Hypercompendia

Probably due to some heavy pressure and rolling his eyes as he reads, Steve Ersinghaus has been kind enough to take a look at the Paths project and has some nice words to say about it at his site. 

No, he wasnt’ paid, but we do try to help each other out when we can and I sincerely appreciate his willingness to put some time in amid his super busy schedule. 

What we’re going to have to do is put some thought behind understanding the nature of the beast, and focus on who a writer of hypertext plays to, what audience would be interested in the reading of hypertext if they knew about it, and what makes it easier to transition from volume of pages to CD and screen.

An interesting thought this morning brought about by once again working on Paths:  Two of the stories are in third person, two are in first (that’s it for now, though I’m considering adding a chorus).  The stories may seem to conflict with each other not only in perspective and recall, but in fact based on choice.

So who is the more credible, the third person narrator, or the first person characters as they tell the story themselves?  Is there, not a standard, but an edge that one has over the other?  Are there stats on readers’ opinion?  Is it pov that’s a viable source for belief or the characters as they establish themselves? 

On the one hand, we can say that the narrator is relating a story from a neutral stand.  But how much have the characters let him in on, how far into their minds have they granted him access?  His own take on things may be wrong, having based his narrative on how he’s reading the characters.  And, he may lie.

In the first person, again, there is clearly perspective that colors story.  That, and a tendency and ability on the speaker’s part to put himself in the best possible light, make himself the worst of the victims, the hardiest of heroes, the most noble of thieves.  And, he may lie.

Interesting point to consider when writing in multiple pov, particularly in hypertext. 

I’m done.  No, I’m not.  I’m done.  No, I’m not.  I’ve never been so unsure. 

Going through the architecture of this piece, brick by brick, I find a question, a gap in the mortar so to speak:  Who is Andrew?  Why’d Anne marry him–if, in fact, she did? Why back to Boston?  Why not hang out with the seagulls and collect shells on the beach for a while?  Why not make peach wine?

So a thread and a loop.  And another piece of the story fits together.  Even as I study the map view of the narrative, I try to relate to the title boxes.  Here’s where I might have been more astute in matching the ideas of the stories through the title of each Writing Space.  Planning for the reader instead of suiting my own thoughts as a writer (I’ll kneel before Barthes tonight to make restitution).

The titles I’d placed were to jog my mind as to where they played in whose story.  They were my own little made-up ‘spark’ words to be easily recognizable…by me.  In the frameshop, I do this regularly.  Forget what Matisse or Dali named his piece, they’re something else entirely to me.  And God help me if ever the proud grandmother reads upside-down on my workbook "ugly child with monkey or younger brother."

But it’s really too late (no it isn’t, I’m just lazy) to change titles now because while the main links are automatically corrected, I don’t think the text links and the guard fields are and that’d be a holy mess to unravel.  In Map View anyway; it’d likely be an easier task in Outline or Chart.  Gotta decide if the whole piece is worth it or if it’s time to move on soon.

Steve Ersinghaus has an interesting posting regarding endings and what they traditionally mean or as construed in various patterns of thought and form.

He says, "A better question may be why multiple paths, not alternative endings (which assumes a primary and secondary set), may be called for in a given story. "  Steve has produced a novel, The Life of Geronimo Sandoval, in hypertext format using Storyspace, so he fully understands the question of paths and variables based on choice.  His novel has paths that run concurrently in time and space, as well as overlaps in these areas–meaning, alternatives.

In focusing on my plan to give Story #1 two endings, he says, "What’s interesting here is the implication for Story 1 that it has two endings and not one. But how can this be so?"  Actually, in adding another "ending" to Story #1, I’ve in fact added a third or fourth, since the four stories themselves are all alternative paths.  That may not make sense, but the whole piece is based on the concept of choice.  Choice and regret; choice and satisfaction; choice and action, inaction, and reaction. 

Then throw character perspective in there and you’ve got a whole lot of options.  As a matter of fact (dammitdammitdammit!) there’s an idea swimming around that maybe the main four stories aren’t really the full story.  I can easily see a few more possibilities, even based on one summer back somewhere in the 70’s.  I can see dreams and wishes as clearly as memories.  That’s no reason they all can’t be part of the narrative; aren’t they, after all, a part of every man’s life?

I’m pretty pleased with some additions and changes I made last night to the story that bothered me.  In addition to adding to the information we get about one of the main characters, we get a sense of how he got to this particular day in the main thread. 

I also suspect that this story–knowing it was the last in the group to be written–was sort of thrown together without happening by itself, just to meet a deadline.  It was reflective–as the stories really all are, both in the minds of the characters and hopefully, an introspection will be encouraged within the reader as events have relevancy both to the story and to some aspect of most readers’ lives.

One of the points of human nature and understanding I’ve been dwelling upon for a few years now with more intensity is the notion of perspective, how we each view the same item or thought in a different manner, based on individual experience and personality traits.  This project brings those perspectives into conflict as the three main characters recall their interaction of the past, and their relationship in the present.  Throw in the woulda, coulda, shoulda’s of life, and there’s no end to the possibilities.

Rolling back around to the creative edge of the project, after doing a lot of work on the fiddling with presentation via the typeface and box sizes–a pull down the edit ruler, change, save, put up the edit ruler, save again for each writing space.  Realized that saving immediately after a change, such as moving the box or changing its size, is the best bet rather than moving on to the next and saving a few at a time when a major change is being made. 

On the writing end, there are still plenty of things I’m curious about in each of the stories–after doubling them in word count (or at least write spaces)–but first there’s a major overhaul begging to be done on one of them. One path is a rather sad reflection brought up by memories and possibilities.  Another is rather whimsical on the surface yet holds the key to learning the consequences of choice.  The last story is perhaps a less romantic, more realistic acceptance of where we lead ourselves.  But one story appears shallow.  The character himself, with each addition of discovery, only gets worse.

I either try to expose the better side of this character if it exists, or I’m going to redeem him.  My tactic is to ask some things of him and see how he chooses to handle them.

I fell asleep last night on an idea and now it’s lost because it was too cold to get out of bed and shuffle to the laptop and write it down.

But this morning I started reading and realized why Anne in Story 1 is so bitter.  Where her life was being led because she was too weak to swim against the tide, and where and when that silly notion had been put into her head.

Paths is becoming more than what it was.  I think the difference is the hypertext atmosphere.  It’s like looking under leaves in autumn woods.  Or landing on Mars without a map.

Gave myself a bit of a break this morning from the Storyspace side, though everything seems to be working well in it and I’ve even had fun writing a couple of sidetracks into the story.  Took the opportunity to remove the page references within the text, and when needing a breather from the intense work on link-checking, I did some editing on the writing itself.

But the fun I needed was with finding four photo images and Photoshopping them in preparation for possible use as title pages.  This gave a rest to one part of my brain and woke up the other, the one that goes in a different path from the alphabetical language.

Story 3 Chloe and The Corn, color and special effects, and B&W: 

I’ve screeched to a halt here with Paths into Storyspace and that is the fault of neither, yet due to the abilities of each.  I find that even as Paths was written in "pseudo"hyperfiction, that is, text meant to be hyperlinked within itself to tell different angles or paths of story, it really isn’t non-linear enough to be a true candidate for hypertext telling. 

Since the story is all in the program, and since the majority of links have been made (couldn’t stop myself in time) it makes sense to continue working with this piece.  The next step in my estimation is to take a more serious look at the chart and see where links can be cut out, where they should lead, where they must lead back, and make changes not only to linkage, but to the story itself, or rather the stories.

In the meantime, I’ve been playing with the test version to try to come up with a likeable working chart view that might make it even easier to follow story threads and tie them in together with more purpose and reason.

So now here’s a visual via language (since my hands were busy with other equipment and couldn’t take a photo):

The pre-dawn kitchen lit by the old-fashioned fluorescent double rings.  The silence of an autumn morning when even chickadees still snuggle in the firs.  The woman dressed oddly like a giant hummingbird in brilliant green satin robe with raspberry collar and cuffs sets up the laptop on the kitchen table, wondering if she ought as well to trust the battery, a finicky resource that she, with all her mistrust of what she cannot control, uses seldom.  She stretches out the microphone–headband style as that is all she has–to close in on the soft billiping of the airlocks on the jugs of ruby, topaz, nearly amethyst colored wine.  She holds her breath, clicks on the start and watches as the little dot drives safely down the middle of the lit green line.  There, she’s gotten it, she thinks; the sounds of harvest to become part of a film.  Back in form, plugged in, she clicks on the player and, excited, listens.  Silence.