1. Here, I mean to invoke Richard Schechner’s perfomance-theory concept of the “actual,” in which the drama is created as it is performed. I discuss Schechner’s work in chapter three. On text versus audio in Antin’s talk poetry, see Raphael Allison, “David Antin’s Pragmatist Technophobia,” in JML 24.8 (Summer 2005): 110–34. On Blonk’s performances, consult “hold your breath and gag,” PoemTalk no. 6 (May 4, 2008)
http://poemtalkatkwh.blogspot.com/2008/05/hold-your-breath-and-gag-poemtalk-6.html
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2. For an overview of the debate regarding archives and digitization, see the essays in Kathryn Sutherland, ed. Electronic Text: Investigations in Method and Theory (New York: Oxford UP, 1997).
3. For work that questions the archival impulse in literary and cultural studies, see Helen Freshwater, “The Allure of the Archive,” Poetics Today, 24.4 (Winter 2004): 729–58.
4. The literature on the relationship between sound and print in reading acquisition, and on the continued importance of sound in silent reading, is vast. For a survey of the field, see Michael Kamil, Peter Mosenthal, P. David Pearson, and Rebecca Barr, eds. Handbook of Reading Research, vol. 3 (Mahwah: Erlbaum, 2000).