Reviews essays on statistical analysis of literature from the journal "Computers and the Humanities." Divides the essays into four groups: the philosophical, statistical analyses of language, literary texts, and themes. Questions whether valid statistical analysis of any text must be based on complete linguistic description. Emphasizes…

Compares the success of lexical statistics, content analysis, and function words in determining the true author of "The Federalist." The function word approach proved most successful in attributing the papers to James Madison. Lexical statistics contributed nothing, while content analytic measures resulted in some success. (MJP)