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Digital Storytelling : How Technology is Shaping the Future of Urban Literature

Often digital textuality is seen as an alternative medium for literature, there is, however, literature that uses digital textuality much more effectively. This integrates aspects of digital dynamics as part of the signifying structure and widens the range of literary expression. The reference is to ‘digital storytelling’ which brings together the ancient art of storytelling and multimedia technology. Through the careful scrutiny and close reading of various examples of e-narrative this essay argues that, contrary to Benjamin’s prediction regarding the demise of ‘storytelling’ in the media culture of the twentieth century, such a type of narrative has known a revival which has taken different shapes. In some cases hypertextual narrative structures bring about an interbreeding of literary genres and visual arts, in others - the ones that are focused upon in this chapter - the impact of the geographical ‘locale’ and of a well-established trope, ‘the city’, make them hybrid texts, occupying a new space between printed text and multimedia presentation. The importance of this type of study is apparent if considered in the context of the growing critical interest towards the so-called ‘locative technologies’, and their frequent use as story-telling/e-readers devices.