I picked up this book to help me settle into the ETL533 course. It’s from 2008, so has some limitations. However, it provides a good overview of the history of ‘elit’ up to that point and some of the key issues and implications of the various forms under the ‘elit’ banner. The author’s focus is on works that examine the philosophical aspects of digital works, so many of those discussed verge towards experimental or metafictional works or, indeed, textual artworks.
Hayles contends throughout that all texts are digital now and that human subjectivity is being reformed by the digital landscape but also that we are doing a disservice to elit by continuing to use the tools of analysis, criticism, and teaching imported from print media. Curiously, Hayles ends by looking at three print works (one of which I know and love) that have embraced their ‘digital’ nature and played with it to interesting effect. As such they seem to sidestep making predictions for the increasing popularity or impact of the types of literature they spend most of the time discussing, in order to make a point that print books will explore the potential of digital creation and changing natures of readers. It’s not clear that is the case in 2023.
As a literature and philosophy student, I enjoyed the author’s explorations. However, as a teacher, I feel there would be limited interest in the types of digital and experimental literature she discusses. It has led me to reflect on my perception that many of the readers I see at my school, both the voracious consumers and the seemingly ‘aliterate’ are quite conservative in their reading preferences. They seem much more focused on narrative than poetics or metafictional playfulness, something that was a big thing for me in my own late teens. I am wondering if some of the postmodern nature of webcomics and video games that students I see do enjoy, is actually almost invisibly subsumed into the work and taken for granted. As such they may not find some of the elit Hayles discusses mentally stimulating, more likely the opposite.
References
Hayles, N. K. (2008). Electronic literature: New horizons for the literary. University of Notre Dame Press.