Borges and the Implications of the Library of Babel



The Library of Babel, in Ficciones, is a useful microcosm regarding many of Borges’s themes, including questions of taxonomy, hermeneutics, epistemology and cosmology. By examining both textual and biographical clues, we can gain a larger understanding of these themes in relation to his corpus.

I Biography
i Borges as Librarian
ii The library as a historical and anti national
a) The consequences of disobeying Peron (i.e. the tension between nationalism and internationalisms)
iii The irony of a Blind Librarian
II Cosmology
i Is the universe orderly, and if so can we understand that order?
ii what are the implications of chaos?
iii the idea of a reversal of paradise (what you imagine as perfect becoming horrific)
iv hexagons and the kabala
III Hermeneutics
i the origins as singular source, and the consequences of multiple sources.
ii the inherent impossibility of ordering the world, a reaction against one correct interpretation. (Barthes: Hermeneutics of Suspicion)
iv Anti foundationaliusm, comparing and contrasting the traditional goals of Hermeneutics with the goals of this text.
IV Epistemology
i the futility of learning
ii learning with a goal in mind leads to depression, madness (a cautionary tale?)
V Taxonomy
i What is being categorized, how is it being categorized, why ?
ii what are the implications of how we categorize

Conclusion
i discuss the labyrinth/garden of forking paths as a clue to this text
ii discuss how the story can be used as an almost mocking correction to the philosophical goals of the enlightenment