The Inchoate Reviews of Google Books

[beamjockey]

Many items in Google Books have been given a "Common terms and phrases" list, or "word cloud," with links to the text. Roughly speaking they are words whose frequency in the book is much greater than their frequency in general use.

When I discussed The Boy Mechanic recently I called this an "inchoate review."

Here are Inchoate Reviews of five more books. The first is Moby Dick; the others will be trivially easy to guess.

again almost ambergris avast away baleen Bedford Bildad binnacle birth-mark blubber boat book of Jonah bows bowsman bowsprit pointing Bulkington cabin cannibal Cape Horn capstan Captain Ahab Captain Peleg cetacea Cetology CHAPTER chief mate clam come common porpoise crew cried Daggoo darted deck don't doubloon Duodecimo dyspepsia Euroclydon ever eyes feet Fin-Back Whale fish fishery Flask flukes forecastle Greenland whale gunwale hammock hand handspikes harpoon he's head himself humpbacked whale Indian ocean Ishmael it's Jeroboam Jonah Joppa King-Post Leviathan look main-mast Martha's Vineyard mast-head mate might missing murderers Moby Dick monomania Nantucket Nantucket ships Narwhal never night oars Octavo pagan Pequod Perseus Peter Coffin phrenologists Propontis Quaker quarter-deck Queequeg queer Ramadan Right Whale round sail sailors schooner seemed sharks ship ship biscuit ship's shipmates side sloop-of-war sort soul Sperm Whale spermaceti spile spiracle spout stand Starbuck Steelkilt Straits of Sunda strange Stubb Sumatra taffrail Tahiti tambourine Tarshish Tashtego tell thee thing third mate thou though till tobacco smoke tomahawk turned vertebrae Vishnu voyage whaleboat whalebone whalemen White Squall White Whale wigwam windlass

answered asked Scrooge believe bell bless Bob Cratchit bright Camden Town CHARLES DICKENS cheerful child CHRISTMAS CAROL Christmas Day Christmas Present clerk clock cloth cold cried Scrooge curtains dark dead dear Dickens Dilber dinner door eyes face father fire Fred gentleman Ghost of Christmas girl goose Hallo happy head hear heard heart hope Humbug Jacob Marley JOHN LEECH kind laughed light little Bob Marley's Ghost Martha Master Peter merry Christmas never night observed old Fezziwig old Joe parlour past Phantom PHIZ plump sister poor pudding replied the Ghost returned robe Robin Crusoe round Scrooge knew Scrooge looked Scrooge's nephew Scrooge's niece shadows snow spectre Spirit stood stopped streets tell thing thought Tiny told trembled Turkey turned Uncle Scrooge voice walked window woman wonder word young Cratchits

adventures alight Amadis of Gaul answered Don Quixote armor arms asked barber basin battle beard beast beautiful began begged Biscayan blow books of chivalry bray cage called Cardenio carried castle Cervantes CHAPTER coach cried Dapple devil Don Fernando Don Quix Don Quixote saw donkey Dorothea dressed duchess duke Dulcinea del Toboso Durandarte enchanted fair ladies fancied fell friend Sancho galley-slaves gave giant give goatherds governor hand haste head heard heaven helmet Herakles Holy Brotherhood horse innkeeper knew knight knight-errant lady Dulcinea lance landlord look maidens Mancha master Melisendra Montesinos mounted mule mule-drivers niece priest princess Quiteria Quixote and Sancho Quixote's quoth Sancho replied Don Quixote rode Rozinante Rueful Visage saddle sallied Sancho Panza servant shield Sir knight soon Spain squire stood story sword tell thee thing thou told took turned village wonder word worship wounded

abolition absolute alienated antagonism argued association Bauer became become Berlin bourgeois bourgeois society bourgeoisie Bruno Bauer Cabet Cambridge capital century Charles Fourier Chartist Christianity civil society class struggle Communist Manifesto conception criticism Critique of Hegel's Critique of Political division of labour Economic and Philosophical emancipation England English essay estrangement Europe existence feudal Feuerbach Fourier France Frederick Engels freedom French Revolution German Ideology Gospel Hegel Hegel's Philosophy human Icaria idea individual Karl Marx liberal London Man's Manuscripts of 1844 Marx and Engels Marx and F Marx's Marxism means MECW Moses Hess movement natural negative community original Owenites Paris party Philosophical Manuscripts Philosophy of Right political economy position principle private property proletariat Proudhon question radical reason reform relations religion religious republican revolutionary Rheinische eitung Roman Ruge Russian Saint-Simon Saint-Simonian Schapper social socialist species Strauss theory translation Weitling workers Young Hegelians

alfo Angle Angle of Incidence appear arife Axis Bafe becaufe blue Bodies breadth Bubbles caft caufe Circle colour'd compofed compound confequence copioufly Cryftal dark defcribed denfity Diameter diftance equal Experiment fame farther feems feen fenfible feparated feven feveral fhall fide firft Prifm Fits of eafy fmall folid fome fometimes forts of Rays frangible Fringes fuch fuppofe gible Glaffes Glafs Glais greater green hole Image Inch Inci increafed indigo Knives leaft refrangible lefs Lens Lines lours mall meafured Medium Mixture Motion muft Obfervation oblique Oil of Vitriol Opticks orange pafs Paper parallel Particles perpendicular placed Plane Plates PROP Proportion Rays of Light reafon reflected Reflexion refraded refrangible Rays reft reprefent Shadow Sine of Incidence Sine of Refraction Spectrum Speculum Subftances Sun's Light Surface Telefcopes thefe Colours ther thicknefs thofe Rays tranfmitted tranfparent ufual unufual violet Water whitenefs whofe yellow

(The last one has OCR trouble with the "long s" or "ſ." But so do the eyeballs of many of us who learned to read in the Twentieth Century. One recalls Stan Freberg's account of Ben Franklin, teasing Thomas Jefferson about "life, liberty, and the purfuit of happineff.")

There's a certain beauty to these. They're unearthed by a blind, unconscious, inarticulate robot, yet they bring resonances to the human reader's mind, and spark the imagination. There ought to be a way to make a game, or a poem-like object, or something, out of them. Any suggestions?

One could, to take a simple example, use them as a source for Moby Dick-themed Mad Libs.

There's some interesting discussion of "Common terms and phrases" on Eric Rumsey's blog. For those technically inclined, Wikipedia has an article on TF/IDF, or term frequency/inverse document frequency, which Google is using to produce its word clouds.

Comments

Well...

[seawasp]

The second is clearly A Christmas Carol, the second is Donkey Hote, the third appears to be the Communist Manifesto, and the fourth I'd guess to be Newton's treatise on Optics.

Re: Well...

[beamjockey.livejournal.com]

Perfect score.

In case you're wondering, here's the cloud from a Spanish edition of Don Quixote:

adarga agora Alcalá Alonso Alquife Alvaro Tarfe amigo aposento Archipámpano Argamesilla armado asno Ateca Avellaneda aventuras Bárbara batalla Belianís de Grecia bellaco Bramidán buen caballero andante Caballero Desamorado caballo cabeza calle Capítulo Carlos castillo cenar Cervantes cervantina comenzó criado dama decir dejado delante dellos diablo diciendo digo dijo don Quijote dijo Sancho doña Luisa Dulcinea del Toboso ermitaño escudero espada estaba fuese gente gigante grandísima Gregorio gusto hallar harto hidalgo honra Japelín jote jumento libros de caballerías llama llegó llevar luego Madrid Mancha mandó mano Martín de Riquer melonero metió mirando Mosén Valentín mozo mujer mundo noche paje parece pasar Perianeo Persia poco príncipe Priora proprio queda quiero recebir reina Zenobia replicó Sancho respondió Sancho rey de Chipre Rocinante rucio sacó salir Sancho dijo Sancho Panza soldado sortija suerte Tajayunque tengo tenía traía venido ventero viendo volvió vuesa merced vuesas mercedes Zaragoza

[carbonel]

One recalls Stan Freberg's account of Ben Franklin, teasing Thomas Jefferson about "life, liberty, and the purfuit of happineff."

"It's in, Ben. It's very in."

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

Well of course the Midnight Special listener can recite the routine! (Chicago reference)

[carbonel]

True, though in this particular case there's a family connection as well -- my uncle was in a coffeehouse production of the play, and our family went to see it. First time I ever had a mocha coffee, I think. I must have been all of 12 or so.

On the SouthCoast of Massa-ad-chu-essetts

[robin-june.livejournal.com]

In Moby Dick's inchoate review, they got "Bedford" but not "New" --despite, (I'll lay odds) that in all instances of the former, it's immediately preceded by the latter.
I haven't read the book in decades, but, having lived in the city, I'll stake that claim.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

(entering via digression, as is my wont)
For me, there are three cultural divides between the Nineteenth Century and the Twentieth. Quantum physics and World War I are two, and Sigmund Freud is the third. I put Freud in that category of pioneers whose importance as a trail blazer is far more than the importance of the details of his theories. Nineteenth Century notions of perfectly rational actors are a little absurd to us; our taking for granted some sort of "unconscious" would be bizarre to someone Nineteenth Century.
One of the first Twentieth Century art movements was dada, which was prompted to delve into the unconscious by WW I.
That stuff could make good dada poetry. (iirc, dada originated as a literary movement, and only a little later went visual.) Twentyfirst Century technology "creating" Twentieth Century art is a notion I may have to chew over for a while . . .

[beamjockey.livejournal.com]

For me, there are three cultural divides between the Nineteenth Century and the Twentieth. Quantum physics and World War I are two, and Sigmund Freud is the third.

What, no zeppelins?

That stuff could make good dada poetry. (iirc, dada originated as a literary movement, and only a little later went visual.) Twentyfirst Century technology "creating" Twentieth Century art is a notion I may have to chew over for a while . . .

Want to see the essay you write about it.

Speaking of machine-generated literature, there was a discussion the other day of a story-generating card game Jo and Ken Walton cooked up years ago... let me rummage... here it is.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

Zeppelins are timeless. (cf. 1890's UFO sightings)
& yeah, I saw that thing about Jo's card game. I want one. I do still have my copy of NESFA's role-playing If I Ran the Zoo Con. somewhere