Modes of Composition and the Durability of Style in Literature

Modes of Composition and the Durability of Style employs the tools and methods of computational stylistics to show that style is extremely resistant to changes in how texts are produced. Addressing an array of canonical writers, including William Faulkner, Joseph Conrad, Thomas Hardy, and Henry James, along with popular contemporary writers like Stephen King and Ian McEwan, this volume presents a systematic study of changes in mode of composition and writing technologies. Computational analysis of texts produced in multiple circumstances of composition, such as dictation, handwriting, typewriting, word processing, and translation, reveals the extraordinary durability of authorial style. Modes of Composition and the Durability of Style in Literature will be essential for readers interested in exploring the rapidly expanding field of digital approaches to literature.

David L. Hoover, Professor of English at New York University, holds a Ph.D. in English Language from Indiana University. He is Project Partner, “Quantitative Criticism,” Universität Stuttgart; Co-Investigator, “Distant Reading for European Literary History” (COST); and Advisor, “The Riddle of Literary Quality” (Netherlands). He is the author of “Simulations and Difficult Problems” (2019) and “The Microanalysis of Style Variation” (2017) in Digital Scholarship in the Humanities, and Digital Literary Studies (with Culpeper and O’Halloran, Routledge, 2014).