1. Literary Theory and Methodology Session Seven: Electronic Fiction

2. Agenda Fiction and the computer: Marie-Laure Ryan, Narrative as Virtual Reality: Immersion and Interactivity in Literature and Electronic Media. Hyper novels: –Babylondon ”Flash” fiction: –The.Powerbook –Because You Asked –Jim O’Gauble

3. Ryan’s Key Concepts Immersion Spatial: setting Temporal: plot Emotional: character Interactivity –Figural –Literal Weak Strong

4. Immersion ”[…] the experience through which a fictional world acquires the presence of an autonomous, language-independent reality popullated with live human beings.” (14) ”[…]requires an active engagement with the text and a demanding act of imagining.” (15)

5. Immersion 1.Spatial: setting 2.Temporal: plot 3.Emotional: character

6. Interactivity Figural: ”[…] the collaboration between the reader and the text in the production of meaning.” (16)→Iser Literal: ” the textual mechanisms that enable the reader to affect the ’text’ of the text as a visible display of signs, and to control the dynamics of its unfolding.” (17) –Weak: ”[…] a choice between predefined alternatives” –Strong. ”[…] the physical production of the text.”

7. Two metaphors of Text World Language is a transparent mirror Meaning is vertical and referential The reader as voyeur Space is three- dimensional Game Language is an opaque material Meaning is horizontal and intertextual The reader as (de)constructor Space is two- dimensional

8. Immersion John William Waterhouse, 1894

9. Immersion Jean-Honore Fragonard, The Reader (1769-72)

10. Immersion Jean-Baptiste Greuze, Lady Reading the Letters of Heloise and Abelard (1758-1759)

11. Immersion

12. Immersion

13. Failed Immersion

14. Réné Magritte, Ceçi n'est pas une pipe (1926)