Collaborative Fiction
Collaborative FictionCollaborativeFiction is a literature construction process that produces multiple story threads by multiple writers.
Give examples, preferably good ones. I think the most famous story and arguably the seminal one was NakedCameTheStranger?. More recent examples are FinbarsHotel? and YeatsIsDead?. These are all linear collaborative fiction. For collaborative hyperfiction, see WikiFiction.
Role-playing games played by email can be good examples of CollaborativeFiction. Players and game master all contribute their own writing to a common story, within a mutually defined framework of rules, pre-conceptions and a broad plot outline.
I'm always surprised by the unity of tone and the smoothness of the plot achieved in these efforts, without any obvious frustration from the contributors, as opposed to the fun, but silly results of freeform CollaborativeFiction.
One of the issues with traditional ways of playing games by email, though, is that the email or newsgroup threads used hamper a vital aspect of creative writing : editing! Contributions are amended, rescinded or merged only with reluctance and much effort and confusion. WikiWiki adds the editing tools to the CollaborativeFiction experience, and if it hasn't been done before, I'd like to give it a try.
A specific example of a CollaborativeFiction game is the Estate (http://games.dmtcons.com/) in which you must submit a move consisting of a piece of writing adhering to a set of rules defined by the referee. The point seems to be to enjoy the freedom of writing within the constraints imposed by the rules. The Estate game appears to have moved to (http://garage.nexted.com/usqonline/users/dmtcons/)....is this the same thing?
Another one (here I go stretching the definition of CollaborativeFiction again) would be DouglasHofstadter 's recent book LeTonBeauDeMarot, which alternates dozens of translations of a short french poem, with essays by DouglasHofstadter about what it means to translate, to write, etc. The translations range from professional (predating DouglasHofstadter 's book) to efforts from friends, family and strangers. Taken collectively, (because the different translators influenced each other sometimes, and certainly worked off of Marot's first work) they can be seen as a CollaborativeFiction or writing. Again, a major theme seems to be that constraints, freely accepted by authors, provide the backbone or a recognizable theme or unity between contributions, which at least in this case, are some times so different it takes familiarity with the whole corpus to see the links.
There is a new attempt at CollaborativeFiction at the FictionWiki? (http://fictionwiki.blogan.com/) that is attempting to gain momentum at the moment. If anyone is interested, we'd sure appreciate your input. It is a wiki, so one is allowed to edit anything. Branching, linear, or appending stories are welcome too, though. I take this site is kaput?
Looks like the above site is no longer available. I've found a similar site (http://www.wiction.org/). It looks a little incomplete at the moment though.
StoryMash? (http://StoryMash.com/) has taken off and is the first to successfully monetize collaborative writing. Their slogan says it all: The Future of Collaborative Fiction.
Although reading is a linear process, good writing is not. Readable prose comes out of planning and revision. That's why add-on stories are usually such crap! There simply is no mechanism for editing.
By contrast, (http://www.FoolQuest.com/fiction.htm) is the real deal, an ongoing open online workshop dedicated to genuine fiction brainstorming and collaboration, inspired by my own frustration with add-on stories and other childish hidebound modes of collective fiction writing, all lacking any discipline of the writing craft or much creative freedom either.
A deeper problem is the perceived need for consensus, actually a non-problem for which the solution has long existed in the methodology of brainstorming, argument, and creative synthesis.
After all, the worst that can happen is creative difference and different versions.
All are invited! (http://www.FoolQuest.com/fiction.htm)
--Aaron Agassi
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