A text comprehension and retrieval method and apparatus that uses semantic analysis (124) of the syntax between letters in two words to measure to what degree two words are related. Semantic analysis involves assigning numerical values to the letters of a first word and a second word based on the dual characteristics of orientation and category inherent in the letters, and then analyzing those numerical values to identify the semantic relationship of the letters of the first word to the letters of the second word. A semantic-matrix (200) assigns weights to meaningful letters to allow the application of letter semantic rules to convert the concepts represented by the letters of the words to numeric values (128). The numeric values represent how much the first word is related to the second word and are used to retrieve text (132) from documents having concepts related to user supplied query expression.
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