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October 26, 2006
The Mind's Eye
The Library of Babel is a fascinating read as Borges is able to create and then describe this complex and convoluted universe, aka the library, with coherence and elegance. I first began reading Borges in college but I had never read this text. For Borges, perhaps this was a literary exercise as it certainly stands as a unique short story. Not knowing how to craft my labyrinth in response to his writing, I eventually decided instead of modelling his library of hexagons and such (which technically is impossible considering the library is endless) I too would create a physical metaphor to describe the universe of books he invented. To me this story is about much more than the universe. It's ultimately about hope and existence. I loved the line about how suicides were on the rise in the library. Throughout the text Borges shifts back and forth in announcing hope or hopelessness, and finally the story ends as he admits his own hope: "If an eternal traveler should journey in any direction, he would find after untold centuries that the same volumes are repeated in the same disorder -- which, repeated, becomes order: the Order. My Solitude is cheered by that elegant hope." Borges, I believe, uses this story to respond to the endless questions of the philosophical nature that can never be answered. His library is the universe but is also the mind in terms of memories and knowledge. It is also the combined memories and knowledge of the world as we seek the truth, whatever that may be. And ultimately the library is a labyrinth as the truth will never be known. We are where we began. I created a labyrinth in the shape of an eye to mimic how we search through the library for answers,how we take in the knowledge available, but will never see everything we hope to know.
Posted by Charles Miller at October 26, 2006 11:28 AM