Note that links in this chapter to paragraphs within this chapter, to other pages on this Web site, or to other Web sites, will work correctly. However, links to other chapters of The Loom of Minerva, which are not included here, will not work from this Web page. For those, you have to have the whole CD. Note also that you can also see, on other pages of this Web site, images from two demonstrations of the MINERVA System, from 2006 (emphasizing individual applications programs) and 2007 (emphasizing new project planning programs).

"The work of the engineer is not unlike that of a writer. How the original design for a new bridge comes to be may involve as great a leap of the imagination as the first draft of a novel." (-Henry Petroski, To Engineer is Human ) (Illustration: Henry Hudson Bridge over the Harlem River, New York City, photo by C.A. Sowa)

I began, "Poet, you who guide me, consider my strength, whether it is sufficient, before trusting me to the arduous passage." Dante, The Divine Comedy, Inferno, Canto II. 10-12.1 I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success . . . Such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything. Nikola Tesla, 1896.2

The common origins of science and humanities

Birth of Athena from the head of Zeus, from a vase painting.

Arts and technology spring from similar impulses The Greek goddess Athena -- the Roman Minerva -- was patroness both of intellectual wisdom and of crafts and technology. There is truth in this myth, for it is from the same desire to know, to appreciate, and to shape that the arts of the academy and of technology both arise. Technology and science, on the one hand, and the pursuits which we call the humanities, on the other, spring basically from the same human impulses: to shape, to understand, to know, to discover the symmetry and beauty of our universe. The more "practical" among us direct these impulses in such a way as to predict and control; the more "impractical" (and this includes many scientists as well as humanists) pursue their work out of sheer appreciation for its beauty and aesthetic satisfaction. Applying Systems Analysis to literary study This is a course about using computers in the field of literature, either for use in a classroom or for self-study. It introduces the MINERVA System for Study of Literary Texts, a set of tools, some using a computer and some not, for planning and carrying out a project in the field of literary study. Techniques of Systems Analysis, borrowed from the scientific and commercial world, are adapted to analyzing the insights of traditional belle-lettres literary criticism. A project is defined as an enterprise that has a goal and an organized way of achieving it. Methods of Systems Analysis emphasize diagramming techniques and modularity, as a means to achieve a systematic and ordered analysis. These are techniques for taking a large, vague question and breaking it down into smaller pieces or modules, which can be worked on separately without disturbing the entire enterprise. Top-down methods are emphasized, going from large ideas to small units, but bottom-up methods are also used, for example in writing down a group of ideas and letting them coalesce into a pattern. The problems that we demonstrate are always grounded in literary (and historical and social) concerns, which alone confer significance on any endeavor, whether scientific or literary. All our discussions are based on actual examples from literary criticism. The trick lies in analyzing the language of criticism, finding how impressionistic ideas can be expressed in precise language, and identifying what is quantifiable. Many of the techniques presented are applicable not just to computer-aided study, but to any enterprise in which the student or scholar strives to attain a precise definition of the characteristics of a work of literature and to express accurately his or her evaluation of it. As the chapters proceed, we pass from aesthetics and intuition to progressively greater technical precision, going from literary insight to instruction in how to put together a piece of research using (or even writing one's own) computer programs. Methods borrowed from commerce provide a way back to literary values Paradoxically, methods borrowed from the world of commerce and manufacturing offer a way back to the original values of literary study and criticism. In contrast to vast agglomerations of literary databases, collected with no particular purpose in mind, or the proliferation of tool-driven techniques that are used just because they are there, the methods of Systems Analysis, with their emphasis on the setting of goals, leads us back to a focus on the actual reasons why we are studying a particular piece of literature, author, or genre. Our aim is to understand the object of study, to find out why it has the effect it has on us, and to know why we should care about it. A set of programs, the MINERVA Program Suite for Study of Literary Texts, is contained on this disk, which can be used as a stand-alone system. (A program is a set of instructions, in a code called a programming language, that tells the computer what to do and in what order; the MINERVA programs are written in the programming language called Visual Basic.) These include programs to make concordances, search for words and cooccurring words, perform simple statistical tests on the distribution of grammatical categories, "compose" original compositions, and look for cooccurring clusters of words. All were designed and created out of interchangeable and reusable subroutines, by using the techniques of Systems Analysis described here. A course about logic and analytical thought, not just computers It may seem odd to design a course about computers that begins by explaining that a computer is not needed. What we present, however, is not so much an advertisement for using computers as an encouragement to use the tools of logic, of analysis, and of organization, of which the computer is but a natural extension.

Athena: Drawing of a statue from Velletri, in the Louvre.

A computer-filled world entices the literary scholar

We live in an amazing world, where we humanists, along with everyone else, are invited to "surf the Internet" as we "drive down the information highway." The world's literature and art pour out on telecommunication lines and CD-ROM disks. Multimedia databases link literary texts in variorum editions, or illustrate verbal material with sculpture, painting, and topographical maps. Software "toolkits" allow us to extract, alphabetize, count, arrange, and display texts, words and pictures. (How computers came to occupy such a large part of our literary lives is a topic addressed in Chapter 6.)

"How do I use all these things? How can these facilities help me?" the literary scholar asks. "And anyway, what does any of this have to do with ordinary literary criticism or scholarship?" There is a tendency to let the tools drive the research; the scholar uses a particular technique simply because it is there, not because it contributes to any actual notion that the researcher may have about the chosen topic. If we discover a software package that allows us to search for words beginning with each letter of the alphabet or to sort all the words of a text according to their length, and we happen to be studying Hamlet, we may decide to extract all the words in Hamlet beginning with each letter and produce a list of words in the play arranged from shortest to longest. Why do we do this, the scholar wonders, other than just because we can? Is there some way to relate these activities to our real interests as scholars, critics, students, and teachers?

While each scholar's response to the dilemma will be individual, this course offers a path to a solution.

What is a project?

We start with the idea of a project, an undertaking that has a goal and a way to get to it. We will demonstrate a set of techniques for laying out a project ahead of time so that we can see where the parts will fit. The method includes analyzing literary criticism itself, to determine which aspects can be studied using a computer. The steps for designing a project are laid out comprehensively, with examples, in later chapters (especially in Chapter 2). These steps include a paragraph describing the purpose of the project, worksheet of key words, hierarchical diagram of modules, flow charts, program(s) to be used, synthesis of computable and non-computable parts, and evaluation of results. These parts of the MINERVA System are only partially automated, although an aim of MINERVA is to eventually create programs to aid the user here, too. These programs could include, for example, programs for making a hierarchical or flow chart from information in a descriptive paragraph or list of ideas, or other tools for taking vague ideas and turning them into charts.

Many of the examples of literary analysis that are presented in discussions of specific programs in the MINERVA System are the actual problems whose solutions formed the basis for these programs. Sainte-Beuve's acerbic criticism of the poems of Baudelaire, for example, was the inspiration for a program to create a visual map of the interplay of contrasting images (the program is named CATMAP), and Gertrude Stein's own assertion that she "caressed" her nouns by repeating them led to a statistical program to study repetitions of different parts of speech (the program is called GERTRUDE).

These chapters demonstrate how to use the programs of the MINERVA System in projects to study various works of literature. But they also tell the story of the design of the MINERVA System itself, as it illustrates our principles for designing a project.

Ours is not the only solution, but it is a good place to start.

Systems Analysis: the art of project planning

An algorithm is a step-by-step procedure for solving a problem. The word "algorithm" comes from the name of Mohammed ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, a 9th century mathematician born in what is today Uzbekistan, who wrote many algorithms for solving mathematical problems. There is more about the history of computers in Chapter 6, in "From Homer's Golden Servants to the Internet." (Illustration: an anonymous portrait of al-Kwarizmi.)

The discipline of Systems Analysis is well known in the industrial world and in the sciences. The systems analyst uses charts, graphs, and diagrams to lay out a framework for an endeavor, and to indicate the steps for completing the enterprise. Automated programs for organizing the processes of planning, design, and operation of a system are also common in science and manufacturing.³ These techniques are not as familiar in the humanities. They are, however, easily adaptable to humanistic subjects.

Systems Analysis is the art of analyzing an activity or process into its constituent parts, for the purpose of determining the most effective method of arriving at a goal.

The literary systems analyst

The literary scholar setting out to use the techniques of Systems Analysis may have to do some things that he or she may be unaccustomed to doing:

The tasks of the literary systems analyst: Planning a project ahead of time. Breaking down the activities of the project into a sequence of small steps. Analyzing the language of criticism to figure out exactly what it actually says.

Choosing (and modifying) our goals and plans

The literary scholar may not be accustomed to thinking in terms of a "project." The scholar may ordinarily proceed without a specific goal, other than the general one of expanding his or her knowledge of a chosen subject. He or she may proceed without any organized plan, going from one interesting insight to another. It may be that no overall structure is imposed until the time comes to write a final report or article for publication (or a grant proposal!). The essence of a project, however, is that it has a goal and a plan for achieving that goal. That goal may still be a general one of learning as much as possible about one's subject, such as second century Roman history or seventeenth century English poetry, or it may be specific, like establishing the authenticity of a novel attributed to Jane Austen. (These are, in fact, among the topics that have been studied by scholars using computers or other quantitative methods and are discussed in Chapter 6.) The plan consists of a set of things to do in an organized way to achieve the goal.

Goals need not be immutable. Goals may change. There may be more than one way to achieve a goal.

Top-down vs. bottom-up methodology

We primarily use a top-down or modular method in MINERVA, first identifying the overall subject for each project, then dividing it into its major parts; we then expand these parts into smaller divisons. The modular approach has the advantage, firstly, that it renders a potentially daunting task more manageable; secondly, that parts can be added, removed, or changed without disturbing other parts or changing the overall shape of the project.

The opposite of top-down design is bottom-up design, where we begin with small units that are gradually aggregated into a larger project. This and some other ways of building a project are described at the end of this section.

Systems Analysis can be used without a computer

Although Systems Analysis does not necessarily have anything to do with computers or other mechanical aids, its techniques are well adapted to the use of computers. Some of the examples of research that are described in later chapters, in fact, did not use computers (for example, Carney's use of quantified methods of content analysis in his studies of Roman historiography). The techniques of project planning are useful for any endeavor.

An algorithm for achieving insight: breaking the project into small steps

We break down a problem into modules that can be changed or moved around without disturbing the whole plan, just like the containers on a modern cargo ship; this principle is given technical definition in "Subroutines: the Mechanics of Modularity" in Chapter 9. (Illustration: a ship enters the port of New York through the Kill Van Kull, Staten Island. Photo by C.A. Sowa.)

Our first task is to break down the project into small steps that can be tackled individually and can be given to the computer to solve. We start with the division into those parts of the problem where a computer can be of help and those where it cannot. Half the trick is knowing when and where a computer should be used, a subject that we treat below under "Choosing a Topic for Research") and in greater depth in Chapter 2 under "Identifying the Quantifiable".

It is the essence of the modern digital computer that it breaks down everything it does into a series of small activities that it performs over and over. Information is stored in the computer as an aggregation of ones and zeroes, called "bits," represented by circuits that are on or off, and bits are arranged in groups of eight, called "bytes." The digital computer, like an abacus, operates by calculating in discrete steps (the word is from the Latin digitus "finger," referring to calculation by counting on one's fingers; the opposite is an analog device, which moves by continuous amounts, like a sundial).

The programs of instructions that tell the computer what to do are themselves built up of reusable modules, repeated over and over. In this, they resemble Homeric and other oral poetry, with their reusable "formulas," "type scenes," and "themes." Later chapters describe how standardized modules are put together in different ways to do different things in various projects. (See Chapter 3, "Homer, Beowulf, and Computer Programs: Using Prefabricated Pieces.")

Typical modules, such as those listed here, including reading, searching, and arranging, look familiar to any methodical scholar, whether or not he or she is using a computer.

Some typical reusable modules: Read input from a database or from information typed by the user on the screen. Search the database for desired information (such as a word, phrase, or date). Arrange data in alphabetical, numerical, or other order (such as word length, page number, or year of publication). Perform statistical functions, like counting frequencies (for example, of words, letters, stressed and unstressed syllables, or books published in a given year), or finding a correlation between sets of data (such as word length and sentence length or numbers of books published in France and England). Format output for attractive viewing on the screen or in print.

An algorithm is a recipe for carrying out a process

The order in which we perform the series of activities making up the project defines the algorithm to be used. An algorithm is a step by step set of instructions for solving a problem. The word looks like a cross between "arithmetic" and "logarithm," but actually comes from the name of Mohammed ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, an Arab mathematician of the 9th century A.D., who wrote many mathematical algorithms. The algorithm, like a cook's recipe, defines the steps and the order in which they are to be performed. The flow does not have to be strictly linear. Choices are made, and movement may be circular or repetitive, with many branches. We shall see an example of such choices in the flow chart later in this chapter.

Analyzing the language of criticism

To use a computer in literary study, we must break apart the language of criticism into parts that can be quantified, that is, expressed by counting, sorting, or arranging aggregations of data. The humanist must give precise definition to vague critical terms that are often used impressionistically. We must learn to discern what we really mean when we say that a piece of literature is "beautiful," "ugly," "popular," "resonates with majesty," or use other subjective or metaphorical language. Can our impression be defined in terms of the number of times certain words are used, or the order in which they occur, or other quantifiable phenomena? We discuss this process at length in Chapter 2.

In defining a problem to be handled by the computer, the student literally analyzes the problem. The English word "analyze" comes from the Greek ana-luo, to break apart something into its constituent pieces. The use of the computer forces the scholar to think out his or her questions with clarity. The scholar must analyze a subject, together with the feelings it stimulates and the questions it raises, taking the word in its etymological sense; we must quite literally take the matter apart to discover the elements of which it is composed. We may, in the end, know a good deal more about what our opinions really mean than ever before, while at the same time our work remains securely anchored in the value of the literature itself.

The computer program as an art form

. . . If a person Asks his questions of [the lyre] knowingly, with skill and wisdom, Clear of voice it teaches all kinds of things that delight the mind, Easily, when played with soft familiarities, For it avoids ill-suffering labor. But if a person Questions it stupidly and violently from the start, In vain it makes a false, bombastic jangle. (-The Homeric Hymn to Hermes, vv. 482-488, translated by C.A. Sowa) Hermes, speaking to Apollo, is describing the lyre, a machine for making music that he has just invented. The computer, like Hermes' lyre, is in itself a work of art, and the programs (the "music") that we write for it should respect its nature. (Illustration: Greek red-figured vase, lithograph by A. Rey for de Kaeppelin et Cie., ca. 1840.)

---

Computers and their programs are, at their best, art forms, each with its own structure, balance, and symmetry. A computer program is a narrative telling the computer what we want it to do. It has a beginning, middle, and end, and, like any work of literature, it has something to communicate!

Computer programs and programming languages differ greatly in style, although this aspect is usually visible to the nonprofessional computer user only in its effects. Programs are compared to various literary forms in Chapter 3, where we discuss the similarity of program elements to literary components such as vocabulary, narrative, and character development, and in Chapter 7, where we describe different programs as telling the same story different ways. Some programs (and programming languages) are long and windy, like nineteenth-century novels; others have the algebraic rigor of a haiku. Programs that use a lot of graphics are like coffee-table books, consisting of mostly pictures and little text.

To "think like a computer" does not mean to dehumanize ourselves, but to think with logic and clarity. To be "scientific" does not mean to strip literature of its beauty.

"Scientific" doesn't have to mean "ugly" or "sterile"

Science is based on methods of rigorous testing and predictability, requiring the capacity to get the same answer with each repetition of the same experiment. It uses empirical methods, based on an accumulation of observations, recorded with word-for-word exactness. In the modern world, science comprises the most dominant and prestigious branch of thinking. Non-sciences, such as history, have attempted to resemble science, basing their conclusions on accumulations of observed events. A way of looking at the world has evolved, which values the quantifiable and the easily duplicated, while devaluing the shifting and ambiguous. This awe of engineering and "efficiency" and its effect on literature are discussed in Chapter 6.

Humanists frequently succumb to the temptation of trying to turn their fields into sciences, in order to enhance the prestige of their own disciplines. These attempts sometimes embody valid adaptations of scientific principles to humanistic studies; at other times, the scholar simply grasps at the trappings of scientific practice. Humanistic scholars who use the new technology abandon their own aesthetic values too readily, allowing themselves to be persuaded that words like "beauty," "elegance," and "charm" are inappropriate to the objective pursuit of scientific truth. They write in abstract jargon and display the results in impressive tables, assuming that the use of a computer will of itself confer significance upon their work. Scientific methods and technical terms have valid uses and meanings; indeed, many are described in these chapters. They do not of themselves, however, confer worth upon a project that does not otherwise have it. Seeking to rid themselves of intuition (which any real scientist will assert is indispensable to solving a problem), humanists pursue the will o' the wisp of out-scientizing the scientists, only to end in arid and useless exercises in abstraction, a quicksand of megabytes and multivariate analyses.

Pseudoscientific affectations are not confined to work in which a computer is used. They have been endemic to the more technical kind of scholarly writing for many years. The introduction of the computer has only aggravated the tendency. This, however, has little to do with real science or technology.

The aesthetic dimension in science

The best scientists and engineers have for centuries looked upon their occupation as an Art, and they recognize the importance of the emotional dimension as a guide to its proper pursuit. Words like "intuition," "elegance," and "beauty" are frequently encountered in scientific writings, as seen in the following excerpts:

Scientists' words about beauty in science: C.B. Bazzoni expressed the importance of aesthetics in Kernels of the Universe, "Scientists . . . are necessarily poets -- I mean that in their work they must use the same powers of constructive imagination that poets and painters use." 4 Robert A. Frosch, geophysicist, oceanographer, and, at the time, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, reminded a group of systems analysts, that in the proper assessment of a job they must ask, " . . . but is it a good system? Do you like it? Is it harmonious? Is it an elegant solution to a real problem?"5 Henry Petroski, in To Engineer is Human (quoted at the head of this chapter), states that "The work of the engineer is not unlike that of a writer. How the original design for a new bridge comes to be may involve as great a leap of the imagination as the first draft of a novel."6 Physicist Edward Teller, lecturing at UCLA, followed his explanation of one of the great scientific discoveries with the words, "Of what use is all this? Well, in the first place it's beautiful, and it's true..."7 E.W. Dijkstra, speaking of computer and program design in "Some Meditations on Advanced Programming," says "the tool should be charming, it should be elegant, it should be worthy of our love . . . In this respect, the programmer does not differ from any other craftsman: unless he loves his tools it is highly improbable that he will ever create anything of superior quality. Thus, at the same time these considerations tell us the virtues a program can show: Elegance and Beauty."8

Differences between humanities and technology

Science and engineering are like the humanities in that they are guided by beauty, elegance, and harmony, appeal to the emotions, and are forms of art. But they are different from the humanities in one important respect. While the humanities may encompass rational modes of thinking, the sciences demand and require logical thought and reasoning. The use of the computer enhances clarity of thought.

There are, of course, those who feel that their enjoyment of a thing or person comes from a sense of mystery, from not knowing too much about it. But the computer's aid is welcome to those who, when they love a thing or person, want to know as much as possible about the beloved.

Sainte-Beuve and the computer

One of our principal case studies will be an analysis of narrative themes in Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner. (Illustration: painting of an antique ship, artist unidentified.)

Analyzing belles-lettres criticism

In these chapters, we will examine a number of works of literature, and the critics and scholars who have studied them, with the purpose of seeing how quantitative methods could be brought to bear on them. Subjects include a study of sea-going supernatural themes in Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, a statistical study of repetition in Gertrude Stein, intimacy of style in Vergil's Eclogues, Baudelaire's combination of beauty and viciousness in Les Fleurs du Mal, onomatopoeia in Victor Hugo's sea poem Une nuit qu'on entend la mer sans la voir, Edna St. Vincent Millay's ambivalent career ambitions in Travel, various ancient writers' views of the Roman statesman Marius (by Cicero and others), mythic themes in the Homeric Hymns, questions of authorship in St. Paul and Jane Austen, reconstruction of damaged manuscripts, composition of poems and folktales by computer, and many other topics. Critics range from aesthete Walter Pater (on Coleridge), to flamboyant romantic Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (on Baudelaire, Vergil, Molière), to poet T.S. Eliot (on Dante), to eccentric Gertrude Stein (on herself).

To speak of using computers in criticism, we must talk about the nature of criticism itself. Fashions in criticism come and go. There have been classical criticism, romantic criticism, traditional philology, New Criticism, deconstruction, postmodernism. The computer can be used with any of them. Some are more easily computerized, some with more difficulty.

While many types of literary scholarship can benefit from using the computer, this course emphasizes applications of technology to concerns of traditional belles-lettres or aesthetic literary criticism. This emphasis is not accidental, for I wish to show that the use of computers is not inimical to the most intuitive humanistic studies. The nineteenth-century French critic Sainte-Beuve may be taken as the prototype of the romantic critic. His essays on French and Latin literature are filled with a vocabulary of "purity" and "light" that would be widely derided today as "unscientific." Yet even such criticism can be brought within the range of the computer. I like to think, somewhat whimsically, that these chapters show how Sainte-Beuve might have used the computer, if he had had access to one and the inclination to use it.

The computer cannot confer total objectivity

The question is often asked, of how the computer can be used to ensure complete objectivity. The answer is that the computer will never confer complete objectivity. There are arbitrary decisions to be made in all parts of the project, starting with the choice of the subject to be studied and the definition of the way the problem is to be solved, and concluding with the final interpretation of the results. The very use of the term "objectivity" implies that to every question there is only one answer, which can be stated in only one particular way. The use of statistics to "prove" wildly contradictory conclusions is well known. We cannot be "completely objective" in this sense, nor should we want to be. We will return to this topic in Chapter 2 in "Alternative definitions of the data: What if I change my mind?" and "The Computer is not an Oracle," and in Chapter 5 in "The Significance of Statistics."

Top-down or bottom-up? Different ways to design a project

(To get a peek at what you will see when you run the programs, see below in the paragraphs on "What you will see when you run MINERVA.")

The MINERVA System is designed to be extended, deepening its exploration. One possible expansion, mentioned above, is to automate the Systems Analysis portion of MINERVA. This would involve writing programs to aid the user in creating charts, diagrams, and programs from verbal descriptions of ideas for a project.

Another possible expansion is for each of the current eight programs that perform literary analysis to become a portal to a whole family of programs. Thus, instead of one program to make a simple concordance of a text, there could be a screen offering the user a choice of several different types of concordance; instead of one statistical program, we might see a gateway to a selection of various statistical measurements; instead of one program to compose original paragraphs, we might be offered a choice of several different kinds of composition programs -- perhaps one to compose paragraphs in the style of an author, one to compose haikus, one to put together original "folk tales," "soap operas," or "westerns."

A program based on Sowa and Sowa's Clump Finder project to perform cluster analysis (the study of recurring word groups), described in Chapter 6, has already been added to the MINERVA suite of programs, in response to a user request. Discussed in Chapter 3, it is called CLUMPS.

The logistics of the Ancient Mariner

We use Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner as a case study in Chapter 2 to demonstrate our top-down method of building a project. This image is appropriate, because we structure our projects out of small steps, subroutines, and screen images, just as cargo on a ship is not stowed willy-nilly but in bags, boxes, and standardized containers. It is also appropriate because The Loom of Minerva can be thought of as a journey, like those of the Ancient Mariner or Odysseus: homeward bound but also in search of insight.

The present-day merchants and adventurers who follow in the tracks of Odysseus and the Ancient Mariner have refined their voyages on King Neptune's seas through the modern science of logistics. The modules of our projects, too, can be reloaded and shifted around, without disturbing the harmony of the enterprise.

b. How The MINERVA Chapters and Programs are Organized

Theseus used a ball of thread to find his way through the Labyrinth; we use various charting methods to navigate our way through a project. (Illustration: the ruins of the Palace of Minos at Knossos, Crete, perhaps the original of the Labyrinth, photo by C.A. Sowa)

Using the diagrams of Systems Analysis to describe the MINERVA System

The MINERVA System is itself a project. The goal is an understanding of project design and of the use of quantified aids in literary scholarship. The text chapters of The Loom of Minerva and the specific programs may also help individual scholars achieve the goals of their own projects. The steps to achieve the goal are the text chapters and programs. In this section and the next, we use three common types of chart -- functional decomposition or hierarchical chart, flow chart, and wheel chart -- to describe the project that is the MINERVA System.

Division of MINERVA into its major parts: the functional decomposition chart

The MINERVA System is organized as shown in Figure 1.1, which follows our top-down emphasis. This is a functional decomposition chart, one of the most important types of diagram. The use of functional decomposition is further illustrated and explained in Chapter 2, but it may be described briefly as providing a general map of an entire project (or part of a project), showing its "anatomy." The top box represents the central focus or topic, in this case, the name of the MINERVA System. Each succeeding level of boxes represents a deeper level of detail. Figure 1.1 shows only one secondary level, representing the two major parts of the project, the text chapters and the programs. Boxes are connected by lines, as in a genealogical diagram. For a project, we create a series of functional decomposition charts, with increasing amounts of detail, as we see in succeeding illustrations (Figures 1.2-4).

Division of the text chapters of The Loom of Minerva into major sections

Figure 1.2 shows the organization of the text part of the MINERVA System, the chapters of The Loom of Minerva. The top box again represents the central focus, the name of the text part of the course, The Loom of Minerva: An Introduction to Computer Projects for the Literary Scholar. There is a new secondary level, depicting the three sections of the text.

We can add more detail by drawing lower-level charts (as we do below in Figure 1.3). We can also introduce verbal descriptions. Here, in broad outline, is what the major sections contain:

MAJOR SECTIONS OF THE CHAPTERS OF THE LOOM OF MINERVA Part I, "The Making of a Literary Project": The chapters in this part (which includes the present chapter and Chapters 2, 3, and 4) lay out the steps for developing a literary project, illustrating the method with examples from literature and literary criticism. Here we introduce the MINERVA System, using an analysis of Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner as a case study. In addition to providing directions for using the MINERVA programs, we talk about the strategies that were used for designing the programs, breaking each problem into smaller parts. Many literary examples are presented, from Vergil and Baudelaire to Gertrude Stein and Noam Chomsky, and their critics, such as Sainte-Beuve and Swinburne. Diagramming methods are stressed, and the Project Life Cycle is introduced. Part II, "Variations on the Computer Theme in Literature": These chapters survey some applications of computers and computer-like devices to literary scholarship from the oldest beginnings to the present. Strategies of quantification, including statistical and other methods, are emphasized, as well as the influences of technology on literature, from antiquity to the the present day. Synopses of modern scholarship in literature using a computer are provided, including a number of different applications. Part III, "A Visual Basic Implementation of the MINERVA System," is a manual of Visual Basic that uses top-down methods of Systems Analysis to create modular programs. The MINERVA programs are also analyzed from a technical point of view. Testing and debugging (i.e. error-correcting) methods and other ways for "making your project work" are explained.

A closer look at the contents of the chapters

In Figure 1.3, we draw a detailed visual Table of Contents for the entire text, showing the individual chapters that make up each major part. The contents of each chapter are described in the paragraphs that follow, as we enter into a deeper level of detail.

Part I: The Making of a Literary Project

Synopsis: The first part demonstrates the steps for creating a project and illustrates the programs of the MINERVA System. It provides tools (the OwlData programs) that allow the student to create original data to use with the MINERVA programs.

CHAPTERS OF PART I: THE MAKING OF A LITERARY PROJECT Chapter 1, "A Guide to the Labyrinth: The Problem and its Solution,"is the introductory chapter which you are reading. Some of the most important principles of modular design are demonstrated in it, such as the setting of a goal, the development of a step by step plan, and the use of charting methods to lay out the project. Chapter 2, "Starting Out: How to Plan a Project," takes the student through a sequence of steps for designing and completing a project, demonstrating a variety of diagramming techniques (including the functional decomposition chart used here, the flow charts and wheel charts introduced later in the current chapter, and other important kinds of chart). We analyze different styles of criticism, seeing which parts of a topic can be subjected to quantifiable (and computerized) methods. Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner, with criticism by Robert Southey, Charles Swinburne, and Walter Pater, is used as a case study to demonstrate the planning of a model project. Steps include selection of a topic, creating a descriptive paragraph, worksheet, functional decomposition and other charts, defining input and output requirements, program design, running of the program, synthesis of computable and non-computable parts, and evaluation of results. Your opinion of what can be quantified may change as you read the chapters and analyze your topic. The MINERVA suite of programs is introduced here as a tool for studying aspects of a work of literature. The discussion is illustrated with images of how the system looks when running, so that the argument can be followed even if you are not running the programs. Chapter 3, "Picturing the Problem: Fitting the Big Pieces Together," analyzes literary works by various writers, including Vergil, Baudelaire, Victor Hugo, Shelley, Edna Millay and Gertrude Stein, together with a selection of critics for each author. For each problem, we describe the use of one of the MINERVA programs. In addition to programs to study existing literature, there is a program that enables the computer to create "original" compositions "in the style of" an author, including Shakespeare and Noam Chomsky. Delving deeper into each example, we begin to see how to solve a problem by building solutions from ready-made modules. Chapter 4, "Completing the Circle: Creating Data and Finishing the Project," tells the reader how to use the OwlData programs to create original data for the MINERVA programs. What we put into our data determines what type of answers we can hope to get from it ("Garbage in, garbage out" is the common phrase, or, as we might put it, "Poetry in, poetry out"). This chapter concludes with a discussion of the cyclic nature of project development, which is described by the Project Life Cycle.

Part II: Variations on the Computer Theme in Literature

Synopsis: The second part is an excursion into various applications of quantified methods in literary studies, emphasizing strategies of quantification, even in apparently unquantifiable material. Where the first part took as its principal topic the use of the MINERVA System, the second part is an analytical survey of work done by a variety of scholars, writers, inventors, and thinkers.

CHAPTERS OF PART II: VARIATIONS ON THE COMPUTER THEME IN LITERATURE Chapter 5, "Statistical Methods and Literary Style," discusses common statistical procedures, and a few less common ones, that have been applied to literary material, and describes how the computer can be used in their application. Chapter 6, "The Kinds of Projects That Have Been Done in Literary Computing," describes the history of computing both as analyzer and subject of literature, and discusses recent applications of computers to the study of literature. The first part of the chapter sketches the relationship between computer-like concepts and literature from Homeric antiquity and the Middle Ages to the modern day. Starting from Homer's fictional robots (and Hero of Alexandria's real ones) and ancient calculators like the Antikythera Mechanism, we proceed to Lull's mechanized logic in the Ars Magna of the 13th century, Leibniz' calculator of the 16th century, John Clark's Eureka machine of 1845 to compose Latin hexameters, and other forerunners. Moving up to the "giant brain" computers of the 1940's (one of which was programmed by Alan Turing to compose a love letter), we conclude with the Internet and the multimedia databases of today. The second part of the chapter presents a discussion of applications using modern computers (mostly beginning in the 1960's, although some are earlier). Different types of literary problem are arranged in a progression from studies of individual sounds (such as alliteration, versification and the mechanized scansion of Classical poetry) through studies of words and vocabulary up to studies of themes, concepts, and the wider external context of a work of literature. We end by discussing programs to "write" stories and poetry, including a "McPoet."

Part III: A Visual Basic Implementation of the MINERVA System

Synopsis: The third part (strictly for techies!) is the programming section of the course. It is for students who wish to learn to write their own programs, or modify the ones provided on the CD. The language used is Visual Basic, but the top-down, modular methods of program development follow the same basic principles as are presented in the rest of the course, and can be applied to any programming language. Information is included on both Visual Basic 5/6 and Visual Basic.NET. Every programming language has its own idiosyncrasies, its own personality, its own style. Visual Basic is descended from BASIC, one of the oldest languages. It was originally a simplified language for beginners. You will find that in the MINERVA System we are creatively stretching the language to perform tasks that might surprise its designers.

CHAPTERS OF PART III: A VISUAL BASIC IMPLEMENTATION OF THE MINERVA SYSTEM Chapter 7, "Programming the Problem," begins with a brief description of various programming languages and how they are used to create programs that tell the computer what to do. Instruction is provided in the use of Microsoft's Visual Basic to create programs like those of the MINERVA System. Chapter 8, "A Model Project for Literary Analysis: The MINERVA System," contains technical discussions of the Visual Basic programs that are currently included in the MINERVA System. The programs themselves are not reproduced, as they can be examined or printed from the disk. Chapter 9, "Formulaic Programming in Visual Basic: Building Blocks of Programs," contains a small primer or manual of the commands of the Visual Basic programming language. Like Homeric poetry, computer programs are formulaic, and program commands are grouped according to the "formulas" they represent, like Input and Output, Searching for a Word, Sorting a List, Mathematical Operations, or Character String Functions. Only a subset of Visual Basic is included. Specialized features of the language have been omitted; they are not used in the MINERVA programs. This simplification not only makes the language easier to learn, but makes the programs more portable to other languages. Chapter 10, "Do-It-Yourself: Techniques for Making Your Projects Work," presents some structured ways of making sure that your program works. Testing and correcting programs, so that they work as intended, is an important part of project development. The same techniques of Systems Analysis that we use to design a project are used to create a test plan, embodying the algorithm for testing a program or system. Technical Appendixes provide some basic definitions of computer workings, including data organization, the ASCII code for representing data in zeroes and ones, and the functions of Boolean logic used in the computer's computation.

Organization of the MINERVA programs

The programs of the MINERVA System can also be represented by a functional decomposition chart, as shown in Figure 1.4. (Charts showing a more detailed breakdown can be seen in Chapter 4, Figure 4.28 and in Chapter 8, Figure 8.1.)

The MINERVA programs as executable programs and as source code

If you have installed MINERVA on your hard disk, you can run the programs of the MINERVA System. The directions for using the Tutorial in Systems Analysis and the MINERVA programs for Literary Analysis begin in Chapter 2, "Starting out: How to Plan a Project." More programs are introduced in Chapter 3, "Picturing the Problem." The Owldata programs are presented in Chapter 4, "Completing the Circle."

If you clicked on "Both read the chapters and run the programs" on the Minerva Startup screen (on the hard disk), you are ready to run the programs. If you clicked on "Just read the chapters," you can go back and click on the Minerva icon on the Windows desktop and choose "Just run the programs." Now you can run the programs, too. The program screens also link directly to selected paragraphs of the text chapters. To use this feature, click on the button for "Click for More Info."

The disk contains the programs of the MINERVA System in two different versions. One version, which you can use immediately, called the compiled or executable version, is all ready to run, and requires no special knowledge of computers. Its use is described in Chapters 2, 3, and 4. The other, called the source code, is the version that can be changed or altered by the programmer. It is included for the benefit of readers of Chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10, who either know how to program or are learning to program. In their present form, these programs are copyrighted by the author. The reader should feel free to make modifications for research or teaching purposes, but is asked to credit the original author whenever such work leads to publication or public presentation.

What you will see when you run MINERVA

The illustrations below are a sample of what you see when you run the MINERVA programs. The first screen you see after the Minerva Startup screen is the Minerva Menu. From here you can choose another menu, for the Tutorial in Systems Analysis, or you can choose individual programs. The tutorial screens are a condensed version of the demonstrations you can read about in Chapter 2 of the text. (Images of the actual tutorial screens appear in Chapter 2, Figure 2.2b.) Individual programs are the (currently sixteen) programs of the MINERVA Program Suite for Study of Literary Texts.

Below, you see the Minerva Menu, the Systems Analysis tutorial menu, and screens from the program called COMPOSE. This program lets you "compose" prose in the style of an author. In our sample we request paragraphs "in the style of Shakespeare". The bottom illustration demonstrates some results (the results will be different each time you run the program!) COMPOSE lets you "play back" rules of language structure by using them to generate compositions. A full description of COMPOSE and its uses will be found in Chapter 3.

c. Choosing a Topic for Research

Deciding what parts (if any) of your project can be mechanized can be a challenging, if fascinating, task. Your idea of what can be computerized may change as you go along -- as happens frequently in technology. In the nineteenth century, the old hand-operated looms (which themselves replaced more primitive weaving methods) were replaced by the power-operated Jacquard loom, which was controlled by punched cards. The Jacquard punched card became the ancestor of the punched cards used in older modern computers, as we describe in Chapter 6. Modern weaving is, of course, computer-controlled. Pictured is one of the looms that predated Jacquard's invention. (Illustration: "Ribbon loom," from an 18th-century engraving.)

Choosing a topic of intrinsic worth and computability: the flow chart

Choosing a topic of both literary (or historic or social) worth and computability is one of the most important (but sometimes difficult) tasks we face. Just as the ancient gods divided heaven from earth, so we must divide the computable from the uncomputable. It is a topic freighted with ambiguity, to which we return in Chapter 2, "Identifying the Quantifiable", "Why Coleridge on the computer," and Finding the Computable in Various Styles of Criticism.

We will use a second important type of diagram, the flow chart, to illustrate the decision process of choosing a topic.

The test of intrinsic worth should always come first, before assessing computability. We should keep looking for a topic until we find one of real significance, then see where (if anywhere) we may employ mechanical help. Unfortunately, we seem too often to do the opposite, looking first at what is computable then trying to find a justification for it, as in the example alluded to at the beginning of the chapter, where we sort all the words in Hamlet by word length without any idea of why we are doing it.

The procedure for choosing a topic of literary worth and analyzing it for possible computability is illustrated in the flow chart in Figure 1.5. A flow chart (explained more fully in Chapter 2 under "Flow charts."), is a pictorial view of the algorithm, or series of steps, for solving a problem. Where a functional decomposition chart shows the parts of a project, but is silent about the order in which tasks will be performed, the flow chart establishes a sequence, shown by arrows linking the boxes. The boxes in our chart, representing the steps in the process, are labeled "Choose a topic," "Determine instrinsic worth," "Determine computability," and "Carry out the project." This is a simplified flow chart, which will be given more complexity in Figure 1.6.

Non-linear or circular thinking

Our activities do not always take a straight line; they may be circular or follow many branches. Figure 1.6 is a more detailed flow chart of the same problem as Figure 1.5. As with functional decomposition charts, we may draw a series of flow charts showing additional levels of detail. Our detailed flow chart shows decisions (represented by diamond shapes) to be made at key points. The same boxes appear as in Figure 1.5, but questions are asked. If the answer to the question "Is [the topic] worthwhile from a literary standpoint?" is "No," the arrow goes back up to the top in a loop allowing us to choose another topic. To the question "Could parts of [the topic] be quantified?" there are two possible answers, pointed at by two arrows sticking out like arms: "Pursue a non-computer solution" and "Divide topic into computable, non-computable parts" (followed by "Carry out a combination solution").

Whichever route we choose, we eventually arrive at the END of the project (although, as we shall see below in "The Project Life Cycle," the END may not actually be the end at all, but only a new beginning.)

The Project Life Cycle: the wheel chart

The designing of a project may be compared to a journey or quest, the search for a solution to a problem. It is, however, sometimes more like a labyrinth, in which there are many different routes, and perhaps even many different outcomes. In the commercial and industrial world from which the discipline of Systems Analysis comes, the development of a project is often formally defined in terms of a Project Life Cycle. This life cycle contains phases or episodes, that are the stages of its life history. They are frequently defined thus:

Phases of the Project Life Cycle: Feasibility Study (to see if the project can or should be done), Analysis (to see how the project can be done and to compare alternative ways of carrying out the project), Design (to create an overall structure for the system), Programming (to write the individual programs that make up the system; if a vendor package is used, appropriate features are selected); Testing (to try out the system under a variety of conditions, to be sure it works), Implementation (to complete the system and make it available for use), Evaluation (to analyze the system's successes and failures, as a guide to future work, often leading to the beginning of another feasibility study).

Figure 1.7 illustrates the Phases of the Project Life Cycle. The circle shape of the wheel chart indicates the cyclicality of the process, with the last step leading back to a repetition of the first. These chapters themselves follow, loosely, the Project Life Cycle, going from Analysis (studying the problem) through Design (planning the project), Programming (writing the programs, in our case, in Visual Basic, or if you are using the pre-written MINERVA programs, choosing the relevant programs), and Testing (making the project work), ending with a finished product (the programs of the MINERVA Program Suite). The MINERVA System itself has gone through several life cycles of its own, and will go through more as future developments are planned. There is more about the Project Life Cycle in Chapter 2, under "The Project Life Cycle" and in Chapter 4, under "Expanding the Labyrinth: the Project Life Cycle."

"Write the report in advance, before you do the research"

To plan a project is to create a framework into which the wandering pieces can be gathered. In this regard, the distinguished mathematician Richard W. Hamming has given the apparently paradoxical advice:

"Write the final paper in advance, either in your mind or on paper, before you do the research." ⁹

The method is inherently sound despite its apparent absurdity, for the fictitious "final report" establishes a coherent structure into which the real results will fit once they are actually obtained. The plan will, of course, be revised as you go along.

The "Hamming method" is helpful even when the real results turn out to be the exact opposite of the results predicted earlier. Even if the original hypothesis was completely wrong, a clear demonstration of why it was wrong may also have a beneficial result. Should a theory be a complete blind alley, the researcher can abandon the hypothesis and go on to more fruitful areas.

Cicero and the need for breadth of experience

"Just as ball players do not use the specific skills of gymnastic exercise in the game itself, but their very movements show whether they have learned the arts of the gymnasium or have had no such training, ... thus in our very speeches in the law courts, in the public assembly, and in the Senate, ...it is easily revealed whether the speaker has simply wallowed around in his declamatory work, or whether he has approached his task of speaking fully instructed in all the liberal arts." (-Cicero, De Oratore, translated by C.A. Sowa) Just as ball players and public speakers benefit from a broad array of experience even in the practice of their principal talent, so too, comprehensiveness of training, not just in science but in the arts and other fields of human endeavor, is necessary for the best use of the computer. (Illustration: basketball players on the West Fourth Street Courts, New York City, photo by C.A.Sowa.)

Comprehensiveness of training always shows

Two thousand years ago, Cicero took the position in his de Oratore that the finished orator must know not only oratory, but philosophy and all other disciplines that bear upon its practice. Such knowledge shows itself in the works produced by such a person, whether or not it seems relevant to the precise action of the moment. Crassus, the spokesman for Cicero's views in the dialog, speaks as follows (as translated from the Latin):

Cicero on the training of an orator: . . . I feel that no one should be numbered among the orators who is not accomplished in all those arts that befit the independent man; for even if we do not actually use them in our speaking, it is nevertheless apparent and obvious whether we are ignorant of these subjects or have been trained in them. Just as ball players do not use the specific skills of gymnastic exercise in the game itself, but their very movements show whether they have learned the arts of the gymnasium or have had no such training; and just as with those who portray something, even if they are not at the moment employing the art of painting, yet it is not hard to see whether they know how to paint or lack this knowledge; thus in our very speeches in the law courts, in the public assembly, and in the Senate, even if the other arts are not expressly brought into play, nevertheless it is easily revealed whether the speaker has simply wallowed around in his declamatory work, or whether he has approached his task of speaking fully instructed in all the liberal arts.10

The use of the computer, too, requires for its most effective practice more than just a narrow proficiency in the operation of machinery or the writing of computer programs; it calls instead for a knowledge of and respect for subjects that touch upon it. Simple use of the computer should ideally be supplemented by knowledge of the history of computing, awareness of the place of the computer in the literary scholar's world, reflection upon the limits of computability, and acquaintance with the pleasures of mechanical objects as well as with the delights of art, sculpture, and literature. Humanists could reclaim science itself as one of the humanities (instead of making the humanities a branch of science -- or pseudoscience), by bringing to bear on the art of computing the full range of human experience. But then, every field worthy of note, from Classical literature to music to filmmaking to shipbuilding, in fact contains within it, in differing forms, all human experience.

Notes

2. Quoted in Margaret Cheney, Tesla, Man Out of Time, New York: Dorset Press, 1981, p. 107 (reprinted, paperback, Bantam Doubleday Dell, 1998).

3. An example is Dassault Systèmes' Product Lifecycle Management Suite, which includes Catia (computer-aided design), Delmia (to control manufacturing), and Enovia (to manage the database of designs and specifications). Various parts of this suite are being used by Boeing and Airbus to design, manufacture, and maintain their new airplanes.

4. C.B. Bazzoni, Kernels of the Universe, New York: George H. Doran, 1927, p. 16.

5. Quoted in the IEEE Spectrum, Sept. 1969, pp. 24.28.

6. Henry Petroski, To Engineer is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design, New York: St. Martin's Press, 1985, p. 78.

7. In a lecture on "Inertia" delivered at UCLA, Oct. 10, 1960.

8. In Information Processing 62 (IFIP Proceedings 1962), Amsterdam: North-Holland Publishing Co., 1962, p. 538.

9. In a talk entitled "You and Your Research," at IBM in Poughkeepsie, NY, August 8, 1969.

10. Cicero, De Oratore I. XVI. 72-73 (translation by C.A.Sowa).

Copyright © 2007, Cora Angier Sowa. All rights reserved.

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