What does Pi have to do with Poe?
Besides the fact that I really like pie (especially pumpkin or pecan!) and find Poe stories to be intriguing...nothing, really. At least, nothing on the surface.
Mathematician, software engineer, and author Mike Keith enjoys blending his passions by applying mathematics to music and the English language, the latter of which led to his interest in Pilish.
What is Pilish? Pilish is one approach to the idea of constrained writing where the writing adheres to a pattern based upon Pi. To write in Pilish, each word's letter count must match with the numbers found in Pi.
For example, Keith rewrote Poe's The Raven using Pilish. It begins:
"Poe, E.
Near a Raven
Midnights so dreary, tired and weary."
If you count the letters in each word and put them together, you have 3(.)1415926535. The first eleven digits of Pi!
You can find the entire Near A Raven poem and its 740 digits of Pi here. Keith also wrote Cadaeic Cadenza, another Pilish piece that uses nearly 4,000 digits of Pi. (Cadaeic Cadenza is a collection of shorter pieces modeled off of other popular texts; part one is Near A Raven.)
Perhaps a little something to tuck away for March 14th...(Is it too early to start planning?)
If you're intrigued, here are Keith's guidelines for writing in Pilish.
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