I would like to frame my response as a series of answers to some of the most important questions posed by the respondents.
Walker asked what other hypertext theory I use. One of the most important sources for my own understanding of hypertext is Ted Nelson, Literary Machines in particular. For all his eccentricities, I still find Nelson to be a powerful and provocative theorist of hypertext. I am surprised that no one, to my knowledge, has addressed (let alone refuted) his claims that hypertext is "fundamentally traditional" or that literature ("an ongoing network of interconnected documents") is a model for hypertext sytems ("literature is debugged"). Besides Nelson, I also use Vannevar Bush (who initiates the longstanding claim that hypertext is more like the way we think) and, among more recent critics, Espen Aarseth (whose concept of "cybertext" I think could help me with the distinction I am trying to draw between technologies and paradigms). Overall, though, I feel that hypertext theory has been in a something of a lull since the initial flurry of work of by Landow, Bolter, et al. in the early 90s. If anyone knows of more recent work that seeks to define hypertext on a theoretical level, I would love to hear about it.
Walker, Bucknell, and Millard all, in slightly different terms, questioned the legitamacy of basing a theory of hypertext and hypertextual reading on only one text (and one that would be considered by many not even to be a "real" hypertext at that). This point is well taken, and I can see how my presentation might be taken in this way. To clarify, I will, in part 1, consider other texts. Specifically, I will discuss the Talmud (I did a short presentation on this at last year's DC) and William Blake's Songs of Innocence and of Experience as hypertexts. I will try to demonstrate the existence of a tradition of nonlinear writing (and reading) as part of my larger claim that hypertext is really an approach to writing (and reading) rather than a particular kind of text. This would also be my answer to Walker's observation that there are other critical traditions that embrace nonlinearity, openness, etc. Yes there are, and I think these traditions are evidence of a broader "hypertext tradition" spanning multiple technologies and media of writing.
Millard questioned my use of the "surfing" metaphor (I'm actually surprised I don't catch more flak for this term) and comments that "the challenge for hypertext literature seems not to find a role for the hypertext reader but a role for the author." It is actually this challenge that I hope to address with the surfing metaphor. "Surfing," by which I mean to evoke the physical activity of the watersport rather than the passivity of "channel surfing," stands somewhere between two other common metaphors: browsing and navigation. Browsing, as Millard points out, is unsatisfyingly random: the reader moves about with no particular plan, perhaps finding interesting things, perhaps not. It hardly seems like a viable model for seriousn reading in any medium. However, I also think, with apologies to Netscape, that "navigation" is a misleading metaphor for hypertextual reading. Navigation implies a definite destination and a perspective that allows one to plot more or less exactly the route that will one will take. I've yet to encounter a hypertext, electronic or otherwise, that empowers the reader to that degree. In fact, the element of surprise (or "mystery" as Walker suggests in her statement) often features prominently in hypertexts. The "surfing" metaphor, I think, best describes the combination of freedom and constraint, direction and wandering, expectation and surprise that hypertext involves.
Finally, I would just like to mention that I have a longer explanation of my project, the formal prospectus I submitted, that elaborates on some of these points and fill in some of the gaps in my position statement, particularly about the Pound component of the project. Thanks to all for their attention and comments.
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