READING
HYPERFICTION:
AN ACCOUNT OF A FIRST EXPERIENCE
For starters, I am no longer reading from a tangible, physical copy of
something written or printed, and so I can no longer hold or touch, or smell, or
even taste it (I mean, I could, actually, taste it if I wanted. I had
the choice to do so with the physical copy if I had been bestowed such bizarre
habits) and I also no longer have any use for any of my 200 bookmarks; I
bookmark the hyperfiction by adding it to my “Favourites” menu.
If all this sounds like I loathe the whole idea of hyperfiction
because I believe in the intrinsic worth of the tangible, physical printed
material or because it has made my 200 bookmarks redundant, the truth be told, I
do not. Really! Because as much as hyperfiction has taken away some of
the joy I derive from reading a book (I enjoy holding the physical copy,
being able to touch immediately the text I read. There’s a sense of some kind
of permanence to it. I know I can keep the book, and I can always reach for it
from my shelf, unlike those e-things
that might just disappear on you the very moment you are reading it), and
made me feel those bookmarks were a terrible waste of money, it has,
nevertheless, done some good for the people who live with me.
Reading hyperfiction means I no longer recline on my dad’s (and
mine too!) favourite couch to do my reading; hyperfiction forces me to sit
upright on another chair facing a lit-up screen. My dad wonders why I have
finally ceded the “throne” to him, without so much as a royal fight. Am I
undergoing major stress, too
much work from school, having a change in character? My mom, on the other
hand, no longer has to put up with me leaving my books lying around the house;
digital technology has made that a thing of the past. Now my mom wonders if I am
reading less, have become tidier or that after all these years, her efforts at
making me a neat freak have finally paid off.
But really, my reactions to hyperfiction are more than all this (yeah,
the sighs of relief not least those of mine, are almost audible to me, here, now).
Although for very stubborn and not overly logical reasons the printed word will
always, for me, carry the true meaning of what a book is, (I know, I know, I
can almost see myself stubbornly holding onto the branch of a tree which
represents the book, while the rest of the world rush on past, swept up by the
mighty mighty currents of the electronic wave), I have to admit that there
are texts in hyperfiction form that work pretty well too, and well, can carry
the true meaning I guess of an “e-book” (yeah well, if this word isn’t
already in use, it should be. These days, we attach the prefix ‘e’ to
everything—email, e-space, e-commerce, e-zine…) That hyperfiction is
rather enjoyable reading and pretty successful in its delivery of content I
discovered from reading my first piece of hyperfiction, 24
hours with someone you know… by Philippa J Burne.
Okay, I have to admit that it is not really my first, although it is
my first complete one. What happened was, I tried to read some
of the recommended hyperfiction but I found I just couldnt’t! I
couldn’t read Twelve
Blue by Michael Joyce because I could not put up with the font and
background colours of the text, having to read page after page of bright blue
words on a navy blue background was too painful an experience for my eyes (already
they are hurting from all this reading off a computer screen). I also could
not read The
Colour of Television by Stuart Moulthrop and Sean Cohen because I didn’t
understand the basis of some of the connections the writers made between certain
hyperlinks and the pages they linked me up with.
As for The
Buddha Smiled by Pratik Kanjilal, I think I just could not comprehend the
text, or the context of it at all (I’m not a very literary person, you can
tell.)
Hence, I settled for 24
hours with someone you know by Philippa J Burne which is written very much
in the same vein as “Choose your own adventure” stories that have been
around long ago in the printed form. As is typical of such types of stories, the
reader is given some sort of identity and is oriented into the story by a
description of the setting one is immediately found in. At the end of the
description, the reader is offered two or more choices. The reader then decides
and clicks on the link he/she wishes to follow which then takes him/her to
another site and the story develops. Again, at the end of a certain description
of an event, or place, the reader is given yet other links/options and in this
manner, he/she chooses how the story proceeds.
And so I found I was Jess’s cousin and that I had come looking for
her because there are some things I should have told her at some earlier point
but that I did not. I meet her friends, get to know a bit of their lifestyle,
engage in some activities with them and
maybe I would have actually met her
except that I did not follow certain links that might have led me up that path.
What I did and where I went and consequently how the story developed
depended on my choice of links at every stage of the story and therein lies the
beauty and importance of the hyperlink as a reading tool. From one single
starting point, all of us readers of this text could branch off on ten thousand
different routes and we may encounter different or the same people who may,
depending on where we meet them exhibit very dissimilar aspects of their
characters, or find ourselves at different places like the pub or the library or
the park. We may have been moving around in a group or alone and at the end of
the journey, we may or may not have had the same experiences. All this, and only
with the mere clicking of the mouse.
Although it is a general feature of “choose your own adventure”
stories that we can chart our own journeys and that each reader’s path is
totally different from another or even from himself if the routes taken are
changed, the broader range of choices and ease with which to navigate through
these choices aren’t. The plots and hence the various ways of developing the
story in “Choose your own adventure” stories in the print form are limited
by the pages between the covers so that if in the print form we get ten choices,
in the hyperfiction form, there is room for many times that. The latter form
also allows new destinations to be endlessly created for us simply with the
provision of more choices and more links (more, we want more! What we have
now is not enough, never enough) which the writer can provide at his
convenience (no, we are not at the mercy of the writer. We just shouldn’t
impose on him/her. It isn’t good manners) at any time without having to
recall physical copies of his work and making the new additions and having them
published all over again.
Of course hyperfiction, like so many other things that the advances in
computer technology have brought us, is able to do more. Just as an example,
apart from being an excellent text form for “Choose your own adventure”
stories, hyperfiction could too be a very valuable text form for classic
literary fiction because entire chunks of information about the work or its
author or related works could now be summoned to your screen just by a single
movement of your left index finger.
The hyperfiction text, 24
hours with someone you know…and the choices of plot development it offers
with the use of hyperlinks is only an instance of, and a microcosmic one, of the
crucial importance of hyperlinks in the new way of reading, brought about by the
present digital age. Reading now is a whole new experience involving a very
different approach and demanding an equally different attitude from the reader.
Hyperlinks provide me with choices I did not have with the linear, sequential
and therefore inflexible printed book.
With hyperfiction, I do not necessarily have to read a piece of
fiction from beginning to end because at certain junctures, I am presented with
choices to leave the main text to read about or even take a look at some place
or character or event described in it. Gone are the days when I have to get
myself to the library or the bookstore to get information I needed or visualize,
with as much imaginative powers as I have been blessed with and be damned when
they fail me, just the place being written about in a piece of writing (never
mind that I may not again enjoy the sheer pleasure of letting my imagination run
wild and preserve a sense of mystery, suspense and apprehension about the world.
Whyever would I want that? Wouldn’t I want to rid the fear of the unknown?
Seriously but seriously? I don’t. I enjoy all the shocks and surprises life
has to offer. I am one of those give-me-a-chance-to-take-on-the-world
types, I suppose).
But no, I have the choice now, with ease and convenience, to access
such information and pictures with the click of a button! How easy! I
also have the choice now to not return to the main text with which I started and
instead roam from the site I was first linked to, to other sites of interest to
me (why did I even bother with the main text, it’s not what I want, its
REAL value was only in helping me get somewhere else, isn’t that what it’s
all about?). I am given choices (and, oh, what a world of difference that
makes!) I am the new (and they will tell you, improved) reader.
Now, in this wonderful age of such advanced and modern technology, I
can click to wherever I want. I have freedom of choice. I am empowered. This
is liberation. Or am I missing something here?