Week 2: Form and Meaning

When I read this week's blog theme on the way materials effect meaning, the first idea that popped into my head was Jonathan Safran Foer's Tree of Codes. I first heard of this book-meets-art-project object last Winter in Dr. Golick's bookmaking workshop, where the materiality  of books and book-like objects was our primary focus. Tree of Codes is both textually and physically an experiment: The author took an existing text called The Street of Crocodiles by Bruno Schulz and struck out passages to create a new story with new meaning. Interesting in itself. right? He then decided to publish it with actual cut-outs, empty boxes where text had once been. 

According to the Visual Editions, the publisher's website, "As Jonathan began to carve out his story, we started doing our production homework and literally got turned down by every printer we approached – their stock line being “the book you want to make just cannot be made”. Thankfully, we found Die Keure in Belgium who relished the challenge of making a book with a different die-cut on every page." (http://www.visual-editions.com/our-books/tree-of-codes)

I find it so interesting that so many aesthetic options emerged from the basic concept of altering existing text: He could of printed the new text in normal paragraphs in either print or digital form. He could have published it with blacked out or struck out portions and this would have changed the tone and experience to that of a censored object. The cut-out option seems the most materially dynamic because we are presented with layers of exposed or partially exposed words. Some of them are legible right away and with others the reader must negotiate whether this is part of the immediate story or something that will only be meaningful later on. I have to mention here that Kirschenbaum and Werner used Tree of Codes as an almost paradoxical example of the digital humanities (p.446). While the component of physical interaction with the text is crucial, they point out that this book could not have been produced on a mass scale without digital intervention to produce the cuts. Therefore the book is actually a collaborative work, combining old and new technologies to create a unique experience.  

Tree of Codes from Visual Editions: https://www.flickr.com/photos/visualeditions/5132830443

I looked up the book and found that U of T does have a number of copies, including at my work. Hooray! After picking up Tree of Codes and beginning to read, I found that my main challenge was in deciding which pieces to read. Just the things on the current page? Everything that's visible in whole words? It's pretty fascinating that the construction of this book gives a whole new aspect to the reader's agency. I also like the duality of the altered text in terms of meaning - the story as a linear text has been transformed but what what you're left with and how you understand it is also now malleable.

Last thoughts: I already brought up the fact that producing such a complex book was achieved with the help of computers and lasers and digital design. If this was supposed to be impossible to make as a codex, I wonder if there could be a wholly digital version? Would the effect be lost? Could you effectively mimic the covering and revealing effect? Would it be more or less confusing? Would it still be book art since it's already sort of digitally-born book art?

Citation and links:

Kirschenbaum, Matthew G. and Sarah Werner. "Digital Scholarship and Digital Studies: the State of the Discipline," Book History 17 (2014): 406-58.

Safran Foer, Jonathan. Tree of Codes. London: Visual Editions, 2010.

"Tree of Codes". Visual Editions. Accessed January 21 2015. http://www.visual-editions.com/our-books/tree-of-codes 

Tree of Codes at UTL and TPL