it occured to me as i read the comments to yesterday’s post that i left out a key element in the equation -? the ovearching vision that determines what gets included in the ideal Ulysses and how. ideally this vision will be a creative amalgam of the perspective of the great teacher, the enquiring reader and the canny editor/producer.
this trinity may seem obvious but i think the question of how to balance the power between the three is something we don’t really know much about. to put differently, if in the print world the hierarchy of AUTHOR/reader has been fiercely protected by those whom it favors, the promise of the networked book to upset these relations is just that, a promise. that will be the case until we come up with new schema powerful enough to be the foundation of a real transformation* (see footnote at bottom of the post)
i think perhaps an interesting next step would be to sit in on classes with some of the great teachers of Ulysses -? the ones who make the book come alive for their students. i’d like to see what characteristics are common to all and which different. then we could think about how to take the essence of this experience into an ideal version. note, that even if the answer in the end is that for teachers to work their magic they need to be live, in front of an audience, then the question for me becomes, how do we get that into a networked book?
So please if you took a great course in Ulysses or know of anyone who did, comment here or send me a note at bob@futureofthebook.org.
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* footnote -? many years ago a group of us were trying to imagine the encyclopedia of the future. we saw it in part as the ultimate teacher/tutor who knew everything about everything, who waited in the background till called, and who then was able to engage you at your level on any question you put forth. this view, while valid, placed 100% of the value on learner-initiated activities. it seems in retrospect as if foolishly we completely discounted the ability of the teacher/mentor/knowledgeable companion to raise interesting questions which could start the learner off in unexpected but perfectly wonderful directions.