Abstract
In 1986, Michael Joyce published the first edition of his groundbreaking work of hypertext fiction, afternoon, a story. Created in Storyspace, software co-programmed by Jay David Bolter and Joyce, afternoon is the first fictional digital work built with a hypertextual, multilinear narrative structure. The work has been re-edited several times since its original publication, using different software and interfaces. A few years ago, a team of French translators started working on the production of a French translation of afternoon. In 2017, I was hired to work on the later production phases of afternoon’s translation. Translating electronic literature entails many operations: this complex process is similar to a form of “resurrection,” which raises several questions in terms of translation, editing, and interface design.
I would like to formally and publicly acknowledge the following people for their help in the preparation of this article and for any involvement in the project itself: Jo Gauthier, both for his friendship and his impressive mapping of afternoon in a spreadsheet; Sandy Baldwin and Arnaud Regnauld, both for their insights on my first draft and for hiring me for this project; Jean-René Boucher and Alban Leveau-Vallier for their tech support for the coding “noob” that I am.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
The notion of “proto-hypertext,” put forth by authors such as Jean Clément, is contentious and has been subsequently challenged; see Guilet (2009) for further discussion on the subject.
- 2.
I use the term “traversal” instead of “reading” to refer to the act of consulting a work of electronic literature, to acknowledge and mark some of the specificities of the “reading” activity required by this particular media. In the case of afternoon, recursive traversals enable further multilinear narratives, interactive activation of hyperlinks, and prompts.
- 3.
I have chosen to use the term “electronic literature” (or, its short-form “e-lit”) as opposed to other terms (such as “digital literature”). Heckman and O’Sullivan define the term as follows: “a construction whose literary aesthetics emerge from computation, […] a work that could only exist in the space for which it was developed/written/coded—the digital space” (2018, online).
- 4.
Publication was affected by the pandemic and since the time of writing, the publication has been pushed back to an undetermined date.
- 5.
Maria Mencia from Kingston University, UK; Manuel Portela from Coimbra University, Portugal, Soren Pold from Aarhus University, Denmark; Sandy Baldwin, from Rochester Institute of Technology, United States, succeeded by John Cayley, Brown University, United States, and Arnaud Regnauld, Université Paris 8, France.
- 6.
The initial work of translation, in which about 85% of the textual content of afternoon was translated into French, was accomplished by the combined efforts of Arnaud Regnauld, Anne-Laure Tissut and Stéphane Vanderhaegue in 2012; upon working on the production of the translation, I discovered additional untranslated content, whose translation was handled by Émilie Barbier and myself.
- 7.
Technological obsolescence can be defined as the condition by which the introduction of a new technology renders obsolete previous technologies.
- 8.
The mission statement of the Electronic Literature Lab published on their website reads thus: “Directed by Dr. Dene Grigar, ELL contains 61 vintage Macintosh & PC computers, dating back from 1977, vintage software, peripherals, and a library of over 300 works of electronic literature and other media. One of a handful of media archaeology labs in the U.S., it is used for the advanced inquiry into curating, preserving, and the production of born digital literary works and other media.” The website can be found at http://dtc-wsuv.org/wp/ell/.
- 9.
The mission statement of the Laboratoire NT2 published on their website reads thus: “Fondé en 2004, et soutenu financièrement par la Fondation canadienne pour l’innovation (FCI) dans le cadre du programme des Fonds de l’avant-garde (FA) jusqu’en 2012, le Laboratoire NT2 a pour mission de promouvoir l’étude, la création et l’archivage de nouvelles formes de textes et d’œuvres hypermédiatiques.” The website can be found at http://nt2.uqam.ca/en.
- 10.
The regularity, and notably the loop, being at the foundation of the working of the computational machine, we can read the influence of the computational logic on the elaboration of a narrative strained between pseudo-aleatory and regularity. However, this is what constitutes one of the challenges specific to the translation of a variable and modular narrative; its complexity requires the respect of an isotopic coherence, itself founded on the recurrence of the same semes and metaphors allowing for a few and treacherous variations. (My translation).
- 11.
- 12.
It should be mentioned that when I informed Michael Joyce by email that we were planning on using Twine to recreate his work, he expressed displeasure, as he believes that this software owes an important intellectual debt to Storyspace, which it never properly acknowledged. When I asked him for additional comment on the subject, he wrote back: “Aime-t-on jamais son pickpocket? Peut-être. As I think I may have told you, our granddaughter discovered hypertext through Twine even before she was aware of her grandmother’s and my history as pioneers of hyperfiction and I have had students who did wonderful work in Twine. I only wish that Chris Klimas’ and Mark Bernstein’s tangling over guard fields, “literary economy” (que se passe-t-il) etc., had not clouded the degree to which Twine is beholden. Perhaps this project will offer an ironic symmetry.” (private correspondence, February 1, 2019).
- 13.
Twine attracted mainstream attention in 2014 when it became the subject of a lengthy article by Laura Hudson in the November 19, 2014 edition of The New York Times Magazine; furthermore, the game Depression Quest, developed by Zoe Quinn, Patrick Lindsey, and Isaac Schankler, was featured in this article and became the starting point of an ugly episode referred to as “gamergate”; for more on this controversy, see https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/14/the-only-guide-to-gamergate-you-will-ever-need-to-read/.
References
Cayley, J. (2018). The translation of process. Amodern. Retrieved June 3, 2019, from http://amodern.net/article/the-translation-of-process/.
Esslin, A. (2007). Canonizing hypertext. Explorations and constructions. London: Continuum International Publishing Group.
Gauthier, J. (2012). Relire afternoon, a story de Michael Joyce: nouvelle visualisation et déviations thématiques. Cahiers Virtuels du NT2. Retrieved June 3, 2019, from http://nt2.uqam.ca/en/cahiers-virtuels/article/relire-afternoon-story-de-michael-joyce-nouvelle-visualisation-et.
Guilet, A. (2009). Petit recadrage terminologique et historique: le proto-hypertexte et l’hypertexte. cyborglitteraire.org. Retrieved June 3, 2019, from http://cyborglitteraire.com/2008/11/17/petit-recadrage-terminologique-et-historique-le-proto-hypertexte-et-lhypertexte/.
Heckman, D., & O’Sullivan, J. (2018). Electronic literature: Contexts and poetics. Literary studies in the digital age, an evolving anthology. Retrieved July 2, 2019, from https://dlsanthology.mla.hcommons.org/electronic-literature-contexts-and-poetics/.
Hudson, L. (2014). Twine, the video-game technology for all. The New York Times Magazine. Retrieved June 15, 2019, from https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/23/magazine/twine-the-video-game-technology-for-all.html.
Keep, C., McLaughlin, T., & Parmar, R. (2006). Afternoon: A reading. The Electronic Labyrinth. Retrieved June 15, 2019, from http://elab.eserver.org/hfl0288.html.
Landow, G. (1992). Hypertext: The convergence of contemporary critical theory and technology. Baltimore: John Hopkins Press.
Mamber, S. (2003). Narrative mapping. In A. Everett & J. Caldwell (Eds.), New media: Theories and practices of intertextuality (pp. 145–158). New York: Routledge.
Montfort, N., & Wardrip-Fruin, N. (2004). Acid-free bits. Recommendations for long-lasting electronic literature. eliterature.org. Retrieved June 15, 2019, from https://eliterature.org/pad/afb.html.
Portela, M., Pold, S., & Mencia, M. (2018). Electronic literature translation: Translation as process, experience and mediation. Electronic Book Review. Retrieved June 3, 2019, from http://electronicbookreview.com/essay/electronic-literature-translation-translation-as-process-experience-and-mediation/.
Regnauld, A., & Vanderhaeghe, S. (2014). Machiner le subjectif. Traduire afternoon, a story. Cahiers Virtuels du Laboratoire NT2. Retrieved June 15, 2019, from http://nt2.uqam.ca/en/cahiers-virtuels/article/machiner-le-subjectif.
Snyder, I. (1996). Hypertext. The electronic labyrinth. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.
Yellowlees Douglas, J. (2009). ‘How Do I Stop this Thing?’ Closure and indeterminacy in interactive narratives. In M. Bernstein & D. Grego (Eds.), Reading hypertext (pp. 59–88). Watertown, MA: Eastgate Systems.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Tremblay-Gaudette, G. (2021). You Can’t Go Home Again: Moving afternoon Forward Through Translation. In: Desjardins, R., Larsonneur, C., Lacour, P. (eds) When Translation Goes Digital. Palgrave Studies in Translating and Interpreting. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51761-8_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51761-8_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-51760-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-51761-8
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)