From Print to Hypertext: A Discussion with Bolter
Stemming back from the days where writing was literally etched in stone, to our fast paced and overly stimulating digital age, writing has continuously been changing. Writing will continue to change its space as technology evolves. This “writing space,” according to Jay David Bolter in his book Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print, is any literal space, or material that writing is acquainted with. Thinking back to the writing tablet, the papyrus roll, the scroll, to classic paper and pencil, to typing on computers, to the integration of the Internet and hypertext, we must ask ourselves if writing is the same as it once was. Has the true form of writing been lost in the fast paced digital age? What is happening to writing? A simple question; with no simple answer (Bolter).
Bolter draws his readers back to the age of Socrates and Plato - a time period when epic poetry was recited orally and writing was rare and of great value and importance. He explains how the “Platonic hybrid” came to pass. This hybrid was a combination of oral performance, “including speeches and dramatic poetry,” and written forms of early prose. For example one such an author named Herodotus would use a technique called “ring composition” (Bolton 104). In this style of speech, the story would be first presented to the audience as a logical, linear plot line. Then it would digress into a series of subplots, or “interesting details.” The audience would be notified when the author would return to the original plotline. Bolter suggests that this way of speaking could be described as “a straight line with occasional digressive loops” (Bolter 104). This was a new form of writing, different from the classic forms already existing in the ancient world. In both fiction and nonfiction works, the audience was taken on a straight, definite path with a clear steady plot line. Plays and histories were also presented in a “step by step” fashion for the audience. This was not a time where the audience was to be confused by many subplots, or a weaving storyline. Yet, the world was changing and writing changed with it. Some poets of the ancient world began to publish and distribute some of their works. As more texts were written down in textual form, instead of being presented orally and remembered, information, stories, and histories could be looked up, researched, and passed on through the years. People were no longer required to remember this information through word of mouth, they could use the written texts as a tool for study. For the most part however, these texts as they grew more common, still continued to be very linear in form. This form went hand in hand with the papyrus roll (Bolter 104).
According to Bolter, papyrus suited this linear form of writing quite well. Papyrus, because it is a linear form of paper that must be scrolled through downwards, must be read in a linear fashion of literally scrolling through a passage. It is no question why the best suited writing style for this type of writing space was a linear style of writing. After the invention of the paged book however, there was a true change. While linear writing still continued to be the dominant form of writing, some authors took advantage of this new writing space and started to emphasize the text in new ways. Bolter says that, “It became more common to make hierarchical structures visible on the page by using different letter sizes and forms as well as different colors of ink, a trend reinforced with the invention of printing” (Bolter 105). An easy example of this is the table of contents a reader sees at the beginning of every book: a simple “hierarchical description of the contents of the book” (Bolter 105). Today we have many examples of works that are still linear in form, but hierarchical in structure, for example, articles. These articles could be anything from a breaking news story to science fiction, but most articles while still following a linear story telling pattern, use many hierarchical structures such as changing the colors of the text, bold headings, paragraph size and spacing, and page orientation to guide, yet interest the reader (Bolter 105). Keep in mind that this hierarchal system still defines the “professional activity of academic writers” (Bolter 105). This type of structure is more than a matter of style. According to Bolter, “both scholarly and scientific writing must me nonfiction in a hierarchical-linear form” in order for this structure to be taken seriously (Bolter 105).
Today as an audience, we think of the digital network as a brand new and involved writing space. However, Bolter suggests that the idea of a “network” has been in place since the Homeric age. Today, a network is a group of related, organized information that we can access online, but it wasn’t always like this. He proposes that Homeric oral poetry is an example of this networking that is older than writing itself. This particular network was established by the “repetition in the minds” of both the poet, along with the audience. These ancient stories contained mythological tales and it was the poet’s duty to draw upon the network of this knowledge to tell his or her story. After the invention of writing in the ancient world, the writer again would draw upon this “networked knowledge” and it was the responsibility for both the readers and writers to read between the lines of the text. This inner “networking” can literally rise to the surface of text when it is a part of a web page. Bolter tells us that there are certain “hotspots” on a webpage that can become animated at the simple touch of a mouse click: hypertext. By “scrolling” on such a webpage (think back to the ancient writing on papyrus) the reader can travel though these virtual pages. According to Bolter, it is still more likely for a reader to follow a linear fashion and click the link to the next page, rather than clicking some link in the middle of the page (Bolter 106). This example of networking becomes visible in a way that was never before possible with the use of the Internet.
It is no question that over the past two hundred years, the form of linear writing has continued to dominate writing. Even so, there have been many writers, a group of “antiauthors” that have tested the boundaries of linear writing. One well-known influential teacher and antiauthor was Wittgenstein. Yet, he published little in his lifetime and agonized over the task of writing. When he did write, he wrote short, disconnected paragraphs that forced his readers into a state of confusion, while they made their way through his disjointed works. Wittgenstein did not want to collect his thoughts into a linear work. He wanted to write exactly as he thought, this of course not being a sequential, or linear form. “Because Wittgenstein could not cast his philosophy in linear-hierarchical form, it had to remain a journey through a network of interrelated topics” (Bolter 108). Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations was finally published, but not in the classic linear manner. Each entry was numbered in the hope of guiding readers through its pages, but diagrams were also needed in an attempt to help the readers make their way through the complicated philosophical documents. Wittgenstein rejected the linear argument, but still followed the classic “form” of the printed book. Going even further than disrupting the classic linear form of the text, “some poststructuralist writers extended their attack to the typography of the book itself, creating “antibooks” that disrupted the traditional notion of how a book should look and behave” (Bolter 109).
One example of such an antibook was Derrida’s Glas. This particular antibook was divided into two columns of Hegel and a French novelist Genet. “Paragraphs set in and around other paragraphs and various sizes and styles of type gave the page an almost medieval appearance” (Bolter 109). Even though there was no linear argument, the reader’s eye would be drawn around the page looking for visual and verbal connections. Bolter suggests that in Glas, “Derrida laid down a textual space and challenged his reader to find a path through it” (Bolter 109). Derrida stretched the boundaries of writing, as would a digital form of writing. While one may think that the extinction of the linear form of writing would be the end of books, think again. Bolter says, “Another possibility is that digital media might refashion the book in a way that enhances the possibilities of multiple presentation without eliminating the book’s cultural significance” (Bolter 110). While in Glas these connections were hidden in the text, the web creates a space where these relationships simply float on the surface.
Now we find digital technology being used to give text a new form of “typography”. Bolter tells his readers that texts always go through a form of typography as it moves from one writing space to another (Bolter 110). One example is the change in Greek literature. Bolter tells his readers that Greek literature has evolved from the papyrus roll, to codex, and then to the printed book. “When we read a paperback edition in English of Plato’s dialogues or Greek tragedies, we are aware of the translation from ancient Greek to a modern language” (Bolter 110). It is important for readers to still be aware of the original translation and the style of writing of the ancient Greeks. The original ancient Greek text had “no book or scene divisions, paragraphing, indices, punctuation, or even word division” (Bolter 110). The transfer of ancient, or even modern texts to a digital form is another example of these translations.
In the 1990s, the Internet became the most popular and economically favorable form of communication. The ability to use “hypertext,” has refashioned the way that authors can write and post online. For example, “instead of one linear argument, the hypertext could present many, possibly conflicting arguments” (Bolter 112). The Internet is not only responsible for redefining the standards of simply text, but “also graphics design, photography, film, and television” (Bolter 113). One does not usually think of the Internet as a new space to fashion essays, but one does think of it as a place to redefine the standards of multimediated writing. The quickly changing digital writing space is easily seen in the classroom. Our generation started out learning to read and write with no technological support, but now we find ourselves immersed in the new world of digitally printed works. The generation of children in elementary school now, only a few short years later, find themselves learning to read and write with so many more digital tools. It is remarkable how fast this digital space is changing the learning process.
After using many different forms of technology to aid learning in the classroom, I find that it has been beneficial for students. Bolter adds that technology in the classroom is not simply kept for the learning process of reading and writing. “Many have even come to regard the networked classroom as a means for social or political change, as they combine digital writing with various strategies of cultural critique” (Bolter 114). In this light Bolter suggests that some educators are trying more and more to incorporate technology into their classrooms for more then one reason. While most teachers of writing are still staying true to the classic power of the spoken and written word, there is no question that incorporating certain technologies can be a great asset to students. With the help of the technology of computers, students can now sit is a classroom, dorm room, in the same building, or across the world, and have a conversation, or edit each other’s works. Bolter asserts that this technology is not meant to replace, but complement learning. This complementing of learning, along with the “refashioning of dialogues,” shows how writing has changed over time. As technology continues to progress, there is no doubt that the way in which we write and perceive writing will continue to change with it.
Bibliography:
Bolter, J. David. Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print. 2nd ed. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2001. Print.
