Hyper-constrained: Translating Nick Montfort’s Textual Generators
Hyper-constrained: Translating Nick Montfort’s Textual Generators

Summary/Abstract: Analysing Nick Montfort’s poetry generators, the authors discuss the place of digital literature in the field of contemporary experimental writing. Drawing on the terminology of expressive processing developed by Noah Wardrip-Fruin, they read the generators by examining the input, the process and the output. Montfort's generators are contextualized as the newest type of constrained literature. Montfort is presented as a central figure of the second generation of digital writers, who publish small-sized work independently online. The status of such works is discussed through aspects of gift economy, open access, appropriation, and remix culture. The authors provide a case study of three works, which they discuss from the perspective of the English language, and also in translation. A significant part of the article is devoted to a discussion of the issue of translating digital literature, which is presented as in-depth reading, involving input, process and output.

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