Author: Tim Massey

This essay examines the influence of emerging media technologies on the way in which writers structure their work. It firstly explores the role of texts as artefacts building on some of the conclusions drawn within the previous essay. Through a consideration of contemporary approaches to the structuring of texts, looking particularly at works for film and television, it surmises how the possibility of audience interaction might influence this process in the future.

Through the work of the late television playwright Dennis Potter, this essay sets out to examine the relationship between writer and medium. Questioning the extent to which the various media influence the writing process in terms of both political economy and technological restraints, the work’s principal focus — television — is compared with other media including printed texts. The essay concludes with an assessment of Potter’s skill in using his chosen medium to articulate his own ‘individual voice’.