The Western canon in Hebrew digital media

Abstract

This article presents the findings of the first part of a research project on the Western canon and Israeli active cultural memory in the Digital Era. The article focuses on the methodological problems of mapping a national cultural memory from the angle of the use it makes of Western literary heritage. The detailed description of the mapping process—beginning with the construction of an initial list of relevant canonic texts and ending with the validation of three cultural “memes” (Don Quixote’s tilting the windmills, Hamlet’s contemplation of suicide, and Romeo and Juliet as the ultimate lovers) as the most appropriate matter for constructing multimedia hypertext educational threads, touches upon many aspects of Intertextuality and Cultural memory theories, and the positive and negative aspects of the Internet with respect to both.