dd:
How did you start writing hypertext and what does it
mean to you?
DL: I started out
wondering about ways to show connections without words. How
could you show the secrets in a town where no one is willing
to talk about them? How could you depict the secret longings
of a Pastor's Wife for the life of a saloon girl? How could
you show how the memories in a place get tangled up in time?
Certainly not with a linear, page by page presentation. So I
created a physical hypertext of an old west town. But
physical presentations harbor a multitude of limitations. I
transferred the thing to a computer, and crafted Marble
Springs (using Hypercard, available from
Eastgate).
Hypertext, more than
anything else, means connections. It isn't the link, the
portals from page to page, but the meaning, the connection,
of the link, the WHY this word becomes a door, what is on
the other side of the door, and why the two are related.
This is a relationship without words.
Digital literature merges
images and text and sound in the same way. It is the meaning
behind the juxtaposition that can come through, and this is
only been made possible through a computer.
dd:
Hypertext is all about link and link is all about
alternatives and free choice. What does this mean to you as
reader and as author of hypertext?
DL: Hypertext
isn't all about links any more than books are all
about paper. Yes, the hypertext uses a link to show
relationships, but there needs to be something there for
these relationships. Hypertext is about using the technology
in new and interesting ways to create meaning.
I read hypertexts for what
they are saying--or trying to say--. As a reader, I don't
like works that hide behind the technology and refuse to
give me a story or paint a picture or intrigue my thoughts.
We need to use the technology because it is the only --or
the best-- way to say something. Not because it is
there.
dd:
You have been writing hypertext for more than a dozen years
now. Do you think this technology does to any extent affect
the topic of what is written with it?
DL: I don't think it
affects the topic as much as it affects how material is
written. There are things that you can do in StorySpace, for
example, that you can't do on the web (names of links,
mulitiple links from one word, programmable links, levels of
nodes). In Samplers, I took advantage of StorySpace
to put shadow stories in the names of the links. I can't do
that on the web, but in Disappearing Rain, I linked
to other websites, drawing them into the work.
There are also wonderful,
obsolete programs that can do many more things than the
web--HyperCard allowed programming to such an extent that
you could create virtual worlds--as I did in Marble
Springs. Myst even used Hypercard to program the
effects and keep track of the action. Ahh, we need to find
ways NOT to lose the incredible programs and spaces in the
rush to new technology.
Anyway, it's not topic as
much as it is technique and how you tell the tale. I've read
incredible stories on paper and rotten stories on paper.
Likewise, I've read great stuff and horrible stuff on disk
and in Storyspace and on the web.
dd:
You have published your works with Eastgate Systems, which
now sells it on diskettes. Does this form of trade pay the
rent? What future lies in the net where, as Stephan King has
shown us, one can publish and earn independently from
publisher houses?
DL: Well, first off,
does writing really pay the rent? The median income for a
linear writer is $5,000 a year--and that includes Stephen
King's income. So... no, writing does not pay the rent. We
are still working on business models--what works for an
author who sells millions does not work for a poet who sells
hundreds. We need to find ways to write and get groceries at
the same time--quite a challenge.
***
dd:
Mark Bernstein's keynote at Hypertext Conference 1999 was
entitled "Where Are The Hypertexts?" He then presented quite
a lot of hypertexts including the precursors in the realm of
book. However, the more important and more problematic
question remains: Where are the readers of
hypertext?
DL: Well, this is
sort of a trick question, along the lines of "where are the
believers?" Believers in what, we have to ask first of all.
If by readers we mean where are the critical academic folks
who are reading this for a class, for a thesis, for further
expanding our lit crit, they are alive and well in the
worldwide academia. More and more universities are teaching
digital literature, more and more students are discovering
it. If by readers we mean where are the digital literati,
the avant garde experimentors, they are on the web using
Shockwave 8 files and having fun. Too many --far too many--
sites to keep track of are popping up for digital arts and
literature.
If however, we mean, where
are the readers who would pick up these books for fun and
while away an evening sitting by the firelight of their
computer reading a digital work of literature, then I would
have to say that I don't see them on the scene yet. I don't
know of any hypertext readers groups that meet regularly but
I know of so many readers groups that meet to discuss other
works of literature. (Please let me know if you know of any
--again, I could be way out of the loop.)
Where are these guys? We are
tracking phantoms here, and I don't know if I would
recognize this mythic reader or not. (I have had some emails
with "just regular folk" looking for hypertext, have
referred them to 253,
Lies,
Same
Day Test,
Ferris
Wheels and other
"comfortable, easy introductions," and have had them
correspond with me, looking for more and talking about the
works. So these folks do exist, it's just that I don't see
them in the grocery store purusing the latest from the
Iowa Review Web.
There are many labyrinths in
which these people could be lost:
1. Lost in
access
Many of these readers have
busy lives and can't be playing on the web looking for
underground URLs. Their fireplaces and bathtubs are very
comfortable--what do we offer to entice them to sit at a
screen to read? How are they finding out about what we
offer? They aren't.
We need to publicize digital
literature and explain what it is and why it is worthwhile.
Organizations like the Electronic
Literature Organization
and trAce
are reaching out to writers and readers, exploring this new
medium. We need to do a lot more outreach.
We need to bring access to
these folks. The epub movement, which has exploded at a rate
a wee bit faster than the first internet explosion, will
surely help us there. They are developing electronic readers
you can carry and read easily, new business models for
downloading works for lower prices than for physical media,
drumming up business for reading on screen. The digital
literature community needs to sit up, take notice, and join
in.
2. Lost in
expectations
A long time ago, we thought
we had the "lost in hyperspace" problem licked. Readers
weren't getting lost, says our usability testing. They are
finding the information they need, thank you very much.
Yet the anecdotal evidence I
have is that readers are still having trouble dealing with
expectations such as "Where's the plot? Where are the
characters?" (Two recent ELO chats mentioned this: May 13
Teaching
HT and Aug 19
Digital
storytelling on the web.
I have not heard of or seen
papers on lost in expectations--or usability testing for
enjoying a hyperfiction. I am not really in the loop, so if
these papers are out there, please let me know.
3. Lost in
complexity
Many of the digital works we
have now are masters of complexity. The story (and people in
the story) break up, apart, under, down, and over without
warning. Dedicated readers spend years figuring out one
story. Well, imagine a world where we have Kafka's full span
of works, Joyce's Finnegan's Wake, Pynchon's V, Kerouac on
some good drugs with fancy equipment, a couple of dime
novels, and some grad student work in cinema --and that's
IT. Now, we take a few people from the grocery store, sit
them down with these works, and expect them to have fun,
make sense of the works --and buy more like them. Let me
tell you, it won't happen. We have yet to have the thrilling
storytellers, the romance, the escape that you can get in
paper. We have yet to tell the story simply.
This may be the nature of
the beast. As Michael Joyce said "There is no simple way to
say this." If there were, believe me, we would all be
writing with paper. (Paper is cheaper and faster, you don't
have to explain it to anyone, it's dead easy to program, and
it doesn't crash losing your entire work without backups the
day before a major presentation).
This may be because
literature needs time --we didn't get Shakespeare the decade
after the printing press was invented.
This may be because many of
the hypertext writers are interested in literary theory and
are writing to prove/disprove/reprove points from
theorists--which makes life complicated.
This may also be because we
are so infatuated with the possibilities--FINALLY a way to
say what I want to say how I want to say it --that we get
swept up in the complexities and don't remember the average,
grocery store reader. I try to think about all levels of
readers in my works --from the person opening that first
hypertext and wondering how to use the mouse to the most
sophisticated reader searching for hidden ahas! For example,
you can just put the Samplers disk in the computer, click
twice to load, and then hit return (and continue to hit
return) for a nice, simple reading. Or you can explore the
names of the links for a shadowed, more detailed and
sinister reading. Or you can search for hidden spaces in the
bowels of the program.
4. Lost in
schooling
If you are over 35, then you
didn't grow up with computers and were introduced when your
ways of thinking and gathering information and reading were
set. We learned character, plot, setting, and a strict form
of reader comprehension--and expect that now in our
reading.
The Internet/digital
literature is going through the same generational split as
the automobile, where many who grew up without it refused to
join in, were timid, created laws against it, etc. (Others
in the generation were enthusiasts--I'm not saying that it
is a function of age but an excuse of age). Younger folks
who grew up with the automobile jumped right in their tin
lizzies, honked their horns, and voila. Younger folks who
grew up with the computer don't have the same excuses for
fears and have more expectations for reading and finding
information by clicking through rather than by turning
pages.
dd:
You run the Hypertext Writers' Workshop on the
last four Hypertext-Conferences and invented the
CyberMountain- and Cybercity-Meetings to promote and improve
hyperliteracy and quality hypertext writing. Could you tell
us more, please, about these events? How do they work, and
do they succeed?
DL: Why are there MFA
programs, writer retreats, writer workshops, writer
conferences, writer support groups, etc. everywhere? What is
it about writing that we need to make it a community task
rather than a solitary exercise? I think it is that we need
to find a way to explore new ideas, get fresh perspectives,
react to other people's works, and get reactions to our
own.
All of the events that I
have organized (and am organizing) are designed to help
bring digital writers together in the same way that paper
writers get together. They succeed in many ways: we hone
works, we spark ideas, we write papers (both about the works
and about working with programmers to develop works), we
start projects and organizations (the Electronic Literature
Organization started at CyberMountain), and we lay the
foundation for future collaboration.
I am currently
planning/doing:
CyberFlats
in Denmark August 20-24, 2001. This will bring 10 writers
and 10 programmers together to create tools for writing and
working with literature and beyond. O.W.E.L,
an ELO-sponsored online workshop, where we will look at two
or three works a month and meet in Lingua Moo on the fourth
Saturday of each month to discuss these works. CyberDAC --a
piggyback workshop before the Digital Arts and Culture which
will bring writers and readers together. And of course, the
fifth Hypertext Writers Workshop in conjunction with
HT01.
Also, ELO and
trAce sponsor chats every Sunday for creative writers
and readers to discuss the exciting innovations and
possibilities in hypertext and other forms of electronic
literature. I host the program chats on the first and third
Sundays, which feature special guests from among the leading
lights on the electronic literature world. The schedule for
upcoming chats and archives of previous chats is at:
http://www.eliterature.org/com/index.shtml.
At all of these events, we
welcome writers, readers, programmers, and anyone interested
in Digital Literature, share works and perspectives, and
generally revel in the possibilities of digital
literature.
***
dd:
In your recent stories "Disappearing
Rain"
the college freshman Anna has disappeared and has to be
found. One of the "clues" is an online diary with a list of
actual URLs that point to Anna's interests and suggest how
she might have disappeared. That way the story not only
winds up online somewhere, but you make real websites, e.g.
companies, institutions, into figures in your detective
story without their knowing.
DL: I don't know how
much I want to say without giving away the plot (or some of
the pivotal plots) in Disappearing Rain, but as the
characters determine where Anna has disappeared, they become
more and more engaged with the web. Sophie, the grandmother,
finds ways to intimidate credit card companies and their
conspirators through webcams and other unorthodox methods of
communicating over the web. Anna, Amy's twin sister,
reconfigures the web to join up with Anna. Throughout these
discoveries, readers can link to real world pages (ranging
from Yahoo people search to home pictures of the Yang-tse
River on a GeoCities page).
I integrated the fictional,
surrealistic world of Disappearing Rain and the "real
world" of the internet web sites through links to relevant
web sites. The work thus functions somewhat like a live
action game --you don't really believe that the Sheraton
hotel is Dracula's castle, but you are really running
through the lobby and tipping the bellman for clues. Readers
(I hope) won't (and haven't yet) gone to the webcam at 9th
and Pearl and waited for Sophie's
messages
Disappearing Rain is
meant as a transitory work, an ephemeral comment on the
ephemeral nature of the net. As more and more of the real
world links turn to 404 errors, we lose sight more and more
of Anna. As Amy says, the site is going to move tonight or
tomorrow, so act now.
On a technical/legal note, I
wrote this during the scare last year when the U.S. Court of
Appeals upheld an argument that sites were responsible for
the content of pages that they linked to --and for a while
there, sites were going to be responsible for what sites
linked to them. As the net is in such a state of flux, I
figured that I would provide a snapshot of the web at the
turn of the millenium. This meant notifying over 200
websites that I was linking to their pages. I got some
interesting mail back and posted it on the site
as well.
dd:
This is a striking concept of mixing fiction with reality.
Is "Fictional Reality" the future of "Virtual
Reality"?
DL: Gosh, I hope
not. I hope we can have a thousand and one (or an infinity
and one) ways of playing with reality.
dd:
And how exactly does "Disappearing Rain" work?
DL: Disappearing
Rain, an integrated web fiction, functions on many levels.
On the surface, it is a mystery asking the reader to join in
the family's search for Anna. As we search for Anna, we find
more traces of her family's history and connections with the
web.
The exoskeleton of the
hypertext's multilayered structure shows through as a series
of "kanjikus" --haikus written on the top of Japanese
characters. Each of the kanjikus is thematically related
--so each forms a "chapter" in the hypertext. Each word of
these kanjikus forms the title of a node, thus showing the
structural relationships between the plots and characters.
The work presents a choice of navigation--either to become
immersed in the story and follow thematic connections, to
explore the kanjikus to see the structural connections, or
to go "forwards" and "backwards" on a default story
line.
dd:
How do you see the present and future of the American and
international of hypertext or digital literature
scene?
DL: This is the
brightest of futures, this is the darkest of futures. I
think that digital literature is barely ready for swaddling
clothes compared to what is going to take place in terms of
technology, collaboration, merging with art/sound/text/ and
more. I also think that digital literature may be ready for
burial shrouds if we cannot find a way to work with and
entice readers and interactors in the media. No matter what,
there will always be people who want to play along the edges
of these new toys. The question is, what will the results of
the play be and who will watch it?
dd: We
will watch it. Thank's a lot for the interview.
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