Digital Narrative

When speaking of digital narrative, I immediately think of keitai shosetsu (the cellphone novel). In 2003, a thirty-year old (“Yoshi”) in Japan first popularized the idea by publishing his novel, Deep Love, in book form. In relation to hypertext narratives, the cellphone novel plays a similar role that bridges the world of post modern idealization, but quickly commercializes it into a profitable market. Since 2003, the cellphone novel has spread into Western countries and creates a plane to which unconventional authors, such as Momo, can flourish outside the strict standards of a publication office.

Often keitai shosetsu offer the desired entertainment for “low art” that culturally dates back to the late 17th century when the vulgarity of Ukiyo-e (Japanese woodblock print) began. Shelley Jackson’s My Body, Adrienne Eisen’s Six Sex Scenes, and Tina Laporta’s Distance express a similar theme; although their presentation is not merely meant as low entertainment, but instead are highly politically charged in their society. Japanese society tends to be accepting of such issues due to their “flattened” identity and Westernization, regardless of their strict societal hierarchy. In addition, vulgarity isn’t really identified as taboo, since it is an established cultural norm in contrast to the previous thought in Western culture.

Beginning with navigation, Chang Heavy Industry’s Dakota function in a similar way as the cellphone novel by being linear. More control is given to other digital narratives, such as My Body or Six Sex Scenes, but only because the reader is allowed to read at their own pace. No hyperlinks are presented in Dakota and distinguish the interactivity of the digital narrative experience. As a reader, I lost my interest at times, because I had no control over the text’s speed. Next, Dakota’s shortened sentence structure and framework of the story replicated that of a cellphone novel. In its origins, the cellphone only allowed 70-100 word chapters for each text. Six Sex Scenes and My Body tell their stories through a variety of sentence structures and length. Their navigation was more flexible and allowed the reader to choose the direction of the story. Jackson’s hypertext allows the reader to choose which part of the body that they want to read from, but I became frustrated when I felt I was stuck in the story’s armpits. Six Sex Scenes’ navigation followed a chronological structure. The different pathways of the story followed the main character as she grew older. This consistency kept me engaged. Overall, Six Sex Scenes gives the reader enough control in navigation that they will want to explore and read through the different story options as if it is a novel.

Moving onto the use of autobiography and fiction in digital narrative, I find that it is difficult to distinguish fact from fiction, because these narratives are digital and posted on the Internet. The concrete nature of words published in book form clearly separate autobiography from fiction because of categories and genres they are placed in. Digital narrative doesn’t have to deal with defining itself. Another Japanese example is 2channel’s Densha Otoko (Train Man), where an individual created a thread on a bulletin board system and through various “characters” contributed to the story’s development about an otaku falling in love. Because the story took place in BBS, it is hard for its readers to absolutely know if the story was true or not. Six Sex Scenes and My Body cause an analogous dilemma; especially Six Sex Scenes. If the reader searches to find a concrete biography of the author, Adrienne Greenheart, they will only be sent in a loop of several fictitious identities to realize that Ms. Greenheart is most likely a mythological persona. Because My Body lacks the chronological structure of Six Sex Scenes or Densha Otoko, it is harder to believe that it more than just a fictional account. Dakota doesn’t face this problem, since it is easy to find that it is the remixing of Ezra Pound.

Even though the purpose of cellphone novels and artistic digital narrative differ, I think the line between literature and art are blurred. Both serve as representation of their current culture. The literature of a cellphone novel greatly deviates from its traditional form, because it is digital. Though widely popularized by digitized generations, cellphone novels are still too new to fit solely into literature and uphold an artistic character just like the digital narratives discussed. At the same time, digital narratives embodies literature and gives fiction the ability to become believable.