Literature in New Media: A Comparative Study of Literary Affordances of Lance Olsen’s “10:01” in Traditional and Digital Medium

Abstract

The recent advances of the digital era invoke an array of new media for communication. This impressive feat of technology purveys a wide range of new affordances to communication unviable in print. The new media affordances of the electronic and the digital have impacted the creative literary compositions, providing innovations in contemporary literature. Postmodern literature being the initiation of experimental works has strived to reinvent the affordances of literary fiction. It has now advanced into resorting to digital technological affordances to maximize narrative inventiveness. Lance Olsen’s “10:01”, a postmodern novel adapted as hypertext fiction, is an exemplar of such feat. This research examines the literary affordances of the chosen text in print and its hypertext adaptation within the framework of affordance theories. The study unveils the inlaid new media aesthetics and viabilities of the digital in relation to the traditional medium of print by focusing on affordances. The paper asserts the significance of theorizing the aesthetics involved in digital textuality by holding print and electronic literature at the intersection. This study aims to establish the shift in literary analysis paradigms of text due to the emergence of New media.