Chapter 7

In Chapter 7, the final chapter of “Electronic Literature,” Rettburg discusses the importance of hypertext in the digital age and why electronic literature is not a “replacement” for print literary culture, but instead a form of “extended storytelling” that creates new experiences suitable for digital culture. As he discusses throughout the book, Rettburg reinforces that genres of electronic literature are interchangeable, serving as “building blocks for other forms to follow them” and relying on interaction to function. This interaction is known as “play” and it’s what we’ve been doing every Thursday in this class. Rettburg defines this “play” in Text Rain as “conversation, imagined as a physical act.” I really like this definition of the way readers understand electronic literature. When I think about my major and the study of literature, “physical” is one of the last words I would use to describe English, but electronic literature does require movement, manipulation, and intention in order to be fully grasped. I think it’s a really interesting form of media and I’m glad that I was introduced to it. One of my favorite quotes from the reading was the last line, “Never forget that. Always remember the fun.” It made me appreciate the “play” aspect of electronic literature more and try to not find “meaning” in every piece of work that I look at and instead enjoy the exploration of the work before me.

Rettburg notes that “As technologies complicate the distinction between the map and the territory, and as we increasingly live in a reality in which our movements are virtually mapped and monitored, these locative works provide us with tools to reflect on the meaning of mapping in our everyday lives.” Something that I took away from this quote is that the media reflects the age, meaning that new technologies influence the thoughts and ideals of a society. Rettburg remarks that, because of this, we need to preserve electronic literature in the same way we preserve books in libraries. I find it very interesting that databases with the history of electronic literature exist on the Internet to preserve the timeline of advancement in the field, and I’m curious to see what forms of media will exist in future years that will also be preserved for future generations to study.

Lily