INTRODUCTION

This is the first time I work with a hypertext. At the beginning this kind of texts can present some difficulty because it is not the type of text we are get used to read. Despite the complexity of this kind of text, this way of reading a text has seemed to me more interesting than I thought.

As you can observe, the selected text is Damascene: a Tale for computer and compasses, which was written by Milorad Pavic. I have opted for this text because the title seemed to me attractive and interesting. In addition I read some information about the author which paid my attention such as the Nobel Prize he got, his novel “Dictionary of the Khazars” which contains the Serbian original of this novel-lexicon and, the most interesting thing I read in his web page was the “Unique Item”, a delta-novel. This is a tale of love and a detective “multi-ending story” that diverges into one hundred branches and leads the reader towards one hundred different endings. What did me to be interested in this author was this “multi-ending story”.

This work about Damascene: a tale for computer and compasses will focus on several aspects: the plot, which provides information about what the text is talking about. In this case, the reading of the text does not present any difficulty because it follows a linear structure, so it’s easy to going on the reading. Also a character’s analysis is presented in order to know better what the characters that appear are in the text and their personality. Other aspect which is analyzed is the space; the distinction between external and internal space, what are the spaces that appear in the text as the dinning-room, the church, the palace…

The last aspect which is analyzed is the external structure. In this aspect the links, images and sounds are commented. The text does not present a great number of links and this makes the reading easier. Referring to the sound, specifically this text does not present any kind of sound.

Lastly, a conclusion is presented. In it I comment my experiences at reading this new type of text, the hypertext.