When I created “The Witness Story” in Twine, I wanted readers to explore the truth from different sides, just like real investigators. Twine lets writers build hypertext stories1, where each part connects to others through links. Readers don’t need to move in a straight line; they can choose what to read next.
This idea comes from Nelson’s work on hypertext. He explained that digital writing connects information “like a web of ideas,” not like the one-way flow of a printed book (Nelson, 1999). When I linked different witness scenes together, I was following that same idea. I let readers jump between voices and form their own understanding.
In this story, each witness talks in a natural and conversational way, so readers feel as if they are hearing people speak rather than reading formal text. (Ong, 2002). This program and the others help me reorganize my thoughts. (Heim, 1999). During revising my Twine story, I realized that this program didn’t just help me write, it helped me think. It showed me how stories and memories can change depending on the path we take.
References
Heim, M. (1999). Electric language: A philosophical study of word processing. Yale University Press.
Nelson, T. (1999). Xanalogical Structure, Needed Now More Than Ever. ACM Computing Surveys, 31(4).
Ong, W. J. (2002). Orality and Literacy:The technology of the words. Routledge
1 Hypertext plays an important and beautiful role in how we read and share information today. It lets a story or idea unfold in many layers at the same time. People can click on a link to jump ahead to another part of the story or go back to reread something that wasn’t clear. Instead of reading in a straight line from start to finish, readers can move around freely.
You can imagine of hypertext like a magic door in “Alice in Wonderland,” where there are many doors and paths to take. Hyperlinks also work like a modern table of contents. They connect not just to chapters, but to exact ideas, examples, and definitions. This helps readers find information faster and understand topics from several aspects. However, this freedom has a downside too. When readers keep clicking link after link, they might lose track of where they started like being lost in a maze. So, hypertext is both a wonderful tool for discovery and a challenge that asks readers to stay focused.