On Sun, 30 Nov 2008, Julia Valenzuela wrote…

 

>

>----- BEGIN FORM -----

>comments      

>Hello,

>

>This is Julia Valenzuela, I'm a student at the

>University of Philology and Communication in

>Valencia, Spain.

>

>We are studying Hypertexts and Narrative and I

>have chosen Rainbow Factory to make an html

>website to analyse and explain the story and the

>tools aspects about it, I just went through the whole

>poem and I have to say that it has amused me quite

>a lot, I was supposed to just skim over it a little

>today but I have not been able to let it go until I

>finished it...and repeated most windows a few

>times, ha!

>Great job!, I has been the first thing I have ever

>read online but, I really liked it.

>

>Well anyways, First of all I wanted to thank you for

>your time, reading this... and was wondering if you

>could help me with some questions that came up,

>as I was reading it?

>NAME   Julia Valenzuela

>----- END FORM -----

 

Peter replied to me on Sun, 30 Nov 2008

 

Hi Julia,

 

I'm glad you liked Rainbow Factory. Please do ask your questions and I

will try to answer them.

 

All the best,

--

Peter

 

http://www.hphoward.demon.co.uk/poetry/

http://peterhoward.org

 

 

Peter replied to me on 2, Dec 2008

 

Hi Julia,

 

I'll answer your questions as best I can...

 

 

>    I wondered, as I read it in a orderly and linear top left to right

>    and then bottom row also left to right, if the election of the

>    order of Rainbow Factory might change in anyway the story told?

>    I also wanted to know your personal opinion or preference of the

>    order of the windows of the factory?

 

It's probably best read from left to right, top to bottom, i.e. leftmost

top window, leftmost bottom window, 2nd top window, 2nd bottom window,

and so on. This is because the bottom windows often contain a trope or

commentary on what happens in the corresponding top window. The top

windows are occupied by the management, who want to present as good a

picture as possible of The Rainbow Factory. The bottom windows house the

disaffected workforce.

 

>

>    I also think I need an explanation for the 4th top row window: I

>    understood the text as a metaphor of rainbows to explain what

>    electronic literature can be about, and at the end you put an

>    ironic crossing out of the information written. Did I get this

>    wrong?

 

I didn't consciously have the idea of the rainbows being a metaphor for

electronic literature, but that doesn't mean you're wrong. In fact, I

like this idea a lot. The crossing out is the infiltration of the guided

tour by the dissidents. The word 'spin' is used a lot in UK politics - I

think this is what the crossing out is complaining about.

 

>    I had another question about the 8th top row window; I'm not sure

>    if I understood right the meaning of the text that scrolls quickly

>    up in an antique looking frame, is it a satiric poem? 

 

It would be claiming too much to call it a poem. It's supposed to be an

ancient text extolling the economic virtues of The Rainbow Factory. I

used some archaic spelling and the long form of the letter 's' (it looks

like an 'f' but has a shorter cross-stroke and was used in English

typography but died out by the nineteenth century -

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_s ). Yes, it is satiric, on some

levels.

 

>

>    And then in the window below that one (8th)the one where the text

>    flashes around appearing and fading, I wanted to know if there was

>    any reason for the chaotic sense of this window?.. or if it has to

>    mean something in particular or if it is just random?

>    And what is the price of god's blood or who are the fuckers in the

temple caste?

 

I wrote the piece around the time of the last stock market panic, i.e.

the dot com bubble. So it's investors panicking, which is why it's

chaotic. The price of god's blood comes from "How the colours came"

(window 2, top row) "red from the blood of a dying god" and the fuckers

in the temple caste is an extension of that. I was thinking that getting

blood from a dying god would be the job of priests, and that in a

society where this was important economically, those priests would have

a lot of power, and also be likely to be hated when things went wrong.

 

 

>    Alright, that is about the most important things, I have more

>    questions, but I didn't want to bother

 

I'm happy to try to answer more questions if it helps you.

 

Cheers,

 

 

 

Peter replied to me

 

Hi Julia,

 

On Fri, 5 Dec 2008, Julia Valenzuela wrote...

 

>    Since I am actually supposed to do an analysis of the tools aspect,

>    I am going to ask if you can explain, the type of tools used to

>    create the "black comedy", I have noticed that your using movement and

>    sound as well, makes the story unique and dynamic. And very

>    appealing.

 

Almost the whole piece was written in Macromedia (now Adobe) Flash. The

rainbow image was designed in Macromedia Freehand, and the 'library'

(upper window 5) is html (with a bit of javascript) written in Notepad.

The sounds were taken from various royalty-free libraries on the web.

 

>    In some pages the words or lines change as we readers watch it, and

>    that makes it very impacting at times, amusing and even confusing

>    at other times, the pieces of temporal structuring create effects,

>    and my question is; were these changes and what they make the

>    reader feel, improvised or did you want different reactions from

>    the reader at specific times in the story?

 

There's obviously a political element to the piece, but I wasn't trying

to tell the reader what to think, but rather to invite them to draw

their own conclusions and responses. I think didactic art, where the

artist is trying to tell the audience what to think, tends to fail, as

people dislike that sort of manipulation. On the other hand, the

selection of material and the way it's presented is always going to

suggest some sort of bias.

 

(Does that answer your question? If not, ask me again and I'll have

another go.)

 

 

Cheers,

--

Peter

http://www.hphoward.demon.co.uk/poetry/

http://peterhoward.org

 

 

Peter replied to me 8:09 PM  

 

On Mon, 8 Dec 2008, Julia Valenzuela wrote...

 

 

>    Just one more short question... You must have noticed , that in

>    these emails, I have been referring to Rainbow Factory, as a

>    hypertext, poem, story, and said it was a comedy a satire, etc.

>

>    How would you name it? To someone like me, that is new to

>    electronic literature.

 

 

Hi Julia,

 

I don't think it needs to be categorised into any one single form. All

the descriptions you've used seem appropriate to me.

 

I certainly see it as a satiric black comedy. In form, it's an animated

story with poetic elements, I think.

 

Thank you for your questions. I've enjoyed thinking about them and

answering them.

 

All the best,