machines are endowed with a kind of language parser that keeps the entire author’s corpus in its memory, and continues the literary thread. Every author has a kind of fingerprint which identifies him or her. Every author has a limitation on their vocabulary, will stylistically employ certain words in relation, and reiterate the same themes. Every author has but one megatext, and multiple works are just slices of it. So, here are the machines that finish every author's megatext. Spinning away! More tales!”
“But if Castellemare’s Library is infinite, would it not already house those works in its infinite possibility?”
“For sure, yes, of course! But… there is a different reason for this… Never mind! Did you know it also finishes books by authors who never lived? Okay, well, moving right along… room B… Beyond this door is an incalculably vast warehouse wherein are housed every novel that remained unfinished by readers. You never know what gem lies in those many novels you began, but never finished! I am not particularly fond of this room, however, since it says something awful about you people . So, finally, room C is my absolute favourite: it houses the most stupendous invention of all time… The Anonymizer!”
“The name seems to announce its function.”
“Doesn’t it?” he said with a face beaming with sallow, perspiring lunacy. There was now no trace of the mild and dusty man I had met only hours ago. Instead, he was being overtaken by rapid animation. “It’s a swell room! A conveyor belt feeds into this room from the library and into the Anonymizer to… make all the works anonymous .”
“What purpose does that serve?”
“I’m a bit hurt and perplexed by this seemingly dismissive and irreverent question. What library can call itself complete without anonymous works ?”
I was beginning to think better of questioning for what passed for Setzer’s logic. I could not grasp any real, single purpose to this entire enterprise. The more information I received about this brand of infinite library, the more the questions multiplied. He must have suffered a setback after being fired.
As if reading my thoughts, “the bifurcation of the question is one of the most precious blooms of an infinite library. For what is knowledge - and non-knowledge, outright falsehoods, myths and facts - but that feeling of realizing more of what one does not know?”
“But this place is not so much infinite as an attempt to construct the infinite through machinic artifice.”
“Gimaldi, I would tell you my so-called master plan, but that would be to ask you to be disloyal to your employer. One cannot work for two masters. It simply is not done. I’ve already compromised myself considerably in showing you this much.”
“I appreciate that. But now I must admit a ferocious curiousity for what you call your master plan.”
“Ah, I am so weak to requests since I am accommodating by nature, to a fault. I suppose it would make no difference if Castellemare knew. He probably already does and sees it as no real threat. Simply put, I am in the process of overproduction. I know for every book produced here, it repeats in the infinite Library. I have a formula that proves these books do not already reside in his holdings. I have discovered the secret of creating the new . I know how to produce those things that exist outside totality. His Library will absorb these, and this will cause a violent displacement effect. Simply, it means that by bucking the logical apparatus of his Library, I push more of the books through that rift and into the real where people like you need to reacquire them. I’m overstuffing the machine beyond its capacity. I'm also ensuring that you'll always have work,” he added with a wink. “Besides, what is this talk of artifice? Against what? The natural? Be a bit more baroque and play with the border between the two a bit more.”
“So you are trying to make things more difficult for
“But if Castellemare’s Library is infinite, would it not already house those works in its infinite possibility?”
“For sure, yes, of course! But… there is a different reason for this… Never mind! Did you know it also finishes books by authors who never lived? Okay, well, moving right along… room B… Beyond this door is an incalculably vast warehouse wherein are housed every novel that remained unfinished by readers. You never know what gem lies in those many novels you began, but never finished! I am not particularly fond of this room, however, since it says something awful about you people . So, finally, room C is my absolute favourite: it houses the most stupendous invention of all time… The Anonymizer!”
“The name seems to announce its function.”
“Doesn’t it?” he said with a face beaming with sallow, perspiring lunacy. There was now no trace of the mild and dusty man I had met only hours ago. Instead, he was being overtaken by rapid animation. “It’s a swell room! A conveyor belt feeds into this room from the library and into the Anonymizer to… make all the works anonymous .”
“What purpose does that serve?”
“I’m a bit hurt and perplexed by this seemingly dismissive and irreverent question. What library can call itself complete without anonymous works ?”
I was beginning to think better of questioning for what passed for Setzer’s logic. I could not grasp any real, single purpose to this entire enterprise. The more information I received about this brand of infinite library, the more the questions multiplied. He must have suffered a setback after being fired.
As if reading my thoughts, “the bifurcation of the question is one of the most precious blooms of an infinite library. For what is knowledge - and non-knowledge, outright falsehoods, myths and facts - but that feeling of realizing more of what one does not know?”
“But this place is not so much infinite as an attempt to construct the infinite through machinic artifice.”
“Gimaldi, I would tell you my so-called master plan, but that would be to ask you to be disloyal to your employer. One cannot work for two masters. It simply is not done. I’ve already compromised myself considerably in showing you this much.”
“I appreciate that. But now I must admit a ferocious curiousity for what you call your master plan.”
“Ah, I am so weak to requests since I am accommodating by nature, to a fault. I suppose it would make no difference if Castellemare knew. He probably already does and sees it as no real threat. Simply put, I am in the process of overproduction. I know for every book produced here, it repeats in the infinite Library. I have a formula that proves these books do not already reside in his holdings. I have discovered the secret of creating the new . I know how to produce those things that exist outside totality. His Library will absorb these, and this will cause a violent displacement effect. Simply, it means that by bucking the logical apparatus of his Library, I push more of the books through that rift and into the real where people like you need to reacquire them. I’m overstuffing the machine beyond its capacity. I'm also ensuring that you'll always have work,” he added with a wink. “Besides, what is this talk of artifice? Against what? The natural? Be a bit more baroque and play with the border between the two a bit more.”
“So you are trying to make things more difficult for
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