Untitled - witz cultural

39'lNOTES TO PAGES239-241the matrix, that of the genetic code, that now infinitely 'gives birth' based on afunctional mode purged of all aleatory sexuality."This statement has many implications for both hypertext and critical theory particularlyabout the relationship between the author and her work. The author doesnot beget herself she sprouts from each of her segments" ("Comments on Patch'WOTK GLTL I.9. Williams continues: "Perhaps one may see this tension between order and disordermostclearly inlife. Patchwork Girl'sfitnaloning mirrors a cell's life. The cytoplasmof links serves as a permeable medium through which disparate parts pass signs. Itsglobal disorder accommodates the local structure of organelles, which may have beenconceived autonomously, but together rely on one another's differentiated function toachieve their firllest existence. Cells that incorporated subunits with diverse textureswrinkledmitochondria, knotted DNA, smooth and rough endoplasmic reticulumhadsufficient complexity as biological collages to form entities such as readers of texts j'10. In his lexia Lars Hubrich argues that in Patchwork Girl scars become morethan emblems of disfigurement, since we encounter "the story of a long struggle, ofan emancipation that ends not in a mouming about the lost battles but in newstrength, as the monster explains:Scar tissue does more than flaunt its strength by chronicling the assaults ithas withstood. Scar tissue is new growth. And it is tougher than skin innocentofthe blade."ln fact, the scars become a new, living organ, opening up a new sensorium that goessilaight into the chest of the monster. The scars are hot, responding to other people'sinput. And they have the ability to share their experience, to inscribe themselves onsomeone else's skin."The scars hold together the individual parts, each one having its own history,and gain their strength from the parts' experiences. But they do not pointback, they rather are signs ofan active, progressive look into a future that has leamedfrom history."I have a navel like any other person. Does Shelleyl monster have onel Ofcourse, it has to. Not that it gets mentioned, though, as far as I have read PatchworkGirl. It would be rather odd for a monster like the one in the story to have a navel. Itsorigins lie somewhere else, not at one single point.'And then we realize what those scars really are: birthmarks. Birthmarks of anew history, arisen from endless struggles. Donna Harawaywould smile" ("Stitchedidentity").11. In his lexia entitled'A Spotlight on the Haze: Notions of Originin PatchworkGirl," Brian Perkins claims, however, that "hlpertext is not so much a harbinger ofthe new possibilities, but a spotlight on the old machinations. It makes manifest theproblems involved in defining the author as producer and the reader as consumer,problems which are not specific to hypertext, but which encompass all of languageand signification. The transmission of meaning has forever been a blurry and com'plicated phenomenon. Hypertexts like Patchwork Girl are not novel because the