The literary imagination may take flight on the wings of metaphor, but hard-headed scientists are just as likely as doe-eyed poets to reach for a metaphor when the descriptive need arises. Metaphor is a pervasive aspect of every genre of text and every register of speech, and is as useful for describing the inner workings of a "black hole" (itself a metaphor) as it is the affairs of the human heart. The ubiquity of metaphor in natural language thus poses a significant challenge for Natural Language Processing (NLP) systems and their builders, who cannot afford to wait until the problems of literal language have been solved before turning their attention to figurative phenomena. This book offers a comprehensive approach to the computational treatment of metaphor and its figurative brethren-including simile, analogy, and conceptual blending-that does not shy away from their important cognitive and philosophical dimensions. Veale, Shutova, and Beigman Klebanov approach metaphor from multiple computational perspectives, providing coverage of both symbolic and statistical approaches to interpretation and paraphrase generation, while also considering key contributions from philosophy on what constitutes the "meaning" of a metaphor. This book also surveys available metaphor corpora and discusses protocols for metaphor annotation. Any reader with an interest in metaphor, from beginning researchers to seasoned scholars, will find this book to be an invaluable guide to what is a fascinating linguistic phenomenon.

To what extent can Cognitive Linguistics benefit from the systematic study of a creative phenomenon like humor? Although the authors in this volume approach this question from different perspectives, they share the profound belief that humorous data may provide a unique insight into the complex interplay of quantitative and qualitative aspects of meaning construction.

Creativity is a highly-prized quality in any modern endeavor, whether artistic, scientific or professional. Though a much-studied subject, and the topic of a great many case-studies, the field of creativity research is still very much an open one. Creativity remains a field where absolute definitions hold very little water, and where true insight can only emerge when we properly appreciate - from a nuanced, multi-disciplinary perspective - the crucial distinction between the producer's perspective and the consumer's perspective. Theories that afford us a critical appreciation of a creative work do not similarly afford a explanatory insight into the origins and development of the work. As researchers, we must approach creativity both as producers - to consider the vast search-spaces that a producer encounters, and to appreciate the need for heuristic strategies for negotiating this space - and as consumers, to appreciate the levels of shared knowledge (foreground and background) that is exploited by the producer to achieve a knowingly creative effect in the mind of the consumer. This volume thus brings together both producers and consumers in a cross-disciplinary exploration of this complex, many-faceted phenomenon.

Computational creativity is an emerging field of research within AI that focuses on the capacity of machines to both generate and evaluate novel outputs that would, if produced by a human, be considered creative. This book is intended to be a canonical text for this new discipline, through which researchers and students can absorb the philosophy of the field and learn its methods. After a comprehensive introduction to the idea of systematizing creativity the contributions address topics such as autonomous intentionality, conceptual blending, literature mining, computational design, models of novelty, evaluating progress in related research, computer-supported human creativity and human-supported computer creativity, common-sense knowledge, and models of social creativity. Products of this research will have real consequences for the worlds of entertainment, culture, science, education, design, and art, in addition to artificial intelligence, and the book will be of value to practitioners and students in all these domains.

To what extent can Cognitive Linguistics benefit from the systematic study of a creative phenomenon like humor? Although the authors in this volume approach this question from different perspectives, they share the profound belief that humorous data may provide a unique insight into the complex interplay of quantitative and qualitative aspects of meaning construction.

"The Orchard" is a satirical critique of modern life written in the form of a novel. The art scene is where it all begins but Tony Veale's story soon reaches out to embrace the madness of media, politics and celebrity-inspired hysteria. The book chronicles the rise and fall of Matt Flight, an idealistic young artist who believes he can change the world. With a cast of characters like a page from the Theatre of the Absurd, "The Orchard" rattles along at an unremitting pace. Here, you may read of the pitifully washed-out nostalgist Cyril Pout; the camp and outrageous couturier Willie Fitz; the sex-crazed janitor Gittins; the devious art-market-fixers Bernie Feltz and Sylvester Rich; the singing Police Chief Buller and his agony-aunt friend Dame Bradstock; and the American tycoon Hiram Grouper and his English butler Sir Harvey Haugh. Only Matt's girlfriend Holly Tree is with him for more than the ride. Knowing and worldly-wise, she believes she can steer him through the madness he has unleashed.