SOURCE: “Cyberwriting and the Borders of Identity: ‘What's in a Name’ in Kroetsch's The Puppeteer and Mistry's Such a Long Journey?,” in Canadian Literature, No. 149, Summer, 1996, pp. 55-71.

In the following essay, Williams discusses the notion of self in the post-modern world as it appears in The Puppeteer and Mistry's Such a Long Journey.

Borders are fast disappearing in the new Europe, along the information highway, and in the mega-channel universe. Hong Kong’s Star Satellite, carrying five television channels to fifty-three countries, has already changed the face of Asia. In India, a new generation openly celebrates the country’s “Californication,” while their elders debate “The Challenge of the Open Skies” (Joseph) to a state broadcast monopoly. Given such a fundamental shift in the mode of information, we might ask whether the nation state, or local culture, or even the concept of a substantial self can survive the...