Computer Poetry: An Act of Disinterested Communication

Author(s): Josef Ernst

Source: New Literary History , Spring, 1992, Vol. 23, No. 2, Revising Historical
Understanding (Spring, 1992), pp. 451-465
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/469245

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

The Johns Hopkins University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and
extend access to New Literary History

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 Computer Poetry: An Act of
Disinterested Communication

Josef Ernst

N MOST WESTERN NATIONS a majority of white-collar workers is

concerned with the transmission of information in one way or
another, be it the traditional form of operating a cash register,
or teaching, or the modern form of producing software for individual
uses. Within only a few years the computer has become the primary
tool for the production and streamlining of information.
While the machine has already had an enormous impact on
modern societies' ways of production and has widely influenced the
way people perceive their environments, it has thus far only had a
marginal impact on traditional intellectual premises; chess computers
are finally maturing but literature has remained the domain of an
assumably individual creativity. Could Racter, a computer program
produced by William Chamberlain and Thomas Etter, change the
scene?'
This article will attempt to analyze computer poetry as an artis-
tically adequate, although misguided, representation of the structure
of the postindustrial "information society."
Racter is programmed to conjugate verbs, to provide the correct
antecedents for nouns and pronouns, and to determine the form
of its own output. It fills in its self-generated sentinel structures by
searching through dictionary files containing about 2,400 words.
The words are categorized by identifiers, strings of up to twelve
characters, which define one word in relation to another. This
thesaurus allows Racter to choose adjectives to match with nouns.
The program also chooses certain blocks of text, such as "poetry"
or "stories," to appear and reappear in the output, creating "what
might initially pass for coherent thinking."2 A version of Racter
allowing users to implement their own vocabularies is also available.
Racter seemingly obliterates any function which was once ascribed
to the omniscient author of a given literary product and also breaks
wide-open the inherent incongruence between any word used and

New Literary History, 1992, 23: 451-465

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 452 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

its ambiguous variety of in

"nothingness" can at once be
of the program, who seem to
of apparently egalitarian pr
output). Like Japanese playe
discernable influence over th
through diligent and mechani
expose themselves to an expe
and individual insignificanc
key and watch Racter gener
intriguing. It is disturbing, h
keyboard erases the ambiguit
literature. On second thoug
the responsibility individuals
communication became a sign
with the invention of the pr
a problem of computer tech
to say, of Racter.
From a literary critic's poi
that can be regarded as progr
Because it is concerned with
ambiguities, computer poetr
going about literature, as the
shows: new or "open" varie
the structure of the software. Furthermore, Racter rather tends to
reverse the emancipation process which was initiated by the artistic
"avant-garde,"3 constituted first by the modernists around the turn
of the century and then by the dadaists in the 1910s. And finally
Racter's output highlights the producer's and reader's ultimate al-
ienation from literature, from each other, and from themselves, as
their roles pragmatically converge.

II

Since the days of the modernists, dadaists, and later follower

such as the surrealists, existentialists, and postmodernists, the tra-
ditional search for an all-engulfing truth has become vague if n
meaningless. James Joyce, Thomas Mann and John Dos Passos tried
to present their "truths" indisputably through their respective mam
moth works. Yet all of them are now looked upon as saying tha
this is impossible to do; Dublin is not the Dublin of the Dubliner
or of Ulysses, time escapes the Magic Mountain, and America

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 453

different from and mo

U.S.A. Although these au
critic-confirmed catego
"-ism"-followers of the
encompassing whole, th
interpretation, remains
While this may be "tr
in The Counterfeiters, m
We are a far cry from
world to be meaningless
appears to explode our m
in communicating over
we communicate with each other. Therefore each of the books
mentioned above can be best understood as, in Umberto Eco's
phrasing, "machines for generating interpretations."'4
So far it has been implied that a common rationale exists which
gives people something to communicate over. If no particular issue
is imminent, without fail people talk about the way they communicate
with each other, thereby referring to the fundamental issue of the
changing interests which guide their substantive communication
processes. And by doing this people gain insights into their sub-
jectively experienced objective reality. Generally the goal of com-
munication is, first, to direct attention to something in the real
world which stands between a group of people or single individuals
and their desires-people formulate issues. Second, people com-
municate over the restraints a society has installed--they deliberate
over the issue. Third, people communicate over the choices that
offer themselves-they seek solutions to the issue. Finally the issue
is resolved in one way or another, thereby feeding new material
into another communication cycle.5 Literature is an obvious agent
of the general communication process. This, however, is not the
place to define more closely the impact it may have on the individual
phases of the communication process. Here it suffices to look at
the first phase, the formulation of an issue to be communicated,
because Racter seems to imply that communication is obsolete and
that people must therefore be communicatively dead. Why?
Racter is not a human author who, besides communicating sub-
stance, which is open to interpretation, also displays the very need
to communicate when he/she produces a work of art, a car, or
anything else. This basic need is not open to interpretation beyond
style; it is a reference to people as political beings-that is, to our
need to accommodate each other. In other words, what is said is
open to debate, as an act to be recognized in reference to the basic

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 454 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

interest in politics. This ess

herent in every human acti
interests behind individual o
courses. Interests, however, ar
economic, and power conte
community.

III

The interests behind literary productions have traditionally veer

between a critique of the politics of a community and the subordina
use of the community's language apparatus in order to influen
the community and negotiate changes. In essence this estimate
appropriate for all literature if we look at literary productions with
the political parameters outlined above. Only if certain secondar
standards become superimposed do trivial divisions, such as tha
between "highbrow" and "popular" texts, gain widespread accep
ance. However current critical thought has pointed out that it may
actually be impossible to talk about the politics of a community in
a critical fashion by using the established code of that community
Roland Barthes, for one, has attacked "the discourse of arroganc
which he sees governed by a power which has most prominent
become established in language or, "more precisely, in its obligator
expression, the language system (langue)."6 He classifies languag
neither as reactionary nor progressive but simply as fascist, where
fascism does not mean "to oppress" but "to force language" so that
it reconfirms current values.
Yet textualists are likely to deny that language is a closed system
unless it is designed to be that within specific environments, and
even then for limited periods of time only. Always there is the
critical look at reality, comparing what one sees with what one
means, that eventually breaks down a given code, jargon, or cliche
when these serve no other purpose but the status quo. A look at
the Oxford English Dictionary, for instance, thus provides great insights
into historical and psychological continuities in the development of
the British people, as does Das Grimmsche Wdrterbuch for the Germans.
Still the politically dialectical and ambiguous position of literature
has at times been endangered by forcibly becoming attached to one
end, thereby destroying its political impact.7 This occurred (and
occurs) under political regimes attempting to co-opt literature by
employing the labor of agreeable authors to squash those who
disagree with the politics of a community. In such cases literature

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 455

may merely sustain t

in the tapestry of o
Barthes's concept are th
powers behind a langua
to use it for political
requires the reader to
a basis for the "dialogue
has put it.8 Such rea
interpretation of the in
the adequate tool to at
may be the proper ins
level.

IV

Racter defeats political approaches because the program neither

initiates a conscientious critical process (the opposite is true in that
it hampers advanced technology from aiding such a process), nor
is it based on a recognizable human interest. Still, hidden under
the packaging of nearly impenetrable literary formatting lies Racter's
"truth." The machine may yet teach literary audiences something
about their customarily formalized perception of art.

In a half bright sky

An insect wraps and winds
A chain, a thread, a cable
Around the sphere of water

What looks like a poem and reads like a poem is not a poem. It
is a Racter piece which the reader may identify according to a
formalistically pragmatic understanding of literature. The typo-
graphic pattern on the page and the highly subjective use of lan-
guage-arranged in an old-fashioned grammatical and syntactical
order-make the above piece identifiable as poetry. Behind this
recognition lies the general dilemma readers encounter when they
attempt to classify a text as a novel, a novella, a short story, or a
poem. Before readers attempt an interpretation of the text, they
need to interpret their superficial identification of the piece as a
literary genre. The failure to do this provides Racter with credibility.

Racter gains its seeming credibility from this superficial identifi-

cation process. The form and content of the output, although beyond

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 456 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

any immediately recognizable

identification process: before
what it is has been answere
simple cliches, which are m
economize output. Rather th
of a literary format which it
is this void alone that gives
the disinterested program can
compilation of meaning.
Even the stitching togethe
done by an author who would,
him/herself into an alienate
The user of Racter, therefore
a metadiscourse which begins
The question of meaning,
meaningful, will be frustrate
interest to communicate. Ra
reflection of the interest to
of language. But it subverts t
aesthetic packaging of the p
berlain's book The Policeman's
output and includes interpreti
the dictionary of the program
in traditional poetry when
addition of Hall's illustratio
parallel and integrative collag
matter what the references are, however, the structural lack of a
human interest behind the applied technology remains. It is only
Hall's illustrations that make the Racter output palatable and
printable.
Does the reader of Racter output then more or less instantaneously
"rewrite" what he or she reads? Do the users of the program liberate
themselves from traditionally conditioned approaches to the text?
Again, no. The aspects open to interpretation with The Policeman's
Beard are the interest behind the effort of making a book (again
employing the new medium for purposes of the old) and Hall's
illustrations, for which Racter supplied a stimulus. In any case, the
communication process happens between people; the readers of
Racter output merely recreate the image of a communication process,
not genuine communication, in an act resembling autistic behavior.
What exactly happens to the user of Racter? One individual
interpretation or reproduction of Racter output is unlikely to match
another as there is no identifiable issue or interest communicated

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 457

through the piece. Racter

societal significance of
serves) beyond accessibl
parades a technical option
any rational ties betwee
act ostracizes one individual from another as well as from their
interests in communication, which are rendered obsolete in an ove
noncommunicative environment. It is thus useless for one pe
to explain his/her Racter output to another; when talking about
people do not communicate over remotely tangible issues or inter
Their talk becomes ridiculous chatter, a reflection of the particip
submission to "nothingness" -that is to say, the disinterested
Racter willy-nilly idealizes. Racter's topic, therefore, is the comp
mentalization of individuals from one another, and their alienation
from their political environment.
Racter output directs attention to the need to liberate commu-
nication from presupposed concepts which may no longer apply
and which therefore might altogether abort any communicative effort
through a classification stratagem. The categorization of the piece
as a poem, for instance, does not help with Racter; it should rather
initiate a debate on how useful traditional classifications have been:
is it of substantive use to categorize a "poem" as such, or does such
an activity preempt possible interpretations a text could otherwise
hold as an unidentified, "open" piece of communication?
To illustrate the matter, consider this scene from James Joyce's
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Stephan Dedalus employs h
friend Lynch as a sounding board for his ideas on universal beauty
by discussing a basket:

-In order to see that basket, said Stephen, your mind first of all separates
the basket from the rest of the visible universe which is not the basket.

... [T]he esthetic image is first luminously apprehended as selfbound

and selfcontained upon the immeasurable background of space or ti
which is not it. . . . You apprehend its wholeness. ...
-Then, said Stephen, you pass from point to point, led by its form
lines; you apprehend it as a balanced part against part within its lim
you feel the rhythm of its structure. ... Having first felt that it is
thing you feel now that it is a thing.
. . When you have apprehended that basket as one thing and hav
then analysed it according to its form and apprehended it as a thing you
make the only synthesis which is logically and esthetically permissible. Y
see that it is that thing which it is and no other thing . . . the whatness
a thing.9

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 458 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

Now what do we see in th

the glorification of our aest
because the "whatness" of t
into decontextualized matter
ascertain our ideas about it
or not-a point which unde
proven. As it stands, the b
all other things which may
stratagem. The next look a
"insight" into the essence
pattern of empirical condit
is a basket is a basket. At the same time, however, the actual basket
falls by the wayside; one no longer goes through the motions Stephen
prescribes, because what else could be found in the basket but the
essence of it all? At this point discourse is likely to disappear.
Joyce lets Stephen continue: "-What I have said, he began again,
refers to beauty in the wider sense of the word, in the sense which
the word has in the literary tradition. In the marketplace it has
another sense. When we speak of beauty in the second sense of
the term our judgement is influenced in the first place by the art
itself and by the form of that art. The image, it is clear, must be
set between the mind or senses of the artist himself and the mind
or senses of others" (213).
Stephen then categorizes art into three forms, the lyrical, the epi
and the dramatic. Although treading on a slippery slope, let u
assume the usefulness of these distinctions for the moment. Thus
by application of the lyrical form (that is, "poetry") the "artist presents
his image in immediate relation to himself" (214). Furthermore
is the case with Racter, assume that the presentation (a poem)
the image ("a basket-thing") occurs on the narrowest of marg
one person presenting something to him or herself, thereby co
bining the roles of seller and buyer in a marketplace. The prod
of the effort, of course, immediately turns into an object itself. A
so the process starts over on a secondary level: a poem is a poe
is a poem. Or, as Eagleton has paraphrased the matter, "What
said derives its legitimacy neither from itself as a message nor fr
the social title of the utterer, but from the paradigm of reas
inscribed in the very event of saying."'1 Racter users are thus sold
on the image of the presentation--that is to say, the "form" Steph
talks about. Or, in the words of Wolfgang Fritz Haug, "[t]he aesthe
of the commodity in its widest meaning-the sensual appearan
and the conception of its use-value--become detached from t

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 459

object itself. Appearance

more so-than the comm
Taking this train of th
the question whether
certain piece limits its
theoreticians have assert
on a highly individual l
ever, if the immediate
irrelevant to understand
in this context certainly
as a nonexistent wordm
experience is tied to the
other things, produce
perience provides a text
or that of any other m
Yet the rationales are fo
sway of historical flux
How does it behave in
descriptions of the thi
rience, not their definiti
can be better understo
cording to Karl Popper
in those of its rules whic
and inferences from a
of scientific description
for this task, and not as
Poetry has traditionally
that is, to attempts to r
of definitions, no matt
"nothingness" they came
Racter's hidden logic of
these stratagems for an
according to the Racter s
experience? How could
different historical peri
thing essentially in com
perience if it complies w
that is to say, if it matc
it? Thus if our intuition
experience. Racter outp
fore it transmits huma
is a basket case.

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 460 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

VI

On the one hand, classification stratagems provide Racter with

credibility. On the other hand, the software indirectly displays these
stratagems as obsolete. No certain "truths," which are at once shown
to be nothing but presupposed ideas about their object, can be
perpetrated by a definite interpretation. Such intellectual work is
of historicist origins and is designed to reconfirm the status quo by
rationalizing the mode-that is to say, the form and implicitly (and
absurdly) the content-of Racter output to be in alignment with
current concepts.
Truth is a key concept in this context. Mechanical writing, such
as Andre Breton and Philippe Soupault had in mind, for instance,'4
was meant to be interpreted in respect to a presupposed end in
order to identify some hidden sources that produced it. The audience
was thus tied into a framework which it could not directly under-
stand-that is, interpret. The mechanical writing was not immedi-
ately, if at all, related to the readers' own psyches, nor could the
writing be dismissed as gibberish because it was by definition
drenched with symbolic meaning. Yet the underlying intention of
mechanical writing also reflected a rather traditional concept of a
preconceived, constant truth which was intended to be uncovered
through the "surrealist" artistic variation. But no matter whether a
reader can interpret mechanical writing of this sort, it does reflect
the interest of certain individuals to communicate in this particular
way.
At no point, however, did this or any other technological attempt
at art liberate the participants in respect to the imminent system.
Neither language nor politics were confronted by discourse which
retrains itself to rationalize why a given reality is acceptable instead
of constructively making it the subject of emancipated discourse.
The search for hidden meaning was itself an act hiding from reality.
Racter is indeed not far from approximating the symbolic truths
of those who labelled themselves "surrealists" or the socialist ideals
of those who labelled themselves "constructivists," and so forth. Such
"truths" generally refer to premeditated elaborations, which ar
sometimes regarded as scientific and which are intended to prov
certain conceptualized ideals. These ideals uncritically employ com
prehensive traditional strains of thought that were generally meant
to avoid rationalizing reality; they merely support current powe
structures through the representation of the techniques of a given
art form.

Finally, such concepts reflect the procedures of production found

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 461

in a static, linear writte

and ambiguous oral tr
nocratic approach to h
the aura of the autho
comprehensive theoreti
to affirm), leaves comm
Racter constitutes a rat
communication. Yet t
provides a glimpse of
proach their environme
impact on the media?

VII

Computers can be regarded as the symbol of the informa

society. They have transformed many jobs and opened new
portunities for people to exchange information. Thus, save
increasingly outmoded government controls in many countries,
munication has become decentralized or is headed in that direction.
Indeed the concept of the industrial age with its exchange of goods
may sooner or later be replaced by the concept of an exchange
information. It would perhaps be going too far to point out t
impact the new technology and the new media may have on t
structure of capitalist markets. But one can guess that it will drive
rationality, in Max Weber's sense, to new levels of secularizatio
and demystification.
The design of the Racter software contradicts the open structure
of the computer and the open society this technology aims at. This
misuse by Racter of the egalitarian technology for conveying tr
ditionally closed intellectual patterns succeeds in disguising the powe
structure of the language system. More importantly, it provide
good example of how an older medium, here that of poetry, b
being superimposed on a modern one, that of computer softwar
deconstructs the capabilities of the latter. Beyond the static for
of writing and close to the conversational oral realm of commu
nication, the computer synthesizes these largely separate traditions
and makes the writing and the follow-up analysis of Racter output
obsolete; both commemorate literary approaches that have becom
outmoded in theory and in practice.
Yet Racter can still be taken to signify an interest in producin
software and thus communicating with other people via the mediu
of the computer. If Racter's randomized output is of margina
substantive concern (it can be replaced with any number of substitu

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 462 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

at the press of a finger), it n

can be used in this particula
incoherence of technological

VIII

The playful first use of a new medium seems natural,

earlier with film. Before the capabilities of a new mediu
realized, they are used to transport traditional material wh
actually affected by the new mode of transportation." Mod
were thus mishandled at first as carriers for primarily linea
which reflected the structure of traditional Western cultur
when a new medium is continuously used in this restricted
does the procedure turn into a process and become que
When the naive pragmatic approach, the merely technic
turns into standard operating procedure, the technical effo
further legitimize standardized intellectual operations whic
have lost their rationale through the mediation (in the
sense of the term) of the new apparatus. Advanced technolo
to turn yesterday's reality into images of itself, and only t
limitation of its capabilities provides the then "artistically" i
images with an aura of actuality. This in essence is the
Racter output.
Racter fixes the state of literary ambiguity and categoriz
an ideologically complicated and secretive way. The ma
parently deconstructs the author as well as any meaning of
text. The reader may contemplate his or her own personal re
or rather reflexes, in front of the screen, but none of these have
anything to do with Racter whatsoever. The screen is not a mirror
on the wall to be asked narcissistic questions, nor can it be the
starting point for meditation; it is too vague for the former and it
is too definitional for the latter.
Where literary perceptions of the industrial era tended to classify
and streamline the production of literature according to traditional
values, and largely achieved alienation similar to that of an assembly-
line worker, Racter goes astray by reproducing the mere image of
information according to prevailing traditional values. The technical
apparatus no longer serves the users of Racter as a tool to negotiate
their position in society. Rather it turns into a vehicle, rehashing
the symbols of the status quo. The computer is more powerful than
this and, to avoid the rationalization of the status quo, users should

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 463

exploit the capabilities

remembrance of things
The traditional linear
applied to literature i
book is read cover to co
mass media, the comp
montage structure wh
and sound, all of whic
Instead of linear com
allow for several oper
communication proce
many individuals who
modern communicatio
longer need to pick up
current technology all
where objects may be
discretion. To move in
graphic communication
its parts distinguishabl
and fall prey to the wo
of the apparatus inste

IX

Racter seemingly produces highly individual pieces, and thereby

caters to the traditional connoisseur's genial values. In fact the
disinterested approach of the software and its consequent jargon-
output, if taken seriously, alienates communication from the com-
municator and constructs gibberish. This "Racter-procedure" pro-
vides for an objectively superfluous repression which makes the user
the object of the modern apparatus of production. The fusion of
domination and technology via linear and parallel assemblage of
text produces a knot of neurotic and, in terms of the technology
applied, pragmatic communications which lack interest-oriented
streamlining. In effect the software covers up the political need for
an advanced, that is to say self-interested, form of political discourse.
Adequate discourse, on the other hand, would not leave readers
locked in the role of consumers and would make the producer the
subject of discourse. The latter would not be a mere handyman
who has to ask him/herself whether the material fits the apparatus
so much as whether the apparatus serves his/her needs."7 Adequate

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 464 NEW LITERARY HISTORY

use of the computer as a

acceptance of a piece. Inste
readers alike to confront the
a given piece into existence
between the producer, the
would identify the author as
nique rather than an indivi
the reader would no longer
would be a participating me
They would interdependent
in their discursive exchange
a modern Aristotelian catharsis which would in turn lead toward
purposive-rational action.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

NOTES

1 William Chamberlain and Thomas Etter, Racter, computer software, M

Inc., 1985.
2 William Chamberlain, Introduction, The Policeman's Beard is Half Constructed (New
York, 1984).
3 See Peter Biirger, Die Theorie der Avantgarde (Frankfurt, 1972), in English as Theory
of the Avant-garde, tr. Michael Shaw (Minneapolis, 1984).
4 Umberto Eco, Postscript to The Name of the Rose (San Diego, 1984), p. 2.
5 See Herbert J. Spiro, "Comparative Politics: A Comprehensive Approach," in
American Political Science Review, 56 (1962), 577 ff.
6 Roland Barthes, from his inaugural speech at the College de France, rpt. in Le
Monde, 9 and 10 Jan. 1977, p. 14; my translation.
7 See Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory (Minneapolis, 1983), and The Function of Criticism
(London, 1984).
8 See Jurgen Habermas, "Technology and Science as 'Ideology,' " in his Toward a
Rational Society, tr. Jeremy J. Shapiro (Boston, 1970), pp. 81 ff.
9 James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (New York, 1964), pp. 212-
13; hereafter cited in text.
10 Eagleton, The Function of Criticism, pp. 14-15. The "social title of the utterer"
in this context refers to the role an author plays in the marketplace.
11 Wolfgang Fritz Haug, Critique of Commodity Aesthetics: Appearance, Sexuality and
Advertising in Capitalist Society, tr. Robert Bock (Minneapolis, 1986), pp. 16-17.
12 Karl R. Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies (Princeton, 1962), I, 32. "Sci-
entific," in this context, can safely be interpreted as a general inquiry into human
affairs. It simply opposes the pseudoscientific view of the world described above.
13 For a further discussion see Theodor W. Adorno, The Jargon of Authenticity, tr.
Knut Tarnowski and Frederic Will (Evanston, Ill., 1973).
14 See Andre Breton and Philippe Soupault, Les champs magnetiques (Paris, 1971),
in English as The Magnetic Fields, tr. David Gascoyne (London, 1985).
15 History teaches that it may take a long time before the recognized capabilities
of new media become realized. This was the case with the transformation of theatrical

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMPUTER POETRY 465

productions in the Middle A

to traditional pageants, as w
not used for the production
century, and film, the possi
but which as a medium may
See for a comment on this sub
and G. V. Alexandrov, "A Stat
pp. 257-59.
16 Apple Computer's Hypertext is a first application of this capability. Optical disk
technology with its vast storage capacities may in the future allow individual users
access to a wide variety of information which could then be streamlined according
to their interests by combining audio and visual materials. See Ted Nelson, Computer
Lib (Redmond, Wash., 1987).
17 See Bertolt Brecht, "Anmerkungen zur Oper Mahagonny," in Mahagonny (Frank-
furt, 1972).

This content downloaded from

49.36.214.64 on Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:30:37 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms