Literature and the Internet ...

... I mentioned the other day that I had a longish poem published in the current issue of Boulevard.

I also mentioned that I contributed as well to a forum discussing literature and the Internet. It has occurred to me that visitors to this blog may be interested in this sample of what I had to say:

What is being overlooked in all this is that the Internet is not simply a repository for traditional content, but is developing new forms of content as well. This is what nobody is quite sure about — though it is fair to say that, whatever impact the Internet may have had so far on literature, it is likely a good deal less than the impact it is going to have.
So far its impact has simply been its challenge to print. But already there is developing online what is called distributed narrative, which involves telling a story by means of networks. A good example would be email narratives. Michael Betcherman and David Diamond, for instance, put together something called The Daughters of Freya. This was an email mystery. If you subscribed, you received a number of emails every day, each of which would deepen the mystery and advance the progress toward a solution. (Figure out a way to integrate hyperlinks into narrative — perhaps someone already has — and a whole new kind of story-telling will become possible.)
At Blue’s Cruzio Café, poetry is combined with animation and jazz: You click on a picture and the portrait starts to recite the poem to a jazz accompaniment. Poetry has exploded online, as I discovered when I wrote about it last year for The Inquirer. I announced my intention on my blog — yes, I blog — and invited comments, suggestions, information, links. I ended up with a story that was reported entirely via Internet.
The Internet has revived literary activities that had been on the wane. Not many people correspond by letter anymore, but everybody does email and it seems altogether possible that email will develop into an art much as letter-writing did. Who knows what literary potential blogging may have? But consider this: The essay began as Montaigne’s method of exploring the contents of his consciousness, but quickly morphed into a vehicle for displaying literary style. Blogging may bring it back to what Montaigne was originally aiming at.