Date of Award

1999

Level of Access Assigned by Author

Open-Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

English

Advisor

Welch Everman

Second Committee Member

Naomi Jacobs

Third Committee Member

Mark Jackson

Abstract

This project allowed me to explore two of my greatest areas of interest and creative expression: writing and web design. While a World Wide Web presence is not a necessary for the use of hypertext, I believe that the web will be a major conduit for the written word in the years to come. It’s not my intention or desire to replace print and paper, but rather to explore the new tools and avenues available for the creative writer. In creating this piece, I tried to use the most fundamental tools available. The story itself I had already outlined and partly handwritten in notebooks. When developing the hypertext for the web, I used the text editor, Composer, that was part of the web browser I use, Netscape 4.5. This was all free, since I am both student and staff at the University. In addition, I rewrote some of the code using my own knowledge of HTML, in this case 4.0. For designing some of the graphics, I used Microsoft Paint, which is a part of our Windows 95 system on our home Dell 486 PC. For others, I used the one piece of software that purchased, PaintShop Pro 5. At $70, it was bargain, since it contains many of the features in Photoshop 5, which costs @ $300. For Now, the novella is available at the library on cd-rom and on the special collections website; and at the English department on cd-rom, with a copy of Netscape 4.5 on the disk as well. (That may make it accessible for the next few years.) I also plan to keep it on any future website that I have – or whatever comes next. Any of my work will always be accessible by doing a search on my name.

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