tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1162330207530103649.post8183107508748988386..comments2023-07-22T08:53:37.900-06:00Comments on New Media Narratives: Writing and Publishing in a Developing Field: What is a book?Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1162330207530103649.post-10975091851963047652012-01-31T09:30:53.925-07:002012-01-31T09:30:53.925-07:00I'm not familiar with the books you reference,...I'm not familiar with the books you reference, so read a few reviews on Hopscotch. Its different pathways and voices sound foreign film-like to me; also more like the way we experience life - learning things years later about people that alter what we thought of them at the time, things that disorient us because they alter what we took for truth - auntie so and so gave up a child for adoption, so and so is really her mother and not her sister, Newt Gingrich had an affair - okay, some things are less surprising than others. <br /><br />Maybe hypertext is giving us back some traditions we've lost - the notion of fixed text between editions and copyright versions of things that cannot be altered is a relatively new phenomenon. I think it was Dickens who would drive his publishers mad because he would sell one version of his story to one and another version to someone else. And the ability to create our own texts harkens back to the former practice of commonplace books, where people transcribed passages of books they found thought provoking, creating their own 'book' over time. Robert Darnton argues that we are overemphasizing the shift from text printed on paper to digital text; here's a link to an interview he did with Publisher's Weekly after the release of his book, The Case for Books: Past, Present, and Future. He is by no means dystopian about the future of the book and embraces the e-book as it could be, but has some thoughtful perspectives on books of the past and cautions us not to lose sight of the journey of the book. <br /><br />http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/20090914/451-on-the-ropes-robert-darnton-s-case-for-books-.htmlJudith Dyckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02187881191079129428noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1162330207530103649.post-16129039956283372962012-01-29T19:50:46.739-07:002012-01-29T19:50:46.739-07:00Very interesting and reflective post Judith. I'...Very interesting and reflective post Judith. I'm thinking of GISELLE BEIGUELMAN's The Book after the Book (http://www.virtualart.at/database/general/work/the-book-after-the-book.html).<br />I'm also thinking about that idea that 19th C books were "static" in that sense that we could go back to a chapter (as you explain). But, what about other books and stories like Hopscotch (1963) by Julio Cortázar, Invisible Cities (1972) by Italo Calvino, Life: A User's Manual (1978) by Georges Perec and If on a winter's night a traveler (1979) by Italo Calvino. These are just some stories, especially Hopscotch, where the author deliberately tries to prevent the reader from retracing her/his steps. Similarly with Calvino and Perec, they wove narratives that encouraged us, as readers, to lose our *spots*. These books too, today, might be said to facilitate a game-like experience.<br /><br />I also love your Zen haiku rather than the usual Microsoft error message. We should be able to download an app that changes all computer errors (and 404s) to that!Dr. Jessica Laccettihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12820510348273741004noreply@blogger.com