I write like...

An old friend of mine shared a rather inane little piece of fun with me recently.

Someone apparently has gone to the trouble of creating an online tool to get your literary fortune, so to speak. All one has to do is paste a several paragraph sample of one's writing on the input side of the black box and press the "Analyze" button. Lickity-split, the black box spits out what famous author is most similar to that writing style.

Truly, it is a feat of engineering marvel and technologic achievement.

Here is the result I got for submitting several paragraphs from one of my earlier blog articles:

I write like
James Fenimore Cooper

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Cool! I have always enjoyed Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales. That is the series of novels that includes The Deerslayer, The Last of The Mohicans, and The Pathfinder for all you unfortunate enough to have been born into the current generation of literary unwashed heathens who have no or nominal at best exposure to the writers from the Romantic Era, particularly the American ones.

I have to wonder, if I submit a selection of Cooper's writing, would it come back saying he writes like me? I must of necessity argue that if the black box returns anything but a result confirming reciprocality, even if it says his writing is like his own, the black box is not valid, accurate, or reliable. Otherwise, if the black box returns the result that Cooper's writing is like... hmm... let's say Arthur Conan Doyle, then it stands to reason my writing is like Arthur Conan Doyle.

That can be proven using simple math theorem. A=B, B=C, therefore A=C. But, if my writing (A) is like Arthur Conan Doyle's writing (C), why not give me that result instead of saying it is like Cooper's writing (B)?

See, here is exactly what happened. I did submit several paragraphs from the Cooper's Last of The Mohicans, chapter 1. The little black box said it was most like Arthur Conan Doyle. So, I submitted several paragraphs from Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles, chapter 1.

You want to take a guess what the result of that was? You still have all three of your helps left. You can Poll the Mob, Ask the Mob, or Trust the Mob...

Give up? If you said George Orwell, or Julius Ceasar, or Samuel Taylor Coleridge, or Herman Melville, or H.G. Wells you would be absolutely wrong. You would also be wrong if you said Jane Austen, any of the Bronte sisters, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Agatha Christie, or J.K. Rowling. And you would be so wrong that words can not describe the ensuing pandemonium and end of life as we know it if you had the audacity to say it was me.

The result was C=C. Arthur Conan Doyle's writing is most like Arthur Conan Doyle's writing. Not the logical C=B of Doyle's writing is most like Cooper's. Hence, there is no way that my writing is anything like Doyle's.

Okay, the captain has turned on the buckle seatbelts light, so please remain seated and return your tray table and seat to the locked and upright position, we're going to experience some turbulance. C is not B, so C can not be A because A is B. Yet how do we explain B is C? That the black box is wrong? If only it were that simple!

The only explanation is found in something more complex and mind boggling than string theory exponentially increased by the theory of relativity divided by the sum of the origin of species and quantum physics. Yes, it is not only more complex and mind boggling, but dreadfully more sinister and oppressive... it is that vast right-wing conspiracy...