Search results

Intro -- Contents -- Preface -- Acknowledgments -- 1. VR101: Confused about virtual reality? What is it? Here's a guide for complete beginners. -- 2. Virtual Realism: Between the future shock of network idealists and the naïve realism of the Unabomber runs a middle path. It is the peaceful road of virtual realism. Ten signposts mark the way. -- 3. The Art of Virtual Reality: Artists teach us how to marry technology with spirit. PlaceHolder and the Virtual Dervish provide lessons in virtual realism. What do you learn from spending six hours in a headmounted display? Here's a report. -- 4. Interactive Design: Tunnel Or Spiral? Since the 1960s, artists-from Glenn Gould to Jim Morrison-prepared us for digital interaction. The same artists now help us understand how to build holistic virtual worlds. -- 5. InfoEcology: Survival dictates that we integrate information systems with planetary ecology. Virtual Reality is already cleaning nuclear waste sites left by the Cold War. One engineering project adds photogrammetry to virtual realism. -- 6. Nature and Cyberspace: Does nature end where cyberspace begins? Or can we put nature into cyberspace? The author looks at the puzzle through some personal life history. -- 7. AWS and UFOs: Why do alien intruders populate so many nightmares? What brings them to us? Consider these visitors our future selves, summoning us from the not-too-distant technological future. -- Notes on Artists and Works -- Chapter Notes -- Vocabulary of Virtual Realism -- Suggested Reading -- Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- X -- Y -- Z -- Illustrations.

Little is known of Karel Havlíček Borovský (1821-56) outside Czechoslovakia, but his fellow Czechs revere him. He is one of their nineteenth-century culture heroes - satirist of great finesse and a shrewd but always humane journalist and politician. The Russian journey proved to be the turning point in Havlíček's life.

The goal of this collective effort is to provide an overview of the course of Central European literatures in the twenty years following the fall of the Berlin Wall. The authors have highlighted works they consider representative of their countries' literary production and placed them in the context of the political and social changes they reflect. Where English translations of the works in question are available, they are listed in a bibliography attached to each article.