Chapter 8 Meredith

 This chapter seems to be about all the rest of the genres of electronic literature that haven’t had their own chapter yet. Rettburg mentions that he can’t even give them all the attention that they deserve because they’re all in one chapter. It talks about locative narrative, interactive installations, and VR to name a couple. I particularly loved the Yellow Arrow street art project, and sometimes I’ll see stickers stuck on poles in Boston or NYC or Indianapolis back home and wonder if they’re part of a bigger story. I also thought about Pokemon Go and this similar app called Soundmap that’s like Pokemon Go for music; you can collect songs and albums and get medals for collecting discographies of artists by driving or walking around. They could be considered a combination between locative narrative e-lit and interactive/game-like e-lit. I also had my own experience with interactive installations recently in Boston visiting the WNDR museum! All of these e-lit forms are so common in our digital world now and we really don’t even think of them as “literature.” 

 

I examined Text Rain by Camille Utterback. It originally intrigued me in Rettburg’s book, and it was on the list to look at as well. In this interactive installation, people can go up to a mirrored projection of themselves and text will “rain” onto them. Anywhere that is dark enough to register as a person or item will start catching letters. The letters, words, and phrases are part of a poem by Evan Zimroth called Talk, You. You can put your arms and hands out to catch letters and I wonder if you can choose to catch only certain letters to make your own words or message. The installation reminds me of the ones I just saw in the WNDR museum, especially the heat map-like one where if you walk in front of the wall, the colors will change from blue to orange where your body is. If you move your arms, the color goes with you.