Week 4 - Borges, Jorge Luis. Labyrinths: Selected Stories and Other Writings - Nicholas Latimer - On the Merging of Literature and Labyrinth

Let me discuss a novel, but not just any novel. One whose narrator would “disfigure the facts and indulge in various contradictions which would permit a few readers -- very few readers -- to perceive an atrocious or banal reality…” (17).

Labyrinths - as read by me - was a whirlwind of disorienting tales, told by a fantastical narrator who lived one thousand lives - and now recounts his adventures with a reflectively, philosophically, bitter taste. Unfortunately, I was not one of the ‘lucky few’ foreshadowed on page 17. At first, in ‘Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius’ I was reminded of the ‘Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy’ , whereby seemingly absurd phenomena are recounted as the mundane organization of lands far far away. It is explained: “ One of the schools of Tlön goes so far as to negate time: it reasons that the present is indefinite, that the future has no reality other than as a present hope, that the past has no reality other than as a present memory” (23) or “These small, very heavy cones (made from a metal which is not of this world) are images of the divinity in certain regions of Tlön” (29). As you can imagine - many readers may be offset by this opening story. 

Nonetheless - there were also instances of more clear themes which Borges was presenting to his readers - some of which were more relatable to me, and offered in a more transparent way. The recurrence of mazes, challenge to our concept of time, considerations of chance vs. fate, and an idea of omnipotence - which spoke to me in their respective stories. These concepts were made visible to me through the instances of adventuristic storytelling, seen best in the story of ‘The Lottery in Babylon’. It writes: “I have been proconsul; like all, a slave. I have also known omnipotence, opprobrium, imprisonment. Look: the index finger on my right hand is missing. Look: through the rip in my cape you can see a vermilion tattoo on my stomach” (40). In the moments where a character is clearly shown as a powerful and experienced, I found myself most entertained, and perhaps would have liked to hear more in this tone than the more factual recollection seen elsewhere.

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As many of us have discussed the confusion, and complexity of this book - perhaps wondering what to make of Borges’ intentions with these stories - it seems most fitting to acknowledge this exact outcome as a potential ‘absurdist’ approach to challenge his readers on identifying “what might just not be so” in their path through life. Perhaps hidden in a reference found in ‘The Garden of Forking Paths’ - we are presented with the idea of maze and literature as a merged item: “I am withdrawing to write a book. And another time: I am withdrawing to construct a labyrinth…” (36).

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I do wonder however, if I am alone in feeling an “up and down” pattern throughout the text, whereby some stories fly by and others seem overly complicated and disorienting. Might this have been on purpose? And if so - why?