Calvino's Hypertextual Tendencies

Calvino raises several interesting points. Hypertext calls for the active reader; it is built on the assurance that the reader will choose what to read, which storyline to follow, etc. In this way, the hypertext reader, to a great extent, creates the text before him. Every reader has a different experience, every reader constructs his/her own reading.

Calvino declares that such an experience occurs with the conventional novel. Your own story -- your life -- changes the reading of the novel. Perhaps you are angry when you pick up a novel, perhaps you just lost your job. How will you read this novel differently than, say, if you had just been promoted? What happens if you read a certain passage after some sort of tragedy? Might you read it differently? Might it have different implications? Of course.