A trilogy of Shakespeare plays retold through the vocabulary of three historical encoding systems, for NaNoGenMo 2017. Each line of the original text is replaced with the translated code message that it is most similar to. (This is calculated using the Levenshtein distance, being the minimum number of letters that must be inserted, changed or removed to get from one sentence to another: eg. "In sooth, I know not why I am so sad" has a distance of 25 from the message "Indiana, Illinois & Iowa", closer than any other sentence in that cipher book.)
Final generation on 30 November 2017 was 50,474 words total:
- Tillman: The Merchant of Venice, through the 1897 Robinson Telegraphic Cipher
- Victor Lima: The Tempest, through the International Code of Maritime Signals, 1969
- KOD: Romeo and Juliet, through a list of Internet acronyms from Ed's Web Site, a 2008 Geocities page.
Sample output from ''Victor Lima'':
GONZALO
I have lost my propeller: I am abandoning my vessel; my position is doubtful. I have cast off port towing hawser: there is fishing gear in the direction you are heading. I have no, or no other, hawser.
Exeunt
Re-enter Boatswain
Boatswain
Do not overtake me! welcome! welcome home! Landing here is highly dangerous.
A cry within
I have taken the line! you are out of the dangerous zone.
Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO
Welcome! what is your course? Shall I take you in tow? Have you a doctor?
SEBASTIAN
I cannot be refloated by any means now available!