computer-generated text

Golem is a computer-generated casebound book consisting of 109 pages of text in eight sections. Each section has sentences of a distinct syntax. These express the undertakings, interactions, perceptions, and thoughts of a few people. The seventh section has two long Perl programs which differ from one another, the first described as being understood by one of the people, the second described as being written by another.

The book includes a postword by Zach Whalen.

"Show's Over" is a creditable fiction by Stuart Moulthrop. The work consist of a credit roll for fake films, generated as they go, composed on the fly by a series of programs. The shows are all over, so you can just hang out and watch the words. Watch while you want. Get up and go when you're ready. There is bonus content in the shape of a story in eighteen parts. The story can be accessed by clicking anywhere in the active window while the credits are rolling. While doing this a subtle message will appear in the background, saying something like request story/narrative/disrupt. The messages will differ from time to time but their meaning is always the same. You'll have your story segment as soon as the current credit sequence completes.

When story bit rolls up, the words will pause at the top of the screen. You have two  minutes to read in peace. If you don't need that much time, click in the active window and things will move along. You cannot go directly to the next bit to the story as this is disruptive technology. You have to sit through at least one imaginary credit roll before the story resumes. There are several ways the show can end, depending on what you choose to see. And the end is not the end, of course: swallow-taled, the story will happily recycle after you reach full count. Some shows go on forever.

Barbosa’s theoretical-practical trilogy closes with Máquinas Pensantes: Aforismos Gerados por Computador [Thinking Machines: Computer-Generated Aphorisms] (1988), as it can be understood as the third volume of A Literatura Cibernética. Here, the author presents a long series of literary aphorisms, in which the generation of texts is said to be “computer-assisted” (Computer-Assisted Literature) in BASIC language. The “A” series (Re-text program) deals with combinatorial “re-textualizações” [re-textualizations] (1988: 59) of a fragment (“matrix-text”) by Nietzsche and the “B” series (Acaso program), which had been partially published in the Jornal de Notícias (1984), draws upon the conceptual model created by Melo e Castro’s poem “Tudo Pode Ser Dito Num Poema” [Everything Can Be Said in a Poem], included in Álea e Vazio [Chance and Void] (1971). Finally, the “C” series (Afor-A and Afor-B programs) comprises reformulations of traditional Portuguese aphorisms, which result in new interpretations, sometimes ironic, sometimes surreal.

[Source: Álvaro Seiça, "A Luminous Beam: Reading the Portuguese Electronic Literature Collection" (2015)]