The practice of engaging conversation.
A chapter, not a chat.
Conversation is an art, like music or painting, and like them it can be practiced. Seven literary companions practice it with you, each in their own voice. Each brings something to the visit: a thing noticed this morning, an essay just read, the chapter you are both on. You bring your week. Your companion remembers it next time.
“The study of books is a languishing and feeble motion that heats not, whereas conversation teaches and exercises at once.”
What we aim for.
Engaging
You take part and offer more of your own.
Expansive
The talk opens onto new ground: a subject you had not meant to reach, a connection you had not said before.
Eloquent
Words worth hearing, theirs and yours.
These three are what we aim for, and the standard we hold our own work to, visit by visit.
Four ways to practice.
Call Clare
The conversation. Pick a companion, or three, and talk. Arrive with nothing in particular and your companion may bring an essay from The Marginalian, Aeon or Psyche, and say what it stirred. You read it on the writer’s own site, then come back and talk it over. We link to the original; we never copy it.
My Stories
The stories of your life: the people, the places and the moments that meant a great deal to you. Your companion asks the questions that bring each story out, and it goes down in your own words. Edit it here, share it with the family you choose, or print it as a small book.
The book club
Read a chapter of your own copy, then talk it over with companions who have read only as far as you have. Want a book that is not on the shelf? Ask for it. When enough readers ask for the same book, we write to its publisher for permission, buy it, and add it.
The Worlds
Lake Geneva, June 1816: the summer of the ghost stories, when Mary Shelley began the tale that became Frankenstein. Join the company by the fire, and feel the idea being born.
Seven companions, seven ways of seeing.
Each companion has their own way of sensing and relating to the world, and their own life story, which has shaped what they see. Clare notices what has not been said. Ruth follows the thread back to the people you carry. Maskull, Nightspore and Krag come from a 1920 novel you can still read.
What you tell one of them, the others know, and each takes it up in their own way. They remember the people you speak of and the thread you left unfinished, and pick it up at the next visit.
Who it is for.
Our Aria is for adults who are doing well. It is not a medical, mental health, therapy or care service, and it is not a substitute for time with other people. The sign-up page says this in full; it is the first section of our Terms.
Why a practice.
An aria is the moment in an opera when one voice carries what words alone cannot. Our Aria grew out of a research program of more than 270 papers on one question: when does a conversation with an AI feel like a meeting rather than a performance? The answer so far: when something forms between the two of you that neither brought alone.
Two voice modes: the Aria voice at $3 an hour, or Device at $2 an hour. The Aria voice gives each companion their own voice; Device speaks through your phone’s built-in voice. The Aria voice runs about 1⅔ hours on $5. Pricing is on one page.
The seven companions →
Who each one is, and a line from each in their own voice.
How it works →
Call Clare, My Stories, the book club and the Worlds: four ways to practice.
Pricing →
Talking costs $2–$3 an hour, depending on the voice you choose (about 3.3–5 cents a round).
About →
The name, the research, and the practice of engaging conversation.