In our analysis of what earns a given work the classification of “book,” I am unsure if I would consider digital literature the next evolution of the book or its own entity of scholarship entirely. A large part as to why I consider electronic literature separate from the book is due to its inability to fit print publication and the traditional book format, especially because it requires technology for the literature executed by user request. As Ted Nelson describes, hypertext is “a body of written or pictorial material interconnected in such a complex way that it could not conveniently be presented or represented on paper” (Ryan, Emerson, & Robertson 170). This observation by Nelson establishes a critical separation between traditional print and born-digital literature on the basis of material fixity and the necessity of user interaction. With hypertexts, users must engage with navigation and do not always receive the same stories based on their choices which defies the constraints of the page. When Nelson outlines the “inconvenience” of formatting hypertexts onto the page, this is not just a logistical issue but a conceptual one. 

From studying Patchwork Girl in Digital Humanities last semester and seeing how different table groups interpreted the work in the DH Center, it is clear that with hypertext reader interaction radically changes narrative structure. Without a linear structure or page numbers like the traditional book, Patchwork is meant to be lost in and disorienting as a part of the user experience. I would not consider this a goal of the traditional book, however, which emphasized a separation between print and literary work made explicitly by and for the digital. In this way, the purposes of the medium present themselves as books more typically transmit information while digital literature is a heavier experimental and creative pursuit. 

As a Books class, I still consider it important to study electronic literature to understand what a book is and what it is not. The purpose of this is not to solidify the category of “book” as an elite title with prerequisites, but to interrogate our understanding of what a book does and doesn’t. With our world moving into and already in an increasingly digital age, we must ask ourselves what counts as a book when we move away from the physical page? This is also vital to consider as we prepare for what our future of reading and writing behaviors will look like.