Ramblings with a hint of creativity
all the world is a stage….including digital ones
So I read this article on the BBC website the other day. The RSC are giving Romeo and Juliet a modern twist via Twitter called Such Tweet Sorrow.
While I welcome modern interpretations of Shakespeare’s work I do wonder whether Twitter is a good form of medium to do this on.
For me when i think of Twitter as a social media tool I think of it as in a sense a insight into other peoples lives you read what other people are doing, you converse in what seems like a tiny community but in reality is on a rather large scale. We use it to also have a stream of news whether it be general, music, technology etc
So for Twitter streams fronm individual charaters that you already know is clearly fictional will it really have the same effect? I think once there is awareness that what you are reading is not real, the sense of immersion that you get when something is (or at least appears to be real)
While studying at University I did a case study on Online Caroline (URL is www.onlinecaroline.com but it doesnt seem to be active anymore) if you are not familiar with it, the idea is that you log on to a site daily to view webcam feed by caroline, which pans out as an intereactive story where you choose clothing, gifts and other such items which have an impact on the story, you also recieve personal emails from Caroline. When this was first launched it was made to believe that this person was real and you were conversing with her, with that you felt immersed in the story that was playing out this article by Jill Walker really does highlight this point.
So for a story to pan out that is fragmented (as twitter posts are) in its making and you are already aware its a story…I feel there is some distance created to the story already, even with a book at least you can feel like you are are there as a third person and the story flows as slowly or as quickly as you like….i am currently following 354 people on Twitter i lose track of most of their stories let alone trying to follow fictional characters stories as well
will certainly keep an eye on the project though to see how it pans out…
One Response to “all the world is a stage….including digital ones”
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Janey Hutchinson
April 17th, 2010 at 7:11 PM
I think that “Such Tweet Sorrow” could work in the Twitter medium. Yes it would require the tweet readers to use their imagination but surely we do that every time we pick up a book. The author sets the scene and gives us the characters but we paint the picture.
For just over a month, since his miraculous birth at Taronga Zoo in Sydney, I have been following the antics of @MisterShuffles our little baby Asian Elephant, Pathi Han. At one stage he asked “Why do boy elephants have 2 trunks but girl elephants only have 1 trunk?” and I stupidly answered and told him “Oh dear, I think you need to ask your dad”. To which he replied “I don’t know who my daddy is. Do you know?” I was devastated to think I’d bought this baby elephant pain. Yes I am fully aware that it is one of his keepers who is on twitter, but I’m so caught up in the stories that Mr. Shuffles tells us about doing a rain dance, escaping through a secret door in his barn to visit the gibbons and learning how to climb a tree (impossible you say but he’s done it!) that he has become real to me. Every time he tweets it brings a smile to my face, warmth to my heart and many chuckles.
If a baby elephant tweeting his escapades can make me laugh and cry then I will be a blubbering mess if “Such Tweet Sorrow” comes to Twitter!