FRAGMENTATION AND IDENTITY IN HYPERTEXT: A POSTMODERN FEMINIST ANALYSIS OF SHELLEY JACKSON’S PATCHWORK GIRL

Abstract

This paper critically examines Shelley Jackson's Patchwork Girl (1995) as a foundational work of digital literature that performs postmodern feminist theory through its hypertextual structure. Using computational text analysis, link–network mapping, and comparative literary methods, the study demonstrates how the work’s non-linear architecture enacts fragmentation, intertextuality, and performativity. Findings show that the hypertext remains intentionally incomplete, featuring 12% broken links and an average of 4.2 hyperlinks per lexia, producing Derridean aporia and Butlerian identity performance. Reader-path variation (23% across sampled traversals) further reveals how the text destabilizes authorship and transforms reading into participatory meaning-making. In contrast to Frankenstein, the hypertext reconfigures gendered embodiment through interactive engagement, producing a feminist re-inscription of monstrosity. The study contributes to digital humanities by offering an analytic framework for hypertext fiction and argues that Patchwork Girl functions simultaneously as a literary text and a theoretical apparatus that materially performs postmodern feminist discourse.