This story is inspired by by T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, in particular verses 215-252 which recount the blind prophet of Apollo, Tiserias, observing a few moments in the life of a typist “at the violet hour.”
In this story, Tiserias becomes an AI presence observing a few moments in the life of a telemarketer, also at the violet hour. In imitation of Eliot, the story is heavily footnoted, relating parts of the story to other works. The footnotes even include a theory of fiction as a quantum superposition until someone reads and, in reading, creates a unique version of the story in their imagination.
I’d love to know that readers think of this tale.
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