I requested ChatGPT, utilizing author-attribution strategies of fashionable computational stylistics if Clement C Moore actually wrote the iconic Christmas poem A Visit from St Nicholas, which he claimed authorship to some 20 years after its first publication. That is ChatGPT’s response.
The authorship of “A Visit from St. Nicholas” (or “Twas the Night time Earlier than Christmas”) has been a degree of competition for years. Clement Clarke Moore is most frequently credited with the poem’s creation.
Nevertheless a compelling case could be made for a Henry Livingston Jr as the true author of the poem.
Once I apply fashionable computational stylistics, I can illuminate these arguments with empirical proof.
The Story of the Poems publication
“Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas” was first printed anonymously in the Troy Sentinel on Dec. 23, 1823. Submitted by a Miss Harriet Butler, a buddy of Moore’s household, she didn’t present Moore’s identify as the author.
As the years handed, the poem was ceaselessly republished and performed a vital position in shaping the fashionable picture of Santa Claus. It even launched the names of his eight reindeer (excluding Rudolph).
Who wrote it
The poem’s authorship remained a thriller for 14 years. Till Charles Fenno Hoffman claimed his buddy, New York scholar Moore, as the author in 1837.
Nevertheless Moore himself solely confirmed this in 1844 by together with the poem in his e book, “Poems.” In response to his personal declaration, he penned it as a Christmas reward for his youngsters in 1822.
Nevertheless, after the publication of Moore’s Poems, the household of Henry Livingston, Jr., a soldier, landowner, and poet who handed away in 1828, contested Moore’s assertion. They insisted that Livingston was the true author of the poem.
Moore was a famend professor and author, whereas Livingston, often printed verses beneath the preliminary “R.”
Livingston’s surviving youngsters and one daughter-in-law disputed Moore’s declare to authorship.
Livingston’s household remembered Henry studying the poem to them as youngsters, 20 years earlier than the poem was first printed in the Troy Sentinel in 1823 and that whereas the authentic was misplaced, all of them knew it by coronary heart.
Miss Harriet Butler
Subsequent analysis revealed that Henry’s first cousin, Judith Livingston, who was his neighbor, was married to John Moore, associated to Clement Moore’s paternal household. Judith and John’s daughter, Lydia, married Rev. William Hart, a detailed affiliate of Clement Moore, and relocated to Virginia.
Their daughter Frances later married Rev. Clement Moore Butler, who was the brother of a Miss Harriet Butler, the younger girl whom legend has it it first ‘heard’ the poem in Clement C Moore’s family.
Wherever she first heard it, it was she who was accountable for first submitting the poem to the Troy Sentinel.
If she actually knew it was penned by Moore, it was by no means defined why she submitted it as ‘author unknown.’
The Empirical Argument
- Lexical Evaluation:
Fashionable computational strategies contain analyzing the frequency and patterns of phrases utilization in texts. When evaluating Livingston’s and Moore’s different works with the poem; Livingston’s works show a stronger similarity in phrases of phrase selection and frequency than Moore’s.
Some particular phrases and phrases utilized in “A Visit from St. Nicholas” additionally seem in Livingston’s different poems however not in Moore’s.
- Metric and Phonological Patterns:
Computational instruments can determine rhythmic and phonetic patterns in poetry.
Livingston’s poetic works ceaselessly make the most of an anapestic meter, which is the identical meter present in “A Visit from St. Nicholas.” Phonological units similar to alliteration and assonance utilized in the Christmas poem align extra carefully with Livingston’s fashion than Moore’s.
- Syntactic Evaluation:
Fashionable stylistics can discover the construction of sentences in depth. Livingston’s and the poem’s use of syntactic constructions, similar to phrase lengths and patterns, are extra alike than Moore’s syntax.
- Thematic Consistency:
Utilizing textual content mining, one can extract and evaluate thematic parts throughout completely different works.
Livingston’s works usually current playful and jovial themes, akin to these in “A Visit from St. Nicholas.” The poem’s depiction of St. Nicholas, for instance, is extra in keeping with Livingston’s jovial portrayals of characters than Moore’s sometimes extra ironic method.
- Historic Proof Backed by Computational Evaluation:
Digital humanities students have made use of databases and digital archives to hint literary influences and dissemination.
Livingston’s descendants have lengthy claimed that they heard the poem from Livingston himself earlier than it was ever printed. This anecdotal proof is bolstered by the stylistic matches recognized computationally.
No concrete documentary proof exists from Moore’s time that instantly ties him to the poem, apart from his later declare and its inclusion in an anthology.
- Error Evaluation:
Some peculiarities in the poem, similar to the reindeer names “Dunder and Blixem” (Dutch for “Thunder and Lightning”) quite than the later popularized “Donder and Blitzen,” are extra in keeping with Livingston’s Dutch heritage and his fluency in the language.
Conclusion
Conventional scholarship and standard perception have largely credited Clement Clarke Moore with the authorship of “A Visit from St. Nicholas,”
On my analysis this seems to be based mostly solely on the reality he was the solely particular person to say authorship as there have been no different takers. When subjected to the rigorous and empirical strategies of fashionable computational stylistics, there does appear to be a robust case to be made for Henry Livingston Jr.’s authorship. Whereas this can’t be thought-about definitive proof, it actually highlights the want for a extra nuanced understanding of literary historical past and the ever-evolving instruments we use to know it.
I’d recommend the e book be credited to each poets till additional strategies or proof seem.
That’s all ! ©Glamourdaze