, increasingly comprehensive literary and linguistic corpus in arrangements that are first ‘read’ by algorithmic and statistical models and then offered up to us in finely composed—and often illustrated, multimediated—pages that precede and predetermine any further or deeper ‘human’ reading. Perhaps this is how we are now inclined to read, as our relationship with language and language-making changes fundamentally? Is the algorithmically composed reading ‘social’ or ‘posthuman’? Is our subsequent ‘deep’ reading a solipsistic throwback? For works that have been written by human individuals, questions of ownership, copyright and integrity are raised continually in entirely new, if instantly commonplace, situations.
The example of a closely associated process—developed earlier, quoted from a paper by one of the artists’, and as applied to a short extract from Beckett’s text—may provide an illustration: “blue and white of sky” “a moment still” “April morning in the” “mud it’s over” “it’s done I’ve had the” “image the scene is” “empty a few” “animals still then” “goes out no more” “blue I stay” “there way off on” “the right in the mud” “the hand opens and closes” “that helps me it’s” “going let it go I” “realize I’m still smiling” “there’s no sense in that now" “been none for a long time now” “my tongue comes out” “again lolls” “in the mud i stay” “there no more” “thirst the tongue” “goes in the mouth” “closes it must be a” “straight line now it’s” “over it’s done I’ve had” “the image”
These words comprise three fragments from How It Is and they also correspond to the final part of a short prose work which Beckett originally published in French as L’Image. But this is not Beckett. Each quoted phrase represents a maximal syntagmatic association with Beckett’s text, while a Google search has been undertaken to ensure that these word sequences are attributable to others, often many others. We have established these attributions with cited URLs. (For details and full citations, see: Cayley, John. ‘Writing to Be Found and Writing Readers.’ Digital Humanities Quarterly 5.3 (2011): http://digitalhumanities.org/dhq/vol/5/3/000104/000104.html)
Quote from the process-generated text, heard in the installation as a spoken performance: My tongue comes out and touches her face. The lonely neonate screams again into the merciless ears, ... lolls in the nucleus of every decomposing metropolis. When I slip in the mud the sky opens up. Should I stay or should I go? I just stood there gazing. If we drink, we shall no more thirst; the dead need life. This man appears a good man for us, and his tongue goes in the right direction. If her mouth closes it must be because of his kisses. And a man's, which should be a straight line, meets hers at the return from each of these deviations. “It's over now. It's over. It's over.” It's done. I've told you what happened. I don't want to think about it. How can we compare an idea with an image, if it were one being who had the idea and another who had the image?
The ‘perceptual reader’, an autonomous software entity embodying specific reading strategies, first developed for the artists’ Read For Us installation (2010), is released within Beckett’s long prose work, How It Is, on one of the main installation displays. This reader is seen moving through that part of this text known and published elsewhere as 'The Image,' highlighting phrases as it goes, in the center of a perceptually defined, typographically composed space. The reader has been adapted to consume the text in up to four-word phrases and then to attempt to ‘source’ these sequences on the internet in contexts that are not associated with Beckett or his writing. The searches are sent, live, to auxiliary displays in the installation where visitors may read these phrases in an aestheticized selection of the new contexts that are offered to us by networked services. 'The Image' of How It Is is read through Common Tongues.
Common Tongues is also a literary sound installation. The recording of an oral textual performance is heard within the space of the installation. This text was generated by 'writing to be found' in the commons of language using networked search services. Phrases from 'The Image' are found within language in the networked commons that has notbeen authored by Samuel Beckett. This language was then composed by Cayley into a new text in a process that is quasi-algorithmic. The new text contains its supply text embedded within language that has been discovered in the linguistic commons. This spoken text is poetic, disturbing, and uncanny in relation to what it purports to be reading through and addressing.
The visually-accessible reading of the ‘perceptual reader,’ and that of the more expansive generated text in spoken performance will diverge when left to their own devices, but a simple interface allows a visiting human reader to control and bring the aural and visual readings into a more synchronous relation of correspondence and commentary.
As a gesture from the latter days of print, Common Tongues offers, as artifactual, archival and sculptural components of the installation, copies of two print-on-demand publications made from certain processes of its 'reading through'—the exhaustively annotated How It Is in Common Tongues, and The Image (both Providence: NLLF Press, 2012, see 'child' links under 'Web URL' to the left). The latter book is composed of screenshots from the search-driven, phrase-by-phrase readings of 'The Image' in How It Is. It is a book of images constructed from the same reading strategy performed live by the perceptual reader and its auxiliary displays—a book of the Common Tongues... reading.
In the artists’ Read For Us installation (2010, http://thereadersproject.org/index.php?p=installation/readforus/readfor…), a similar process was applied to Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, as a critique of the market-determined and advertising-inflected reading that phrase-based internet search engenders. For Common Tongues, we address, in addition, the association of phrases with an authorized text, exploding its integrity and discovering the same words ‘in the wild,’ so to speak—amongst fragments of feral language both human and posthuman, in the common tongues that are proper to the contemporary linguistic commons. Paradoxically we use the same mechanisms of big software that are, as we speak, enclosing language, in order to find the words of an authorized text where they are still, if only momentarily, associating freely.