Hayley's Response
From English 194 Wiki
According to Abbott's The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative, all kinds of changes can be made to narrative discourse and still tell the same story, in other words there is more to the narrative then just a summary of events and as long as that narrative posses certain qualities, it is still a narrative. Furthermore, Abbott notes, “One thing that strengthens the sense that stories are always mediated is that they can be adapted”. This notion is quite interesting in that one could question, to what extent can narratives and stories be manipulated and “adapted”? When does it stop being the same story? This question can be applied to hypertext and the electronic narrative. These modern forms of the narrative have the capability of breaking up text and including pictures, graphics and sound. Earlier in Abbott’s discussion, he states that, “Narratives usually come packaged in additional words and sometimes even pictures…All of this tangential material can inflect our experience of the narrative, sometimes subtly, sometimes deeply. So in this sense all of this material is part of the narrative”, hence the resources of the electronic narrative do exactly such. Also, it is interesting that with the electronic narrative, readers are given the unique ability to link to other virtual spaces that can include information like definitions, pictures, footnotes, etc. which is influential to the narrative experience, bases on how each link is deployed. Consequently, the narrative experience becomes based on the individual and how he or she chooses to utilize each link. So is this still a narrative? Abbott says that narratives can move backwards and forwards, even inside out, but if the narrative constantly changes with every new reader, does it still fit the definition of a true narrative?
Abbott's perspective relates directly to mapping and modeling or what could be called three-dimensional narratives. These concepts could fit into what Abbott calls “experimental fiction” which “has turned on the way it undermines narrative linearity”. These kinds of concepts can be looked at in the way Abbott looks at the lyric poem. This narrative genre is not dominated by a story but by a single feeling yet Abbott suggests you will still find narrative. This abstract concept of the narrative can also be applied to games. Once again, the narrative sequence comes into control of the viewer, or in this case, the players. Abbott uses the example of Dungeons and Dragons, but his concept is also applicable to many virtual games like The Sims or Rollercoaster Tycoon. These games appear to be narrative; they suggest a sequencing of events yet give player the freedom to create their own events. In a way, the write the narrative as they go. Is this the future of the narrative? Can it even still be called a narrative?
