Poetry of the telephone

Our friend, the english artist Graeme Miller captures the poetry of the landline. In this half hour, we follow the arc of a single call from dialling to hanging up, taking in the sweep across the global landscape of the 20th century. He draws out the private habits and distinctive speech as well as the collective dreams and nightmares of the landlines art and culture.

"Brighstone 428" is a wonderfull radio-show on BBC Radio 3, a sound-drama treating of the poetry of this emotive way to communicate with people (in the 70s: at home, or standing inside a cabin, or out in the traffic' tumult) and the nostalgia of theses old fashioned rings.

"While collaging the mores and cadences of telephone behaviour and speech the piece also lands in the physical space of the landline - the actual line and the real land. The world of the telephone engineer atop a telegraph pole; the village operator, the maintenance or laying of underwater cables, the middle-of-nowhere phonebox which exists oblique to the density of traffic of information and chat.

The plot lines of death and murder stalking the crossed lines of the city, to the call of the worried voice "Are you still there?". All these spaces are opened up with the reassurances and communities of landline use."

extract of the presentation on the BBC3 post

just click here  

and enjoy!

Also highly recommended: this Radio Nova's jingle from the early 80, using some famous "human voice"...