The purpose to my own exploration of Facade is multinatured. As a writer, I am furthering my steps into the world of new media that has lured me beyond the pages and into a moving visual and audio world of story. As with Patrice’s film last night, and those presented at the writers group meeting this past week, I am learning to ask the questions of choice of presentation. My first question from the three films seen at the meeting was "how would you have written this, how would you put into text the overwhelmingly beautiful ballet of five women preparing a meal in a small kitchen?" as seen in Family Tree. Would then the answer be that it was written for film, or enhanced by it?
In Facade, I question at greater depth the possibility that one of the characters, Grace, is lying to us about whether or not she produced the painting on the wall. It is more serious a question than it appears:
If the characters with whom we are interacting in a story are capable of lying, then that adds another dimension to the piece. If it is just another plot–and previously, I had noticed that while new revelations come out in the stageplays (not all is revealed in each) all details were alike, i.e., Grace’s parents are wealthy, Trip had an affair in Barcelona, etc.–that would indicate a different basis of "past" and therefore more paths to take for their future (paths to explore in the game). Or, it could mean that someone messed up in the programming–easy enough to do when so much is going on with producing such a work.
I am currently planning a "pseudohypertext" piece that will be comprised of three stories tied in by the main characters, but it will be done in text–that’s book text–form. Bringing the new technology of something like Facade or interactive fiction back into the old printed page format. Why? ‘Cause I wanna. Obviously for this endeavor I am learning something from Facade as I have learned from Borges’ Garden of Forking Paths.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
Your constant outpouring is beyond belief.
I ask you this: do you belive translations of literature bring the gold to a reader?
How about the Russians? Dostoyevski?
As for my constant outpouring, I am ridiculously quiet in real life, but tend to chatter aimlessly but amicably onto the screen.
To answer your question of translations, I would say yes, to the aspect of it bringing the opportunity of reading anything not in one’s realm of language understanding. To take it further, while nowadays anything can easily be published in many languages, there was a time when only certain classic or historical literature was worth the bother of translation. Dostoyevski, Chekov, heck, the Epic of Gilgamesh, were certainly worth the effort. My question would be how the translations have changed the reading, the story, since no language is strictly translatable to another and thus dependent upon the interpretation of the translator himself. I’ve just mentioned in a prior post on April Fool’s Day how the protagonist, Ivan, freely uses his own philosophical and moral understandings to translate Protestant marriage manuals. How truly wonderful it would be to be able to read literature in its orignally written form.