Alex Beam of the Boston Globe writes like Cory Doctorow and weirdly, when I am not writing like David Foster Wallace, so do I
By Nancy, on July 23rd, 2010
I must have been having a really good day. Leave it to dryly funny Alex Beam of the Boston Globe to come up with this – it is a site (“The internet sensation of the moment”) called I Write Like and you type in a writing sample (cut and paste in my case) and it compares your prose to a famous writer. At first I was told that I write like David Foster Wallace – yeah, I wish – and I submitted another sample (what, because Foster Wallace wasn’t good enough?) and I also write like Cory Doctorow (evidently a famous sci-fi writer and blogger) and Alex Beam also writes like Doctorow. I am having way to much fun with this – try it out. Read Alex Beam’s column here. Maybe I should analyze everything I’ve written and see if I am just charmingly varied or all over the map. Okay – it says I also write like Dan Brown, Ian Fleming and Stephen King. Man, I need to focus on one style, maybe. Here is an interview with the creator of the site, (only 27 years old) Dmitry Chestnykh, at The Awl.
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Wow! That is so much fun! But I am a bit suspicious, since it told me I write like… you guessed it, David Foster Wallace. 4 out of 5 times. Either the whole thing is a sham, there’s a glitch in it that makes something always point to DFW, or DFW is so influential that we all unwittingly mimic him. Curious to hear what others get!
I am scared to try it.
I did it for you (your post on design track mind) you write like Chuck Palahniuk -Charles Michael “Chuck” Palahniuk (pronounced /ˈpɑːlənɪk/;[1] born February 21, 1962) is an American transgressional fiction novelist and freelance journalist. He is best known for the award-winning novel Fight Club, which was later made into a film directed by David Fincher. (from wikipedia) but then I put in the post about books you were forced to read as a child and you write like Vladimir Nabokpv…not bad!
I loved the site myself. I submitted a writing sample and it came back J.D. Salinger. An author who I’d heard of but never took the time to read. So I decided to purchase Catcher In The Rye and so far, so good.
Agreed @ the internet sensation at the moment.
Many bloggers have added the site to their respective blogs.
Alex Beam of the Boston Globe writes like Cory Doctorow and ……
Here at World Spinner we are debating the same thing……