You Might be Able to Get There from Here: Reconsidering Borges and the PostmodernThis book details the immense impact that Jorge Luis Borges has had on the thinking and writing of the twentieth century and how many have misunderstood that impact. It highlights how his symbols, techniques, parody, irony, and artful ambiguity in his fiction, essays, and poems force us to question what we can know with certainty, what is real and what is dream, and who we are, and thus define what has become the core of the postmodern vision. The book explores Borges's distinctly Latin American postmodern pluralism. It details how this pluralism has informed the postmodern discussions of the self, love, history, feminism, and politics, and has influenced writers in the U.S. and Latin America. Throughout, it argues that the Argentine writer avoids the nihilism and chaos of a radical relativism that many have come to associate with postmodernism. Rather, his vision affirms values and a search for positive knowledge. Mark Frisch is Associate Professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Duquesne University. |
Contents
| 15 | |
| 30 | |
Pluralism Meaning Postmodernity and Borges | 49 |
Borges the Self and the Postmodern | 75 |
Women Feminism Postmodernity and Borges | 95 |
Borges Universal History and Historical Representation | 113 |
Borges Politics and the Postmodern | 130 |
Borges the Postmodern and the Literature of the Americas Cien anos de soledad and The Universal Baseball Association Inc J Henry Waugh Prop | 147 |
Borges in His Own Words and Some Implications for the Postmodern Debate | 166 |
Notes | 179 |
A Selected Bibliography | 183 |
Index | 195 |
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Common terms and phrases
aesthetic affirms Aleph Argentine argues asserts attitude Aureliano biblioteca de Babel Book of Sand Borges's Borges's writings Calinescu challenges chaos characters Circular Ruins concept Coover's create critics Dahlmann Daneri death define Dios discourse discussion divine dream El Aleph Emma Emma Zunz emphasizes essay existence expresses feminism feminist fiction García Márquez gaucho gender Glencairn Henry Waugh highlights hombre House of Asterion Hutcheon idealistic identity implications issues Jorge Luis Borges Juan Kabbalah labyrinth labyrinthine Latin American Postmodernisms Library of Babel libro limitations literary literature Marxism meaning metaphor Minotaur mirror modern modernist monistic mundo mythic narrative narrator nature notion novel Orbis Tertius pantheistic past perspective philosophical Pierre Menard pluralism pluralistic poem political postmodern debate postmodernist questions Quijote reality realizes references role ruinas circulares sense skepticism social Solitude stance subverts suggests symbol theme tiempo tiger tion totally traditional truth underscores understand universal history Western culture women Zahir
Popular passages
Page 70 - Autobiography, sadly remarked that "a new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.
Page 177 - The beliefs which we have most warrant for, have no safeguard to rest on, but a standing invitation to the whole world to prove them unfounded.
Page 69 - Postmodern science — by concerning itself with such things as undecidables, the limits of precise control, conflicts characterized by incomplete information, "fracta" catastrophes, and pragmatic paradoxes — is theorizing its own evolution as discontinuous, catastrophic, nonrectifiable, and paradoxical.
Page 88 - Vi el universo y vi los íntimos designios del universo. Vi los orígenes que narra el Libro del Común. Vi las montañas que surgieron del agua, vi los primeros hombres de palo, vi las tinajas que se volvieron contra los hombres, vi los perros que les destrozaron las caras. Vi el dios sin cara que hay detrás de los dioses. Vi infinitos procesos que formaban una sola felicidad y, entendiéndolo todo, alcancé también a entender la escritura del tigre.
Page 87 - Lo que hace un hombre es como si lo hicieran todos los hombres. Por eso no es injusto que una desobediencia en un jardín contamine al género humano; por eso no es injusto que la crucifixión de un solo judío baste para salvarlo. Acaso Schopenhauer** tiene razón: yo soy los otros, cualquier hombre es todos los hombres...
Page 110 - La historia era increíble, en efecto, pero se impuso a todos, porque sustancialmente era cierta. Verdadero era el tono de Emma Zunz, verdadero el pudor, verdadero el odio. Verdadero también era el ultraje que había padecido; sólo eran falsas las circunstancias, la hora y uno o dos nombres propios.
Page 93 - Swedenborg y del infierno de la mitología tibetana) no es espantoso por irreal; es espantoso porque es irreversible y de hierro. El tiempo es la sustancia de que estoy hecho. El tiempo es un río que me arrebata, pero yo soy el río; es un tigre que me destroza, pero yo soy el tigre; es un fuego que me consume, pero yo soy el fuego. El mundo, desgraciadamente, es real; yo, desgraciadamente, soy Borges.
Page 50 - We (the undivided divinity operating within us) have dreamt the world. We have dreamt it as firm, mysterious, visible, ubiquitous in space and durable in time; but in its architecture we have allowed tenuous and eternal crevices of unreason which tell us it is false.
Page 93 - Time is the substance I am made of. Time is a river which sweeps me along, but I am the river; it is a tiger which destroys me, but I am the tiger; it is a fire which consumes me, but I am the fire. The world, unfortunately, is real; I, unfortunately, am Borges.
Page 43 - Creo que nuestra tradición es toda la cultura occidental, y creo también que tenemos derecho a esta tradición, mayor que el que pueden tener los habitantes de una u otra nación occidental.