Interesting dilemma today. There’s a story sitting in Storyspace that I’ve pulled and nudged and felt and yet it’s not working for some reason. It has depth, it has some serious meaning, and yet to get it to move is like pulling taffy. It shouldn’t need so much manipulation to grow, like a hot house orchid. It should have its own genetic code, recognize what it needs to be, be comfortable in and have an understanding of its medium, live its life, solve its conflicts, and approach its natural death or ending with dignity. It seems instead that I’m whispering in its ear, telling it what it might consider doing. At least in hypertext I can offer it choices. Even then, it’s like a stubborn cranky child. Maybe like me.
There is another story that’s just sort of a fun thing and it knows where it needs to be. It is a hypertext as well, but it belongs in Hypertextopia. It is not a complex story and while it might benefit from the interesting trails of Storyspace capabilities–does the tiger kill and eat the lady? does she fall in love with it and they take off to Tahiti?–the more simple blips of background following along a more linear telling with perhaps some silliness in between, is more perfectly suited to the Hypertextopia form.
There’s another idea floating that’s begs for straight traditional text, and not because of its linearity as much as the fact that it wants straightforward telling. It wants a fast and clear comprehension and it doesn’t want any argument.
Do we creat a story to suit a format? Yes, but a story also seeks its own level of telling.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology