"The First Web Novel at 30: The Collection and the Creative Process"
Proposal Type
Panel
Location
Hypertexts & Fictions
Start Date
July 2026
End Date
July 2026
Abstract
Summer 2026 marks the 30th anniversary of Sunshine '69, recognized as the first novelistic hypertext fiction published on the web. While the full work remains accessible online—an "(un)supervised" preservation achievement in itself—the archive remains split between boxes and memory. This conversation between the work's creator and a major scholar in electronic literature documents both specific preservation challenges and systemic patterns in what the field chooses to preserve.
Topics include: figuring out web-born composition before established methodologies existed; the three decades of technical decisions that kept a 1996 work alive through format obsolescence and server migrations; and what gets lost when preservation efforts document the experience of pre-web works while creation processes of web-born work go unacquired.
While scholars document early hypertext through projects like ELMCIP and Pathfinders, major research libraries holding related collections have failed to accession the foundational materials. In the case of Sunshine '69, the collection includes hand-drawn hypertext maps, research notes on composing for screens (dating back to 1988), correspondence with the early hypertext community, and the late Robert Coover's unpublished writings containing the teacher/author's perspectives on early hyperfiction. Yet even these materials don't capture the human intelligence explaining how they connect, the labyrinths of memory contextualizing each compositional breakthrough, which exists only in conversation, and no institution is systematically collecting these stories.
First-generation creators are in their 50s-80s. Their archives exist now in closets and aging hard drives. Paradigm shifts deserve documentation while creators can contextualize them. This session models what's needed: recorded conversations, preserved memories, permanent records. The field must act before this history disappears.
"The First Web Novel at 30: The Collection and the Creative Process"
Hypertexts & Fictions
Summer 2026 marks the 30th anniversary of Sunshine '69, recognized as the first novelistic hypertext fiction published on the web. While the full work remains accessible online—an "(un)supervised" preservation achievement in itself—the archive remains split between boxes and memory. This conversation between the work's creator and a major scholar in electronic literature documents both specific preservation challenges and systemic patterns in what the field chooses to preserve.
Topics include: figuring out web-born composition before established methodologies existed; the three decades of technical decisions that kept a 1996 work alive through format obsolescence and server migrations; and what gets lost when preservation efforts document the experience of pre-web works while creation processes of web-born work go unacquired.
While scholars document early hypertext through projects like ELMCIP and Pathfinders, major research libraries holding related collections have failed to accession the foundational materials. In the case of Sunshine '69, the collection includes hand-drawn hypertext maps, research notes on composing for screens (dating back to 1988), correspondence with the early hypertext community, and the late Robert Coover's unpublished writings containing the teacher/author's perspectives on early hyperfiction. Yet even these materials don't capture the human intelligence explaining how they connect, the labyrinths of memory contextualizing each compositional breakthrough, which exists only in conversation, and no institution is systematically collecting these stories.
First-generation creators are in their 50s-80s. Their archives exist now in closets and aging hard drives. Paradigm shifts deserve documentation while creators can contextualize them. This session models what's needed: recorded conversations, preserved memories, permanent records. The field must act before this history disappears.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/elo2026/hypertextsandfictions/schedule/31
Bio
Robert "Bobby Rabyd" Arellano is the author of seven novels, including Sunshine '69 (1996), recognized as the first book-length hypertext fiction published on the web. His five novels with Akashic Books include Havana Lunar, an Edgar Award finalist. He is Professor and Founding Director of the Center for Emerging Media & Digital Arts at Southern Oregon University, where he has taught for over 30 years across four institutions, including Brown University where he co-founded the Hypertext Fiction Workshops with Robert Coover. Arellano recently led the recovery effort for Coover's endangered Hypertext Hotel VR project, preserving a foundational work of electronic literature. His scholarship focuses on digital narrative, preservation of born-digital works, and arts-based research methodologies. He is a 2025 Miller Foundation Spark Award recipient and recently served as Board Chair of Oregon Humanities. His work appears in venues from Routledge anthologies to Metal Hammer magazine, and his interactive fiction has been studied in digital humanities programs worldwide.