1 month ago
42
Hi r/literature ,
I’ve been getting into reading texts from Project Gutenberg recently, (just read Count of Monte Cristo, now reading Brother’s Karamazov). I’m enjoying that everything is free and accessible but sometimes struggle with the following challenges:
Due to the nature of everything being older English translations, sometimes things can be hard to follow or understand. For example in Brother’s Karamazov there are plenty of biblical references that go over my head as well as historical references (Napoleon) in the Count of Monte Cristo
For foreign translated books or lengthy ones (definitely applies to Monte Cristo and Brother’s Karamazov) keeping track of numerous character names and relationships is onerous.
Due to the length of the books, losing context when picking up a book after a long break can be annoying.
I’ve started working on a tool that:
- Allows you to ask questions about the text you’re reading to an AI and ensure that the answers you receive will be spoiler free.
- Creates a character map of the text up to the point that you’ve read, displaying all the characters and the interactions between them.
- Gives you a log of your past reading sessions and a short summary of what happened in the book in each session.
Here are some screenshots that explains what this looks like
Asking questions about the text inline without spoilers - https://imgur.com/a/V8sDzxw
The dashboard displaying a character map and my past reading sessions.- https://imgur.com/a/R2jYAGE
I’m trying my best such that the answers don’t spoon feed or sparknot-ify the text. I don’t want an AI telling me how to interpret a book I want to enjoy, I just want it to help me dispel any confusion I might have.
I'd greatly appreciate your thoughts on if any of you would find something like this useful or if you’ve found other ways to deal with these problems!
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