Getting going on the CQ challenge quilt

The quilt in its current format is a variation on "the void" - the idea is still to have an empty centre ... after all, the theme is "on the edge" so why not focus on the edges? 

Gradually the idea of using paper instead of fabric has developed - I was thinking about all of human knowledge (written down) and yet how we are totally clueless about some really important things, things that can't be caught in words. 

Looking for books I could bear to cut up, I found only a Polish-English business dictionary, a technical drawing manual (computers do that now), and an old copy of Roget.

My focus switched a bit, toward how we can say things in such subtle ways but when it comes to some of the strong emotions, words aren't all that useful. So there's a silence in the centre of things. Then I happened to read in Saturday's paper that someone (George Eliot?) had written about "the roar that lies behind the silence", which fits in with my thinking on "the void". 

Anyway, Roget - word lists and index - got cut up and folded (two layers, though the weaving will make two layers of another sort) -

And pages machined together into long strips, to satisfy the "joined by stitch" criterion.

Some tangible thoughts about weaving those edges -

Next decision - what to use in, or rather behind, the middle? My "void" drawings suggest there has to be something there, not an entirely plain bit of fabric ... some sort of disruption.