dear mattias,
there are so many instances of the word 'new' in your account, that i
wonder how it is that there are still so many books being printed at
all; why almost all of those books look pretty much like books looked
before DTP, and why even most e-publications look like pre-DTP books;
why the tens of thousands of books published every year are still
pretty much in the same genres as they used to be; why all those
world-changing hypertext and collaborative writing practices have
done so little for changing people's taste for linear narratives and
for holding a bound pile of paper in their hands?
the fact that kids are writing more is good, but i'm not sure which
definition of literature as an art practice would automatically
include 'SMS, chatting via MSN, Skype etc.'
really, you make it sound a bit as though all the promises of the
mid-90s had come true and as though the connection between literature
and paper was now as tentative as that between cows and milk. allow
me a certain degree of doubt, though i look forward to reading the
things that have changed literature as much as you say they have.
regards,
-a
>Pˆ* Fri, 19 May 2006 10:46:28 +0200, skrev Andreas Broeckmann
><[log in to unmask]>:
>
>>the use of computers seems to have had less of an impact on
>>literature, that it has had on, for instance, music or
>>architecture. as i say, i think this is an area fit for wild
>>guesses.
>
>And wild guesses that is Andreas.
>
>
>The impact the use of computers have had on literature is
>tremendous. We write in a very different way (cut&paste, spelling
>check, software dictionaries, etc). We read or use literature
>differently (non-linear or multiple linear literature, e-published
>literature, hyper-text, cd/dvd accompanying books, audiobooks, and
>still up-and coming electronic papers). The cost of publishing is
>next to nothing compared to pre-computer days (e-publishing,
>printing costs, typographic costs, etc). The distribution process
>has radically changed (e-publishing, doing typographic work in UK -
>printing it in china, selling it in Norway). It has changed how the
>content is presented graphically (the use of pictures, time-lines,
>use of text-boxes, etc). It has opened up new ways of writing
>(discussion forums - both on web-sites and on email-lists like this,
>blogging, sms-poetry, podcasts, and other ways of collaborative
>writing). It has created new ways of multiple communication (not
>one- or two-way communication, but multiple participants
>simultaneously). Kids write much more than before, at least in
>Scandinavia. In fact, they write all the time, and creatively.
>It’Äôs hard to make them not write (SMS, chatting via MSN, Skype
>etc.) The have developed a whole new language, a language that I am
>not able to understand.
>
>I think this shows that the impact computers have had on literature
>is not less than the impact they have had on music or architecture,
>and this is not an area particularly fit for wild guesses. We guess
>all the time. Another term for guessing is "constructing a theory".
>But some guesses are wilder than others, and sometimes these guesses
>are the ones that make the world move forward.
>
>
>Yours sincerly
>
>Mattias Thronsen
>
>[log in to unmask]
>
>
>In Bergen:
>
>Grˆ½nnesmauet 4
>N-5016 Bergen
>Norway
>
>Home: +47 5555 8782
>Mob: +47 9345 5057
|