July 21, 2008
New TIRW: Instruments and Playable Text
The latest issue of The Iowa Review Web, volume 9, number 2, is out. This is a special issue on “Instruments and Playable Texts,” guest-edited by long-singing hypertext star Stuart Moulthrop, author of the 1991 Victory Garden and winner of the 2007 Vinaròs prizes in both narrative and poetry. One of his prize-winning pieces, “Under Language,” is included in the new TIRW number.
The issue also provides “Concerto for Narrative Data,” a new work by another hypertext fiction pioneer, Judy Malloy. John Cayley’s “riverIsland,” another prizewinner (in the 2001 Electronic Literature Organization awards) appears in a recent interactive QuickTime version. There are two offerings from Shawn Rider, “So Random” and “PiTP.” You may know of Ryder from his wry piece in the Electronic Literature Collection, volume 1. Elizabeth Knipe’s “activeReader,” which is something of a response to Bruce Andrews’ essay in the 2003 Cybertext Yearbook, is also featured. And, there’s a contribution of mine, “The Purpling,” a computation-free poem in purple hyperprose and, alas, probably the least playable and most minimally instrumented work of this lot.
It’s great to see TIWR back after almost a year. I hope you’ll enjoy the new issue.