The Nature of Memory

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In the parable "The Witness," Borges imagines the death of the last person who had firsthand experience of pagan rituals in Anglo-Saxon England. He observes, "with him will die, and never return, the last immediate images of these pagan rites." As a result, "the world will be a little poorer," having lost its final link to a bygone era. Borges then reflects on which memories will fade when he himself passes away.

In a similar vein, "The Aleph" delves into the fragile and unreliable nature of memory. The story begins with Borges expressing his admiration for Beatriz Viterbo, who never let her final suffering "give way to self-pity or fear." This admiration is tinged with melancholy when he notices a new billboard promoting an American cigarette brand. While this detail might initially seem trivial, it helps Borges illustrate the subtle ways in which the world around us is constantly changing. This change highlights the idea that when someone dies, the memory of the world at that specific moment will also disappear. "This slight change," Borges realizes, "was the first of an endless series." Eventually, the last person who knew Beatriz will die, and as Borges reasons in "The Witness," the world will be "a little poorer." At the story's end, Borges acknowledges this sorrowful truth by describing our minds as "porous" and admitting that he is "distorting and losing, under the wearing away of the years, the face of Beatriz." Readers can empathize with the narrator's frustration in trying to recall what he saw in the Aleph, but the story also emphasizes that the effort to perfectly remember something as significant as a loved one's face is ultimately futile due to the passage of time and its impact on human memory. Therefore, the reader learns that in the Aleph, Borges "saw the rotted dust and bones that had once deliciously been Beatriz Viterbo."

The Literary Problem of Infinity

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Much of Borges's skill as an author is rooted in his years of extensive reading. In his essay "The Fearful Sphere of Pascal," he explores the age-old idea that God is a sphere whose center is everywhere and whose boundary is nowhere. He states, "if the future and the past are infinite, there cannot really be a when," and "if every being is equidistant from the infinite and infinitesimal, neither can there be a where." Based on this reasoning, he concludes, "No one exists on a certain day, in a certain place." The difficulty in writing about such a concept lies in the fact that language cannot fully encapsulate the idea. If a character were truly able to perceive an Aleph, how could they possibly describe the experience to a reader or even to themselves?

Borges addresses this problem by first having his narrator apologize for being unable to "translate into words the limitless Aleph." Since language is "a set of symbols" that can only be understood sequentially, any attempt to recreate the experience of seeing every point in the universe simultaneously is destined to fall short. With this apology still resonating with the reader, Borges then offers a limited yet carefully chosen list of some of the things he observed in the Aleph. To convey the entirety of his vision, Borges includes images related to nature ("the teeming sea," "tides," "deserts," "shadows of ferns on a greenhouse floor," "bunches of grapes, snow, tobacco"), animal life ("horses with flowing manes," "tigers," "bison," "all the ants on the planet"), history ("a copy of the first English translation of Pliny"), geography ("a terrestrial globe"), astronomy ("a Persian astrolabe"), biology ("the delicate bone structure of a hand," "my own bowels"),...

(This entire section contains 392 words.)

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and numerous specific place names (America, London, Soler Street, Queretaro, Bengal, Fray Bentos, Inverness, Adrogue, Alkmaar, the Caspian Sea, Mirzapur, the Chacarita cemetery) to illustrate the immense breadth of the Aleph’s contents. While the description of what he saw in the Aleph takes up only a small part of the narrative, it effectively imparts to the reader a sense of the incomprehensible nature of infinity. "In the Aleph I saw the earth and in the earth the Aleph," Borges explains; if this language appears ambiguous or elusive to a reader, it is only because language is insufficient for capturing infinity on the printed page.

Universal Metaphor and the Image of God

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In Jorge Luis Borges’ essay, “La esphera de Pascal” (“Pascal’s Sphere”), the image of God as an endless sphere serves as a universal metaphor that traverses centuries and cultures. This concept, which Borges explores through various philosophical and literary traditions, traces its origins back to six centuries before the Christian era and extends to the thoughts of Blaise Pascal. Borges embarks on this historical journey by referencing Xenophanes of Colophon, who challenged the Greeks’ pantheon by proposing the existence of a singular, perfect divinity—a God that encapsulates all through the form of a sphere, symbolizing completeness and eternal presence.

This metaphor of the divine sphere finds resonance in the works of Parmenides of Elea, who similarly described a unified and spherical reality. It also appears in the Egyptian Hermetica and echoes through the verses of the twelfth-century poem Roman de la rose, as well as in the biblical Book of Kings. In medieval times, this idea evolved into a belief that God existed within all creatures, yet was not confined by any single one, echoing the reaffirmation of Scripture’s omnipresence.

As the cosmic vision depicted in Dante’s La divina commedia (The Divine Comedy)—where the earth stood as the immobile center of a universe structured around nine celestial spheres—gave way to the Copernican model, humanity’s worldview underwent a profound shift. Copernican space brought a sense of liberation from the geocentric confines, yet it also introduced existential despair. The universe became an expansive labyrinth, an immeasurable abyss in which humankind found itself adrift, grappling with solitude and insignificance amidst the infinite.

Misunderstanding of the Aleph by Carlos Argentino

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In "The Aleph," the character Carlos Argentino embodies a profound misunderstanding of the mystical object known as the Aleph. Contrary to Beatriz, who intuitively grasps the essence of the Aleph without getting lost in its intricacies, Carlos becomes entangled in a web of details that impedes true comprehension. While Beatriz seems uninterested in literary pursuits, preferring to engage with life in its most immediate form, Carlos's obsession with books serves as a retreat from genuine experience. His fascination with literature becomes a substitute for living, where the vibrancy of life is replaced by pages filled with observations.

Carlos's reflections on modern humanity reveal his enthusiasm for simulated experiences, which he mistakes for reality. His years spent in the basement, fixated on the myriad facets of the Aleph, demonstrate an intellect unable to synthesize the whole from its parts. Instead of perceiving the Aleph as a gateway to universal truths, he becomes ensnared by its innumerable details, diligently documenting them in a futile attempt to rationalize the ineffable. His poetic pursuits claim to mirror life authentically but falter by merely cluttering facts together, missing the fundamental essence that true art seeks to capture.

Limitations of Language and Memory

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Borges's portrayal of the Aleph is a masterclass in the elusive nature of language, capturing the struggle to convey an experience that defies verbal articulation. Through a series of unrhymed, seemingly chaotic events, Borges mirrors the bewildering encounter with the Aleph itself. He grapples with the limitations of language, acknowledging that words often fail to encapsulate the essence of such profound experiences, leaving literature a pale reflection of reality.

This awareness is further complicated by the rich tapestry of religious and literary allusions he weaves into his narrative, drawing upon a shared cultural heritage that transcends individual understanding. These references are not meant to showcase verbal prowess like that of Carlos Argentino, but rather to root the experience in a collective memory. Yet, Borges acknowledges the necessity of forgetting, recognizing that time inevitably erodes the vividness of the memory, much like the fading colors of an old photograph.

For Borges, this erosion is not a loss but a relief. The omniscient vision granted by the Aleph is an overwhelming feat of perception, a "godlike knowledge" that becomes an unbearable weight. Memory's decay offers a welcome reprieve, allowing him to distance himself from an experience that, while profound, is ultimately too immense to bear continuously. Thus, Borges finds solace in the natural ebb of memory, as it restores a semblance of normalcy and liberates him from the suffocating embrace of total comprehension.

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