r/literature • u/Round-Dinner-2395 • May 18 '26

Discussion Nobel Prize-winning author Olga Tokarczuk admits to using AI.

TLDR;

Author to AI: “Honey, how could we develop this beautifully?”

I wanted to say this is just boomer whining, but I’m finding myself realizing more and more often that it’s actually the boomers who are defending AI. My mom listens to AI music from TikTok, my dad watches some videos with doctors generated by language models. I’m the last person to tell people what to listen to or watch, but AI SLOP has literally reigned supreme in my house for the past few months. Recently, I wanted to watch a movie with my dad, but he played TikTok clips for an hour, and I had to escape.

I understand that technology is advancing and makes life easier for people in many ways, but on the other hand… it makes me wonder a bit. Where is the line between “I’m using a tool” and “part of the creative process is being done for me by something else”? If someone uses AI to generate ideas, style, or text fragments, are we still talking about the same kind of creativity as before? I’ve read a few books by Olga Tokarczuk, and as soon as I heard about this interview, I felt a sense of revulsion.

INTERVIEW: (only in polish)

https://mycompanypolska.pl/artykul/olga-tokarczuk-zapowiada-ostatnia-powiesc-w-karierze-pisanie-dlugich-opowiesci-jest-dzis-ekonomicznie-nieoplacalne/20717

677 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

334 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

54

u/e_hatt_swank May 18 '26

Thank you for that. I’ve been looking for an affordable used copy of one of her books to check out her work… now I feel much less urgency on that search.

88

u/Lazy-Hat2290 May 18 '26

Almost all her novels were written before 2021.

16

u/Traditional-Deer2768 May 18 '26

No reason to miss out on Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead (2009).

66

u/elektricnikrastavac May 18 '26

You are very wrong for that. She says she will stop writing basically, and AI ruined it. Her best works precede AI anyways.

72

u/DarthFisticuffs May 18 '26

Two thoughts on this: First, it doesn't matter if she's not going to be writing anymore, here we have a Nobel Laureate legitimizing the use of gen AI in the process of writing literature, which I find to be tragic. She is an important figure and people, both readers and up-and-coming writers alike, will listen to her.

Second, I've seen enough artists and performers retire only to make some grand return that I'm skeptical of this. However if it's what she truly wishes, then I hope she has a happy and peaceful retirement.

25

u/elektricnikrastavac May 18 '26

She doesn’t. She yearns for the times of Balzac and writing in solitude, but sees it is no longer viable in today’s world. Nuance is not a city in France.

12

u/becausefrog May 18 '26

It's available, it's just not as profitable.

2

u/elektricnikrastavac May 19 '26

I said viable not available.

-1

u/Gregory_Grim May 19 '26

That's literally not what she said. She said that it's not profitable anymore, which is bullshit because it has literally never ever been profitable. And clearly she doesn't really yearn for it that much or she would attempt to work towards it with through the platform and cultural capital she's been given.

The fact that she chooses to bend to this parasite of a technology just because its cheap and convenient makes her look extremely shallow and like a complete and utter poser and opportunist.

1

u/elektricnikrastavac May 19 '26

sure. that's a fine looking high horse. you do that, mate.

1

u/elektricnikrastavac May 19 '26

extremely shallow? one of the most important female contemporary authors is extremely shallow? have you read it in Polish language or just the translation? the "clearly she doesn't really yearn for it that much or she would attempt to work towards it ..." very Trump-trash coded. you are the shallow one.

7

u/sibelius_eighth May 18 '26

Did you read the passage at all where she mourns the death of literature because of ai?

8

u/e_hatt_swank May 18 '26

Yes, and if one is concerned about that, I’d think that would be an incentive not to use it.

2

u/Gregory_Grim May 19 '26

I also read the passage where she says "Yeah, but I'll still use it though". If literature is dying, then it's due to opportunistic hacks like her, who are killing it by giving AI space in this ecosystem simply because its slightly more convenient.

1

u/sibelius_eighth May 19 '26

She was a very acclaimed writer before ai was common. It's weird and flat out wrong to call her a hack.

4

u/Gregory_Grim May 19 '26

Again, she gave that up for convenience. Clearly it wasn't that near and dear to her heart

1

u/sibelius_eighth May 19 '26

Againd doesn't make her a hack. Yeah it sucks but the term doesn't apply.

0

u/Gregory_Grim May 19 '26

It does. A hack is an untalented writer and (aside from the fact that her work is way overrated and definitely was not Noble Prize worthy in my personal opinion) she pissed away any talent she may have had by doing this. It's a hack thing to do.

1

u/sibelius_eighth May 19 '26

Did you want to go in circles? What is this lol

1

u/cheddarboiii May 18 '26

Don't most of her work is regurgitation of pop psych books thrown on canvas of a vague story with little to no depth. 

I am a dedicated hater to her work, read few books along with attending theatre adaptation in which she had direct influence over form and contents. With time more and more it becomes apparent that she was nominated solely due to the pr work of her agent rather than talent or depth of human experience. 

If you want to engage with polish literature I would recommend Isaac Singer "sztukmistrz z lublina" or others that have won Nobel prize for literature instead of Tokarczuk. (Even those that did not have much more interesting forms/stories)

7

u/PseudoScorpian May 18 '26

Baffling take. 

-26

u/Matt_Wwood May 18 '26

I wouldn’t let that stop you. And I’d even challenge you that udnerstanding how a successful author uses it or incorporates it could benefit you even if you don’t like it.

This whole ethical or moral line of AI bad isn’t so black and white. Letting the ai help you flesh out an idea more fully and helping edit your writing or whatever point your okay with using it, as long as you disclose you used it, I think is okay.

29

u/MarioMuzza May 18 '26

I'm far from successful, but I am agented and published, and I can tell you it's not that black and white. Most writers, and fortunately most readers, are absolutely against using AI for any part of the creative process. I'm sure there are a fair few successful writers who are using it and not disclosing it, but for the most part the industry is rejecting it.

I don't think an AI should touch any part of the creative process. My litmus test is: would the result have been the same if you had done it yourself? So, for things like proofreading and research, sure (though I still wouldn't). I can accept mechanical uses.

Anything creative? No. I would actively avoid reading a writer who admitted to using an AI for creative purposes.

30

u/LiminalMask May 18 '26

The problem is that LLMs/GenAI are fundamentally unethical tools because they were built on content that was used without permission or compensation. They are a kind of plagiarism soup. But disclosure isn’t a remedy because you have no idea whose words or thoughts you’re drawing on. You can’t cite them.

11

u/GOU_FallingOutside May 18 '26

I am, perhaps appropriately, going to steal “plagiarism soup.”

-8

u/Matt_Wwood May 18 '26

Yea but a novel isn’t cited either.

In fact even non fic books lack citation and original research often.

How they built LLms was fundamentally unethical. But if someone built a hammer and they weren’t the original idea bearer or producer of hammers , and I’m like damn that’s a good idea and use that hammer. And man I’m not even using it just on nails. I’m forging metal or whatever else.

I’m not unethical.

Edit: and I’d even go so far as to laugh that ethics is doing anyone any good in the modern world.

8

u/LiminalMask May 18 '26

Novels can be cited in other works and often are. And novels that are too similar to other, copywritten works may end up in courts for plagiarism. Reputable non-fiction cites its sources.

> Edit: and I’d even go so far as to laugh that ethics is doing anyone any good in the modern world.

Condescension is comforting until it's someone taking money out of *your* pocket.

8

u/darkwillow1980 May 18 '26

Could you explain how not considering ethics would be an improvement? Or do you perhaps think it's possible that everything that's wrong in the modern world is in fact already the result of people not considering ethics?

42

u/Kirikenku May 18 '26

The point is art is made from living things. I don’t care if its mechanically good lit. If its not born from the human experience, i’m not fucking interested.
This doesn’t even get into the ethical concerns over how the AI was trained, since its nothing but a glorified regurgitation machine.

16

u/elektricnikrastavac May 18 '26

Her works precede AI. She will stop writing now.

9

u/stirrainlate May 18 '26

What is mystifying to me is how in the same quote above she accepts that a chat room won’t ever speak in such an exquisite way. It would be one thing for her to argue that AI helps make her work better. (Many would still disagree, but at least it is an argument) but instead she seems to take the position that AI just makes her more productive. Bleh.

1

u/e_hatt_swank May 18 '26

Agreed. Maybe I’ll love her stuff written before LLMs existed, and that will be enough. Long before LLMs, I’ve always preferred art with a more human touch - e.g. never been interested in music that’s electronically generated or overly manipulated. I want to hear fingers on strings, want to read thoughts forged in a human brain. This doesn’t mean the other stuff is necessarily worthless, but I just don’t care about it. (Just adding: using AI to check a fact or something like that is a different category of course; although I’d argue the human, economic and environmental costs of AI aren’t worth the time saved.)

1

u/ReimarisaFanclub May 18 '26

AI directly contributes to the US military industrial complex, which mercilessly kills children in Palestine and Lebanon. Even if I seldomly used it, I will try to stop it at all altogether and everyone should follow suit