I Write Like...

[Ghost]

Here's a website called I Write Like. It compares your writing style and word choice to famous authors. Now, I know I don't write like Vladimir Nabokov and James Joyce, but the idea is encouraging even if it's inaccurate. The results vary more widely if you enter smaller chunks of text, so I'd recommend using larger sections of writing. I thought we could post results for fun.

I entered all of my short stories there and got the following: Ernest Hemingway (x2), Jonathan Swift, JRR Tolkien, Dan Brown, Ursula K. Le Guin, Stephenie Meyer, Neil Gaiman, and Mario Puzo. I'd be happy if I was half as good as some of these folks, but they very different from each other. I'm curious who I'd get if I wrote a novel.

For my long poems, I got these people more than once: David Foster Wallace, Arthur C. Clarke, Chuck Palahniuk, Margaret Atwood, and HP Lovecraft.

I haven't read half of these authors, but I'm definitely adding them to my reading list.

What results do you get?

[Elder the Dwarf]

5 Anne Rice (funny, never read her work) 1 Tolkien (love him, would never compare our writing though) and 1 Shakespeare (Can't imagine where they got that one)

I wonder how they judge it.

[Phil the Drill]

I got Jane Austen and HP Lovecraft. If you've read anything I've written, this is hilarious.

[Ankari]

I got JRR Tolkien. I'll take his fame, not his writing style

[Kelise]

That IS hilarious, Phil.

I wouldn't really trust that site. I did one chapter of my work there one week, then did the exact same chapter again a week later, and got different results. First time I got Ernest Hemingway, then HP Lovecraft.

Having read their work, I honestly can't see how the site worked that one out - especially when it gave different results to the same chapter.

[Ghost]

Yeah, I think it's for fun. I did a small section of a story and got Leo Tolstoy but with a longer section I got Hemingway. I also got one James Fenimore Cooper.

This website is like a literary version of the Magic 8-Ball.

[ProfessorBrainfever]

Oh, I got Anne Rice followed by Neil Gaiman. Not bad morale booster, if I do say so myself.

[Chime85]

I got two different results. Using a 700 word sample I got George Orwell. Using a 7,700 word sample (which included the first sample) I got J.R.R.Tolkien. I'm happy with both results.

[Jabrosky]

I entered in the first chapter of my Bride of Perseus story and got Rudyard Kipling. In one sense it's ironic, given that he was a racist advocate for European imperialism whereas my stories feature a lot of non-white protagonists, but on the other hand it seems appropriate given that we both write stories with "exotic" settings.

Then again, looking at an excerpt from The Jungle Book, I don't see any special resemblance between his prose and my own beyond the setting. I wish the program would break down exactly what similarities it perceives between your writing and whatever author it likens you to.

[Telcontar]

Judging purely from the range given to writers who've posted above, I'd say that their algorithms are sloppy at best and really more like a random choice at worst... kinda disappointing. It's a really interesting idea, but would take some serious research to make the comparisons mean anything.