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This chapter was originally delivered as a paper at the First International Conference of Semiotics & Visual Communication at Cyprus University of Technology. \ud \ud It brings together theoretical, historical and practice-based research gathered through the course of 2011. In part it is a collection of ruminations, preoccupations, truths and tales examining the speech balloon, and its dear, yet distinct relative, the thought balloon. It also forms a brief commentary of the work produced during two artist residencies, completed by Lizzie Ridout at the Women’s Studio Workshop in Rosendale, NY, USA in late 2011 and early 2012.

An edited and designed article adapted from a series of informal meetings, emails, notes and a public conversation held between artist Lizzie Ridout and artist/writer/curator Maria Christoforidou. These formed part of Lizzie Ridout's exhibition 'Ways to Talk & Yet Say Nothing, or Ways to Not Talk & Yet Say Everything', bringing together a body of printed works, drawings and objects. Shown at Plymouth University in 2012, this exhibition coincided with the completion of a publication also called 'Ways to Talk & Yet Say Nothing, or Ways to Not Talk & Yet Say Everything'. The publication is the result of a collaboration with Women's Studio Workshop, Rosendale, NY, USA.

'Ways to Talk & Yet Say Nothing, or Ways to Not Talk & Yet Say Everything' is a limited edition publication created in collaboration with the Women's Studio Workshop, New York, USA. It is a development of ideas created as part of a project called 'The Architecture of Conversation'.\ud \ud 'Ways to Talk & Yet Say Nothing, or Ways to Not Talk & Yet Say Everything' brings together a weaving of theory and practice exploring the history, symbolism and usage of the speech balloon. Various print techniques are utilised to examine how we speak.\ud \ud The book comprises a custom-made bound folio containing a set of nine prints, with inset letterpressed pamphlet.\ud \ud Hand-made and printed in an edition of 50, using silkscreen, letterpress, intaglio and laser-cut.

Spaces on bookshelves, the mathematical preferences of bees, Hiroshima survivors, time-travelling, Victorian novelists, incomplete gravestone inscriptions; all starting points to be pondered and to inspire, says Lizzie Ridout, in her endless search for beginnings.

Homeward Bound or An Exercise in Collecting Beginnings brings together research by the fourth Pearson Creative Research Fellow at the British Library, Lizzie Ridout, in 2007. \ud \ud Lizzie has been working as ‘domestic archaeologist’ within the collections, seeking out references to mundane objects with bizarre or poetic twists. Contained within this book are references to her intriguing finds. Beetle-\ud wing dresses, moustache cups, electric tablecloths and ghosts of stockings all make an appearance. Interspersed amongst original source material, Lizzie has included visual work documenting how this body of uncanny things has inspired her in her own practice. A new collection, somewhere on the cusp between what is real and what is imagined, is created.

Maria Christoforidou, Lizzie Ridout and Dion Star were invited to attend a residency at CAST, Helston, to explore their project 'Various Writings'.