Oftentimes the potential energy of a story is compressed into its premise. A premise is a prompt of sorts, an engine that kicks off narrative with a burst of energy. Here I’ve collaborated with GPT-3 to produce a story based on a premise I’ve had kicking around for awhile. I describe the process that went into writing it in the analysis at the end. —Ryan
A story in the style of Ryan Boudinot, titled "Bloodbath and Beyond," about a heavy metal drummer whose band gets sued by the company Bed, Bath, and Beyond for trademark infringement. When the story of the lawsuit goes viral, the drummer, Bob Dorsey, gets the band back together to perform a benefit concert for Tibet.
Chapter 1
Bob Dorsey couldn't help but tap out beats while he worked. A paradiddle against the side of a plastic bucket. A pencil against the metal frame of a shelf. As he finished the paperwork processing the latest delivery of Porta-Potties to his wildly successful Porta-Potty rental company, he thought again about the days when he and the boys laid down such bitchin’ tunes as "Closin' Time (Last Call)," "Fire and Ice," and "Snakebite."
Chapter 2
Bob and the boys had been local legends in their hometown of Gainesville, Florida. But when they signed a record deal with Mega Records (a division of Bed Bath & Beyond), things went south fast.
Chapter 3: Bloodbath and Beyond started in Bob's basement. Those sure were the days. A couple cases of PBR and a large pepperoni pizza could last you all night. They rocked hard. Harder than any other band in Gainesville. Hell, they were goddamn legends.
Chapter 4: The band broke up. Bob became a successful businessman, but he never forgot his music. And the fans didn't forget him either. When word got out that Mega Records was suing Bob for trademark infringement over their song "Bloodbath and Beyond," people were pissed off...
Chapter 5: ...especially when they found out what kind of money was on the line! Fans started an online petition to help save Bloodbath & Beyond from being shut down by Bed Bath & Beyond's lawyers. Thousands signed it within hours!
Chapter 6: Bob Dorsey was back in the studio. The fans had spoken, and they wanted Bloodbath & Beyond to return!
Chapter 7: He knew he couldn't do it alone. So he called up his old bandmates--his brother Chuck on guitar, Jake Puke on bass, and Frankie "The Groin" Gurgleman (who didn't actually play an instrument) for a jam session at the local bar...
Chapter 8: The fans were ecstatic! They bought tickets to the show in droves. But there was one problem...
Chapter 9: Bob Dorsey knew he had a lot of work ahead of him, but this time it wasn't on Porta-Potties--it was his music career that needed fixing. He spent all night writing new songs and practicing them until they were ready for their first performance at the benefit concert organized by Tibet House US ...
Chapter 10: The concert was a huge success! Bob Dorsey and Bloodbath & Beyond rocked the house, playing all their greatest hits like "Bloodbath," "Beyond Hell's Kitchen," and of course, their hit single "Bathroom Break."
Chapter 11: Unfortunately, those Tibetans who left town with all their cash turned out not to be Tibetans after all. In fact, they were French Canadian hockey players from Quebec. Bob and his crew knew that there was only one thing left to do.
Chapter 12: The band reunited, and Bloodbath & Beyond hit the road once again. They were back in business!
Chapter 13: But it wasn't all smooth sailing.
Chapter 14: Things got worse.
Chapter 15: Things got even worse.
Chapter 16: They could have given up, but they didn't. Because Bloodbath & Beyond had one thing on their side...
Chapter 17: And it was all thanks to the fans.
ANALYSIS
Here’s how I produced this story using GPT-3’s DaVinci engine.
I started by writing the setup and Chapter 1 to create a one-shot prompt. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, a one-shot prompt is one in which an example is provided to show GPT-3 the format in which you want it to write. In this case, my Chapter 1 was a paragraph. GPT-3 organized the rest of the output to match this form, starting with Chapter 2.
After Chapter 2, I cut off the AI and responded by writing Chapter 3 myself. I thought about the improv comedy rule of “Yes, and,” in which two partners keep developing a routine by acknowledging and accepting what the other person says, then adding something new. In this case, I was amused that GPT-3 had the band hailing from Gainesville, Florida. I tried to match the tone of the AI-generated chapter.
Chapters 4-10 are all GPT-3. I stopped the AI at that point because it just seemed like the narrative was following too straight a path. So I threw in what devotees of Freytag’s Triangle like to call a reversal. A twist, basically. I wrote Chapter 11 to pull the rug out from under Bloodbath and Beyond and to see what they’d do, then hit Submit again.
Chapters 12-17 are courtesy of GPT-3. These parts sound like a writer who has run out of steam to me. Are these parts good writing? In a sense, no, in that they don’t tell you anything specific about how things went from bad to worse. And yet I find these terse declarations sort of hilarious. And in the end, “good” writing means writing that is entertaining. If writing is interesting and entertaining, it is by definition good, regardless of whether it conforms to conventionally agreed upon aesthetic elements.
I have to say I am really digging the naif quality of GPT-3’s prose, which I understand I tonally provoked with my prompt. It reminds me of how I used to write when I was nine or ten years old. It’s a childlike, bluntly fantastical mode, a sort of playful understatement.
There are a couple flights of whimsy here that truly delighted me. Frankie “The Groin” Gurgleman--talk about a name! And it’s easy to imagine how magnificently awful a song called “Bathroom Break” might be.
Using artificial intelligence to write a story isn’t about pressing a button and sitting back to enjoy the output. It’s far more interesting to engage it as an instrument in a multi-step process. I keep thinking about drum machines. They didn’t replace drummers by any means, but they added a new instrument to the mix and helped artists invent entirely new genres. GPT-3 is like a drum machine for prose.
By pausing the output at certain points, adding more to the mix, then hitting Submit again, I was able to generate a shaggy thing that nevertheless conforms to the classic narrative form of rising action, reversal of fortune, climax, and denouement, if only barely. If the result sounds corny, it’s because the corniness was purposely built in from the beginning.
I’m excited. GPT-3 has opened up a whole new frontier of creative writing. Last night this was just one of the stories I produced. I look forward to sharing more. Subscribe if you haven’t already to see them pop up in your inbox.