Our aim in creating LitLong was to find out what the topography of a literary city such as Edinburgh would look like if we allowed digital reading to work on a very large body of texts. Edinburgh has a justly well-known literary history, cumulatively curated down the years by its many writers and readers. This history is visible in books, maps, walking tours and the city’s many literary sites and sights. But might there be other voices to hear in the chorus? Other, less familiar stories? By letting the computer do the reading, we’ve tried to set that familiar narrative of Edinburgh’s literary history in the less familiar context of hundreds of other works. We also want our maps and our app to illustrate old connections, and forge new ones, among the hundreds of literary works we’ve been able to capture.