2.4 Comparisons

One of the principal features of this program is its ability to enable comparisons of vocabulary between various corpora. This allows the user to compare: i) the complete works of various authors ii) various collections of texts from a particular author iii) individual texts from one author as compared to various other authors. The amount of vocabulary under study can be determined by the user: a study of the total vocabulary, several word classes (only the main parts of speech), or restricted to one e.g. nouns. Over and above this, there are options which allow the user to further refine the degree of comparison to be undertaken.

The value of vocabulary comparisons within one source can be demonstrated by examining the relatively small corpus left by Trakl. So even a comparison of vocabulary contained in the only two publications which occurred during Trakl's lifetime - the collections "Gedichte" und "Sebastian im Traum" can yield useful results. These texts are both roughly the same size but exhibit a tendency to diverge in both theme and style. (There follows an example: cf. 3. below). From this it is obvious that these tools can provide greater results when applied to the works of someone as prolific as Goethe. Tools of comparison as envisaged here may perhaps be able to provide data on the difference in his early works and those of later life. Up till now this has only be achieved on the basis of single words or phrases.

If the corpus is extended sufficiently, a multitude of possibilities to examine and compare authors, and even epochs, will ensue.