Close Reading
New Media: Analyzing Electronic Media
by Jan Van Looy and Jan Baetens
Leuven University Press, Leuven, BE, 2003
185 pp., illus. b/w, col. Paper, Eur24.00
ISBN: 90-5867-323-5.
Reviewed by Dene Grigar
Texas Womans University
dgrigar@twu.edu
It is no little irony that hypertext literature,
which places so much responsibility upon
the reader to plot each unique reading
path and participate in a works
unfolding, requires careful attention
to a work of literature at a time when
information overload demands an increase
in the speed at which we take in that
information and when literary scholars
have rejected epistemologies built upon
the close study of texts. Anyone who has
ever tried to breeze through Talan Memmots
Lexia to Perplexia or Stephanie
Stricklands Ballad of Sand and
Harry Soot, therefore, should get
the gist of Jan Van Looy and Jan Baetens
argument for a close reading of new media
in their collection, Close Reading
New Media: Analyzing Electronic Literature.
This kind of approach to "texts," however,
runs counter to postmodern ones where
theorizing about literature takes precedent
over the works themselves and debates
over meaning and truth have rendered any
meaning and any truth nonexistent. But
Van Looy and Baetens view of close
reading holds that it "does not aim to
produce the meaning of the
text, but rather to unearth all possible
types of ambiguities and irony" (8, authors
emphasis). In this approach they share
much in common with literary translators
and textual studies scholars who have
long argued that the process of careful
reading is necessary for the production
of a translation or a concordance, for
example. But it is, instead, to the semiotics
of Jacques Fontanille and the media philosophy
of Stanley Cavill, as well as theories
suggested by Jay David Bolter and Richard
Grusin, Marie-Laure Ryan, and Lev Manovich,
that the authors turn to for support,
rather than to New Critics who also argue
for close readings of texts. And as such,
Van Looy and Baetens place electronic
literature squarely into new media rather
than literaturea view of electronic
literature, of course, suggested in the
books title.
The book is actually a collection of nine
essays divided into three sectionsHypertext,
Internet Text, and Cybertextwith
each section containing three essays.
And so, in the first section, one finds
analyses of Stricklands True
North, Shelley Jacksons Patchwork
Girl, and M. D. Coverleys Califia.
Section two offers essays on Geoff Rymans
253 and Rick Prylls Lies,
Raymond Federman and Anne Burdicks
Eating Books, and another on Rymans
253. The final section focuses
on Darren Aronofskys website for
his film, Requiem for a Dream;
the interface for ebr (electronic
book review); and the theoretical
views underlying Grammatron by
its author Mark Amerika.
It is not clear why Van Looy and Baetens
have organized the book in this way. Certainly
this reviewer cannot see a discernible
rationale for breaking up the essays in
sections one and two since they both address
hypertext works of fiction and poetry
thematically, structurally and the like;
the reasoning for the third section makes
sense since the first two essays look
at hypertextual works that are not themselves
literary but function as electronic environments
in support of new media, and the third
offers what could be described as a print-based
hypertext. As such, they do follow Espen
Aarseths notion of cybertext and
ergodic reading (19-21).
So few books have emerged specifically
about electronic literature that Van Looy
and Baetens book is a most welcome
addition to scholarship in this area.
Notable among the essays for clarity and
quality of writing are Elisabeth Joyces
essay on Patchwork Girl, Raine
Koskimaas on Califia, Baetens
essay on Eating Books, and Van
Looys on 253. The hypertext
essay by Amerika, who remains one of the
most interesting thinkers in electronic
literature, stands out for its ideas and
approach.
It would be remiss not to mention that
the authors collapse hypertext with electronic
literature and both of these with new
media, for neither the introduction to
the book or their individual essays make
it clear that 1) hypertext is but one
type of electronic literature among many,
2) much electronic literature unites new
media technologies with old media genres
like fiction, poetry, drama, and the essay
and so remains kin to print-based literature,
and 3) hypertext can occur in print media
as well as new media. Additionally, the
book does little to clear up the confusion
surrounding the difference between net
art and electronic literature. A case
in point: Mark Amerikas Grammatron,
evoked in the final essay of the book,
was recently classified as net art at
Ciberart 2004 but also appears as an example
of electronic literature in the Electronic
Literature Organization Directory.
Despite these issues, those looking for
a text to use in the teaching of electronic
literature at the graduate level will
want to include Van Looy and Baetens
book on the list of required reading.
Its message makes for a provocative discussion
about approaches to analyzing new media
texts.