Word‐art for people: Toward a future of user‐friendly poetry and interactive fiction

Abstract

Throughout history, word‐art has been valued as a source of magic, wisdom, and delight. The author argues that genre fiction, advertising, popular song lyrics, and greeting card verse all fulfill these traditional social roles, and that current definitions of “serious literature”; are far too narrow. The true importance of word‐art in daily life cannot be assessed without including such “genre”; work along with “speculative”; writing. The future significance of literature for society, though dependent to some degree on developments in computers and telecommunications, would be enhanced if critics, publishers, and writers adopted a more “user‐friendly”; attitude—helping genre readers to find satisfying material more easily, and respecting speculative readers for the additional time and effort they expend in seeking out the unpredictable and unfamiliar in word‐art.