Chapter 3

Chapter 3 in Electronic Literature focuses on hypertext fiction. The interest in hypertext began around the 1980s and grew into the 1990s. The section that interested me was Metafiction and reflexivity. In this section Rettburg discusses the idea of authorial reflexivity and intertextual reflexivity. Authorial reflexivity is related to the appearance of the author that appears within the "enclosed diegetic system" (59). Kurt Vonnegut and John Barth are a few examples of authors who have had characters sharing their name. Rettburg discussed how these authors included characters with their name in order to "serve not only as a form of resistance...but also as a way to break down the structure of relations" (59). Intertextual reflexivity is about the writings relationship with other literary texts. Gulliver's Travels and Breakfast of Champions are a few examples that are related to Intertextual reflexivity. Rettburg states how hypertext "is not only or even primarily a kind of writing. It is more fundamentally a text technology" (62). I thought it was interesting hearing about where hypertext is found including the meaning of HTML and how the "H" means hypertext. The term hypertext was created by Theodor Holm Nelson who defined hypertext as "to mean a body of written or pictorial material interconnected in such a complex way" (64).

The reference I chose was Theodor Nelson's paper "A File Structure for the Complex, the Changing, and the Indeterminate". Nelson is considered an important figure in information technology because his impact towards hypertext. He created the terms hypertext and hypermedia and created Project Xanadu which was the first hypertext project. His paper focuses on the Evolutionary List File (ELF) which is a structure on organizing documents. He organizes ELF into three different groups: entries, lists, and links.  He defines the list as an "ordered set of entries designated by the user" (36). An entry is defined as "a discrete unit of information designated by the user" (35). A link is defined as "a connector, designated by the user" (36).

http://csis.pace.edu/~marchese/CS835/Lec3/nelson.pdf

Tim