Hypercompendia

Ah, the bennies of bein’ female.  I’m changing my mind.

Even as I strive for improvement in the use of language and try to adhere to some tradition, I need still to go beyond the known and comfortable into new territory.

I’m throwing a monkeywrench into my simple little non-apocalyptic tiff between generations.  There’s an idea I’ve had for a while–actually my husband’s idea–about saving portions of time in the present for use in the future.  It’s sort of a neat idea, especially when you think about the concept of time as a mere man-made measure.  It’s particularly a neat idea when you may need that saved up time to use in a world that seems a little bit off.

Let’s see if I can blend the old with the new into an exciting and fulfilling story.  Of course this is going to wreak havoc with my Map View.  Unless I put it into some sort of organized, row or gridlike structure.  That’s okay; life can still get wild within structured space.

Sort of a mind rendition in hypertext form–or hypertext form in truth being not only a product of the brain’s activity, but a mimicry of the thought process–brings about a piece of work that ties together yet forks into different paths of literature, critique, readers, format and outside influences that produce trends (i.e., TV drama, computer games, the internet, etc.) into a puzzle from which I am attempting to form a pattern that gives me the whole picture.

And questions such as, if there really is a downtrend in reading (and this trails off into who says so and who is reading and why), has anyone wondered if it could be the style of what is currently in vogue (and this is formed into paths of literary critique and newspaper reviewers and, I suppose, the almighty publishing houses) that is the problem?

Daniel Green at The Reading Experience posts some good responses and thoughts on the question of publishing and reading, as do many others.  And I’m certainly not saying that the avant garde should be forsaken to satisfy the larger masses of sci fi, fantasy and romance readers.  But I think that what I’m saying is that even as we plunge ahead into new areas of fiction and poetry and writing styles that represent evolution in thinking, there’s still a need within each to maintain the base of story.  And it’s got to be a story that causes human reaction in the reader–and I’m not talking head-scratching here.  I’d like to see a tear, hear a sigh, catch a glimpse of tight-lipped acknowledgement that signals understanding. 

People are still reading.  Who’s reading what is what’s separating and thus limiting the readership.

Which brings me to the question of hypertext audience.  It can’t be just academics and their students, or technuts interested in the form rather than the narrative.  Why not a hypertext in the more traditional style?  Any of my middle-aged friends when questioned about hypertext bring up the form as being a pita problem.  But I suspect that the detachment of some of the hypertext environment is overly emphasizing the detachment of the narrative itself and so the two together become the impediment to override.  (Impediment here meaning only to those who tend towards closed-mindedness or lack a spirit of adventure, of course).  But still, if folks love romance than they will read a romance in hypertext if it’s carefully constructed not to let them feel lost.  They want the "lost" feeling; but what they’re escaping from is the hubby and kids of reality, not the world they’ve so willingly entered.  So hypertext doesn’t necessarily have to mean ultra contemporary exploratory fiction. 

Nor do the lit journals and this whole post applies to them as well.   Unless you’re a writer looking to get published or you’re a lit professor, you don’t read the hundreds of literary journals out there.  And even writers cancel their subscriptions eventually (after x number of rejections on their submissions, when they realize they’ve given out more money to these people than they’ll ever see even if they did get published).  But what’s one of the longest lived fiction periodicals that still enjoys a high circulations?

Ellery Queen Magazine.

Everyone’s been through this I think, but you know that feeling that you might’ve lifted words from something you’ve read before?  Of course every word you write is something you’ve heard before but sometimes a particular phrase or even just the idea sort of itches your mind like something’s wrong; it didn’t come from you.  This morning I finally came right out and asked a friend if I’d stolen something from his own work.

Today’s a bit of a turning point in this new project since I’ve decided to continue with the story but am approaching it in a different way so that I don’t feel lost because I’m not filling out Writing Spaces as fluidly as I did with Paths.  The greatest thing about Storyspace is that if I peter out on one path, there are many others that may be taken further if my mind is onto them. 

Another thing I did for inspiration was to reread a portion of Paths (where I came across the phrase I’d mentioned above) and soon realized that I had to stop and back away.  The voice, the tone, the entire mood of reflection, regrets and fulfilled dreams were nothing that I wanted in this new piece.  While there’s no real hiding my particular writing style completely within a narrative, there are tones set by the story that need to be consistent because they affect the voice.  God knows, I don’t even want to lift anything from my own prior work because it’s too easy to feel comfortable there and bring influences picked up in reading back into the writing of a totally different tale.

So if I read–and when I’m writing I don’t read quite as much–it will have to be either something relevant to what I’m writing or a diverse group of styles and shapes that can influence perhaps but not negate the form of what I’m doing.

…Steve’s been busy on his own new hypertext project.  I don’t think he’ll mind if I share this:

At the tenth, he saw Death blink above him, the exploding star centered graphically in her right pupil, her wondrous Ankh swinging gently above his outstretched hand, catching in a brief silver glint the upper edge of moonlight entering the window.

What a way with words.

Wandering around a bit today, seeking inspiration since the tale-spinning machine seems to need oiling.  Was going to trade books that I’m reading in my great classic reading roundup before I die binge but somehow, maybe Miller’s Tropic of Cancer is exactly what I needed.

Her eyes flicked to the side view mirror as she caught the reflection of the police car’s door opening and he stepped out.  Tall, all sign of humanness  wrapped in the black uniform of the law.  A thin strip of flesh above a mustachioed grim mouth.  Cold eyes hidden behind black glasses.  He walked up a few steps and stopped.

She watched, seeing him only from his belt buckle down.  Shiny-booted feet set apart and black legs solid as columns.  She followed them up, looking for a bulge.

He had none.

This is just too funny.  In working on Gap–which I think is the title of my second Storyspace project–I’m finding a similar pattern emerging as I’d seen in Paths. 

If I ever became famous for writing, I’d probably be able to coin a phrase for this style and it’d be something like "hunger" or "menu" writing.  I’ll betcha that at least half the writing spaces mention food in one manner or another and in Paths, I became aware of it early enough to play on that and many of the links are based on either eggs or berries, pies or wine.  Shoot, even one scenario that has a main character sitting in her car waiting anxiously for an important meeting she’s parked in front of a supermarket and plans her grocery list as she waits.

Maybe this belongs more into the realm of theme than motif.  Or maybe I can tell folks it’s metaphor or symbolism.

Maybe I’ll become a millionaire by creating the first hypertext library-cafe where when you read (the screens and literature supply are at every table) "peaches" you click and not only get to the next writing space, but a fresh peach drops out of a chute to roll into your left hand.  Feeding mind and body at the same time.

Hmmm.

This is more the flavor of what I wanted the narrative to be.  It’s more subtle and may even lend itself to some humor.

The shriek of siren startled her and she’d tapped the gas pedal in reactionary fear.  She shifted her foot to the brake and looked into the rearview mirror.  Blue flashes whirled within it and for a second she was tempted to try to get away.  She realized it would be useless and slowed  and pulled over.

Jayne Evans looked younger than fifty-six but she knew the cop walking up behind her would insist on seeing her license.  She didn’t have one, of course.  For several years now no one over fifty-five was legally allowed to drive.

Sort of a new beginning after a false start, approaching story in my more usual manner of just writing without thought of where it’s going.  More important for me, somehow, to bring a character to life and plop him into a scene and go from there.

This is based on the same premise as before, but I find it much easier to write prose and fill spaces as  they open up rather than create the structure and force-fit the text within the parameters.  If an offshout comes up, it’s easy enough in Storyspace to make it into a separate thread simply by marking with path name or color-coding.  Especially at this early stage, the color coding is really helpful.

Not exactly flying fingers whipping up story here today.  At first I thought that maybe it was the pressure of filling and stacking Storyspace boxes that is preventing a real flow of writing on what I thought was an exciting idea. 

Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m as excited about the story line as I thought I was and it seems I’m forcing myself to focus on it rather than joyfully skipping along leaving a trail of dust in my wake.

Already, a different story is forming and that may be the way to go.  All I need is to get that first paragraph down that leads me onward.

It’s so strange for me to be actually planning out the structure of a story beyond the opening line.  Though in some ways, the map as I have it here may be considered dual directional and expanding into whatever areas it claims in its flow.  But it’s pretty obvious from just this rudimentary Map View that it’s a narrative that involves man against man, or us versus them.

I just know that it is not within my nature to keep this freeflow going on beyond too many more spaces.  I will just have to have them lined up somehow in neat rows that I’ll mess and move around a bit just when someone’s looking or when I post an updated view here to make it appear that I’m not quite as regimented as I tend to be.

What the above really represents is more a placeholder for each of the ideas as they come to me–mostly in story form, meaning written as prose–but there are obvious character and setting spaces that will become prime threads or paths.

One thing I’d noticed while doing some final reading and editing in Paths is that there were several ideas or phrases or images that reappeared, i.e., lion, wind, etc., that without conscious planning flowed right into another space that reinforced the theme.  What this tells me is that when you get this entrenched in your story, the clock on the wall is bound to show up in several scenes because you see it in the corner of your mind.  With the Storyspace Writing Spaces, these just happen to come up and tie the idea together whereas in straight text, you’ll find sometimes that you wish the author could come up with a different word because it seems repetitive.  I’m not sure what I’m saying here, but I think it’s a case of hypertext = reinforcement versus traditional linear = repetition.  The reaction, at least as writer, is not “oh shit, I said that already a few pages back,” but rather, “wow, that must be symbolic because I’ve mentioned it twice already.” Maybe just one more of the side benefits of the hypertext environment.