From its conception, Patchwork Girl is a pastiche of Frankenstein. It uses the world of Frankenstein to further explore the moral dilemmas such as what it means to be or own one’s body. It does so through the form of electronic literature, allowing a player to choose various paths that tell the story of Frankenstein’s female monster beyond the ending given to her in Frankenstein.
Patchwork Girl is nothing if not true to its title. Composed of collages, vignettes, and excerpts, the amalgamation of works question what it means to have an identity in various ways and through various mechanisms.
Narratively, the two most prominent discussions around the concept of identity occur through the body and the mind.
In the section labeled “graveyard,” an image of the female monster’s body appears. By clicking on different body parts, text panels tell the story of each body part. Notably, these are not stories about her experiences with her own body. Instead, they are stories about the previous owners of these body parts, as they come from various women, men, and animals. While these body parts are originally not hers, they now collectively compose her body and operate under her control.
This isn’t to say then that we are the sum of our parts (that the female monster’s personality is purely based off of the personalities of her body part’s previous owners), but rather that our parts assist us in further understanding society and thus, our own place within the world. Telling the stories of these disconnected body parts reflects the ways in which we absorb skills and perspectives of those around us to assemble and establish an identity of our own.
It is through the stories of the different body parts that we come to understand how the female monster relates to her own body. The various body parts’ histories give her understanding of what other members of society have encountered. But, her own lived experiences and personality can choose to rely on or depart from those previous experiences — allowing her to define her body in a way that reflects who she intends to become. Thus, her appropriation of the physical parts of her body reflects her learned experiences in terms of social interactions and self understanding.
In the section labeled “Broken accents,” the female monster’s stream of consciousness is explicitly laid out. In this section, she delves into the idea of what composes her selfhood.
Perhaps in the most introspective moment in the game, the female monster goes on to truly dissect what it means to be in the passage entitled “identities.” It reads:
“‘Identities seem contradictory, partial, and strategic.’
‘There is not even such a state as ‘being’ female’. Or ‘being’ monster, or ‘being’ angel.’
‘We find ourselves to be cyborgs, hybrids, mosaics, chimeras.’”
Her own examination of philosophical thoughts proves her awareness and sentience. But her scrutiny over what it means to exist evolves into a humanist versus posthumanist debate. Originally in the passages presented to the player, it seems as if the female monster is arguing for her humanity and to have her personhood recognized as other members of society are recognized. She seems to have a little mermaid-like fascination to be part of the human world while making a case that she is no different from other people though she may appear different. However, it is in this passage where we realize that her comprehension of her identity goes further. While she is described as the female monster, she is neither female nor monster. This does not suggest the alternative to be true (a male human), but rather that conceptions of societally created categories are not sufficient to encompass everything the female monster is or is not.
Here is where the idea of incomplete completeness takes its true form. Identities are not static, they are ever changing. How we interact with society, our own bodies, and our own minds change in and with every instance, every circumstance, and every situation we experience. These changes elevate us beyond presupposed categorizations and conditions. Instead, we exist as multitudes — as cyborgs, hybrids, mosaics, and chimeras.
In its gameplay, Patchwork Girl includes a map of each sequence — explicitly showing how each hyperlink will bring the player to another page of text that will advance the narrative. The inclusion of a map allows the game to transform by facilitating directionless exploration. At any given point in the story, a player can forgo the linear branching-path nature of electronic literature and jump to another panel or section.
Notably, this free exploration provides a player with an elevated level of interactivity with the game. Patchwork Girl already consists of a nonlinear narrative, and the nonlinear exploration only further distorts the story. Interactivity with Patchwork Girl therefore does not mainly occur through choosing which path to take when (although that is a form of interaction with the game), but rather outside of the game. The nonlinear exploration in a nonlinear narrative forces a player to patch together the bigger picture and underlying connections among the fragmented passages and consider various perspectives given to us.
When Pathwork Girl examines what it means to have an identity, it doesn’t do so in a vacuum or only in respect to the female monster. In the end, Patchwork Girl is a work of literature that asks us to consider or even reconsider how we understand our own identity. The player is left wondering how different we truly are from the female monster the more we engage with solving the puzzle of her story. Afterall, are our bodies also not just a combination of different parts given to us by our ancestors and parents? Are we not also composed and influenced by our interactions with those around us? Are we not also technically incomplete, since we change as we grow and experience new things? Are we not also more than the sum of the categories we define ourselves with?
Patchwork Girl is an exploration into how contradictions, fragmentations, incompleteness, and oddities create something whole — a game that leaves us understanding and accepting more about ourselves by the end of it.
-Aimee
Intermittent Mechanism 