Maggie Weidlein

Dr.Hey

ENG 255-01

11 November 2017

Digital Literature is a genre of literature that covers works created exclusively on and for

digital devices. The piece of literature, Girls Day Out by Kerry Lawrynovicz, which can be

found in electronic literature collection 1, contains three separate but related sections, including

the poem Girls Day Out the authors note and Shards which is a poem composed from

phrases. In the poem Girls Day Out and the poem Shards, readers can see how ergodic

literature applies both sections. Reading these related sections, one can see how these sections

are considered to be ergodic literature, how this piece is electronic literature, and finally if the

author is needed in this work.

Electronic Literature which is the same as digital literature is different works created on

digital devices. The text Girls Day Out by Kerry Lawrynovicz is considered electronic

literature because it is found on the computer. The multimodality of digital art works challenges

writers, users, and critics to bring together diverse expertise and interpretive traditions to

understand fully the aesthetic strategies and possibilities of electronic literature (Hayles). In the

different sections of Girls Day Out this work makes innovative use of simple combinatory

techniques, reminiscent of Burroughs cut-ups, to reflect on a real-life tragedy. This literature

requires certain technique in order to understand the authors purpose. By including three

different but related sections to the overall piece, readers can see the technique she intended for.
Alternating game play with novelistic components, interactive fictions expand the repertoire of

the literary through a variety of techniques, including visual displays, graphics, animations, and

clever modifications of traditional literary devices (Hayles). In the three different sections one

will see two types of poems and an authors note. In the authors note, Lawrynovicz gives a

clearer view of what her literature talks about. In the poem Girls Day Out written by

Lawrynovicz herself, it tells her story and experience riding in those woods. The reader is then

required to move the mouse which reveals a story within the poem, revealing more details of the

murders. The next section which is the poem Shards is considered to be a technique used by

Burroughs called the Cut-up technique. This is a literary technique in which a text is cut up and

rearranged to create a new text. The poem Shards contains clippings from other articles that

talked about the murders of Star Dust Trail. Although both poems do not include displays or

graphics, it includes the visualization of words appearing and disappearing revealing a better

understanding of what happened at the trails.

For a piece of electronic literature to be considered ergodic, non-trivial effort is required.

Non-trivial effort is interactive where there are multiple potential paths of narrative. In the piece

of electronic literature Girls Day out by Kerry Lawrynovicz, there are two sections that require

the reader to move around the mouse in order for them to make certain choices. The poem

Girls Day Out by Lawrynovicz, talks about two sisters and the love they have for riding

horses. Whenever they visited Texas they would look for a place to ride when they finally came

across Star Dust Trail Rides, which was close to their cousins house, where is assumed, they

stayed whenever they were in Texas. After having been to this specific trail for a few years, their

grandmother was reading the paper when she came across an article based on the stable her

granddaughters go to every time they visit. More than 30 unsolved murder victims were found on
the grounds of star dust trail, where the two sisters loved to ride. When you click on the mouse

certain words disappear leaving on a few words on the screen at a time, this is where the piece is

considered to be ergodic. When one clicks on the mouse it reveals another text within the poem.

What seemed like a poem about two sisters riding horses, turned out to be a horrific truth of the

grounds they ride on. The text within the poem tells the gruesome story about the murders of six

other girls that have rode on that same exact trial. The other section that requires non-trivial

effort is the poem Shards. This poem is composed from phrases found in articles that covered

the events that inspired the poem. This is considered to be an example of Burroughs Cut-up

technique because it has different clippings from different articles and they are all combined in

one text which is the poem Shards.

During the cyber textual process, the user will have effectuated a semiotic sequence, and

this selective movement is a work of physical construction that the various concepts of

"reading" do not account for. This phenomenon I call ergodic, using a term appropriated

from physics that derives from the Greek words ergon and hodos, meaning "work" and

"path." In ergodic literature, nontrivial effort is required to allow the reader to traverse the

text (Aarseth, 1)

This poem however is also considered an ergodic piece because without the movement of the

mouse, this would be just a trivial poem. Between the two poems Girls Day Out and Shards

one can see why these are both to be considered ergodic literature.

Kerry Lawrynovicz who is the author of the digital literature Girls Day Out wrote this

poem talking about her memory of the Star Dust Trail. Although she and her sister were very

fond of this trail, she cant seem to get passes the murders because she will always think back of

how it could have been her sister and her murdered as well.
 Writing unfolds like a game that invariably goes beyond its own rules and transgresses

its limits. In writing, the point is not to manifest or exalt the act of writing, nor is it to pin

a subject within language; it is, rather, a question of creating a space into which the

writing subject constantly disappears (Foucault, 206).

In this excerpt taken from the source, What Is An Author? By Michel Foucault, it explains that

writing can go beyond the limits and where the term writing can disappear. In the work of

literature by Lawrynovicz, one is able to analyze the work through its structure, rather than by

the author. Although the author herself is part of the story when she describes her memoir of star

dust trails, readers are able to forget about the author and focus on the story she is trying to tell

through the digital text. Instead of having just a basic trivial type foundation of her work, readers

have to use a non-trivial way to look more into Lawrynovicz story. The authors structure is a big

part in how the story is told. It keeps readers interested and entertained in reading her story.

Having a story reveled within the poem, describing the horrific truth about the day the murdered

girls were found keeps readers engaged in the story because they revealed the truth behind it.

In Girls Day Out by Kerry Lawrynovicz, her structure can reveal that ergodic literature

is a big part in her story having the readers interact more with the piece of work. Readers also get

a better definition of what electronic literature really is and how it connects to Lawrynovicz

literature. By picking this structure, Lawrynovicz almost disappears as the writer and has the

reader find out the truth behind the story by using the non-trivial effort.