So, this guy, Gareth Rubin, decides he’s going to outsource his job to a goddamn chatbot. A sequel, no less. To The Turnglass, a book I vaguely remember seeing in an airport bookstore while waiting for a delayed flight to… somewhere. Probably Vegas. I tend to lose track.
Anyway, Rubin, bless his ink-stained soul, thinks he’s going to “turn the tables” on the AI menace. He’s going to use the machine, exploit its cold, algorithmic heart to crank out a Shakespearean thriller with a Scottish villain so thick you could spread him on toast. Because, you know, publishers are just clamoring for more Shakespeare.
He feeds ChatGPT his previous book (apparently, the bot has a decent memory – better than mine after a bottle of Four Roses, that’s for sure), gives it a prompt about Shakespeare, Marlowe, and a canal-side encounter with this “Jamie MacIntosh” character, and waits for the magic to happen.
And, well, the magic sort of happens. If your definition of “magic” involves stilted dialogue and a villain who sounds like he wandered off the set of a low-budget Braveheart knockoff.
First, the bot spits out some generic tough-guy lines. “What foul wind has blown you into my way?” Seriously? That sounds like something a community theater Hamlet would mumble before forgetting his lines.
Rubin, to his credit, recognizes the blandness. He wants more Scottish. He wants the full Groundskeeper Willie. And the bot, ever eager to please, starts throwing in “sae” and “speirin’” and “th’ wrang folk.”
Okay, getting warmer. But still not quite there.
Then, after another round of prodding, we get this gem: “‘No sae fast, ye preenin’ Sassenach gobshite.’” Followed by a description of MacIntosh “flailin’ like a spooked highland coo” after stepping on a “slithery haddock.”
A haddock.
This is where I started to lose it. It’s also about that time where I reached for the bottle of Wild Turkey on my desk. Sunday morning, don’t judge.
The scene culminates with MacIntosh declaring Shakespeare fights “like a deranged wild haggis wi’ a grudge.”
A deranged. Wild. Haggis. With. A. Grudge.
I mean, I’ve had hangovers that made more sense than that. I’ve woken up in strange cities with less confusion. I’ve seen politicians make more coherent arguments. And yet, there it is, the pinnacle of AI-generated Scottish villainy.
Rubin, seemingly satisfied with this linguistic train wreck, then asks the bot for plot suggestions. And, of course, ChatGPT proposes the most predictable, cliché-ridden outcome imaginable: a buddy-cop scenario where Shakespeare and the Haggis-Wrangler team up to fight “a gang of cutthroats” and then embark on some “court intrigue.”
Because that’s what Shakespeare was known for. Buddy-cop routines.
The whole thing is… well, it’s a mess. A beautiful, glorious, whiskey-soaked mess. It’s like watching a toddler try to assemble IKEA furniture – entertaining, but ultimately pointless.
The real takeaway here isn’t that AI is coming for our jobs (though it might be, and I, for one, welcome our robot overlords if they can write my next blog post while I’m nursing this hangover). No, the real kicker is that this whole experiment proves one thing: AI can generate words, but it can’t generate soul.
It can mimic style, sure. It can throw in a “sae” here and a “gobshite” there. But it can’t understand the nuances of human experience, the messy, contradictory, often-absurd reality that fuels truly great writing.
It can’t capture the feeling of waking up with a pounding headache and a vague sense of regret. It can’t understand the desperate need for a strong drink and a cigarette at 10 a.m. on a Sunday. It can’t grasp the inherent humor in a Scottish villain tripping over a fish.
It can generate text. But it can’t generate life.
And that, my friends, is the difference between a human writer and a glorified algorithm. One can write about a hangover; the other can only simulate one. I do wonder if it is the fear of a hangover.
So, Gareth, if you’re reading this (and you probably are, because who else reads this crap?), here’s my advice: put down the chatbot, pick up a pen (or, you know, a keyboard), and write your damn book yourself. It might be messy, it might be flawed, but at least it will be human.
And if you need inspiration, I’ve got a half-empty bottle of bourbon with your name on it. Bottoms up, and all that.
Source: ChatGPT, can you write my new novel for me? Och aye, ye preenin’ Sassenach | Gareth Rubin