{"id":222,"date":"2008-09-08T19:41:57","date_gmt":"2008-09-08T23:41:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/?p=222"},"modified":"2008-09-08T23:45:11","modified_gmt":"2008-09-09T03:45:11","slug":"my-boyfriend-came-back-from-the-war-a-window-of-opportunity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/2008\/09\/08\/my-boyfriend-came-back-from-the-war-a-window-of-opportunity\/","title":{"rendered":"My Boyfriend Came Back from the War: A Window of Opportunity"},"content":{"rendered":"

My first impression of Olia Lialina\u2019s My Boyfriend Came Back from the War<\/em> was that it was similar to Hegirascope<\/em> in that both hypertexts are a bit scattered and disjointed.\u00a0 <\/span>As interactive readers, we form our own meanings and interpretations about these works, meanings that are formed through the different experiences we might have, or rather, the different paths we choose to\u00a0take.\u00a0 <\/span>But it gets more complicated than that.\u00a0 <\/span>If we control the order in which the texts and images appear on the screen, are we molding Lialina\u2019s story and thus making our own stories out of it?\u00a0 <\/span>Or, is the story the same although it can be read in a different order every time? \u00a0<\/span>I\u2019d say we uncover bits and pieces of Lialina\u2019s story as we go through and click on different links and images.\u00a0 <\/span>We \u201cfill in the blanks,\u201d if you will, wherever the blanks need filling.\u00a0 <\/span>This is Lialina\u2019s story and nobody else\u2019s story.\u00a0 <\/span>What can be pulled from the hypertext, on the other hand, depends on the reader.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

As readers, we often approach stories with the expectation that there will be a back story.\u00a0 <\/span>In the case of MBCBFTW<\/em>, there is no back story \u2013 We\u2019re just thrown right into the mix. \u00a0<\/span>Therefore, we approach the hypertext with our own back stories, stories that affect how we interpret Lialina\u2019s own personal narrative.\u00a0 <\/span>What really happened while her boyfriend was at war?\u00a0 <\/span>Did she cheat on him with her neighbor?\u00a0 <\/span>Who knows.\u00a0 <\/span>We also approach stories expecting them to have a clear point of view.\u00a0 <\/span>In MBCBFTW<\/em>, however, the point of view is not clear.\u00a0 <\/span>Is this a dialogue between two people?\u00a0\u00a0Are these<\/span>\u00a0the innermost thoughts of two different people?\u00a0 <\/span>Just one person?\u00a0 <\/span>If so, who?\u00a0 <\/span>You can see that the work raises a lot of questions. (I have a lot of blanks to fill in.)\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The format of the hypertext reminded me of a puzzle.\u00a0 <\/span>If you click and follow the\u00a0links in a particular\u00a0frame\u00a0all the way through, you\u2019re left with an empty frame.\u00a0 <\/span>This could\u00a0be a representation\u00a0of the work itself.\u00a0 <\/span>Although you feel like you\u2019ve accomplished something when there is nothing\u00a0left to click, like you\u2019ve completed that part of the story, you\u2019re\u00a0still\u00a0left with just a bunch of empty boxes in the end.\u00a0 The work <\/span>leaves you\u00a0without a sense of closure.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I agree that the images help in establishing a sort of dark theme, as someone mentioned below.\u00a0 <\/span>The images also offer readers even more opportunities to create their own meanings or form their own assumptions about the story.\u00a0 <\/span>That\u2019s actually what I thought of when I saw the image of the window \u2013 the work is a metaphorical window of opportunity that we have to open.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My first impression of Olia Lialina\u2019s My Boyfriend Came Back from the War was that it was similar to Hegirascope in that both hypertexts are a bit scattered and disjointed.\u00a0 As interactive readers, we form our own meanings and interpretations about these works, meanings that are formed through the different experiences we might have, or … Continue reading My Boyfriend Came Back from the War: A Window of Opportunity<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reflections"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":233,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222\/revisions\/233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/fall2008\/343\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}