Conversations with Lord Byron on Perversion, 163 Years After His Lordship's Death

Prantera, Amanda

ISBN 10: 022402423X / ISBN 13: 9780224024235

Published by Jonathan Cape, 1987

About this Item

. Size: 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. 174 pages. Item Type: Book. Clean and bright pages. Binding is tight, covers and spine fully intact. Dust Jacket is in as new condition, apart from normal shop shelf wear - contains no tears or chips or other damage. Dust Jacket un-clipped. No inscriptions. Shipped Weight: Under 500 grams. Category: Fiction; ; . ISBN: 022402423X. ISBN/EAN: 9780224024235. Please contact H4o Books if you require images or further information. Inventory No: 028979.

Seller Inventory # 028979

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Conversations with Lord Byron on Perversion, 163 Years After His Lordship's Death
• Publisher: Jonathan Cape
• Publication Date: 1987
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 022402423X
• ISBN 13: 9780224024235
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition.
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine
• Seller catalogs:
  • Fiction

About this title

Synopsis

New Atheneum,, 1987.. Fine in fine dust jacket.. First US printing. A witty and elegant novel, this is an account of a perhaps surprisingly sucessful experiment with Artificial Intelligence, in which everything known about the romantic poet was fed into a computer in an attempt to uncover the real truth about his life. 174 pp.

From Publishers Weekly

An ape may never write Shakespeare, but the computer/hero of this charming confection manages to write Bryon: three new quatrains to a loved one hitherto unmentioned either in the poet's correspondence or in his verse. Indeed, after having been programmed by a couple of sober-sided technicians and stuffed with every available scrap of Byronic information by the romantic young student Anna, the computer becomes Byron, musing, as its input and output buttons are pressed, on the early years in Cambridge, where he met and fell irrevocably in love with a choirboy. The knottiest problem posed to the computer concerns Byron's sexuality, and whether the verses to Thyrza in Don Juan celebrate a man or a woman. As she asks questions worded to avoid computer pique (because the machine becomes touchy and evasive on the subject of sex), Anna, like scores of young women before her, falls under Byron's spell and even suspects, when called "Anna dear," that the computer may have a soft spot for her as well. Prantera's (Strange Loop, The Cabalist) own fondness for Anna is transferred to the reader, as the quirky facts unfold and the question of Byron's sexuality is satisfactorily answered. This is a book to delight both Byron buffs and lovers of whimsy.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.