Authoring Hypertext Documents

Abstract

The implementation of these hypertext concepts has resulted in a changing of the roles played by a document author and a document reader. “The figure of the hypertext author approaches, even if it does not entirely merge with, that of the reader; the functions of reader and writer become more deeply entwined with each other than ever before. This transformation and near merging of roles is but the latest stage in the convergence of what had once been two very different activities” (Landow 1994).

“Spoken language is a series of words, and so is conventional writing. We are used to sequential writing and so we come easily to suppose that writing is intrinsically sequential. It need not be and should not be. Many people believe these forms of writing [hypertext] to be new and drastic and threatening. However, I would like to take the position that hypertext is fundamentally traditional and in the mainstream of literature. Customary writing chooses one expository sequence from among the possible myriad; hypertext allows many, all available to the reader. (Nelson 1993).”