Introduction

Engagements with Literary Gaming traces the long and varied intersections of stories and games, asserting that while reading and gaming have often been treated as distinct pleasures, they share deep affinities in form, function, and interpretation. Examples as varied as Homer, Geoffrey Chaucer, and John Milton, to Atari’s Pong, Zork, Gone Girl, The Hunger Games , and The Super Mario Bros. Movie collectively indicate how stories have long depicted games, how games increasingly embed narrative structures, and how both media invite interpretive engagement. The concept of literary gaming emerges as a lens for recognizing when stories can be played and when games can be read. The chapter distinguishes between stories that merely depict games and those that use game-like strategies to challenge or deceive readers, as well as between games that tell no story (like tic-tac-toe) and those that deeply integrate narrative into their play (like many role-playing video games). Literary gaming sparks critical debates, particularly in tensions between ludologists and narratologists, and affirms the interpretive richness of hybrid works. As a prelude to the book, the introduction invites readers to consider how literature and games have always overlapped, how both thrive on participation, and how the play of a narrative and the storyline of a game may be more intertwined than previously imagined.