Both of this week’s readings were extracts from Douglas, J. Yellowlees’ ‘The End of Books — Or Books Without End?: Reading Interactive Narratives’.
The first quote in reading one was written in 1939 by Vannevar Bush who said the he couldn’t imagine how books could ever be improved mechanically. I thought this was strange, how could anyone not imagine books becoming electronic? Then I realised that I can actually remember what it was like before you could buy a book on iTunes. Duh primary school.
The example of the interactive Titanic game was given to explain hypertext as being interactive and non-sequential. Although, in the second reading the author explains that hypertext isn’t necessarily ‘non-sequential’ as it is popularly defined. Instead it provides users with a variety of sequential orders. It doesn’t have one beginning and end like a book does. This reminded me of the Goosebumps choose your own adventure books that I loved when I was little. However, I see how this is different because although those books had multiple endings, hypertext really offers unlimited possible endings and beginnings.
It’s also strange to think that one day books might become “the horse of the 21st century” where not everyone can afford them and they will be considered a collectors item. I just can’t imagine this happening, but yet again I didn’t imagine as a kid that I would be reading a book on an iPad one day. The author of the reading argued though, that books are so well established and that although hypertext is quickly evolving, it is still only in its early stages.
Also noteworthy was when the author mentioned how sometimes books can be just as popular or even more popular than their movie counterparts. An example given was the book Lolita. Lolita has been adapted into a movie twice and neither adaptation managed to quite capture the words that were written in the book. He also wrote how movies can actually build the popularity of a book. This was clearly the case when the Harry Potter and Twilight movies came out. I don’t think my mum would have picked up a book about vampires if it wasn’t for the film. I kind of wish she didn’t though because that’s all she talked about for a good 6 months.
– Caitlin
