You're Invited to a Funeral

The Death of Writing

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A Funeral Announcement

Dear Reader,

It is with deep sorrow that I write to you to announce the demise of artful writing, which peacefully left us on the advent of artificial intelligence. Writing was an integral part of our humanity, the very fabric of our soul, and touched many lives around the world. The funeral service will take place on 21st March 2025, bring your condolences and any written words that have touched your heart.

With Warm Regards,

The Writing Community

A Tribute To Creative Writing

Writing was a dear friend. Writing was a therapist. Writing was a listener. Writing was a balm for the broken hearted. Writing was humanity. Writing was emotion. Writing was art. Writing was refuge. Writing was rebellion. Writing was communicating. Writing was life itself mirrored.

One of the most precious forms of art, we decided was too hard, required too much effort, and so we handed it over to a robot that only understand 0s and 1s; not tears or laughter, nor love or hate, nor sadness or grief, nor adventure or fear, nor imagination.

Writing was the human soul’s emotions being etched onto paper for an eternity. The art of writing was a form of human expression, which we foolish humans willingly handed over to language learning models.

We handed it over to soul-less machines, and gave up on working hard to express ourselves as humans. In haste for perfection, we gave up beautifully imperfect words and sentences written by humans. Somewhere along the lines we decided it was okay to handover one of the most beautiful forms of art to artificial intelligence. We gave away a gift that only human beings had.

Why? Because it seems we humans want everything easy and fast in this life. It has been a human want to make every aspect of living life easier. And in many ways technological advancements have made the world a better place. But to take away an art form like writing just seems like an act of pure cruelty.

Writing was a way to express oneself, writing was a way to discover oneself. Writing was a way to mirror society, and show its face to people. Writing was a way to preserve life for future generations. Writing helped record histories, encapsulating them till the end of time. Writing created worlds out of pure imagination. Writing gave us stories pulsing with heartbeat. Writing made us bold enough to lay out our opinions.

Writing was poetry, writing was books, and stories, and novels. Writing was love letters. Writing was the truth, and the lies. Writing was everything. Writing was life itself.

The art of writing was a dear friend, that unfortunately won’t be there to befriend our future generations, our children. Instead, our children will type their ideas into a chat box, and have millions of words generated within seconds, none of which will have the soul that human writing has. It is a sad day indeed.

Most of the human population won’t miss you dear writing, but there are a few handful of us in this world which will continue to try and keep you alive, even if there would be no one left wanting to read you in the end.

Forever yours,

A Writer

My Thoughts on AI and Writing

I wanted to frame this essay with a positive, an all is going to be fine attitude. But I couldn’t. A question that I asked myself multiple times before starting my newsletter Enchanted Letters: is AI the death of writing? And if so, what is the point of writing this newsletter?

Truth be told, I do think AI is the slow demise of writing, or perhaps fast given how quickly technology is advancing. Now when I say writing here, I mean the art of writing that humans take part in. Writing will obviously exist till the end of time or so I hope, but words written by actual humans is already in a decline.

I initially wrote more than a thousand words on this topic, relaying my feelings and how I think AI is evil, blah blah. But truth be told it was kind of boring to write, so I figured it would be boring to read as well. Then a spark of imagination turned into a small flame, and I thought why don’t I write this essay as a tribute for the art of writing? I imagined what a funeral for words written by humans would look like. Which is what you just read above.

Do you think AI could create a piece like that? It can, if you give it the idea. But can it come up with that idea? I genuinely want to know.

And I know the tribute sounded melodramatic, and even to me it seemed inherently flawed. But it was purely my feelings being expressed about the current scenario. Truth be told, it really is how I feel about the advent of artificial intelligence. Look, I have nothing against all these technological advancements, that’s the way of life after all. Everything evolves, and there’s a lot of advantages too.

But some things should be protected, savored and cared for. I know writing is hard, I know it takes hours, I know it takes fine tuning to find the right words and I know it takes time to craft beautiful sentences that evoke emotions. I know it isn’t convenient. I know it is time consuming. I know it’s not the most efficient use of time. But isn’t that the beauty of it? Isn’t the beauty of writing that it comes from a human with a beating heart and a soul full of emotions?

I do think the world would be a very sad place without the art of creative writing. One that comes from hours, days of hardworking from a human writer. One that comes from the blood and sweat of a writer with a beating heart, and a thinking mind. One that comes as a form of human expression.

When I read a book or any piece of writing, I marvel in the very fact that a human wrote it. I marvel in the beauty of the human mind, and it’s ability to spin up wonderful stories and writing out of nothing but pure imagination. When I read nonfiction I marvel in the fact that it was a human with real opinions that wrote it.

I’m Scared of the Future

If I’m being honest, I’m scared for the future of writing. And this is just my opinion, but I think the art of writing is sitting on its deathbed. Writing won’t disappear completely of course, but most of the human population is already using AI in some way or the other for their writing. At least that’s how it seems.

I’m afraid that soon, no one will find it important to write something fully crafted by themselves. I fear for our children. It’s so important to learn the art of writing, it doesn’t have to be Shakespeare or Ernest Hemingway level. But writing should reek of authenticity and originality, which artificial intelligence can’t provide.

Writing is a pure form of self expression, one that every human should experience at some level. Writing helps to shape and form opinions, it helps to clarify our thought processes, and most importantly writing helps to heal.

Perhaps non-writers won’t understand this. Perhaps I will be seen as a foolish person. Perhaps I will be touted as an overdramatic, insecure writer. And perhaps that may be true. But I ask you, if the art of writing (by humans) is going to die, what will happen to the art of reading? And more importantly what will happen to the originality of thought? Because that certainly won’t remain if we outsource our thinking to artificial intelligence. And all this because we just don’t want to put the work in?

I wish I could explain to you what the art of writing means to me. I wish I could tell you how many times writing words down has healed my heart. I wish I could tell you how many times writing down my feelings has calmed me down. I wish I could tell you the joy I’ve felt when I’ve written a story just from the crevices of my mind. I wish I could just tell you everything writing has been for me, and for millions of writers across the world. In fact, I’d like to argue there is no greater magic than writing in this world.

And here we are casually ready to hand over that magic to something that can “think” like a human, but in truth can never truly understand what a human feels.

So where does that leave me in this equation? I can easily increase my productivity by using artificial intelligence to assist me in my writing, and produce a lot more content. Not to sound pompous or anything, but I’d like to think I’m a decent writer and with the power of AI I can become an even more impressive writer. It should seem like a simple choice.

And it is a simple choice for me. The truth is, I value my integrity, a lot more than producing a lot of high quality content. I’m not a content generating machine after all, and I would never want to be.

So I will continue to write slowly, imperfectly, and messily. I will keep publishing my flawed work full of awkwardly crafted sentences. I may never get the fame that the 8 year old me desired and wished for, and I may never get the recognition.

But I may be able to cater to a small audience that values handcrafted, well thought pieces written by a real human. That, and knowing the very fact that I wrote every single word myself, is enough for me.

Now it’s your turn.

Do you think AI is the death of creative writing? Let me know below in the comments.

Wishing you a wonderful day,

Wajeeha