Genetically Modified Literature
What's here
Genetically Modified Literature is part of the Collaborative Writing Project.
Genetically Modified Literature is a space where students and faculty can re-code the classics. Part of the Collaborative Writing Project, GML is partly inspired by the online game IVANHOE developed at the University of Virginia.
The re-coding possibilities in this space are limited only by the imaginations of users. Here are some suggestions:
Re-program
- Add a page with some text from a literary work in the public domain available from The Gutenberg Project.
- Save the page to create a record of the original text.
- Make changes to the text. Other users will be able to compare versions of the text by looking at the page history.
- Using Add Comment, explain your changes and how they would affect later developments in the text.
Cross-breed
- Frankenstein meets the Mummy. Jane Eyre meets Mrs. Dalloway. Elizabeth Bennet meets zombies. Mash-up texts or create hybrid characters.
Grow appendages
- Create characters, situations, descriptions, etc. that are not in an original text such as David Copperfield or The Great Gatsby. Explain how adding these to the text would change it.
- Or: write letters by one or more characters to other characters in the same novel or (see "cross-breed," above) by a character in one novel to a character in another.
