The Exquisite Corpse Boogies

By Melvin Perry

"Pshaww!!!" you say, "A computer can't write books."

Well, of course there have always been naysayers and luddites who cast pejoratives on the Ascent of Man -- or as Ransom K. Ferm said in Kurt Vonnegut's Sirens of Titan:
"Every passing Hour brings the Solar System forty-three thousand miles closer to Globular Cluster M13 in Hercules -- and still there are some misfits who insist that there is no such thing as progress."

The Exquisite Corpse was a game played by French Surrealists in the 1920's. Aided by bottles of plonk, the participants would create literature by adding words, sentences, or drawings without knowing the other participants contributions.

This created the surrealist experience of Automatism -- i.e., "The dictation of thought without the control of the mind". I think the only surviving example of this is "The exquisite corpse will drink new wine".

• Language: English
• Publisher: Melvin Perry
• Release date: Jul 20, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465803719

Melvin Perry

Melvin Perry (1945 -- )Toiled for many years in the bowels of the finance industry as a minion of EMCs(Evil Multinational Corporations) creating algorithms which resulted in the destruction of the civilization we used to know.In later life, he escaped to follow his dream of being a burden on society and writing least-selling apps for the iPhone(e.g., QwikLit).At an early age, he befriended an IBM 1620, and computers would be his best friends in the ensuing years.A short while ago, his latest computer, having grown weary of plotting the destruction of non-silicon life forms, presented him with several short stories which he has dutifully edited into an apocalyptic volume.

Book preview

Introduction

Pshaww!!! you say, A computer can't write books. It has no feelings, no emotions, no publicity agent. All you've done is string together a bunch of words and phrases and claim they're the equivalent of Young Republicans Go Shopping or Gay Boys in Bondage!

Well, of course there have always been naysayers and luddites who cast pejoratives on the Ascent of Man -- or as Ransom K. Ferm said in Kurt Vonnegut's Sirens of Titan:

Every passing Hour brings the Solar System forty-three thousand miles closer to Globular Cluster M13 in Hercules -- and still there are some misfits who insist that there is no such thing as progress.

Better to compare this to IBM's Deep Blue or Watson. In both of these cases, the IBM minions loaded up their computer with zillions of human facts and then claimed superiority over lowly human life forms. In the case of Deep Blue, they loaded thousands of past grand master games into its memory and still claimed it was machine logic that beat poor Mr. Kasparov. Watson's victory on Jeopardy was even more egregious -- in addition to human facts, IBM gave it a faster response time than the human nervous system could muster, so of course it rang the buzzer first.

The Exquisite Corpse was a game played by French Surrealists in the 1920's. Aided by bottles of plonk, the participants would create literature by adding words, sentences, or drawings without knowing the other participants contributions. This created the surrealist experience of Automatism -- i.e., "The dictation of thought without the control of the mind. I think the only surviving example of this is The exquisite corpse will drink new wine".

The Computer Program

The system consists primarily of tables of nouns, names, verbs, places, phrases, etc. To generate a story, the program follows an outline(itself randomized) and inserts random words or phrases throughout. Ancillary functions do things like capitalize, pluralize, nationalize, etc. as needed.

The first version of this was around 1979 in Applesoft on an Apple II Plus as reading exercises for my 4 year old.

A couple of years ago, I wrote a version in Objective C as an iPhone app called QwikLit. It may or may not be still available. See my promo vid on YouTube--search for Qwiklit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iYOc5BLzc0

Why did I keep doing this? -- who knows? ... maybe to prove I still have the brain cells ... maybe to snatch a few more moments of happiness before I go to the long sleep.

Melvin Perry , April 2011

Basic Tales

These are concise stories for the 21st century man and/or woman of action who wants to get to the heart of the story and doesn't have time for useless frills and embellishments.

Just the meat and potatoes, no bits of parsley or other gooey bits sprinkled around your plate because the author thinks he's an intellectual or gets paid by the word.

Moby Snookums the Puce Ostrich by Malachi Melville

Call me Leroy

Whenever I become annoyed, I need to cry on the high seas and so I came to Baden Baden.

The only Inn, The Anchovy & Slug was crowded, so I had to share a bed with an obnoxious Canadian tree surgeon named Hymie.

Next morning, we went out and signed on to the ship Pinto.

It was an Ostriching ship and Captain Letisha had a wooden toe and a scar on his head.

Aaaarrgh, he said. It was the Puce Ostrich, Moby Snookums, that did this to me and I mean to get my bowling ball on him this trip.

But then we saw Moby Snookums, the great Puce Ostrich, but he got away from us.",

Then we sailed to St. Petersburg and then sneaked over to the Puce Lagoon and then shimmied to St. Petersburg and