LITR 4533:
TRAGEDY

Genre Presentation 2000

Ava Zinn

Hypertext Fiction

(aka hyperfiction, interactive literature, nonlinear fiction)

Definitions:

  • "Hyperfiction is a new art form that while not necessarily made possible by the computer was certainly made feasible by it. Its creators make use of hypertext….to create fiction with many features uncharacteristic of print fiction: multiple paths through the same text; multiple endings (and beginnings); questions posed to the reader which, once answered, influence what the reader will read; audiovisual attachments; navigable maps; and so on and so on." --Michael Shumate, fiction writer and developer of Hyperizons Web site for hypertext fiction.http://www.duke.edu/~mshumate/hyperfic.html
  • "Interactive fiction has found its way into the curricula of English and writing departments at many colleges…It was Michael Joyce, however, who really opened up the electronic frontier to serious writing, blazing the hypertrail in literature with afternoon, a story (completed in 1987)." --Robert Kendall "Writing for the New Millennium." From Poets & Writers Magazine (Nov./ Dec. 1995).

http://wordcircuits.com/kendall/essays/pw1.htm

 

  • "Readers…now make their own books out of the materials the author has

prepared, becoming in a real sense co-authors of the work. [Michael] Joyce and

[Jay] Bolter…spent a number of years creating Storyspace, a program which significantly lowered the technical barriers to writing hypertext fiction…Hypertexts received their first review in what is surely the most ‘important’ review medium in the United States, the New York Times Book Review (1992)."

Howard Becker "A New Art Form: Hypertext Fiction" literary critic http://www.lsweb.sscf.ucsb.edu/depts/soc/faculty/hbecker/lisbon.html

Related genres: fiction, poetry, drama, encyclopedias

Representational genre: single voice, dialogue, narrator + dialogue

Narrative genre: tragedy, comedy, romance, satire

Example: excerpt from Marble Springs by Deena Larsen

Highlights of example: choices for the reader: directory, map, help reading, character connections, help, home, previous, next, description of the cabin

Additional examples: afternoon, a story; The Company Therapist

Questions: 1. What problems do you anticipate in using hypertext in the classroom?

2. Why are many avid readers still unaware of this new genre?