The use of the artificial intelligence It never ceases to amaze us and, despite the fact that some consider it the beginning of the end of our existence, others are dedicated to getting the most out of it. A great example of this is the National Library of Spain (BNE).
Well, researchers from the universities of Valladolid and Vienna have managed to attribute to Lope de Vega a work that was preserved anonymously in a late-17th-century manuscript named “La francesa de Laura.”
The use of artificial intelligence has been very relevant in this discovery, carried out by researchers Álvaro Cuéllar (University of Vienna) and Germán Vega (University of Valladolid), who have managed to transcribe the text and then compare it with other writings from the Spanish Golden Age, including Lope de Vega.
“The use of computer tools has been essential for its detection, the results of which have been fully supported by philological analyses,” the institution states in a press release.
Artificial intelligence at the service of literature
The expression artificial intelligence has been chosen as word of the year (2022) by the Fundéu, which reflects the position that these tools are taking in more and more areas of society and the art and philosophy sector does not want to be left behind.
Well, as for this process that has used artificial intelligence, first the work was automatically transcribed using AI techniques through the Transkribus tool. As they explain, for this case and in order for the tool to learn and achieve the maximum percentage of hits, some 1,300 were processed. construction theaters of the Golden Age.
After this phase, the works were classified by author. And it is that, for the experts, this is a more or less simple job, although laborious, since each of them makes use of language or certain words such as “love”, “time”, “rose” or “when “, which makes them characteristic.
Thanks to this prior training of the tool (machine learning), they managed to get the success rate with respect to a work by Lope de Vega to be 90%. With this, and among the 1,300 automatically transcribed comedies, “La francesa Laura” was classified as written by Lope de Vega.
According to the experts, there is no possible failure. “La francesa Laura is a remarkable theatrical work, with a dramatic force to be expected from a mature Lope de Vega. Everything indicates that we are facing a new genuine comedy by the playwright composed in a last stage of his life, of which we had no news until now “, they explain.
Of course, the use of artificial intelligence in these cases may give us the odd surprise and more good news. In the end, this is only a first step to identify great works whose author is unknown.
