or “unconscious thinking” as Joseph Bleuler, a 19th century psychologist, first termed it. Freud refers to this as the activity of the unconscious mind in waking and dream states. This way of seeing is distinct from the self-conscious perception of “object-reality.” In schizophrenia, this interior vision often supplants a more objective reality. Metaphor and dream imagery are two manifestations of primary process thinking at work.

is part of the double-bind hypothesis of schizophrenic speech. That is, the schizophrenic, fearful of the consequences of a direct response, couches his replies in guarded, ambiguous language. In other words, schizophrenics talk in meaningful gibberish so you don’t realize what they mean is gibberish.

The most useful thing for me here, in the code, is the understanding of the equivalents: one kind of signal may equally be substituted for another with the exact same meaning. It then becomes very clear when a different, non-linear thinking appears, as in « knight’s thinking » { Hannah Weiner, *Trans-Space Communication* }

Most ordinary conversation leans heavily on figurative language. A “normal” speaker, given the choice of an abstract or concrete interpretation of an ambiguous word such as “concrete” will tend to err in favor of the abstract. The opposite is true in schizophrenics who tend towards an over-literal bias.

Ne voyez-vous pas dans la construction du Z une allure contrariée ? Ne figure-t-elle pas le zigzag aléatoire et fantasque d’une vie tourmentée ? Quel vent a soufflé sur cette lettre qui, dans chaque langue où elle est admise, commande à peine à cinquante mots ? Marcas s’appelait Zéphirin. Saint Zéphirin est très vénéré en Bretagne. Marcas était Breton. { Honoré de Balzac, *Z. Marcas* }

… long rambling spontaneous monologs often with little apparent connection or provocation. The quality of the language is often obsessive and at times seems to be “writing itself,” that is, words spoken a few seconds before will prompt more words which in turn… etc…

Voilà longtemps que j’ai senti le Vide, mais que j’ai refusé de me jeter dans le Vide. J’ai été lâche comme tout ce que je vois. Quand j’ai cru que je refusais le monde, je sais maintenant que je refusais le vide. Car je sais que ce monde n’est pas et je sais COMMENT il n’est pas. Ce dont j’ai souffert ici, c’est d’avoir refusé le Vide. Le Vide qui était déjà en moi. { Antonin Artaud }

The speaker is almost just a vessel for it…

Comme le remarque Pierre Dommergues, Molloy et Murphy débutent par la même initiale que « man » en anglais et « mort » en français ou encore « par l’envers de cette lettre W (Watt, Worm, Winnie) qui unirait le M de moi (myself) au W de we (nous) » { Massin, *La lettre et l’image* }

is scattertalk marked by an obsessive flow of escatological or sexually abusive language.

… is the principle pattern underlying automatic speech… a curious metaphor for thought… as in the train of thought is oft derailed.

… a sort of flying off the linguistic handle… speaking in endless digressions… forever leading to nowhere…

The typographical errors (‘Peacher’ for ‘Preacher’, ‘Afghinastan’, ‘Absynian’, ‘Confuscius’) show that the founders were more concerned with the appearance of the type than with what it said. […] Palmer & Rey pronounce the unspeakable in Crayon: Academy of Tyqograqhic Art { Alastair Johnston, *Alphabets to Order* }

… talk is often laced with
references from the immediate field of vision… a patient’s conversation with a doctor for example is filled with words taken from titles of books on a shelf behind him… dimming the room actually cuts down on the flow
of automatic speech.

A DRAWING. The meaning of this is entirely and best to say the mark, best to say it best to show sudden places, best to make bitter, best to make the length tall and nothing broader, anything between the half.
{ Gertrude Stein, *Tender Buttons* }

… is the opposite extreme … a patient goes for years without uttering a word…

… new words often coined with onomatopoetic genius … e.g., the man who called doves, “wuttas”…

are also frequent and outrageous.

of certain words

that is, more words used in
a given speech sample than normal subjects…

severe language breakdown

… the collapse of phonetic word boundaries… schizophrenics are often more in touch with the word’s sound than with its sense… What results is the
breakup of words into smaller syllabic units & new words… e.g., “analyst”
becomes “anal list”… or else nonsense sounds…

… long strings of words with no apparent syntactical connection… most schizophrenics have a conventional grammar intact however…

… speaking in fragments of words… often from
two or three different languages.