Classics and the Western Canon discussion

Here’s the place for your thoughts on translations as well as any background research.

We’ll be reading the 1956 edition which includes 17 stories: 8 stories in the section called “The Garden of Forking Paths” and 9 stories in the section called “Artifices.” The individual stories will be listed in the schedule post.

There are a couple translations out there. I’ll be reading one by Andrew Hurley and look forward to hearing which you’re reading. Is anyone reading the original Spanish?

Here’s the schedule. For the most part, we’ll read and discuss two stories a week. The readings are shorter than we usually do for fiction, but Borges has packed so much in that we should have plenty to discuss.

08/28 — Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
08/28 — The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim

09/04 — Pierre Menard, Author of the “Quixote”
09/04 — The Circular Ruins

09/11 — The Lottery in Babylon
09/11 — A Survey of the Works of Herbert Quain

09/18 — The Library of Babel
09/18 — The Garden of Forking Paths

09/25 — Funes, His Memory
09/25 — The Shape of the Sword
09/25 — The Theme of the Traitor and the Hero

10/02 — Death and the Compass
10/02 — The Secret Miracle

10/09 — Three Versions of Judas
10/09 — The End

10/16 — The Cult of the Phoenix
10/16 — The South
10/16 — The Book as a Whole

Audible has an audiobook version of “The Collected Fictions” which includes “Ficciones.” It’s based on the Andrew Hurley translation.

There’s also this audio version on YouTube: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLB....

The description states “most [stories] are translated by Anthony Kerrigan, as well as a few others. Narration done by Joseph Voelbel. There are a couple of extra stories tacked on the end of this playlist.

PART I.
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
The Approach to Al-Mu'tasim
Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote
The Circular Ruins
The Lottery in Babylon
An Examination of the Work of Herbert Quain
The Library of Babel
The Garden of Forking Paths

Part II.
Funes the Memorious
The Form of the Sword
Theme of the Traitor and the Hero
Death and the Compass
The Secret Miracle
Three Versions of Judas
The End
The Sect of the Phoenix
The South

Extra:
The Zahir
Paradiso, XXXI, 108
Borges and I”

Susan wrote: "Here’s the place for your thoughts on translations as well as any background research.

We’ll be reading the 1956 edition which includes 17 stories: 8 stories in the section called “The Garden of ..."

Unfortunately my edition of Ficciones is a different one and it does not include "The Approach to Al-muta'sim" which is part of the book "A history of eternity" in this particular editor. Well, since I do not own this second book, it seems I will look up in the internet just for this chapter...

I have the Andrew Hurley translations in Collected Fictions.

Monica wrote: "Susan wrote: "Here’s the place for your thoughts on translations as well as any background research.

We’ll be reading the 1956 edition which includes 17 stories: 8 stories in the section called “..."

Monica, “The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim” can be read here: https://www.anthonywarnick.com/fms/we... You will need to scroll down a bit.

Susan wrote: "Monica wrote: "Susan wrote: "Here’s the place for your thoughts on translations as well as any background research.

We’ll be reading the 1956 edition which includes 17 stories: 8 stories in the s..."

Thank you very much, Susan. And of course, I have added "Historia de la eternidad" in my never ending list of "want to read" someday...

Monica wrote: “And of course, I have added "Historia de la eternidad" in my never ending list of "want to read" someday.."

Isn’t that always the way? *grin*

Here is a brief description of the Parsee towers mentioned in “The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim”: https://www.britannica.com/topic/dakhma.

I’m learning that Borges’ allusions can be illuminating. Here’s a Wikipedia article on The Parliament of the Birds which is referenced in “The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Con...

I’m seeing already that one question for the reader of Borges’ fiction is how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go? Do you want to check and find out which statements/references are true and which are false? Do you want to hunt down every literary allusion? So far, I’m leaning toward checking, but given that these stories were written well before the availability of Google, I wonder how their author thought they should be read. Perhaps one should simply accept fiction as truth and vice versa for the purpose of these stories?

Susan wrote: "Perhaps one should simply accept fiction as truth and vice versa for the purpose of these stories?"

Why? Is that perhaps the very question Borges poses? Or should I say "one of"?

I spent a little time with biographical information about Borges. We usually do that about authors in the f2f book group in which I have participated since 1990. Why I have been so spotty about doing that here, I don't know -- focusing more on the "story" than its creation.

But it is feeling very appropriate to be engaging Borges immediately after Spinoza. And, in a certain way, after Laxness, although Laxness is still very much an enigma to me -- haven't done my homework.... associating with a group of casual, and not so casual, writers for a number of years now has made me even more aware of the intersection of person and word -- and environment/community/politics/place in never beginning--never ending (?) history. Borges (along with St. Paul?) seems to belong to that long train of wordsmiths that create "reality" -- at least while within their thrall.

Lily wrote: "Susan wrote: "Perhaps one should simply accept fiction as truth and vice versa for the purpose of these stories?"

Why? .."

I’m not sure I understand the question, so let me restate my thought, and maybe that will clarify it. In “Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius”, Borges mixes references to people who exist outside the world of the story and those who exist only in the world of the story. For example, the notes in my edition inform me that Bioy Casares, Carlos Mastronardi, Néstor Ibarra, Ezequiel Martínez Estrada, Drieu La Rochelle, Alfonso Reyes, and Xul Solar were all known to Borges, and many were close friends. On the other hand, there are characters who exist only in the world of the story such as Herbert Ashe. The same is true for the authors and books that are cited.

That being the case, I’m wondering what’s the best way to read these stories (understanding that different readers may have different answers). Should I check out every person, author or book referred to that I’m unfamiliar with? Or should I not worry about that issue? There is plenty of research on Borges online if one decides to go with option 1, but is all that information necessary to comprehending the story? I expect my own methodology and answer to that question may evolve as we read through the book. Hope that is a bit clearer

Lily wrote: ". But it is feeling very appropriate to be engaging Borges immediately after Spinoza. And, in a certain way, after Laxness,.."

I agree, even though I didn’t read Spinoza and Independent People is waiting on my to-read pile. Borges seems so far like a writer who is very interested in ideas and philosophy, maybe more so than in his characters and their interactions.

Susan wrote: "Lily wrote: "Susan wrote: "Perhaps one should simply accept fiction as truth and vice versa for the purpose of these stories?"

Why? .."

I’m not sure I understand the question, so let me restate m..."

If Borges expects us to do research to appreciate his stories, I say to hell with him. I'll go read someone else's stories that are just as good but don't include a homework assignment.

Roger wrote: "f Borges, expects us to do research to appreciate his stories, I say to hell with him. I'll go read someone else's stories that are just as good but don't include a homework assignment.

Yes, Roger. I know you too went to St. James, like this group's founder and many of its participants. I have no idea what Borges expects. I can only speak to some of my own associations with writers and their works. Does the "homework" matter? For me, with Borges, it "works." But, let the reader decide -- perhaps with some interaction with other readers?

(Personally, I am feeling the need, but not the time, to read/re-read some of the "other great classics," both some we have long ago read "together" on this board, some still unexplored.)

Roger wrote: "If Borges, expects us to do research to appreciate his stories, I say to hell with him. I'll go read someone else's stories that are just as good but don't include a homework assignment.."

I don’t know that Borges had any such expectation of his readers. In fact, he says in the first Foreword, “The eight stories in this book require no great elucidation”, and refers to the two we just read as “tales of fantasy.” It’s certainly possible to read them that way, and that may be the best way.

The mixing of real and made-up references seems playful to me and maybe partly intended as “corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative” as they say in The Mikado.

But Borges is so well read and references so many real but unknown to me details that I’m personally tempted to check some of them out. If anyone finds some background details that seem pertinent, they can share them in this thread where people can read them or not as they like. I’ve already done that above for a couple references in “The Approach to al-Mu’tasim.” Hopefully that arrangement works for folks.

Susan wrote: "I’m learning that Borges’ allusions can be illuminating. Here’s a Wikipedia article on The Parliament of the Birds which is referenced in “The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki..."

This is one rabbit hole that is definitely worth going down. Sholeh Wolpe's translation of The Conference of the Birds is stunning.

That said, it won't add much to the Borges story. Nor will the wonderful article published in Harper's Magazine about the Parsi towers of the dead, "The Ghosts of Doongerwadi" by Sherally Munshi.

Susan wrote: ".Borges seems so far like a writer who is very interested in ideas and philosophy, maybe more so than in his characters and their interactions...."

And in the world about him, with which Borges interacted and commented upon in ways that are perhaps easier for us to re-imagine ourselves than being Socrates or Plato or even Cervantes? (Tongue-in-cheek: or even Tolstoy, re-enacting the Napoleon War in Russia. I perhaps begin to understand why those knowledgeable of military history undoubtedly read W&P so differently than I have, and get into discussions about it where I can have no legitimate presence, except perhaps to listen,)

Another Lily sidebar: stumbled upon Thrift Books this morning as a possible place to sell books one is ready to remove from one's own shelves,. In the process, I rolled through those available that were labelled as written by Borges. Not always certain whether I was looking at authentic titles or publisher's reinventions to make a buck or just pure misappropriations of authorship -- but what a list. Almost as imagination-provoking as the ficciones I keep trying to engage -- enjoy, am challenged by, but perhaps (certainly?) not necessarily understand...

Susan wrote: "...I expect my own methodology and answer to that question may evolve as we read through the book.

Thanks for your comments, Susan. I wasn't so much looking for "how to" as "purpose." For me, rather like having followed US politics via some select, some random sources for the years through Covid and considerable social upheaval, struggling with what understanding is real, what should be understood differently. So far, Borges suggests to me a mind that has already done that for his Calvino-reminiscent city/country, and now his reader has the puzzle of what is he really trying to communicate. Like the letters from a spy held for life in a political prison? Bit by obtuse bit, hear: this is truth, reality, do you hear? Is it worth your time to care? Oh, yes, because...

Thomas wrote: "Susan wrote: "I’m learning that Borges’ allusions can be illuminating. Here’s a Wikipedia article on The Parliament of the Birds which is referenced in “The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim: https://en.wiki..."

Thanks, Thomas! I’ve added The Parliament of the Birds to my list for later reading. I did find the Wikipedia article interesting vis-a-vis the Borges story when it explained: “They [the birds] eventually come to understand that the majesty of that Beloved is like the sun that can be seen reflected in a mirror. Yet, whoever looks into that mirror will also behold his or her own image.”. More mirrors! ;)

Lily wrote: "…stumbled upon Thrift Books this morning…In the process, I rolled through those available that were labelled as written by Borges. Not always certain whether I was looking at authentic titles or publisher's reinventions to make a buck or just pure misappropriations of authorship -- but what a list.."

How tempting! I see that Harold Bloom included five titles by Borges on his list of the Western Canon: The Aleph and Other Stories, Dreamtigers, Ficciones, Labyrinths, and A Personal Anthology. I think those are mostly fictions and poems, and there may be some overlap with the same story included in more than one book.

I might be more inclined to explore his non-fiction as I thoroughly enjoyed and admired his book of short essays “Other Inquisitions 1937-1952. As someone said “So many books, so little time!”

This article on translations of Borges is a bit long, but it does compare four translated versions of the first sentence of “The Circular Ruins” so might be of interest: https://medium.com/@michael.marcus/de...

A number of artists have tried to depict the Library of Babel. Here are a couple of pictures/plans:

https://www.openculture.com/2016/10/w...

https://www.warnockfinearts.com/erik-...

In The Library of Babel, the narrator states “Let it suffice for the moment that I repeat the classic dictum: The Library is a sphere whose exact center is any hexagon and whose circumference is unattainable.” This is an obvious play on the famous quote from Pascal: “Nature is an infinite sphere whose centre is everywhere and circumference is nowhere.” Here’s that quote with a little more context: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7293...

If you want to visit the Library of Babel, there is an (partial) online version. Background and link are here: https://futurism.com/meet-the-digital...

So in the Library of Babel is every book ever written, or that ever could be written. All possible wisdom, mixed up randomly with an unimaginably huge glut of nonsense. A lot like the Internet.

Roger wrote: "So in the Library of Babel is every book ever written, or that ever could be written. All possible wisdom, mixed up randomly with an unimaginably huge glut of nonsense. A lot like the Internet."

Lol.

That’s the theory as I understand it. It seems to me that the limits on book length and the number of characters would restrict what is included. I suppose one volume might have the beginning of War and Peace, and another might include the ending.

And one will have Hamlet, and another will have "To be or not to be, that is the axolotl."

:). And another will have “Barbarbar” or “MCV” over and over again.

The Chinese novel, Hung Lu Meng, by Cao Zhan is known in English as The Dream of the Red Chamber or The Story of the Stone. It is a very long novel with 30 main characters and over 400 minor characters:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Drea...

As I read ”Funes, His Memory,” it seemed strangely familiar to me. Afterwards I realized that it reminded me of an essay I’d read by neurologist Oliver Sacks about a real life case of a man with an almost perfect memory. Sacks’ essay drew from a book by Russian neuropsychologist A. R. Luria, described here: https://medhum.med.nyu.edu/view/12247.

Susan wrote: "In The Library of Babel, the narrator states “Let it suffice for the moment that I repeat the classic dictum: The Library is a sphere whose exact center is any hexagon and whose circumference is un..."
To me at least, the quotation of Pascal that you cite reads more as poetry than as "fact." I wonder what those today deep in the exploration of the universe say when/if they bring Pascal into their conversations. For myself, I will say reading Spinoza tempts me towards going "back" and reading Descartes -- of what/which I am uncertain. (And then António Damásio, Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain . ) But, at this point, I do feel the need to ask "why" -- perhaps more relevant back in the days as a sophomore when a visiting social studies professor asked if one should consider Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy as original work. Instead, in encroaching age, I simply enjoy Lawrence Cahoone, professor of philosophy at the college of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA, as he winds a way through "The Modern Intellectual Tradition" for Great Courses Plus. Not that one necessarily always "understands."

@13, Susan wrote -- "...is all that information necessary to comprehending the story?'

(Laughing, gently...) If it is, I'm definitely not going to be comprehending, at least as much as might be possible. Sometimes I think reading something like this is like watching the colors of a sunset, or a sunrise, with no hope or thought of creating a Seurat-like (dot by overlaid dot) representation. Borges construction of a country with words (alone?) reminds me of Calvino's Invisible Cities. One of my simplistic readings is that Borges slowly makes his city three dimensional, with all that implies about the movement from plans on a sheet of paper to a moving human metropolis. Like origami. Or an encyclopedia Britannica that is missing the flight at Kitty Hawk (famous 1911 edition) , but successive editions expand the "story of aviation." (An unread book in my collection is one of the plans for Chicago, Forgotten is the context that drove asking a friend to bring a copy back when she returned to visit her alma mater there, or something like that. Probably a hope to have spent at least some days exploring, rather than simply circling that sprawling city on the by-ways connecting here to there (that city of Marshall Field's, Sandburg, Dreiser). Perhaps even the contexts of Olmsted and Moses in NYC, or Pierre Charles L'Enfant for D.C. ) Or like deciding how many Legos to buy? But Borges gives us a tour? His agenda in telling the story? Not within my scope...

Lily wrote: "To me at least, the quotation of Pascal that you cite reads more as poetry than as "fact."

Lily, Apologies for my delay in responding to your interesting post. I discovered yesterday that Goodreads notifications don’t seem to be working for me atm.

I agree that Pascal’s statement is more a metaphor than “a fact,” but sometimes poetry says things that can be said in no other way. If you prefer logic, then Descartes might be a better way to go, but I’ve always been glad to have read them together as their viewpoints seem complementary to me.

Over the past few years, I’ve revisited a few of the philosophers I read in college (including Descartes and Pascal) and had a rewarding experience discussing them in company with others, although there’s always that tug towards reading something new instead.

Lily wrote: "Sometimes I think reading something like this is like watching the colors of a sunset, or a sunrise, with no hope or thought of creating a Seurat-like (dot by overlaid dot) representation. Borges construction of a country with words (alone?) reminds me of Calvino's Invisible Cities. One of my simplistic readings is that Borges slowly makes his city three dimensional, with all that implies about the movement from plans on a sheet of paper to a moving human metropolis..."

What a beautiful description of how reading Borges sometimes seems to you, Lily. I’m not sure what it seems like to me nor could I put it so eloquently. But I did decide to pass on checking out every passing reference after I read the translator’s comment that “These notes are intended only to supply information [Argentine history and culture] that a Latin American (and especially Argentine or Uruguayan) reader would have and that would color or determine his or her reading of the stories…There is no intention here to produce an “annotated Borges,” but rather only to illuminate certain passages that might remain obscure, or even be misunderstood, without that information.” [Andrew Hurley].

He did also say “I have presumed the reader to possess more or less the range of general or world history or culture that JLB makes constant reference to or to have access to such reference books and other sources as would supply any need there.” I would guess most readers probably fall on the “less” side of the range, but I appreciate his confidence ;).

Here is a interesting article on what it was like to translate Borges by Andrew Hurley: https://www.inversejournal.com/2019/0...

I was intrigued by what he has to say about Borges’ style and the difference between how he is perceived by Spanish and non-Spanish readers: “But what I saw was… that English-language writers and critics always commented with great wonder and admiration on Borges’s themes, the subjects and philosophico-literary treatment of his stories, his playing with genres, whereas Spanish-language writers and critics, especially at the beginning of his or their career, almost invariably commented on another aspect of his work: his style, his prose, his writing itself. Not that the themes and subjects and genre play didn’t startle and waken Spanish-language readers’ imaginations, sometimes even change their lives and art — Carlos Fuentes, for instance, has spoken very movingly about the influence on him of Borges’s subjects and cultural eclecticism1. But to writers and readers in Spanish, the subjects or “stuff” of the fictions was often simply not as shocking, not as disorienting, not as liberating, not as “new”, as the prose itself was.”

Susan wrote: "But to writers and readers in Spanish, the subjects or “stuff” of the fictions was often simply not as shocking, not as disorienting, not as liberating, not as “new”, as the prose itself was.”

Chico! I wish I understood what those words are saying!?!

Lily wrote: "Susan wrote: "But to writers and readers in Spanish, the subjects or “stuff” of the fictions was often simply not as shocking, not as disorienting, not as liberating, not as “new”, as the prose itself was..."

Although I think this attribute of Borges’ writing is difficult for a non-Spanish speaker like me to fully understand, this additional passage from the article may clarify the impact of Borges’ style: ” Mario Vargas Llosa, for example, who is no great admirer of Borges the fabulist, has talked about the profound way Borges changed not only writing in Spanish, but the very Spanish language:

‘Borges’s prose is an anomaly, for in opting for the strictest frugality he deeply disobeys the Spanish language’s natural tendency toward excess. . . . [In] Borges there is always a logical, conceptual level to which all else is subservient. His is a world of clear, pure, and . . . unusual ideas that . . . are expressed in words of great directness and restraint. . . . Borges made a radical innovation in the stylistic tradition of Spanish. By purifying it, by intellectualizing and coloring it in such a personal way, he showed that the language. . . was potentially much richer and more flexible than tradition seemed to indicate . . ‘.”.

I coincidentally just saw this quote from a Borges interview:

"The idea of fame was alien to the Buenos Aires of my youth.... I remember having read that Emily Dickinson said that publishing was no part of a writer's destiny or career. She never published. And we all thought the same way and along the same lines. We were not writing for a minority, for a majority, or for the public. We wrote to please ourselves and to please our friends perhaps. Or perhaps we wrote because we stood in need of getting rid of some idea. Alfonso Reyes, the great Mexican writer, said to me: We publish in order not to go on emending rough drafts. And I know he was right. We publish to be rid of a book, to forget it. Once the book has appeared, then we lost all interest in it."
(Borges at Eighty: Conversations)

If like me you were wondering who Rurik is, here’s an article about that semi-legendary Viking prince: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Rurik

One of the characters in “The End” is Martin Fierro, the hero of a narrative poem about an Argentinian gaucho written by Jose Hernandez: https://faculty.chass.ncsu.edu/slatta...

Borges writes in the introduction “Aside from one character, Recabarren, whose immobility and passivity serve as contrast, nothing (or almost nothing) in the brief course of that last story [“The End”] is of my invention – – everything in it is implicit in a famous book, though I have been the first to perceive it, or at least to declare openly that I have.”

There’s a picture of Weil’s “Arabian Nights” in this article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_.... The book plays a supporting role in “The South”

For anyone interested in more on Borges, this site is a good resource: https://www.borges.pitt.edu/. For example, there’s this lecture by Borges on his writing, and he talks about several of the stories from “Ficcones” in the Q&A section: https://www.borges.pitt.edu/sites/def...

I shared that Borges quote on fame, above, with a writer friend because we're often lamenting that we wish we could learn to just write for writing's sake and not worry about publishing. She had an interesting response. She did a little research and said Borges was publishing from the time he was 20 or so. She wondered if he was "self mythologizing" at 80.

Kathy wrote: "I shared that Borges quote on fame, above, with a writer friend because we're often lamenting that we wish we could learn to just write for writing's sake and not worry about publishing. She had an interesting response. She did a little research and said Borges was publishing from the time he was 20 or so. She wondered if he was "self mythologizing" at 80.

Interesting interpretation. I shared that quote because I ran into it on Twitter/X as we were reading “The Secret Miracle” where the writer after being condemned to death asks for a year to complete his unfinished play. In the story, of course, he completes the play without audience or publication (although perhaps God is a witness to his work). Since the story was written in the 1940s, an idea of writing without thought of publication seems to have been consistent across Borges’ life; whether his theory matched his practice I don’t know.

Interesting--I see the connection. As I was reading "The Secret Miracle," I was struck by that line: "He did not work for posterity, nor even for God, of whose literary preferences he possessed scant knowledge." But it doesn't go so far as to say he works for himself. What the next line says instead is, "Meticulous, unmoving, secretive, he wove his lofty invisible labyrinth in time." As if he were writing for time--or, at least, in time. As if time were the more precious thing--and its elasticity is one of its greatest features. I imagine we've all had that experience of being "in the zone" and completely outside of time, although that has the effect of time passing more quickly without your awareness, not more slowly. I have definitely also experienced moments in which I had way more thoughts than you could articulate to someone else, verbally or otherwise, in the same moment.

Kathy wrote: "Interesting--I see the connection. As I was reading "The Secret Miracle," I was struck by that line: "He did not work for posterity, nor even for God, of whose literary preferences he possessed sca..."

I loved the line “Meticulous, unmoving, secretive, he wove his lofty invisible labyrinth in time.” Thinking of these stories as Borges’ labyrinths definitely gave me a wider perspective on his frequent use of the image. And as you point out, time is definitely a focus/theme/key element in The Secret Miracle.

Hladik’s motives for wanting to complete his play are also given. ”If, he prayed, I do somehow exist, if I am not one of Thy repetitions or errata, then I exist as the author of “The Enemies.” In order to complete that play, which can justify me and justify Thee as well, I need one more year. Grant me those days, Thou who art the centuries and time itself.” We are told the design of his play offers an opportunity, by ”hiding his shortcomings and giving full play to his strengths, the possibility of rescuing (albeit symbolically) that which was fundamental to his life.” So time is precious, and the extra time is needed for a purpose — to complete his play and justify himself. Interestingly, the story does not tell us if he used a full year of granted time or finished his work sooner.