Hypercompendia

I realize that I’m not writing into the hypertext environment in the same manner that it appears a lot of the hypertext authors have done. But I am writing true to my nature.

Without a plan.

That’s fine, I’m used to it and though there are some pov issues (sometimes I get a thought of character as the character instead of about him) and mood twists, those kinds of things are easily repairable in the many, many readings that occur as the story grows.

The problem here with my current project is that I haven’t gone back to read it in any real manner other than a writing space or two prior to where I want to add some cars to the train. It’s like I’m blurting out vignettes and details as they occur to me in random fashion, find a place to tack them on (Scott’s recall in the present? Bonnie’s thoughts on Scott and marriage? Goody, goody! Let’s have the third person omniscient watch as Bonnie mounts that spiral staircase that will lead her into freefall of unfrozen space!).

There comes a time however that even I must rein in stream of consciousness and tie together tracks that lead from Boston to LA.

This story has been deciding its own tone and it appears to have a rather dark sense of humor. 

Imagine a husband coming home to find his wife hanging from a chandelier in their bedroom.  He calls for help, uprights the chair she’s kicked away and steps up to desperately try to get her down.  He’s got one arm around his wife and with the other is trying to untie the rope.  He loses his balance.

Now lots of things could happen, and some things will never be really funny, but there are so many different ways to handle this and the tone of the narrative, the voice, is what ultimately decides.

I’ve tread lightly into magical realism in straight text but I’m finding that the hypertext environment gives it almost an irresistible element of fun.  Because one can move around so much in Storyspace, one can take things to the very edge and then drop back into the reason of reality without having to explain oneself.  Maybe not a truly new concept to a writer, but certainly one for me.  The closest I’ve come before in this area is in poetry.

Yet the good story is always a series of what thens? and this is no different.  So what happened after Bonnie trudged through the snow inside her house to go upstairs and change her clothes?  Well of course the first thing she did was kick off her slippers…

In the bedroom, Bonnie reluctantly stepped out of her slippers but was very happy to see that the snow wasn’t cold or wet like she would have thought.  The two bunnies, now free of her feet, hopped in long quick leaps across the room.  She watched in delight as two tufted tails disappeared under the bedskirt.  Like stage curtains the dust ruffle shifted and bulged and then their pink noses stuck out, their long whiskers sparkling like necklaces strung with crystal snowflakes.

I had to laugh when I went to read some of the hypertext fiction available and studied their maps. Very often it was the Russian Doll syndrome, otherwise know as Nesting, with a single box showing in the window. I’m sure their chart views, on the other hand, look quite beautifully symmetrical or asymmetrically balanced.

Me, I like working in an open area of Mapview where the damn story sprawls out like skeletal inkblotches. I understand the hierarchy system, only I can’t seem to apply it to whatever I’m writing. Even in Paths which was about as obvious a set a groupings as I’ve come across, and even before severe restructuring for more interesting (albeit author-guided) reading, looked dopey in a tucked-in-for-the-night setup.

I suppose it will be different for each story, but the creative freedom of an open field of Map is likely akin to the blank page/screen of a traditionally written narrative. The borders of the mapview being alterable as it is moved around within the window to provide for all to exist without borders; the borders of an 8-1/2 x 11 page or screen setup being breached by its ability to spill naturally onto another page.

The Storyspace environment, and the knowledge of hypertext linking of information to make it an enjoyable experience changes the story not only in the end result(s) for the reader, but for the writer most of all

.

Truly becoming a hypertext experience different than what happened in Paths in that i’ve no idea where this is going even as I learn (yes, I know, I’m actually making it up) more about Scott and Bonnie and how this all came to be.  In Paths, I had a basic outline of one incident where the three major characters came together and how that affected them years later.  What I did with that basic skeleton in Storyspace was move things around timewise, interfering with any form of linearity that necessarily separated them into four stories instead of a single coexistence and cohesive form.  And expanded each idea into all areas without it becoming a full blown novel.

What’s happening here is similar in only that there is a core of ‘present’ that can only exist become of its byproducts of ‘past’. Once again, I’m not necessarily allowing for various endings or changes to the basic story, just the way the narrative structure allows the story to be told differently–in other words, leaving the reader with the ability of making up and changing his own mind based on what he will read and in what order it is read.

Obviously, I as writer haven’t tied those trails together yet, as you can see from the current Mapview of The Hanging and how it is developing all by itself into an octopus of story.

Got excited this dark morning about the Electronic Literature Organization Conference in Vancouver, WA. Day late, dollar short as always, but boy, I’d love to maybe go to this one.

Also signed on at Literatronics which is a different hypertext online form that looks sort of interesting and I’ll be posting on that later on today.

Am now about fifty spaces into The Hanging and confident of the way it’s working out. No, this won’t be the one with the enhancements of audio/visuals; I’m still trying to do that with words alone.

Reading Fast Fiction Forward (CW class) is working its magic to a certain degree in getting me going on action–though episodic for this longer hypertext piece–and some of the stuff on Literatronic (A Show of Hands) is helping me get back into the groove of lovely language, just as the reading of poetry would serve.

Noticing here in MarsEdit that even while the text markup is an easy click away, it is often faster and more efficient to simply do it yourself as you write–like now.

Well you just know I’ve checked all the boxes on the games I haven’t played yet to see if I can do so on the Mac. And no, I can’t.

So this may be the first: Apparitions, about ghosts and things and it’s free to try and $19.95 to buy and with this super screen I just hafta try a game out. But not those stretchy, ugly things from Silent Hill I never could escape completely.

Besides this will be research. I’m thinking of going not into sci fi or fantasy, but my own first true love: horror. THAT would be quite a goodie to do in Storyspace with sound effects and Photoshop-liquified images and stuff to soup up my writing, eh?

(Am doing this via MarsEdit so I’m not sure how the post will come out as far as the reference.)

Another push in the direction of hypertext for me; another reason to popularize it for the common reader and make it more accessible and interesting via story and genre base. It needn’t be taken away from academics and techno geeks, but rather added to encompass this much larger starving audience of readers.

Book notes: “”

(Via Megan McArdle.)

I do believe that Storyspace has brought me personally to a new realm of writing because of its capabilities that allow for not merely unlinearlike (!) storytelling, but breaking away from the necessity for linear thinking and planning.  I go here, I go there; in the middle of breakfast I realize things that have happened in the past of the characters that appear like memory jogs to me and I can easily drop them someplace on the SSP map and know that they’ve been saved.  And, know this: They will be relevant because they are a part of the character.  Maybe the specific episode needn’t be in the final story, but they are indeed a part of the makeup of the character.  Just like Sister Cyrene giving me a D in art in 1st grade has made a mark on me more permanent than my coloring outside of lines.

So this is how it works:  A bit of info comes to mind that I remember about Scott (I think that’s going to be his name) and this time, I found a place for it:

Growing tentacles, each one uncoiling out to reach its farthest point yet firmly anchored at a common point of brain and heart.  Tiny suction cups ground the threads and offer a cohesive and adhesive yet extremely flexible hold on story.

It is strange for me to see the sprawl of story–on my own work anyway.  It’s not that I have ever planned out narrative, traditional text or hypervised, but I do tend to keep things organized, in straight lines or balanced left side/right size in an unnatural sense of fairness.  Odd though that this new freedom excites me.