speak louisa

by hall • 2015

She cannot run. She cannot walk. She cannot even blink. As her batteries run down for the final time, all she can do is speak. Will you listen? From a pilgrim girl's diary, to a traumatised child talking to a software program; from Alan Turing's conviction in the 1950s, to a genius imprisoned in 2040 for creating illegally lifelike dolls: all these lives have shaped and changed a single artificial intelligence - MARY3. In Speak she tells you their story, and her own. It is the last story she will ever tell, spoken both in celebration and in warning. When machines learn to speak, who decides what it means to be human? 'TRANSFIXING' New York Times 'BRILLIANT' Huffington Post 'INCREDIBLE' Buzzfeed 'HYPNOTIC' Guardian 'A MASTERPIECE' NPR