In October 2016, the Swedish Academy declared that singer-songwriter Bob Dylan would be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for “creating new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” This announcement created a stir because, for the first time, a musician was honored with the world’s leading literary accolade. The decision prompted debates, with many questioning its validity and sarcastically suggesting that novelists might soon aspire to win a Grammy. This controversy ignited essential discussions about the distinction between poetry and song, but the broader question remains: what defines literature? Has its meaning evolved since the first Nobel Prize in Literature was handed out in 1901?
These inquiries didn’t start in 2016. Back in the late 1950s, professors at the University of Birmingham pioneered cultural studies to address new issues: the impact of TV and other mass media on cultural development, the justification for separating high and low culture, and the connection between culture and power. These questions are still pertinent in today’s literary debates. Often, “literary” is seen as a mark of distinction, separating “high” culture from more common or less valued “low” culture. For instance, comics have only recently been welcomed into this exclusive category, partly thanks to their rebranding as “graphic novels.”
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, literature signifies “excellence of form or expression and ideas of lasting or universal interest.” This definition suggests that an artist like Bob Dylan could win the Nobel Prize because of literature’s hallmark: “excellence of form or expression,” which isn’t confined to written text.
But what about other forms of language-based expression? If performing arts like theater or songwriting are considered literature, where do we draw the line? Data from video game consultancy Newzoo shows that more than 3 billion people play video games globally, which is almost half of the world’s population. In Spain alone, 77 percent of young people play video games, making them a highly relevant cultural form. But how does this relate to “excellence of form or expression”? To answer, we need to look back several decades.
When the first video games were created in the 1950s, they split into two main genres: action-oriented games like the 1958 Tennis for Two, and text-based interactive fiction. These early text games required players to read and make choices that directed the game’s outcome, much like an interactive story. Images in adventure games only appeared in 1980 with Mystery House, the first “graphic adventure” game. The peak of such games came in the 1990s, with popular titles like the Monkey Island series, Day of the Tentacle, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango. Despite technological advances, these games retained key features from interactive fiction, such as the significant role of text. Playing these games is akin to reading a book: there’s dialogue, pauses, and the option to revisit previous sections. Players engage in conversations to gather information, much like how books might use footnotes or subplots.
Some classic adventure games have direct literary connections: The Abbey of Crime (1987) is a Spanish adaptation of Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, and The Secret of Monkey Island’s sword-fighting insults were scripted by sci-fi author Orson Scott Card. Myst (1993) centered its gameplay around two books. More recently, a sub-genre of adventure games, known as “story-rich” games, has emerged thanks to independent creators. Games like Papers, Please (2013), Firewatch (2016), and Return of the Obra Dinn (2018) focus on strong narratives, often prioritizing story over gameplay and visuals.
One notable example is The Stanley Parable (2011), where players navigate a deserted office while listening to an enigmatic narrator. At a pivotal moment, when the narrator describes Stanley entering a door on the left, players can choose to obey or defy the instructions, provoking the narrator’s ire, reminiscent of the protagonist’s direct address to the author in Miguel de Unamuno’s novel Fog. Each choice in The Stanley Parable opens new pathways, leading to various endings, similar to a “choose your own adventure” book. The game’s fragmented narrative and playful spirit recall Julio Cortázar’s novel Hopscotch. Playing the game involves postmodern literary features like metafiction, intertextuality, and parody, as detailed by critics such as Mikhail Bakhtin and Linda Hutcheon. Davey Wreden, one of its creators and a critical studies graduate, also developed The Beginner’s Guide (2015), where players explore levels of failed games to understand their creator.
The genre of digital or electronic literature has also emerged, incorporating works that require QR codes, VR headsets, or are published as apps. These language-based works suggest that video games could similarly be categorized as literature. This discussion gains importance today as digital formats reshape our reading habits. Just as we now regard oral traditions or popular music as forms of literature, perhaps one day we will do the same for interactive stories like The Stanley Parable. Literature constantly evolves, challenging established norms, and sometimes it’s worthwhile to ignore the familiar voice and explore the unknown door to the right, leading to new, uncharted territories.