This multimedia book, Pathfinders, begins the necessary process
of documenting early digital literature, specifically pre-web hypertext fiction
and poetry, from 1986-1995.  These literary
works were produced with programming languages like Basic or authoring systems
like Storyspace and HyperCard and required a degree of interactivity between
the reader and the work. They were also among the first computer-based works of
literature to be sold commercially in the U.S. and, because of their
availability through commercial distribution, were influential in shaping
literary theory and criticism that, today, are used to discuss born digital writing.  They are also literary works in danger of
becoming inaccessible to the public because they were produced on and for
computer platforms that today are obsolete. 

From among the many “hypertexts”
we could have selected to document, we decided on four:

Shelley Jackson’s Patchwork
Girl, considered the culmination of the high art of hypertext generating
from the “Eastgate School” and an important work of cyberfeminism from the
mid-1990s

John
McDaid’s Uncle Buddy’s Phantom Funhouse,
a novel created in Hypercard 2.0 and sold as an artist box with artifacts from
the estate of the titular Uncle Buddy

Judy
Malloy’s Uncle Roger, programmed in
Basic as a serial novel published on the WELL in 1986 and, later, sold on 5 ¼
floppies via the Art Com catalog

Bill
Bly’s We Descend, a hypertext novel
created on the Storyspace platform

Readers will also find
material relating to Stuart Moulthrop’s Victory
Garden, another important work of hypertext fiction from the “Eastgate
School” dating back to 1992, in this book.

We chose these works because
they represent a specific individual contribution unique to the field as well
as a reflection of a wide range of experimentation taking place during this
period. Malloy’s Uncle Roger, for
example, was published in 1986 as a serial novel delivered to an online
audience on the Whole Earth ‘Lectric Link (WELL) and, so, constitutes one of the
social media works of literature. Together with the rest of the hypertexts
featured in this book, it represents a commercially available work not produced
in an authoring program.

Our method of documentation
is unique in that we videotaped the artist and readers interacting with a work
on its original computer platform––a methodology, which we call “traversal.” When
watching the traversal for Uncle Roger,
for example, scholars can hear the crackle of the Apple IIe as it boots up and
see the words, “Bad Information,” appear a few seconds later on the screen.
Neither of these two elements is part of the story, but they are important
cultural and artistic features lost in the migration to the web version that
came later.

We see our work with
documentation as a form of digital preservation, one that builds on the method
of “collection,” as opposed to the other two more common methods, “migration”
and “emulation,” by providing scholars wanting to experience the work in its original
format access to video documentation of the works in performance on the
original computer. 

Besides videos of
traversals, Pathfinders also includes
videos of interviews with the artists and readers of the four main works;
photos of physical artifacts such as floppies, folio covers or boxes containing
floppies and other media; sound files from traversals and interviews; and
commentary about the works and media. 
For example, John McDaid’s Uncle
Buddy’s Phantom Funhouse consisted of five floppy disks packaged in a black
box.  Nowhere is it documented that the
box also contains two music tapes, a paper copy of a science fiction short
story marked up by an editor, and a letter from the editor.  All of these additional materials also make
up Uncle Buddy’s and, so, are crucial
to one’s understanding of the work. Pathfinders
provides a video of McDaid opening the box and discussing each item found
inside; certainly, an experience that scholars will see as helpful for
understanding the breath of McDaid’s vision.

Our research would not have
been possible without the support of many organizations and people.  The National Endowment for the Humanities
awarded us a Start Up grant that allowed us to undertake our scholarship and produce
this open-source, multimedia book. 
Washington State University provided support for our research assistant,
Madeleine Brookman, through an undergraduate research grant.  We thank Madeleine for her work with editing
102 videos, producing the Pathfinders
trailer, and tagging and describing media for the book.  We acknowledge the videography of Aaron
Wintersong and early organization by Amalia Vacca.  Greg Philbrook provided tech support for most
traversals and interviews.  We also thank
the Modern Language Association for allowing us to exhibit our Pathfinders research at the 2014
conference in Chicago.  We appreciate the
support of Will Luers who helped us design the book and Erik Loyer and others
at the University of Southern California for the development of the Scalar
platform on which the book is built.  We
thank Matthew Kirschenbaum and the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities
at the University of Maryland College Park for sharing The Bly Collection with
us for our project. We want to recognize Grigar’s Electronic Literature Lab at
Washington State University Vancouver, which provided access to her collection
of computers and works for this project. 
We thank Mark Bernstein for access to images needed for the book.  Finally, we thank the artists who provided
their time and insights into their work. 
Literary history is better for it.