On 29 January 2025, the US Authors Guild launched their “Human Authored” project, which allows authors to certify their work is created by a human and not generated by Artificial Intelligence (AI). With the increasing pervasiveness of AI, this allows authors to distinguish their work and confirm that the only use of AI in production is trivial. Currently, it is only available for guild members and for books written by a single author. However, the Guild aims to expand the programme to include works by non-Guild members and multiple authors. To gain the certification authors apply through an online portal and once completed can place the “Human Authored” logo on their book and other promotional objects.
Artificial Intelligence has already had an impact in the creative field, ranging from the translation of works and production of audiobooks to aiding the formulation of first drafts. So, is it that big a step to assume this intelligence could play an even larger role in literature? Could developments lead to AI-independent authorship in the future?
Well, there is widespread acknowledgement that there could be a time when AI will learn to write novels which could be just as compelling as those written by humans but at a fraction of the time. Large Language Models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT, work by being given human texts, identifying patterns and using this to construct their own works.
Even those authors who deliberately resist following patterns in storylines have a kind of recognisable fictional signature. As readers, we enjoy our favourite authors’ ability to surprise us but also their consistency, and it is this consistency which is theoretically replicable. Since novels are words manipulated by an author and these machines are getting pretty good at manipulating words, it is not an unfair assumption to make that AI could threaten the jobs of authors.
Discussion over the impact of AI in literature is not just limited to the US. The UK Government is in consultation with the creative industries, with dialogue specifically focusing on the use of copyrighted work to train generative AI. HarperCollins has already signed a contract with a tech company which allowed access to a limited number of its authors’ books to train LLMs on a trial basis. Additionally, multiple academic publishers have already signed high-paying deals with technology companies which give access to their backlists to LLM chatbots.
The rising role of AI seems daunting, and authors certainly agree. A survey from the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain, published in 2023, revealed 65 per cent of writers thought increased use of AI would reduce their income, and 61 per cent thought AI could replace their jobs. This legitimate fear has led to initiatives like “Human Authored” which seek to protect human authors by distinguishing them from AI. Nevertheless, is it actually possible that AI-authored novels will come to dominate?
In the Booker Prize article “Why AI will never supplant human novelists – or win the Booker Prize,” Ian Leslie argues for the unlikelihood of our novels being produced by AI in the future. AI is described as “backward-looking.” It imitates previous texts written by humans but lacks a certain nuance and clarity. Thus, if everything comes to be based on previous AI-generated undetailed work then eventually it all descends into what some computer scientists called “moral collapse.” Therefore, it is not feasible.
Additionally, AI simply cannot replicate the appeal of a human author’s work. AI does not understand the wealth of the human experience and can only provide prescriptive “answers.” However, readers are looking for both questions and answers. The nature of existence is a mystery and so are many human experiences, including love, hate, desire or pain. It is the very instability, ambiguity and inexplicable nature of this phenomenon which intrigues us and we do not necessarily want an answer, even if there was one. We like the mystery of books. We like speculating what things really mean, for example, what the green light means to Gatsby. AI is simply not able to replicate this because it cannot understand it.
Therefore, by distinguishing non-AI generated works, initiatives like “Human Authored,” aim to protect authors from the rise of technology. However, despite the alarming rise of Artificial Intelligence, it seems unlikely that machines will ever be able to completely replicate the innate appeal that books by human authors contain.