Shakespeare and the Infinite Monkeys, or Why Art Isn't an Accident

Some people take their clichés too seriously.

A BBC article this morning, entitled "Virtual Monkeys Write Shakespeare," investigates Jesse Anderson's project to simulate an infinite number of monkeys hammering on an infinite number of typewriters, to see how long these code monkeys take to reproduce the Bard's complete body of work. In short, this is a virtual test of the platitude that an infinite number of monkeys pummeling relentlessly on a battered keyboard can shamble together the prose of a lyrical genius. So how much value is there to this cliché?

"If you put enough monkeys in a room with a typewriter, they'll produce Shakespeare": this concept is called the "infinite monkey theorem." (And yes, there's a Wiki page on it. And no, I will not explain the mathematical proofs.) Jorge Luis Borges, in his essay "The Total Library," traced the idea as far back as Aristotle--so the idea is hardly new. Literary theory uses this concept in one of two general ways: either to argue that art is not an accident, or to contend that anybody has the ability to produce art. In the latter case, the monkey adage swings from our tongues to insinuate contempt at someone else's good fortune, or to compliment a budding talent.

But let's stop for a moment. Anderson's project provides a fun glimpse into a quirky thought experiment--can an infinite monkey actually generate Shakespeare's texts, yet alone any others? There are a few pragmatic issues that weigh down this test, like a monkey on the back. Firstly, nobody--save the titular Doctor of Doctor Who--has an eternity with which to toy around in time and space. Secondly, genuine art is a reaction to life experiences, a considered and developed response to an individual's sense of reality. The collaborative effort necessary for monkeys ad infinitum to gather in a room and produce a text are staggering. In the instance of a single monkey, an eternity could elapse before producing the opening chapter of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight.

Which would leave literature in a sorry place, indeed.

This is to say that the complete works of William Shakespeare are the culmination of the Bard's singular existence. His endeavors as an actor, playwright, father, husband, lover, etc. produces an array of influences far vaster than the random happenstance of monkeys slapping their digits across a typewriter's keys. Furthermore, Shakespeare has a certain social, historical, and political context--Elizabethan England, the rise of empire, the culture of the stage, bowing to the wants of groundlings and nobles alike. Perhaps the only context—political or otherwise—of imprisoning monkeys with typewriters is a pending legal action by the ASPCA, or a series of coy adverts released by PETA.

Let us leave literature to each other, and to our individual talents and insights. And let the monkeys keep their own interests intact. "Monkeys," as the BBC article's photo caption reads, are "more interested in throwing faeces than writing sonnets."

The Future of the Library

Recently, Will Gompertz, author of the BBC blog Gomp/arts, wrote a piece on the future of the local library. It's an interesting piece that discusses the range of borrowing possibilities from grocery store checkout lines to the local pub. The central crux of Gompertz's post is, "How do we keep the lending library relevant?"

The answer, perhaps, lies in digital lending. Okay, maybe it seems daft, but here's my thought: There are e-readers out to wazoo, the iPad, the iPod, [not-so]smartphones, and several dozen other ways to read something electronically. Many of these devices are equipped with wifi capability or attached to a 3G wireless network. (In the instance of the Amazon Kindle, the Sprint wifi doesn't even cost anything--as opposed to the AT&T package offered with Apple's iPad, aka the iPod that toked up on technology growth hormone.)

The idea sparked after I was checking out textbooks for a course I'm teaching and noticed that Barnes&Noble now offers a "rent" option on textbooks. For a fee that's less than the cost of a used book, you can borrow a book for the duration of the term and then return it to the store. Then I got my NetFlix in the mail, and...

Well, here's the story: digital lending should be perfectly possible. A "NetFlix" for books would no doubt be too costly, unless rented items were shipped media mail, but the variety of e-readers should, in theory, offer readers great possibilities. Think of it like The New York Times subscription you can get for your Kindle, but instead for your local library. You pay the library an acceptable amount, and you get a one-year subscription (perhaps through Amazon or B&N or Apple, depending upon your library's e-reader preference) to electronic rentals. You can download books that you've "rented," then "send" them back.

I'm no tech whiz, and I'm aware that the idea is fraught with difficulties--precisely because of the broad scope of the e-reader market and other compatibility issues--but it may allow the library to continue bringing in some monetary resources while still protecting knowledge. It pays libraries, who in turn pay our librarians, who in turn are making sure that libraries continue to function and collect knowledge, entertainment, and all that. Something to think about.