Introduction
The Argentine periodical “Sur” released the short tale The Aleph in 1945 for the first time (Núñez-Faraco, 1997). Jorge Luis Borges used it to describe the experiences of a fictitious character as he realized the Aleph, a location in space from which all other places in the universe may be viewed. The story may not show the typical spaceships blasting off into earth orbit to explore the enigmatic void where celestial objects do not relate or rotate but instead uses literary skill to reveal infinity. The piece of literature argues that the cosmos is unfathomable, time is unstoppable, and experiences alter perception and reason via its various themes. The discussion below will be dedicated to identifying essential fantasy traits in The Aleph, appealing to the theoretical fundamentals of the genre and semantic peculiarities of the story.
Discussion
At the initial stage of this discussion, it seems crucial to examine the conceptual framework of fantastical fiction. Great literature has specific potential when questioning prospective methods of creating worlds. This is due to a particular structure frequently present in short tales of the mentioned genre, namely a binary pattern of opposition at the piece’s story level. This is meant to cause the assumed reader to have some curiosity or hesitance that is left unsolved throughout the narration. Fantastic writing creates a feeling of unpredictability or ambiguity by creating ontologically opposed realms, comparing them to one another, or juxtaposing them. One of the most intentional consequences of fantastic fiction is the implication that there is always another way to perceive things. This last point has received particular attention from the cultural sciences because it gives some information on the sociocultural role of the fantastical, namely, its capacity to challenge pre-existing worldviews or metaphysical and epistemological frames fundamentally.
The described traits of fantasy are visible in the same way fictionalized Borges approaches the understanding of Aleph. He saw the Aleph and discovered it to be an inconceivable cosmos that words cannot represent since it is limitless. The narrative is done in the first person, with the storyteller as the primary character. The Aleph, according to him, is a “small iridescent sphere with unbearable brilliance” in which all locations on Earth may be observed from all directions concurrently and without distortions (Borges, 1945, p. 9). The author used language limitations by implying that humans could not adequately describe the world. Borges sought to make the point that infinity cannot be written down because it is endless, using the school of thought and concepts of the authorial philosophy – language is sequential, but the Aleph is synchronized. Indeed, it takes a great act to accurately and thoroughly translate infinity into a paper.
At this point, it would be reasonable to appeal to the aspect of linguistic ambiguity in the narration. Namely, the narrator creates a fantasy atmosphere through imperfect tense. For example, phrases such as “my fruitfulness devotion had annoyed her” while holding a rather negative connotation. Highlights the uniqueness of the relationship between the protagonist and his love (Borges, 1945, p.1). A reflection of fantasy can also be derived from the narrator’s avoidance of certainty. For example, after witnessing the elements viewed through the Aleph, the narrator evokes, “Perhaps the gods might grant me a similar metaphor” (Borges, 1945, p.8). The fantasy notion within this phrase correlates with both the desire to gain insight from gods and seek it despite having a tool that shows all the existent and non-existent.
Figurative speech is also applied to create an atmosphere of mystery. The narrator describes how the photograph of his deceased love smiled (Borges, 1945). The personification of an object highlights an environment in which elements that have an emotional context take the place of the concepts that they represent. On the one hand, the metaphor reflects feelings such as love and memories while. On the other hand, it aligns with fantasy scenarios in which certain phenomena do not correlate with reality. On this note, it is vital to highlight the horror of the literature piece. For example, a rather predictable scenario is fear of death, emphasized by the unfriendly relationship between two characters and the rather dark and mystical place in which the narrator finds himself. On the other hand, horror is replaced by a fantastical revelation of a view of the universe.
Given that the Aleph is impossible to formulate in specific expressions, the narrator seizes to depict it via quasi-related images and ideas, which causes a great extent of the mentioned ambiguity (that yet seems intentional). In particular, the author utilized the phrase “I saw” about forty times to describe the objects he saw with his eyes, including environment, history, geology, astrophysics, biology, and locations. It should also be noted, “In stories of the fantastic, the narrator habitually says “I” (Todorov, 1973, p. 82). This helped him create a long, colorful paragraph to illustrate the strange experience that he associates with Aleph. Additionally, if language cannot adequately convey or understand the Aleph, then neither can human memory. Nonetheless, the story may be interpreted as fiction hidden under the veil of realism (Cappello, 1995). Borges acknowledged that he was terrified since everything in the world was known after the narrator’s experiences of witnessing the unfathomable infinite. As a result, he was struck by humanity’s inherency of forgetfulness.
In the given context, it is notable that Borges “placed” the Aleph in one of the corners of the basement of his house in Buenos Aires. Thanks to the fact that all the points of the universe are gathered here, each object appears as an infinity. However, even after that, there is a judgment that this is not a real Aleph and the real one is inside the stone of one of the mosque’s columns in Cairo. Again, such fluctuations reveal the narrator’s “trick” to implement ambiguity into the story, flurrying the reader’s imagination, an essential characteristic of fantasy.
Here, it should be stressed that the entire plot of The Aleph is built around one lyrical hero, who is the prototype of the author himself. He is too much in love with his dead bride Beatriz Viterbo. She may have a relation to a Canonic Catholic tradition. A comparison with Helen of Troy, a symbol of beauty and flawlessness, might be suggested to the reader (Bernal, 2008). As mentioned in the above exploration of fantasy’s fundamentals, a comparison is significantly inherent to the genre, which, in Beatriz’s case, is manifested in some form of symbolism.
The unfolding of events within the work is exciting, especially when the author begins to describe everything that the character sees. This is referred to in the miraculous passage in which Borges uses the phrase “I saw” multiple times mentioned previously. In this passage, the narrator talks about his entrails, the perishable body of the bride, the essence of each person in the subway, etc., but these do not allow him to observe himself (Borges, 1945). Here, the image of the labyrinth formulated by Borges in this long paragraph is of particular interest.
Perhaps the figure of the labyrinth allows one to touch something intimate and personal, which is difficult to otherwise identify in the classically beautiful, deliberately anti-romantic, and mute prose of Borges. Such a feeling creates a sense of suspense throughout the whole part of the labyrinth. The labyrinth is not only an unsolvable mystery: since it does not hide a secret that would make wandering meaningful, it must inspire fear. The latter may be one of the unnamed sources of inspiration for the Argentine author’s work.
The labyrinth in the texts of Borges is usually endless; it does not lead to any hidden goal, although it is difficult to say with certainty. It is time to recognize that the uncertainty of the state of the world in Borges’ description is probably its main element. However, “We do not doubt the narrator’s testimony. Instead, we seek, with him, a rational explanation for these bizarre phenomena” (Todorov, 1974, p. 85). The omnipresence of these motifs in Borges’s prose only confirms that in the totality of the metaphysical reasoning expressed by this author, many patterns can be found, and there are also some inconsistencies. As a result, most grand metaphysical theories about the nature of the world known to us from the history of culture are valid narratives.
The final aspect that will shed light on Aleph’s affiliation to fantasy will be explored through the prism of the theme of “I.” Notably, the latter will be shown through the idea of immortality in the vision of mirrors. People who live on earth for an infinitely long time lose the ability to be compassionate and become indifferent to everything. For immortals, all actions are the same – they would have already been done once in eternity and will undoubtedly be repeated.
Borges seeks another immortality; he makes the immortal “I” possible only from the perspective of Aleph. A glimpse of this natural immortality is felt when his hero contemplates the entire universe at the same time and, among other things – all the mirrors of the planet, none of which reflects him. Mirrors are often found on the pages of Borges’ stories – they endlessly multiply the world, create copies of it, copies of documents, and so on ad infinitum (Núñez-Faraco, 1997). Behind this infinity, it is difficult to see oneself, to find one’s true self; such a scene creates suspense. Moreover, now this long-awaited moment – when infinity is collected at one point when there are no reflections, one can stop, not think about anything, and just be. This immortality of the “I” is not subject to either time or space.
Conclusion
Thus, the above discussion revealed multiple perspectives from which fundamental fantasy traits in The Aleph can be seen. Borges’s narration appears before the readers as an unusual fantastic story. One can delve into it and then feel an honest search for truth and a deep metaphorical flow where the point that contains the entire universe becomes a metaphor symbol. This is what the author tried to demonstrate with this unique and almost mystical masterpiece of literature.
References
Bernal, A. (2008). Intertextuality in Beatriz Viterbo is an approach to the Borgesian character’s configuration. Acta Literaria, 36, 47–60. Web.
Borges, J. L. (1945). The Aleph. The Massachusetts University of Technology. Web.
Cappello, J. F. (1995). “El Aleph” Read as New Physics Realism. Revista Canadiense De Estudios Hispánicos, 19(3), 463–477.
Klein, D. (2017). On the relationship of media and the fantastic in Borges’s “El Aleph.” Variaciones Borges, 43, 23–44.
Núñez-Faraco, H. (1997). In search of the Aleph: Memory, truth, and falsehood in Borges’s poetics. The Modern Language Review, 92(3), 613–629. Web.
Todorov, T. (1973). Introduction à la littérature fantastique. The Press of Case Western Reserve University.