Distant Writing: Literary Production in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

Revised version 5

Abstract

This article introduces the concept of "distant writing", a novel literary practice in which authors act as designers, employing Artificial Intelligence (AI) assistants powered by Large Language Models (LLMs) to generate narratives, while retaining creative control through precise prompting and iterative refinement. Unlike Moretti's distant reading, which uses computational analysis to interpret large corpora of existing texts, distant writing harnesses AI to author new narratives, reshaping the literary production process. By examining theoretical frameworks and practical consequences, and relying on an experiment in distant writing called Encounters, this article argues that distant writing represents a significant evolution in authorship, not replacing but expanding human creativity within a design paradigm. The distinction between writing (close) and "wrAIting" (distant) reveals how AI-assisted composition creates narrative possibilities previously inaccessible, transforming literature's modal space while challenging traditional notions of authorship, creativity, and literary production. This emerging practice merits critical attention as it shapes future literary landscapes and reconfigures relationships between human creativity and AI.

Keywords: distant writing, artificial intelligence, large language models, authorship, narrative design, modal logic, literary production, wrAIting