Asemic writing is a type of writing that does not use words. The word "asemic" means "without specific meaning" or "without the smallest unit of meaning." Asemic writing combines writing and pictures, while using very few gestures, lines, or symbols. Because it is not clearly defined, readers can interpret its meaning in different ways. These works may have many meanings that change over time. The open and flexible nature of asemic writing allows people who speak different languages to understand it in similar ways.

Styles

Asemic writing comes in many different forms. It is often made with a pen or brush, but it can also be drawn in the sand with a stick and photographed, or created on canvas, paper, computer images, and animations. The most important feature of asemic writing is that, even though it is usually hard to read, it still looks appealing to people. Some examples of asemic writing include pictograms or ideograms, where the shapes may suggest meanings. Others look like abstract scribbles that resemble writing but do not use actual words. Asemic writing sometimes looks like a version of traditional writing but is not a real writing system. It makes people feel as though they are between reading and looking. Asemic writing does not have words, but the way it is arranged can suggest the type of document it might be, which can hint at meaning. It often looks like calligraphy and can be understood either by knowing writing systems or by using aesthetic intuition. True asemic writing happens when the person who creates it cannot read their own work. Relative asemic writing is a type of writing that some people can read but not everyone (for example, ciphers or wildstyle). Most asemic writing falls between these two extremes. Influences on asemic writing include scripts that are hard to read, invented symbols, or early forms of writing like cave paintings, doodles, or children's drawings. However, asemic writing is not just copying old ways of writing; it is a modern style of writing that uses creativity from many sources for inspiration. Other influences include alien languages from science fiction, artistic languages, sigils, undeciphered scripts, and graffiti. Asemic writing can be used for activities like mental stimulation, non-verbal communication, meditation, hoaxes, helping with writer's block, keeping information private, and expressing personal ideas.

History

In 1997, visual poets Tim Gaze and Jim Leftwich first used the word "asemic" to describe their writing style, which looks like calligraphy but is not fully readable. These writers explored forms of writing that are not based on spoken words or letters, and they treated asemic writing as a creative choice and a purposeful practice. Since the late 1990s, asemic writing has become a global movement in literature and art. Its popularity grew especially in the early 2000s, though it has roots in earlier traditions, such as abstract calligraphy, writing without words, and writing that is too damaged to read. Jim Leftwich recently said that creating a completely meaningless asemic work is impossible, and that all writing has some meaning. Others, like author Travis Jeppesen, believe the term "asemic" is confusing because it suggests writing with no meaning.

Asemic writing appears in avant-garde literature and art, which has connections to the earliest forms of writing. The modern asemic movement began with two Chinese calligraphers: "crazy" Zhang Xu, a Tang dynasty (around 800 CE) calligrapher known for creating wild, unreadable calligraphy, and the younger "drunk" monk Huaisu, who also made illegible cursive calligraphy. Japanese calligraphers later expanded on Chinese abstract calligraphy through a practice called Hitsuzendō, which allowed their works to move beyond formal presentation and "breathe with the vitality of eternal experience."

In the 1920s, Man Ray, influenced by Dada, created an early example of wordless writing with his poem Paris, Mai 1924. Later in the 1920s, Henri Michaux, influenced by Asian calligraphy, Surrealism, and automatic writing, made wordless works like Alphabet (1925) and Narration (1927). Michaux called his calligraphic works "interior gestures." The writer and artist Wassily Kandinsky was an early influence on asemic writing, with his piece Indian Story (1931) showing complete textual abstraction.

In the 1950s, artists and writers like Brion Gysin (influenced by Japanese and Arabic calligraphy), Isidore Isou (founder of Lettrisme/Letterism), Cy Twombly (a former U.S. Army cryptologist), and the Japanese group Morita Shiryū / Bokujin-kai (Ink Human Society) expanded writing into abstract, illegible, and wordless visual art. These artists helped lay the foundation for future asemic writers. Mira Schendel, a Brazilian artist, created many illegible works, such as Archaic Writing (1964). Mirtha Dermisache, a writer, created asemic writing since the 1960s and said her works, though meaningless, still had the rights of an independent piece. Angus MacLise, a musician and poet, also made asemic calligraphic works in the 1960s. In 1971, Alain Satié released Écrit en prose ou L'Œuvre hypergraphique, a collage graphic novel filled with asemic writing. León Ferrari, an artist and poet, made many asemic works in the 1960s and 1970s, such as Escritura (1976). In 1974, Max Ernst released Maximiliana: The Illegal Practice Of Astronomy: hommage à Dorothea Tanning, a book that influenced asemic writers like Tim Gaze, Michael Jacobson, and Derek Beaulieu. Roland Barthes also worked with asemic writing, calling his pieces Contre-écritures. Irma Blank was another important contributor to asemic writing.

A modern example of asemic writing is Luigi Serafini’s Codex Seraphinianus (1981). Serafini described the script in the Codex as asemic during a talk at Oxford University in 2009. In the 1980s, Chinese artist Xu Bing created Tiānshū (A Book from the Sky), a work with 4,000 hand-carved meaningless characters printed on books and scrolls. During the same decade, artist Gu Wenda began creating projects with fake Chinese ideograms that looked old and traditional. One exhibition of these works was held in Xi’an in 1986, featuring large-scale paintings of fake characters. In China during the 1990s, an abstract calligraphy movement called "Calligraphy-ism" emerged, led by Luo Qi. This movement aimed to make calligraphy an abstract art, without requiring traditional forms or legibility. In Vietnam during the 2000s, a calligraphy group called the Zenei Gang of Five developed the idea that "wordless" means something beyond naming, representing both the absence of words and the presence of all meaning.

Satu Kaikkonen, a contemporary asemic artist and writer from Finland, once said:

Bruce Sterling, a writer, discussed asemic writing in his Wired magazine blog Beyond the Beyond.

False writing systems

False writing systems are made-up writing systems or alphabets used in fake documents or other places to look real. These systems appear in comic strips, animated cartoons, graphic novels (like The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and the Valérian and Laureline series), and video games.

The writing in Luigi Serafini’s Codex Seraphinianus was confirmed by the author to have no hidden or secret meaning. The Voynich manuscript uses a writing system that has not been translated, and some people believe it might be a fake.

In the video game Outer Wilds, players must read messages written by a fictional alien race called the Nomai. These messages are shaped like spirals and branch off to allow responses. The symbols used look like biological molecules but are not real letters. This is a false script because it follows a single repeated pattern with small changes. Even though tools have been created to generate similar writing, these are not true writing systems because they usually turn text into numbers and choose shapes based on those numbers.