remix my lit

RML has answered our most frequently asked questions.

By far and away the question we most often hear is “what are the rules for remixing literature?”. Well there are “rules” (ie terms) set out by the Creative Commons licence but beyond this, RML isn’t going to give you any rules. What we will do is suggest some things to think about.

When it comes to changing up a story the most obvious ways are transforming elements like point of view, structure, dialogue, characters, even genre. But there are other ways to think about remixing. For instance, the writer Jeff Noon talks about concepts - comparable to computerised music effects - that work as “imaginary technologies, designed to fire the writer’s imagination”. Noon works with “filter gates” such as Randomise, Decay, Explode, Ehance, Control and he even “drugs” the language.

Experiment. Think up different ways in which the stories and the language can be transformed to make it your own. In the words of Jeff Noon, “It’s fun, and more than a little scary sometimes, especially when a piece dissolves down into pure nonesense. But it can always be rescued and, eventually, some phrase or image will emerge from the process, some clue as to how the overall piece will end, and the work can now be pushed along in this direction.”

That’s enough from us. We want to hear what you think about the process of lit remix. Leave a comment or send an email to anthology@creativecommons.org.au.