From Tribal Memory to the Scroll: Literacy, Democracy and the Post-Literate Turn

HTML: Perplexity AI

Source: prompt re: NY Times

9 October, 2026

This follows on another NY Times piece, Ezra Klein on Odysseus here, the last of "My Year in Kuwait" blog. It also follows on the journalistic format before that here, also looking a evolution of democracy & AI. And from the boilerplate HTML format last seen here. On the Medium series, follow the three part "Welcome to the New Middle Ages" starting here.

Made in Copilot AI following the original prompt above

A rough historical arc: oral tribal society, restricted medieval literacy, mass literacy and industrial democracy, and the present drift toward image-led, algorithmically sorted attention.

James Marriott’s recent argument, discussed by Mary Harrington in The New York Times, is not simply that people have stopped being able to read. It is that long-form reading is becoming less central to public life, while the moving image—especially short-form video—becomes the dominant medium through which many people encounter politics, history and reality. “Post-literate,” in this sense, does not mean illiterate: text is everywhere, but sustained reading is losing its cultural authority. [1]

Cartoon from photos and frame-by-frame prompt

After exploring AI-assisted story-telling starting this blog here and journalistic formatting recently here, let's try cartooning using these characters and the prompt that follows.

Characters

L: composed with AI  from two separate originals, R: untouched original

Prompt

Draw multiple portrait frames to string into a cartoon strip. Setting is a 19c. steam train in AZ Monument Valley at high noon w dusty atmosphere pulling a few box cars, one with an open door. 1st photo: me, my daughter& my ex & 2nd photo my new friends. Frames:
1) that train arriving in distance
2) side view of boxcar w me, my ex & daughter from 1st photo sitting looking out open box car
3) jump off to stand next to train and ex + daughter go off in box car
4) that train leaving in distance at L, new train arriving in distance at R
5) new train & boxcar arrives w cowgirl sitting by open door arm outstretched to me running next to train
6) have to jump aside to avoid water tower that has an EMPTY sign hanging akimbo
7) still run next to open door box car w cowgirl kneeling in open door beckoning me
8) jump onto open door of boxcar as cowgirl helps me in
9) we stand hand-in-hand looking out boxcar open door
10) train goes off to the right in the distance

Queen Marie of Romania and “The Sun-Child”

Update 1: more on Queen Marie the story-teller in early XX c. European politics here

Update 2: next in ongoing AI-assisted experiments, a cartoon story board here

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... My story-telling just won't stop! Following a journalistic experiment here, let's return to the classic format we left here: another AI-assisted far-ranging story from one photo...

Accidental sunbeam from a flash taking a photo of a print