Smilšu grāmata

by Horhe Luiss Borhess, Edvīns Raups (Translator)

«Me dijo que su libro se llamaba El libro de arena, porque ni el libro ni la arena tienen ni principio ni fin.»

El primero de los cuentos reunidos aquí retoma el tema del doble: los protagonistas de «El otro» son lo bastante distintos para ser dos y lo bastante parecidos para ser uno. «Ulrica» es la historia de un amor efímero. «El Congreso» describe una empresa tan vasta que se confunde con el cosmos y con la suma de los días. «Undr» y «El espejo y la máscara» son relatos sobre literaturas seculares que constan de una sola palabra, mientras que otras piezas imaginan objetos inconcebibles como un libro de infinitas páginas; un volumen impredecible y a la vez monstruoso: el libro de arena.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Classics, Magical Realism, Literature, Fantasy, Latin American

142 pages, Hardcover

First published March 1, 1975

Reviews

[Glenn Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aesthetic experience is extraordinary in the sense that it is always ours alone, uniquely ours. And some aesthetic experiences hit us right between the eyes with a knockout punch - these are encounters we will never forget.

One such encounter was my reading this collection of stories by Jorge Luis Borges some thirty years ago. The images of the book of sand with its infinite pages, the hermit looking for a one-sided disk, an author's pristine lovemaking with a beautiful woman - for me, all aesthetic knockout punches.

I would encourage anybody who would like to expand their horizons, expand their inner universe, and exercise their imagination to pick up and read this most wonderful collection.

As a way of providing a sample, here are my top ten questions on the title story – The Book of Sand. And below my questions, the actual story.

1. In what way or ways can any short work of fiction be true?

2. What would be your initial thought and feeling if someone handed you the book of sand?

3. What book in your personal library would you trade for the book of sand?

4. Is the book of sand a metaphor for all great works of literature in the sense those works have no end or bottom?

5. What book comes to mind for you as one where the more you reread, the more question arise?

6. Are all works of literature infinite since they expand in different directions each time they are read by a different reader?

7. Are you inextricably bound to a certain book, or, in other words, is there any book holding you as prisoner?

8. What is it about certain books that they refuse to be mastered by anybody?

9. Would you feel uneasy owning the book of sand?

10. Where would you hide the book of sand if you never wanted the book to be discovered?

THE BOOK OF SAND by Jorge Luis Borges
The line is made up of an infinite number of points; the plane of an infinite number of lines; the volume of an infinite number of planes; the hypervolume of an infinite number of volumes. . . . No, unquestionably this is not—more geometrico—the best way of beginning my story. To claim that is it true is nowadays the convention of every made-up story. Mine, however, is true.

I live alone in a fourth-floor apartment on Belgrano Street, in Buenos Aires. Late one evening, a few months back, I heard a knock at my door. I opened it and a stranger stood there. He was a tall man, with nondescript features—or perhaps it was my myopia that made them seem that way. Dressed in gray and carrying a gray suitcase in his hand, he had an unassuming look about him. I saw at once that he was a foreigner. At first, he struck me as old; only later did I realize that I had been misled by his thin blond hair, which was, in a Scandinavian sort of way, almost white. During the course of our conversation, which was not to last an hour, I found out that he came from the Orkneys.

I invited him in, pointing to a chair. He paused awhile before speaking. A kind of gloom emanated from him—as it does now from me.

"I sell Bibles," he said.

Somewhat pedantically, I replied, "In this house are several English Bibles, including the first—John Wiclif's. I also have Cipriano de Valera's, Luther's—which, from a literary viewpoint, is the worst—and a Latin copy of the Vulgate. As you see, it's not exactly Bibles I stand in need of."

After a few moments of silence, he said, "I don't only sell Bibles. I can show you a holy book I came across on the outskirts of Bikaner. It may interest you."

He opened the suitcase and laid the book on a table. It was an octavo volume, bound in cloth. There was no doubt that it had passed through many hands. Examining it, I was surprised by its unusual weight. On the spine were the words "Holy Writ" and, below them, "Bombay."

"Nineteenth century, probably," I remarked.

"I don't know," he said. "I've never found out."

I opened the book at random. The script was strange to me. The pages, which were worn and typographically poor, were laid out in a double column, as in a Bible. The text was closely printed, and it was ordered in versicles. In the upper corners of the pages were Arabic numbers. I noticed that one left-hand page bore the number (let us say) 40,514 and the facing right-hand page 999. I turned the leaf; it was numbered with eight digits. It also bore a small illustration, like the kind used in dictionaries—an anchor drawn with pen and ink, as if by a schoolboy's clumsy hand.

It was at this point that the stranger said, "Look at the illustration closely. You'll never see it again."

I noted my place and closed the book. At once, I reopened it. Page by page, in vain, I looked for the illustration of the anchor. "It seems to be a version of Scriptures in some Indian language, is it not?" I said to hide my dismay.

"No," he replied. Then, as if confiding a secret, he lowered his voice. "I acquired the book in a town out on the plain in exchange for a handful of rupees and a Bible. Its owner did not know how to read. I suspect that he saw the Book of Books as a talisman. He was of the lowest caste; nobody but other untouchables could tread his shadow without contamination. He told me his book was called the Book of Sand, because neither the book nor the sand has any beginning or end."

The stranger asked me to find the first page.

I laid my left hand on the cover and, trying to put my thumb on the flyleaf, I opened the book. It was useless. Every time I tried, a number of pages came between the cover and my thumb. It was as if they kept growing from the book.

"Now find the last page."

Again I failed. In a voice that was not mine, I barely managed to stammer, "This can't be."

Still speaking in a low voice, the stranger said, "It can't be, but it is. The number of pages in this book is no more or less than infinite. None is the first page, none the last. I don't know why they're numbered in this arbitrary way. Perhaps to suggest that the terms of an infinite series admit any number."

Then, as if he were thinking aloud, he said, "If space is infinite, we may be at any point in space. If time is infinite, we may be at any point in time."

His speculations irritated me. "You are religious, no doubt?" I asked him.

"Yes, I'm a Presbyterian. My conscience is clear. I am reasonably sure of not having cheated the native when I gave him the Word of God in exchange for his devilish book."

I assured him that he had nothing to reproach himself for, and I asked if he were just passing through this part of the world. He replied that he planned to return to his country in a few days. It was then that I learned that he was a Scot from the Orkney Islands. I told him I had a great personal affection for Scotland, through my love of Stevenson and Hume.

"You mean Stevenson and Robbie Burns," he corrected.

While we spoke, I kept exploring the infinite book. With feigned indifference, I asked, "Do you intend to offer this curiosity to the British Museum?"

"No. I'm offering it to you," he said, and he stipulated a rather high sum for the book.

I answered, in all truthfulness, that such a sum was out of my reach, and I began thinking. After a minute or two, I came up with a scheme.

"I propose a swap, " I said. "You got this book for a handful of rupees and a copy of the Bible. I'll offer you the amount of my pension check, which I've just collected, and my black-letter Wiclif Bible. I inherited it from my ancestors."

"A black-letter Wiclif!" he murmured.

I went to my bedroom and brought him the money and the book. He turned the leaves and studied the title page with all the fervor of a true bibliophile.

"It's a deal," he said.

It amazed me that he did not haggle. Only later was I to realize that he had entered my house with his mind made up to sell the book. Without counting the money, he put it away.

We talked about India, about Orkney, and about the Norwegian jarls who once ruled it. It was night when the man left. I have not seen him again, nor do I know his name.

I thought of keeping the Book of Sand in the space left on the shelf by the Wiclif, but in the end I decided to hide it behind the volumes of a broken set of The Thousand and One Nights. I went to bed and did not sleep. At three or four in the morning, I turned on the light. I got down the impossible book and leafed through its pages. On one of them I saw engraved a mask. The upper corner of the page carried a number, which I no longer recall, elevated to the ninth power.

I showed no one my treasure. To the luck of owning it was added the fear of having it stolen, and then the misgiving that it might not truly be infinite. These twin preoccupations intensified my old misanthropy. I had only a few friends left; I now stopped seeing even them. A prisoner of the book, I almost never went out anymore. After studying its frayed spine and covers with a magnifying glass, I rejected the possibility of a contrivance of any sort. The small illustrations, I verified, came two thousand pages apart. I set about listing them alphabetically in a notebook, which I was not long in filling up. Never once was an illustration repeated. At night, in the meager intervals my insomnia granted, I dreamed of the book.

Summer came and went, and I realized that the book was monstrous. What good did it do me to think that I, who looked upon the volume with my eyes, who held it in my hands, was any less monstrous? I felt that the book was a nightmarish object, an obscene thing that affronted and tainted reality itself.

I thought of fire, but I feared that the burning of an infinite book might likewise prove infinite and suffocate the planet with smoke. Somewhere I recalled reading that the best place to hide a leaf is in a forest. Before retirement, I worked on Mexico Street, at the Argentine National Library, which contains nine hundred thousand volumes. I knew that to the right of the entrance a curved staircase leads down into the basement, where books and maps and periodicals are kept. One day I went there and, slipping past a member of the staff and trying not to notice at what height or distance from the door, I lost the Book of Sand on one of the basement's musty shelves.

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of Borges' last books, and many of the pieces here are less than his best.

"The Congress," however, is a tale of the microcosm as powerful and effective as "The Aleph," and "The Book of Sand" is also one of Borge's finest stories. "The Sect of Thirty" is an excellent short piece, and the theological implications of this account of heresy are both disturbing and illuminating.

Don't expect too much, and you will enjoy watching an old master at work.

[Flo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Prisionero del libro, casi no me asomaba a la calle.

*

A prisoner of the Book, I hardly left my house.
—El libro de arena/The Book of Sand

From ancient gods to Pierre Menard, everyone knows the deliciously complex journey ahead when you start reading a book by Jorge Luis Borges, the Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator who knew no death.
Nothing is simple in the Borgesian world, nothing is pretentious, and several elements reflect these facts. His fascinating plots where reality seamlessly blends with fantasy. His exquisite language that brims with warm familiarity and distant erudition. His countless references to real authors and fake books that pique one's curiosity and open the doors to labyrinths of truths and appearances. The philosophical nature of numbers. Succinct poems, as it is their true essence. Time and space with no beginning and no end. Love and death in one night. Monstrous books. Legendary gauchos. Unfathomable theologies.

According to Borges, The Book of Sand is his masterpiece. Some critics don't agree. Do critics know more about Borges than the writer himself? I'm not a critic, and I'm certainly not Borges. I'm just a person who, unable to sleep, let her thoughts drift and started to think about this book, and words effortlessly emerged to the surface in the middle of the night—words she wrote down quickly so she wouldn't forget about them in the morning.

Even though this book is a delightful short story collection, at risk of offending scholars and minotaurs, philosophers and other hybrids, the alive and the dead, probably Borges—himself and the other—I must admit that to me, Ficciones' perfection remains unparalleled.




Ratings and quotes:
1. El Otro/The Other ★★★★★

—Si esta mañana y este encuentro son sueños, cada uno de los dos tiene que pensar que el soñador es él. Tal vez dejemos de soñar, tal vez no. Nuestra evidente obligación, mientras tanto, es aceptar el sueño, como hemos aceptado el universo y haber sido engendrados y mirar con los ojos y respirar.
—¿Y si el sueño durara? -dijo con ansiedad. 
Para tranquilizarlo y tranquilizarme, fingí un aplomo que ciertamente no sentía. Le dije:
—Mi sueño ha durado ya setenta años. Al fin y al cabo, al recordarse, no hay persona que no se encuentre consigo misma. Es lo que nos está pasando ahora, salvo que somos dos. ¿No querés saber algo de mi pasado, que es el porvenir que te espera?

*

"If this morning and this encounter are dreams," I replied, "then each of us does have to think that he alone is the dreamer. Perhaps our dream will end, perhaps it won't. Meanwhile, our clear obligation is to accept the dream, as we have accepted the universe and our having been brought into it and the fact that we see with our eyes and that we breathe."
"But what if the dream should last?" he asked anxiously.
In order to calm him—and calm myself, as well—I feigned a self-assurance I was far from truly feeling.
"My dream," I told him, "has already lasted for seventy years. And besides—when one wakes up, the person one meets is always oneself. That is what's happening to us now, except that we are two. Wouldn't you like to know something about my past, which is now the future that awaits you?"

2. Ulrica/Ulrikke ★★★

3. El Congreso/The Congress ★★★

4. There Are More Things ★★★★

Sentí lo que sentimos cuando alguien muere: la congoja, ya inútil, de que nada nos hubiera costado haber sido más buenos.

*

I felt what we always feel when someone dies—the sad awareness, now futile, of how little it would have cost us to have been more loving.

5. La secta de los treinta/The Sect of the Thirty ★★★

6. La noche de los dones/The Night of the Gifts ★★★★★

Lo mismo da; no hay un pueblo de la provincia que no sea idéntico a los otros, hasta en lo de creerse distinto.

*

Just as well; there's not a town in the provinces that's not just like all the others—even to the point of thinking it's different.

7. El espejo y la máscara/The Mirror and the Mask ★★★★★

8. Undr ★★★

9. Utopía de un hombre que está cansado/A Weary Man's Utopia ★★★★★

—Cumplidos los cien años, el individuo puede prescindir del amor y de la amistad. Los males y la muerte involuntaria no lo amenazan. Ejerce alguna de las artes, la filosofía, las matemáticas o juega a un ajedrez solitario. Cuando quiere se mata. Dueño el hombre de su vida, lo es también de su muerte.
(...)
—¿Todavía hay museos y bibliotecas?
—No. Queremos olvidar el ayer, salvo para la composición de elegías. No hay conmemoraciones ni centenarios ni efigies de hombres muertos. Cada cual debe producir por su cuenta las ciencias y las artes que necesita.
—En tal caso, cada cual debe ser su propio Bernard Shaw, su propio Jesucristo y su propio Arquímedes.

*

"When the individual has reached a hundred years of age, he is able to do without love and friendship. Illness and inadvertent death are not things to be feared. He practices one of the arts, or philosophy or mathematics, or plays a game of one-handed chess. When he wishes, he kills himself. When a man is the master of own life, he is also the master of his death."
[...]
"Are there still museums and libraries?"
"No. We want to forget the past, save for the composition of elegies. There are no commemorations or anniversaries or portraits of dead men. Each person must produce on his own the arts and sciences that he has need for."
"In that case, every man must be his own Bernard Shaw, his own Jesus Christ, and his own Archimedes."

10. El soborno/The Bribe ★★★

11. Avelino Arredondo ★★★★

12. El disco/The Disk ★★★

13. El libro de arena/The Book of Sand ★★★★★

Me dijo que su libro se llamaba el Libro de Arena, porque ni el libro ni la arena tienen ni principio ni fin.

*

He told me his book was called the Book of Sand because neither sand nor this book has a beginning or an end.



Aug 7, 2021
* Later on my blog.
** Credits: Book, Borges

[Cecily · Rating 5 out of 5]

“It’s not the reading that matters, but the rereading.”
So true of all JLB’s works

I have the Collected Fictions, but am splitting my review of that into its components, listed in publication order: Collected Fictions - all reviews. The Book of Sand is the eighth, published in 1975.

After the generally quite straightforward stories of Brodie's Report, this is a (welcome) return to more mystical, metaphysical tales.

This review does NOT include the four stories published as Shakespeare’s Memory.

The Other 6*

“The encounter was real, but the other man spoke to me in a dream.”

How often have you wondered what you would tell your younger self, if you had the chance? Would your younger self take any notice? What else would you talk about? More importantly, would you give them a glimpse of “my past, which is now the future that awaits you”, and if you did, would you be constraining that future by doing so?

So many of JLB’s stories have semi-fictionalised aspects of himself, or a person meeting another version of themselves; this has both. (See also “August 25, 1983”, below, and “Borges and I” in Dreamtigers.) But although it is described in pleasant terms, JLB says it was “almost horrific while it lasted” and mentions “elemental fear” and the “sleepless nights that followed”.

They talk about literature, of course (and family). Young JLB has recently read Dostoyevsky’s The Double, which is apt. It’s awkward, though: “We were too different, yet too alike. We could not deceive each other and that made conversation hard. Each of us was almost a caricature of the other.”

JLB realises “There was no point in giving advice,,, because the young man’s fate was to be the man that I am now.” He concludes that the meeting was real for him, but merely a dream for his younger self.

This story is also an opportunity for JLB, by then in his mid-seventies, to appraise his life, work and influence. He’s quite harsh, saying he “wrote too many” books, including “poetry that will give you a pleasure that others will not fully share, and stories of a fantastical turn”.

Ulrikke

A rarity in JLB’s writings: this features a woman – and as the subject of intense and sudden love and desire.

Ulrikke is a Norwegian with an air of “calm mystery”, staying in York, where she meets the narrator, “a celibate middle-aged man” who is a professor visiting from Columbia.

The tender one-night stand that ensues is idealised and ethereal but with signs of looming death. The bedroom is dark, with “a vague glass” and then “no more furniture, no more mirrors… Like sand, time sifted away. Ancient in the dimness flowed love, and for the first and last time, I possessed the image of Ulrikke”. As so often with JLB, the reader is left unsure how much of this is real, and if not, what it means: is Ulrikke the perfect woman or the yin to JLB’s yang, or something else altogether?

The Congress 5*

This has a separate review because I ran out of words here: The Congress.

There are More Things 6*

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." – Hamlet.

One of the homilies drummed into us at school was “Send postcards to people when they’re alive, not flowers when they’re dead”. In this, a man visits the former house of the dead uncle who taught him philosophy and “felt what we always feel when someone dies – the sad awareness, now futile, of how little it would have cost us to be more loving”. But this isn’t straightforward remembrance.

The house was auctioned and bought by a secretive foreigner for twice as much as anyone else offered. The purchaser dumped all the books and furniture, and tried (and failed) to get the original architect to remodel it. Others were brought in to do the work, which was completed in two weeks, overnight, and the owner was never seen again. It’s having dark fairytale qualities now.

The nephew is curious. In fact his curiosity has previously led him to “marriage to a woman utterly unlike myself… trying laudanum… into an exploration of transfinite numbers” and now this “terrifying adventure”.

“In order to truly see a thing, one must first understand it. An armchair implies the human body… scissors the act of cutting… The passenger does not see the same ship’s rigging as the crew. If we truly saw the universe, perhaps we would understand it.”

He visits the architect, who was a personal friend of his uncle, but he learns little, other than that the new owner is Jewish and wanted a “monstrosity” built in place of the original house. That night, he dreams of a labyrinth, and next day he visits the carpenter who did some of the refurbishments. He’s evasive: he says that the customer is always right, but that Preetorious was “not quite right”.

Over the next few days, the nephew walks around the boarded up house until, sheltering from a storm, he discovers the gate is unlocked and the door ajar. The floor is bare earth and the furniture is scattered – and strange.

“None of the insensate forms… corresponded to the human figure or any conceivable use. They inspired horror and revulsion.” It’s pertinent that this story is dedicated to H P Lovecraft.

Then he hears “something heavy and slow and plural. Curiosity got the better of fear, and I did not close my eyes.” Then it stops! Who, what, why did he see?

The Sect of Thirty

“There is no man that does not carry out, wittingly or not, the plan traced by the All-Wise.”

I wish I believed in pre-destination: I could do whatever I liked, without fear of any more damnation that I would have had anyway – though I suppose the fact I think that condemns me in itself.

This is another story based on the discovery of a partial manuscript, in this case, a Christian sect of the name in the title. Their views, though varied (especially about death) and actions would be considered heretical by most Christians, and one aspect repulsive (and illegal) to all. But there is a Biblical logic, however twisted. I take it as a warning against fundamentalism, and especially looking so much at the details that you lose the broader context of right and wrong.

Their generosity to the poor means they do not even have clothes for themselves. Because looking at a woman lustfully is as sinful as having sex with her, and the former is impossible to suppress, they are promiscuous (what about lustful women, consent etc?). The sect’s name comes from Judas’ payment for betraying Jesus (thirty pieces of silver), and because all the participants in the crucifixion are unknown except for Judas and Jesus, “the sect venerates the two equally and absolves the others”. Crucifixion is key: in breach of the fifth commandment, members are crucified when they reach the age at which it happened to Jesus (thirty three).

The Night of the Gifts

This revisits the Platonic idea that knowing is really just recognising because we’ve seen all things in some former world (see also The Congress, above).

When the narrator was nearly thirteen, he went to town on a Saturday night with an older labourer. Bars, dancing, drink, women… You can guess the gist, but it has a slightly unreal quality, especially towards the end, when you wonder how much of it was real, and how much embroidery. The narrator asks that question himself, drawing parallels with “the Captive” Indian girl and the story she told of the Indian raid that led her to her current situation.

”Within the space of a few hours I’d learned how to make love and I’d seen death at first hand.

The Mirror and The Mask 5*

Like “Undr” below and The Library of Babel (in The Garden of Forking Paths), this explores the paradox of infinity coupled with minimalism. More than that, it’s about the sacred danger of true beauty.

A king wants to be immortalised in song. He gives a poet a year to compose such a piece. The song is a triumph and the poet is given a silver mirror. He is also given another year to write an even better song.

In the second song, “the verses were strange… They were not a description of the battle, they were the battle.” But the king liked the obscurity of the verses and gave the poet a golden mask (is this like The Emperor’s New Clothes?). The third year, the poet returns with a single line. “The poet and the king mouthed the poem as though it were a secret supplication, or a blasphemy.” The kind is amazed that all wonders are encompassed so succinctly, but he and the poet now share “the sin of having known Beauty, which is a gift forbidden mankind”. The final gift is a dagger, which the poet dutifully uses as expected. The king “is a beggar who wanders the roads of Ireland, which once was his kingdom, and…has never spoken the poem again.”

”Undr”

I’ve written so many words about JLB, and yet this story is all about encompassing a whole life, a whole word, in a single sound. How is that possible? How close can we get? Why would we try?

Like The Mirror and the Mask above and The Library of Babel (in The Garden of Forking Paths), this explores the paradox of infinity coupled with minimalism – and the peril of such perfection.

A man travels to a remote northern country where they have “true faith in Christ”. They carve runes of Odin (not very Christian), rather than writing on paper or parchment. Perhaps that is why “the poetry of the Urns is a poetry of a single word”. Carvings around the town are of different symbols, but all are, apparently, the Word (with a capital W – very Biblical).

The Urns are also prone to crucifying strangers (again, not very Christian). To avoid that fate, the traveller composes a laudatory poem. It seems to be well received: the king gives him a silver ring (but he glimpses a dagger under the king’s cushion). The next man presents a poem of a single word, and everyone is deeply moved by it. The traveller doesn’t catch the word, but another poet warns him he’ll die for hearing it, and helps him escape. He can’t tell the traveller the word because it is a sworn secret, “no one can teach another anything” and “You must seek it on your own”.

He travels for many years, eventually returning to find the poet and old man. On his deathbed, he tells the traveller a single Word, and in it, he sees everything: the poet’s life and his own. Then he picks up the harp and composes his own single word, demonstrating he has understood.

A Weary Man’s Utopia 6*

A glimpse of a possible, simpler, future, but I’m not sure it’s one I’d want to live in, even if there were no poverty or war. I’m reminded of Le Guin’s short story The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas. The ending has an unexpected punch.

A traveller meets a very tall man with “peculiar eyes” who realises, by the clothing that the traveller has come from another time. The only common language they can find is Latin: “The diversity of languages encouraged the diversity of nations… the earth has returned to Latin.” Esperanto has no place in this vision (it was rejected in The Congress, above, as well).

For a utopia, envisaged by a writer, there are some surprising features, especially regarding books. On the other hand, is does presage some of the downsides of the internet – despite being published in 1975.

“No one cares about facts anymore. They are mere points of departure for speculation and exercises in creativity. In school, we are taught Doubt, and the Art of Forgetting.” There are no libraries or museums because “we want to forget the past” and “Each person must produce on his own the arts and sciences that he has need for… Every man must be his own Bernard Shaw, his own Jesus Christ, and his own Archimedes”. That sounds inefficient and solitary. “We live in time, which is successive, but we try to live sub aeternitatis” [under eternity].

“It’s not the reading that matters, but the rereading”: the old man has not read more than half a dozen books in his four hundred year life. Similarly, printing has been banned “for it tended to multiply unnecessary tests to a dizzying degree”. A brief trawl of the internet shows the truth of that, and the potential for information overload: “All this was no sooner read than forgotten… blotted out by new trivialities.” “People believed only what they could read on the printed page” – and boy do they believe: it was on a website or in an email that said it was reported on CNN, so it must be true. “esse est percipi - to be is to be portrayed”: selfies and general online validation, yep JLB saw that too.

In this utopia, there is of course, no poverty – and therefore no “vulgar wealth”, and indeed, no money. Governments “gradually fell into disuse (some former politicians found success as comedians and witch doctors!). Space travel ceased when “we found we could never escape the here and now… every journey is a journey through space”.

It sounds lonely, though: each person has only one child, and the old man lives alone; “When an individual has reached a hundred years of age, he is able to do without love and friendship” – but why would he? Being the master of your own life also means being the master of your own death, but this is no Soylent Green scenario; each chooses their own time.

After the leisured description of this time/place, there is a neat but shocking ending to the story. The traveller sees strange art that is “almost blank… painted with colours that your ancient eyes cannot see”. He is given one as “a souvenir of a future friend”. Then others arrive, help the old man strip the house and they all walk off to the crematory: “The death chamber… was invented by a philanthropist whose name, I believe, was Adolf Hitler.” Such a subtle way to make the point that Martin Amis was perhaps trying to make in the crass Time’s Arrow and Vonnegut did rather better in Slaughterhouse Five. “In my study… still hangs the canvas that someone will paint, thousands of years from now, with substances that are now scattered across the planet.”

The Bribe

In the afterword, JLB says this is an exploration of “Americans’ obsession with ethics”; he reckons “it couldn’t have happened anywhere else”. I’m not sure about that, but nevertheless, it’s a straightforward short story of university politics – no mystical allusions in this one. Dr Winthrop has to pick one of two candidates to chair a conference. The characters and relative merits of the two candidates were rather dull – until I realised the twist of the tale.

One of the candidates realises Dr Winthrop will strive to be impartial – and to be seen as such. So he publishes a paper criticising Dr Winthrop’s work, on the assumption that will get him the job. “Written in the correct English of the non-native speaker, never stooped to incivility, yet it did have a certain belligerence… Not once was Winthrop’s name mentioned, but Winthrop felt persistently attacked.” It worked, and the winner then goes to Winthrop to tell him! They conclude they share the sin of vanity: one boasting of his strategy, and the other proud of his integrity.

Avelino Arredondo

This is based on a historical event, outlined in the notes. However, it works quite well as a story, even without that knowledge.

Arredondo says farewell to his friends and sweetheart, saying he’s going away. However, he’s really hiding in his back room, reading the Bible (having sold all his other books), but without trying to understand it. There is an unexplained deadline of August 25 (which is the title of a story in Shakespeare’s Memory), though we’re told he won’t finish reading the Bible, and there are chaotic games of chess, with missing pieces, that won’t end. “He missed his friends terribly, though he knew without bitterness that they didn’t miss him.”

It was all preparation for assassinating the president – though he had to ask who he was, to be sure he shot the right man! He cut himself off from friends and newspapers so they could not be blamed.

The Disk

Greed, futility, loneliness, magic. An old woodcutter lets a traveller into his hut. The traveller has the disk of Odin, which is unique because it has only one side. It also makes him king. The woodcutter can’t see it when the king opens his palm, but he can feel it, and he thinks he catches a glint.

The woodcutter kills the king so he can get an sell the disk – but he never finds it. Ever.

The Book of Sand

A travelling Bible salesman sells a holy book from India, The Book of Sand, so called because “neither sand nor this book has a beginning or an end”. It is like The Library of Babel (in The Garden of Forking Paths) in miniature. It is written in an unknown script, with occasionally illustrations, and page numbers that are non-sequential and change every time.

“If space is infinite, we are anywhere, at any point in space. If time is infinite, we are at any point in time.”

They buyer/narrator/JLB cipher tells no one what he has bought. He fears theft, but also the possible discovery that the book is not actually infinite. He becomes an obsessive recluse: the book is monstrous, and so is he - like Gollum and his “precious”, and of course JLB’s own story of The Zahir, in The Aleph.

“It defiled and corrupted reality”. What to do? “I considered fire, but I feared that the burning of an infinite book might be similarly infinite.” He eventually hides it in a shady corner of the national library.

Quotes

• “America, hobbled by the superstition of democracy, can’t make up its mind whether to be a democracy.”

• “The miraculous inspires fear.”

• On blindness, he is “able to see the colour yellow, and light and shadow. But don’t worry. Gradual blindness is not tragic. It’s like the slowly growing darkness of a summer evening.”

• “Indecisiveness or oversight, or perhaps other reasons, let to my never marrying.”
•
• “Love that flows in shadow, like a secret river.”

• “Time – that infinite web of yesterday, today, the future, forever, never – is the only true enigma.”

• “In time, one inevitable comes to resemble one’s enemies.”

• “His face would have been anonymous had it not been rescued by his eyes, which were both sleepy and full of energy.”

• Newspapers are “museums of ephemera”.

[Théo d'Or]

I read " The Book of Sand " at the beginning of the year, along with " The Aleph and Other Stories " , but that book fascinated me so much that " The Book of Sand "remained somewhat in the shadow of a review intention, not that it wasn't worth it, but I simply found it a bit difficult to put together a series of stories in only one thought.

Reading " The Book of Sand " I made a connection of the writer with himself, who uses, or even creates his own mythology, of which he is not, however, aware, the readers being the ones who discover it.
Borges' mythology is subtly and discreetly outlined in this volume, a volume of stories that each bring together an idea of the author, expressed in simple words, but behind are Borges' conceptions, the book being like a puzzle in which readers can configure it as a whole.
Borges' work is a complex work, despite the total lack of literary artifices, which, after all - is not a negligence of the author, but rather an asset in the construction of a natural writing.
Gradually, my idea is confirmed that what distinguishes a novel from another is the author's experiences and sensés.
Borges from the " The Book of Sand " - is the one concerned with the inexorability of time, religion and history, the doubling of the human being and his condition. But the stories speak about him as much as they speak about us, a deeper, wiser " us".
The narrative is told in the first person, making you doubt the objectivity of what is written, but, subliminally, Borges convinces you that the truth of the facts does not matter, because reality is subjective, people actually living with the illusion of reality.
Throughout the stories, Borges constantly reinvents himself, the volume being a continuous oscillation between various hypostases and masks behind which hides his own self, a prisoner self of a book without beginning and without end, a slave of the word and of a subjective reality, in which everything is possible, including the transgression of temporal spaces and the encounter with the inner voice, from which no one can escape.
Thus, whether he is searching for the word or another ego, I think Borges succeeds in what he certainly set out to do :
disguise the complexity of the universe behind simple words.

[Yani · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ya leí cinco libros de Borges y sigue imbatible. Este tal vez no sea el mejor de sus libros de cuentos (un 3.5 sería más sincero), pero reúne el suficiente mérito como para no quedar rezagado. Mientras lo leía me pregunté si hay algo que no esté relacionado con la Literatura en la obra cuentística de Borges y la conclusión (nada brillante) es que no, que todo tiene relación con eso, sumándole también el ámbito académico. Plantea un desafío, porque una entiende ciertas referencias pero cuando nombra textos que suenan extraños se ve en la obligación de consultar, al menos para saber si son inventos. Y suelen serlo.

El libro de arena es peculiar porque hay cuentos que tienen como protagonista al mismo Borges (recreado, ficcionalizado, repensado) y hay otros que tratan de esconder que el personaje está basado en sí mismo. Algo así como Dante Alighieri en La Divina Comedia. Como prueba contundente de ese juego, está la lápida de Borges en Ginebra, cuyo epitafio remite a “Ulrica”, incluido en este libro. Estos cuentos se me hicieron mucho más cerrados (tanto en argumento como en significado). Algunos son terrenales (como “El soborno”) y otros son de corte fantástico, como “El otro” (este cuento me gustó mucho, al igual que “El espejo y la máscara”) o “El libro de arena”. No diré que se leen rápido porque sería una mentira: si no se les dedica tiempo y atención, el libro se termina con la sensación de que no se leyó nada o no se entendió ni la mitad de lo que decía. De más está recordar que las relecturas de los mismos nunca sobran.

Algo más para comentar: hay diálogos o pensamientos de los narradores y/o personajes que se quedan atragantados. Son directos, no tienen mucho filtro y para el lector que desconoce las posiciones ideológicas y políticas de Borges, pueden llegar a ser un estorbo (siempre y cuando no las tome muy en serio).

Recomiendo El libro de arena pero no es el indicado para alguien que quiera empezar a leer a Borges, ya que correría el riesgo de frustrarse. O, en todo caso, eso es lo que me hubiera pasado a mí.

[Fernando · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cómo en todo libro de Borges, algunos cuentos me hechizaron verdaderamente.
"El otro" es mi preferido del libro y se trata de una lúcida, distinta y original versión de la temática del doble.
El encuentro ominoso de "There are more things" que Borges le dedica a H. P. Lovecrat y el amor fugaz de "Ulrica", descollan por su mezcla de retruécano y simplicidad.
Como en "El sur", que es uno de los mejores cuentos de Borges, el narrador es testigo de un enfrentamiento emblemático que incluye a Juan Moreira según lo narrado en el cuento "La noche de los dones".
"El libro de arena", que da nombre al libro, es un cuento fantástico que enlaza con concepto de lo infinito de "La biblioteca de Babel" y "El aleph".
Es imposible no maravillarse con Borges.

[RahafMouman Sy · Rating 3 out of 5]

عزيزي .. خورخي لويس بورخيس أسمك بحد ذاته يحتاج الى كتاب لتفسيره ،لابأس مجرد دعابة مع بداية معرفتي بك ..^_^
لطفا" منك لاتحاول ترجمة تقيمي إن رأيته ذات يوم ..
يقول بورخيس : عمري 84 عاما ، أصدقائي ماتوا جميعهم ، عندما أفكر بهم أتخيلهم أشباح ، اصبت بالعمى وماعدت أقرأ الصحف ، عندما أجد روحي في مقابلة أبادر الى شكر محدثي ، لكني أحذره دائما اني غريب أبالغ في الاراء الجازمة الى حد الازعاج احيانا" ، ربما تكون ردت فعل على ما أقوله فعندما أجزم بأمر ما أكون في صدد أقتراح مجرد احتمال ، واصدار بعض تعابير الشك والغرابة ..
نعم بورخيس ما قلته قد وضعته بداخلي فعلا من خلال قرأتي لهذا الكتاب وهذا تأكيد منك ...

حسنا" ...
كتاب الرمل ، اللامعقول ، النظام ، القانون ، التماثل الممل ، هو كالرمال لامبتدأ لهما ولانهاية
قصص عبثية فلسفية ، عميقة رمزية لا واقعية ، تأخذك لعالم مليء بالألغاز ، تثير شعورك بعدم الفهم والسعادة والغرابة في الوقت ذاته ، تتطلب كامل استيعابك لسيقاتها الأدبية ، ومقاصدها الفلسفية ، وتعابيرها الملغومة ، للإمساك بالرموز المزروعة بين طياتها ، يقابل ذلك إشارات شاعرية ودلالات وأفكار راسبة تحت الحبر بشكل مثير وغريب ، يحضر لك جاهدا" بذاكرته الخرافية جحا وشهرزاد ، وشهريار ، ودراكولا ، واخيل وسنيك ، وزوربا ومونش ، ليخبرك ان العوالم تحضر في ظل المسافة بين القلم والحبر ، تسرح وتمرح كمخلوقات ، كالفراغ بين الذرات والالكترونات بصورة شاعرية فيزيائية النزعة والتكوين ..
كتاب محدود بحجم 90 صفحة كغابة شائكة ما إن يدخلها القارئ حتى يجد نفسه في عوالم ماورائية لانهاية لها ...
__________

[Alan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Close to tears of elation as I type this. This was the final set of stories left for me as “new Borges”. Flipping that last page over sent shivers down my spine. I had thought that 2020’s Ficciones would be impossible to match. That collection blew my world wide open, forcing me to go back and re-evaluate what I had read in my life up to that point. Afterward, echoes of Borges could be heard in all corners. I kept wanting to feel the thrill of Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius, The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim, Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote, The Library of Babel, Funes, His Memory, and Three Versions of Judas. Stories that I read in other collections were beautiful. They came close to recreating something of the atmosphere. But very few hit the heights. Late Borges had a plan for me.

The Book of Sand & Shakespeare's Memory is simply magnificent. Multiple stories in this collection can go up against anything that was in Ficciones. I am thinking of Borges’ fascination with the Doppelgänger and the exploration of time in The Other and August 25, 1983. The constant nods to the Gnostics with The Sect of the Thirty. The idea that a manic, borderline-schizophrenic search for the “Truth” could lead to everything and nothing, all at the same time, explored in The Mirror and the Mask and "Undr". Putting the thesis of our lives under scrutiny in A Weary Man’s Utopia. The dangers of feeling your singular power to be greater than the sum of information in the world, hinted at in The Disk. Thinking about the Path, the Way, the Truth that cannot be spoken but needs to be believed in order to be achieved, deep inside The Rose of Paracelsus. Shakespeare’s Memory, which I have to believe has spoken to many bibliophiles before me, laying among a pile of books scattered around them and thinking about the souls floating about the room, changing lives and identities, being changed by revisiting. Finally, the single representation of the tangible and the infinite all in one: sand. Reminiscent of all and none. You can hold the single grain in your hand and lose it immediately, never to find it again. Coming up against the very boundaries of our minds and the realization that we are absolutely miniscule. The Book of Sand is right up there with Borges’ vision of the infinite library.

And now we have completed the circle for the first time. We begin again, for what will be the second go around the infinite circle that will not stop until the book or my eyes have fallen apart.

[Ed · Rating 4 out of 5]

So much of how we react to the books we read is determined by circumstance and expectation. When I read Borges' Fictions at the beginning of this year, I had heard a lot about the author and had very high expectations. I did enjoy Fictions, but in all honesty it didn't quite match my expectations, and I didn't appreciate it as much as I should have.

Now, reading The Book of Sand and Shakespeare's Memory, the circumstances are different. After having consumed so much Beckett, with his abstract intentions and long and rambling paragraphs, this collection of short stories with its direct and simple structure is so welcome and refreshing. This time, my expectations have been tempered, and as a result have been vastly exceeded. Although The Book of Sand and Shakespeare's Memory is generally considered a lesser work, I enjoyed this much more than Fictions (which of course I will now need to reread).

Borges writes such interesting stories. He is not afraid to transport the reader to distant locations in both time and place, and although he frequently distorts reality into fantasy, the stories always feel very grounded and authentic. The prose feels light -not at all dense - and yet he fits so much into so few pages. It's interesting that he writes here almost exclusively in the first person, often with himself (or someone who shares his name) as the protagonist. Some of these stories are deeply personal, like The Other, and August 25, 1983. Others are more abstract, fantastical and allegorical, like The Mirror and the Mask, and Blue Tigers. All are wonderful.

The Borges who wrote these stories was a man approaching the end of a long and full life. It's difficult to ignore this fact when assessing these stories, just as it is easy to overstate its significance. There is a sadness to the stories, a sense of something lost or undiscovered, but there is also an expression of reverence and wonder for the great possibilities of the world. Maybe the point is that these are not necessarily distinct and opposing perspectives.

[P.E. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Laberinto de signos infinito, imagen de la literatura





Tabla de contenidos:

El otro ****
Historia de doppelgänger

Ulrica ****
Historia de amor romántica y trágica

El congreso *****
Cuento con una asociación de conspiradores de un tipo particular

'There are more things' ***
Pastiche de H.P. Lovecraft

La secta de los treinta *****
Relato sobre una secta herética con simbolismo muy significativo

La noche de los dones *****
Eros y Thanatos

El espejo y la máscara *****
Uno de mis cuentos favoritos de esta colección. Una historia corta con un simbolismo muy denso, centrado en la relación de un alto rey con un poeta/bardo/escaldo.

Undr****
Un viaje en el pais misterioso de los urnos, en busca de su legendaria palabra.

Utopía de un hombre que está cansado*****
Muy parecido al primer cuento del libro El Rey de amarillo... Una variedad de distopía.

El soborno****
La rivaldad entre dos germanistas, y la estrategia de uno par ser electo...

Avelino Arredondo****
Una ficción sobre el asesino del presidente uruguayo Juan Idiarte Borda (25 de agosto de 1897).

El disco****
la codicia asesina de un leñador por un objeto mágico...

El libro de arena****
La historia de un libro autentico sin principio ni fin...





Acompañamiento musical

La Muerte de Los Relinchos - Carlos Viola

Entregarás Tu Rostro a La Señora - Carlos Viola

Que Las Campanas Me Doblen - Carlos Viola

El álbum completo


Solar Halos - Alphaxone

[Nourhan Khaled · Rating 3 out of 5]

"أكتب لنفسي, وأكتب لأصدقائي, وأكتب كي أخفف من عبئ مرور الزمن."
.

"كتاب الرمل" , وهو أول كتاب أقرأه للكاتب الأرجنتيني "بورخيس" .
الكتاب عبارة عن مجموعة من القصص المنوعة والتي تختلف بقصتها وسردها وحجمها, وهم...


" الآخر - أولريكا - المجلس - ثمة أشياء أخرى - طائفة الثلاثين - ليلة الهبات - المرآة والقناع - اوندر - يوتوبيا رجل متعب - الرشوة - القرص - كتاب الرمل."

تعد هذه المجموعة القصصية من أشهر ماكتبه "بورخيس" ويعد هذا الكتاب بداية الشهرة التي حصدها والتي جعلته من أبرز كتاب القرن العشرين,
عندما تقرأ له هذه المجموعة القصصية تتأكد أنه يمتلك أسلوباً مميزاً للغاية , مزيج من الفلسفة والنقد والعتب والحب ..
وطبعاً كان الغموض هو سيد كل القصص , في كل قصة تقرأها يتملكك الغموض والحيرة في فهم معنى المغزى من هذه القصة, وبماذا كان يفكر عندما كتبها ,
هنالك بعض القصص التي أحببتها لتميزها وجنونها مثل ..

" الآخر - ثمة أشياء أخرى - المرآة والقناع - القرص - وكتاب الرمل."


أما بقية الكتب كنت ضائعة في سطورها ,, لا أعلم ربما الترجمة لم تكن موفقة في نقل الصورة المثالية لما كتبه "بورخيس" .. بالأضافة الى وجود بعض الأخطاء الأملائية والتي كانت مزعجة.

كان من الصعب تتبع أحداث حكاياته المثيرة والفريدة من نوعها والتي كتبها لنا "بورخيس" بكل دهاء..
ولكن بشكل عام كانت تجربة أولى لابأس بها ,, ربما سوف اقرأ له كتاب آخر لنرى هل يستمر الجنون والغموض في كل مؤلفاته, أو هذا وجد فقط في "كتاب الرمل".

.

" كان يُسمي كتاب الرمل، فليس للكتاب ولا للرمل أية بداية أو نهاية."

[Mohamed Shady · Rating 4 out of 5]

فى أثناء رجوعنا من الكلية قلتُ لصاحبى أنه لو أننا قسّمنا الكتّاب إلى مراحل تزيد كل مرحلة منها على سابقتها فى المتعة والصعوب��، فإن "بورخيس" سيكون هو المرحلة الأخيرة بلا شك..
فى مجموعته القصصية "كتاب الرمل" ما يقارب ال 10 قصص.. فهمت منهم 4، والباقى قرأته مرتين وتلاتة ومع ذلك مفهمتهمش..
ال 4 قصص اللى فهمتهم دول دوخونى من الحلاوة.. اتمزجت فيهم كما لم أتمزج من قبل.. حاجة كده عصارة العصارة يعنى
لكن عدم فهمى لباقى القصص دليل على إنى موصلتش لسه لمرحلة القراءة لبورخيس، وإنى لسه قدامى فترة من المحاولات فى المسارات الطبيعية للتطور عشان أوصل

فى قصة "الآخر" بورخيس بيحكی إنه قابل نفسه وهو شاب..
كان بورخيس الأصلی صاحب الحكاية عجوز قاعد علی مقعد فی حديقة عامة بينما بورخيس الشاب قاعد جمبه علی مقعد تانی وبيتناقشوا..
بورخيس العجوز، الذی مر بكل الاحداث التی سيمر بها بورخيس الشاب، بيحكی كل المصاعب والعقبات اللی قابلته فی حياته وايه كانت نتيجتها.. مين مات من اصدقاؤه ومين اتفصل من شغله.. بيحكی كمان للشاب ازای هيصاب بالعمی وهو عجوز..

القصة أثارت فى داخلى رغبة جامحة فى معرفة مستقبلى، لكن ما الجدوى ؟

هكذا هى قصص بورخيس، تحوّلنا إلى فلاسفة..

[Raya راية · Rating 4 out of 5]

"لا يستطع المتوحّش أن يُدرك إنجيل المُبشّر، ولا المُسافر أن يرى نشر الأشرعة كما يراه البحّارة. ولو رأينا العالم حقّاً لفهمناه."



لطالما كان الأدب اللاتيني بالنسبة لي مرادفاً للسحر، ووقعت في أسره من أول مرة قرأت بعضاً من روايات وأشعار وكتب هذا الأدب.

وهذه المرة الأولى كذلك التي اقرأ لبورخيس. أسرتني هذه المجموعة القصصية العجيبة، لا أنكر أنني لم أفهم سوى أقل القليل منها، لكن سحرها تغلل في أعماق وجداني، وحرّك في ذاتي خيوطاً لعوالم غريبة لم أكن أعلم بوجودها قبلاً، شعرت وكأنني أنظر إلى لوحة سحرية لا أفهم معناها لكنني لا أستطيع إبعاد نظري عنها. يحاول بورخيس في هذه القصص أن يُطلعنا على الزاوية التي ينظر بها إلى العالم وإلى إعادة تشكيل معنى الزمان والمكان والحلم.
...

[Luís · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a collection of short stories, most, if not all, having a fantastic character, more or less marked, often subtly, between the real and the unreal, but not striking enough.
It's a good pocket read for those days when you only have a few minutes to spare.

[Caterina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Borges'in özel kitaplarından biri "Kum Kitabı"

Eser birbirinden bağımsız öyküler içeriyor ve hepsinde ayrı bir lezzet var. Metafizik bağlamda ve iç dünyamıza yapılan göndermeleri çok etkileyici buldum. Yaşamdan kesitlere yapılan ince göndermeler de düşündürücüydü. Bu yönüyle felsefi düşünüşe de katkısı olabilecek bir yapıt. Dil oldukça akıcı ve içerik oldukça sürükleyici, bir günde bitirdim diye de not düşmüş olayım.

Bir çok sayfada yer imi kullandım. Özellikle Kongre ve Başka Şeyler Daha Var isimli öykülerden çok etkilendim. Öykülerin başında verilen minik alıntılar da çok keyifliydi.

Kitabın içinden seçtiğim alıntılara buradan ulaşabilrsiniz.

[Kevin Lopez (on sabbatical) · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only aspect of this fascinatingly surreal collection of short fiction by Jorge Luis Borges that isn’t utterly astonishing, is that Borges himself remains (as ever) the undisputed grandmaster of the philosophically provocative, boundlessly imaginative, daringly creative short story. Unsurprisingly (and thus a bit boringly), JLB retains (post mortes, ex corpus) his approximately eighty year-long-and-running title belt as the most magnificent (and mischievously malignant!) master of the mind-bending, brain-melting, logic-defying, psyche-expanding, sanity-stretching, conundrum-saturated tales that are both his hallmark style and his unique calling card.

If you read Borges, you are truly in the presence of a master. Doff your cap; bend a knee.

[Laurinha Lero · Rating 2 out of 5]

me dei conta lá pela página quarenta que o jorge luis borges se chama jorge luis borges, com Luis no meio, pq a alternativa seria Jorge Borges. nome de personagem da TV Cultura. não gostei do livro

[Hoda Elsayed · Rating 3 out of 5]

يقول بورخيس:
"أكتب لنفسي، وأكتب لأصدقائي، وأكتب كي أخفف من عبء مرور الزمن."

[عبدالله ناصر · Rating 4 out of 5]

مجموعة قصصية عميقة و مكثفة و رمزية - لا واقعية سحرية و لا شيء من هذا القبيل - لبورخيس و الذي ينظر إليه بشيء من القداسة ساباتو و فوينتس و بينيديتي و يوسا و كل عباقرة أمريكا اللاتينية. هناك الكثير من أحاديث الكتب و الكتّاب و هذا ليس بمستغرب على بورخيس ليس لأنه قضى فترة من عمره أميناً للمكتبة الوطنية في بوينس آيرس و لكن لأمنيته الشهيرة في أن يكون الفردوس على شكل مكتبة.

[Alan (the Lone Librarian rides again) Teder · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bonus Track I couldn't resist doing up a quick JLB bingo card, based on a prompt from the GR is dying? discussion group 😊.


The Book of Sand and Shakespeare’s Memory in Estonian
A review of the Loomingu Raamatukogu Kuldsari paperback (2023) reissued from (2017) as originally translated by Kai Aareleid from the Spanish language originals el libro de la arena (1975) and La memoria de Shakespeare (1983).

[3.9 Average rounded up to a 4 star for GR]
Considering that I use a quote from Borges as my motto*, I haven't actually read that many of his works. This recent reissue of the Estonian translation of his last two collections gave me a chance to amend that, as well as read in my heritage language which can always use some practice.

Argentinean writer Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) was blind after the age of 55, so these late stories were all dictated. Of the 4 contained in the final collection Shakespeare's Memory (1983), 3 were actually published in journals in 1977.


An AI generated image drawn from the prompt: Draw an old man reading a book of sand.

I quite enjoyed getting reacquainted with Borges and his mix of fantasy, mythology and philosophy. I hope to read further soon. While reading, I did individual story ratings and setups as status updates in Estonian. The following are my English language summaries.

1. Other **** Borges as himself starts off by saying that he avoiding telling this story previously as it would have driven him insane. This supposedly happened to him in Boston in 1969. The 70 year old Borges sits down on a park bench and his 20 year old self sits down beside him. The elder tells the younger about what future awaits him.

2. Ulrika *** Javier from Colombia meets Ulrika, a Norwegian, at a conference. Ulrika says that she prefers to walk alone. Javier says that is also his preference and that they could do that together. When they walk they talk of the Nibelung Sagas and how Sigurd and Brunhild slept with a sword between them. When they return to the hotel they go too bed, but there is no sword between them. [This is the only time that Borges wrote a romance story.]

3. The Congress ***** The narrator, Alejandro Ferri, arrives in Buenos Aires in 1899. He is asked to join a sort of secret society called The Congress of the World, an effort to represent all of humanity. Various steps are taken such as collecting a library, building a headquarters, and deciding on the common language. Eventually the Congress is dissolved but regardless of that, it still carries on in all of us. [Borges himself considered this his best story ever.]

4. There Are More Things: In memory of H.P. Lovecraft **** A nephew inherits a supposed cursed house, the Red House but explores it one night nevertheless. He discovers items which indicate that a large creature, possibly of extraterrestrial origin is living there. In typical Lovecraft fashion, the final sentence leaves us anticipating the horror to come.

5. The Sect of 30 *** A work that purports to be a translation of an ancient 4th century manuscript of a sect that worships both Jesus and Judas while otherwise giving up all their possessions and refusing to be converted to regular Christianity. The very short 3-page story simply stops mid-sentence and then states that the rest of the manuscript is lost.

6. The Night of Gifts **** A man tells a story of when he was younger and visited a store with a friend. In that store a young woman talks about bandit raids, when they are attacked by the Argentinean bandit Juan Moreira. The boy hides with the girl. When they reappear, a sergeant has killed Moreira. The man says his younger self had the gift of seeing love and death that night.

7. The Mirror and the Mask *** In an alternate universe, after the Battle of Clontarf, the High King asks his bard to write a poem in commemoration, for which a silver mirror is given as a reward. After another year and poem, a golden mask is the reward. But then after the third year, the poem is only a single line, with fateful consequences.

8. Undr *** Purports to be a translation of a lost manuscript written by the 11th century chronicler Adam of Bremen who listens to the story of an Icelandic poet Ulf Sigurdarson who lived with a tribe called the Urns whose poems were single words.

9. A Weary Man’s Utopia **** A 70 year old language teacher and writer of fantasy (like Borges) named Eudoro Acevedo arrives at a house which is apparently Utopia in the future. He meets a man in the house who tells him that trivial things no longer exist, nor do governments. He gifts Acevedo a painting which travels back with him to the past.

10. The Bribe *** A professor of Old English has to decide between two candidates as to who to recommend for a future position. One of the candidates is rather bland and the other is youthful and ambitious. The second one has insulted the professor in one of his published papers.

11. Avelino Arredondo *** An imagined life of the title character in the two months leading up to the fateful day of August 25, 1897 when he assassinated the President of Uruguay.

12. The Disk **** A man seeks shelter in the hut of a woodcutter. He reveals that he is a king and descended from Odin and is the keeper of the disk of Odin, which is one sided. He reveals the disk, which is invisible, but when it is touched a chill is felt and a flash is seen. The woodcutter covets the disk.

13. The Book of Sand ***** A man buys a book from a Bible seller which is written in an unknown language with occasional illustrations. The cover says that it is holy writ, but it is otherwise known as the book of sand. He discovers that the book is of infinite length. As you turn pages, more pages start to grow in the front and the back.

14. Afterword **** Borges writes: "Writing a foreword to stories that the reader hasn't read yet is an almost impossible task, because it requires talking about plots that shouldn't really be told in advance. That's why I decided to write an epilogue instead."

15. 25. August 1983 ***** Borges was born August 24, 1899. This is yet another version of the doppelgänger first story of The Book of Sand called Other. A 61-year-old Borges checks into a hotel where he sees that his even older self has already registered. The younger rushes up to the room to confront the older 84 year old who tells him about the events which are yet to happen to him.

16. Blue Tigers **** A tiger-obsessed Scottish professor travels to India because he has heard that blue tigers have been seen. When he goes to live in a village of Hindus, various magical events occur there such as finding blue stones which multiply themselves.

17. The Rose of Paraclesus **** A potential acolyte approaches the alchemist Paracelsus and says that he will devote his life to following him if only Paracelsus will resurrect a rose blossom after it has been burnt to ashes.

18. Shakespeare’s Memory **** A Shakespeare obsessed German receives Shakespeare’s memory from another man who wanted to get rid of it. He finds that gradually his own language and memories are disappearing and his memory is being taken over by those of Shakespeare.

19. Borges Looks Back ***** This is the Afterword by Klaarika Kaldjärv. As always with the Estonian Loomingu Raamatukogu this provides an excellent overview of the career and writings of the original writer.

* Footnote

yo, que me figuraba el Paraiso
bajo la especie de una biblioteca.
- Jorge Luis Borges (Poema de los Dones)

[When I imagine Heaven, I always picture it as a kind of library.]

Trivia and Links
The LR Kuldsari (Estonian: Golden Series) presents readers with a selection of works published in the Loomingu Raamatukogu (Estonian: The Creative's Library) throughout the ages. These are favorites from over the past six decades which confirm that the classics never get old! Six books will be published annually, one every two months. - translated from the publisher's website.

The Loomingu Raamatukogu is a modestly priced Estonian literary journal which initially published weekly (from 1957 to 1994) and which now publishes 40 issues in about 20 volumes a year as of 1995. It is a great source for discovery as its relatively cheap prices (currently 8 to 9€ per issue) allow for access to a multitude of international writers in Estonian translation and of shorter works by Estonian authors themselves. These include poetry, theatre, essays, short stories, novellas and novels. The lengthier works are usually counted as several issues but printed in a single volume.

For a complete listing of all works issued to date by Loomingu Raamatukogu including those in the Golden Series (at the bottom) see Estonian Wikipedia at: https://et.wikipedia.org/wiki/Looming...

[زهراء · Rating 2 out of 5]

س : لماذا تكتب الكتب ؟
ج : ليقرأها الناس .
س : كيف تتم عملية القراءة ؟
ج : القراءة ناتجة عن امتزاج مركبين اثنين : رؤية الكلمات و العبارات + فهمها .
س : إذن .. ما فائدة تلك الكتب التي يقرأها الناس و لكن لا يفهمونها ؟
ج : سأموت قبل أن أعرف الإجابة . على كل تلك ليست بالقراءة و هي لا تتعدى كونها عملية رؤية للكلمات و محاولة تشفيرها بعيدا عن الفهم الإجمالي للعبارات و للنص ككل .

" لكي يرى المرء شيئا لا بد أن يفهمه "

أنا لم أر شيئا .. لم أر تأملات بورخيس ، لم أر الزمن و الواقع و الحلم كما يصوره بورخيس ، لم أر العالم كما يراه بورخيس .
لماذا ؟ لأنني و ببساطة شديدة لم أفهم شيئا مما كتبه بورخيس ، لم أفهم المغزى من وراء قصصه تلك .. ما الشيء الذي سأستفيد منه في كتاب الرمل .. ذلك الكتاب اللامتناهي ، أحسست أن صغر عقلي و مخيلتي لا متناهي . ما هو القرص حقا ؟ أهو شيء وهمي يجرنا إليه ذلك الطمع اللامحدود المتأصل في جذور البشرية ؟ ماذا عن المجلس ؟ هل هو العالم من حولنا بما يحمله من أخطائنا و عثراتنا .. ضحكاتنا و ابتساماتنا .. أحزاننا و دموعنا ؟ و ما قصة المرآة و القناع ؟ ما هي تلك الأشياء الأخرى التي لا نعلم بوجودها ؟ من هي أولريكا و من هو اندرو ؟ أما " الآخر " فهو لغز آخر .. هل هو أنا ؟ أم أنا هي هو ؟ و من هو الذي حلم بالآخر ؟
تلك هي مأساتي مع هذا الكتاب .. أسئلة بعدد صفحات كتاب الرمل .. بعدد ذرات الرمل .. أسئلة لا أعتقد أنها سنتهي .
أحسست نفسي كحبات الرمل و أنا أقرأ هذا الكتاب .. مهما سقيتها ماء فهي لن ترتوي . لم ترو عطشي كلمات هذا الكتاب .
أما الترجمة .. فكانت كتلك الريح التي تعبث بالكثبان الرملية ، شتتني و زادت من تشويشي .
لم أفهم لحد الساعة الهدف من تلك الكتابات التي تغوص عميقا في الرمزية .. تثير عقل القارئ و تتحداه و ربما تستفزه أيضا . إذا لم أرد من القارئ أن يطلع على مكنونات نفسي فلماذا أكتب إذن ؟ !
ربما لو رأيت بورخيس في جهة أخرى و لقاء آخر لكنت سأفهمه .. ربما .. من يدري ؟
" لو رأينا العالم حقا لفهمناه "
لا أظن أنني سأنظم لقاء آخر .. فجدولي مليء بالمواعيد المستعجلة !

[Ashley Daviau · Rating 2 out of 5]

While I did enjoy a couple of these stories, for the most part I was left feeling quite bored by this collection. I don’t know if it’s because I was reading in French which isn’t my first language or because the book is a translation and the magic got lost in translation, either one is entirely possible! I am still glad I read it though, it’s something I never would have read before and I’m enjoying pushing my reading comfort zone a bit!

[بثينة العيسى · Rating 3 out of 5]

رغم صغر حجم الكتاب إلا أن قراءته لم تكن سهلة، لأن بورخيس يكتبُ المتاهات، وعالمه مليء بالمرايا والألغاز والميتافيزيقيا .. أحببته أقل من قصائده، بورخيس الشاعر أجمل.

[Alan (the Lone Librarian rides again) Teder · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Book of Sand Redux
A review of the Penguin Modern Classics paperback (2001) excerpted from Collected Fictions (1998) as translated by Andrew Hurley from the Spanish language originals el libro de la arena (1975) and La memoria de Shakespeare (1983).

I read this mostly in parallel with my recent reading of the Estonian edition Liivaraamat. Shakespeare’i mälu (2023) in order to ensure that I didn't miss any nuances. I have to give the edge to this Andrew Hurley translation as it provides quite an extensive Afterword and Notes section, well beyond what even the Estonian Loomingu Raamatukogu does. Those are excerpted from Hurley's translation of the complete prose works as noted above.

I won't provide individual story ratings and summaries again. You can find them in my review of the Estonian edition here.

[Cosimo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una foglia nel bosco

“L'incontro fu reale, ma l'altro parlò con me in un sogno e per questo mi ha potuto dimenticare; io parlai con lui durante la veglia e il ricordo mi tormenta ancora. L'altro mi sognò, ma non mi sognò rigorosamente”.

Nel solco di Stevenson e Dostoevskij, e insieme del bibliotecario Papini, viaggiando a fianco del compagno segreto conradiano, Borges enumera una serie di racconti fantastici, sogni, visioni, incontri con ospiti, spettri e apparizioni, in materia di doppio e sogno, memoria e oblio, ragione e follia, invenzione e premonizione, conflitto tra passato e futuro. Lo stile è semplice e essenziale, la prosa musicale e incantata, la temporalità è aperta e molteplice, il racconto è pervaso dalla soggettività invisibile dell'autore con il suo sguardo soprannaturale. Nell'utopia letteraria e onirica borgesiana, fatta di pluralità e archetipi, ogni uomo è il suo Shakespeare. Se imparare è ricordare, ignorare è avere dimenticato, allora la persona che scrive inventa quel primo personaggio che è l'autore dell'opera (come ricorda il saggio I livelli della realtà in letteratura di Calvino) e la narrazione procede per illusioni, profezie e paradossi, metafore e enigmi, giochi, riscritture e misteri. Tra gli specchi dell'intertestualità, non importano i libri che leggiamo, ma quelli che rileggiamo: disordinate combinazioni, rovesciamenti e possibilità di memoria, volontà e intelletto; luoghi dove comprendere la natura infera dell'identità, a dimostrare che tutti i simboli sono fallimenti. Libri, biblioteche, tigri azzurre, lupi, spade, pampa e deserto e case infestate, duelli, rose e re, mostri e eroi e poesie: ogni elemento in Borges, diabolico o angelico, concorre a formare un'infinita trama arcana, inesplicabile e indecifrabile, una parallela realtà omerica, congetturale, dalla quale ha origine un'istintiva meraviglia, un interrogarsi perplesso dell'intelligenza, una metafisica ebbrezza dell'essere.

“Ricordai di avere letto che il modo migliore di nascondere una foglia è un bosco”.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Books are made to be reread, says Borges in one of his short stories. I definitely have to reread this oneX maybe in one year, maybe in ten. or maybe one short story a month. short story is not completely accurate. Borges has the power to create whole universes in just a few pages. there are so many motives and themes in this book, it is simply overwhelming. He talks about love, about alterego, about writing, about infinity, about death, about words, about heresy. His erudism is overwhelming, his views about life are so humble and so clear.
One need to read such books at least once in a lifetime or once in a while to appreciate the real value of literature.

[Berfin Kanat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okuduğum ilk Borges kitabı. Sade bir dille yazılmış, derin anlamlar içeren harika hikayelerden oluşuyor. Bundan sonra yazarın sıkı takipçisiyim.

[Ana-Maria Beșa · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Și mie viața mi-a dat totul. Tuturor viața le dă totul, dar cei mai mulți nu-și dau seama de asta."
"Dacă spațiul este infinit, ne aflăm în oricare punct al spațiului. Dacă timpul este infinit, ne aflăm în oricare punct al timpului."

[Argos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hiç romanı olmayan, aslında şair mi, öykücü mü, denemeci mi olduğu konusunda üzerinde çok da uzlaşı sağlanmayan bir yazar neden bu kadar sevilir ya da hakkında değerlendirmeler yapılır? Borges için hep düşündüğüm budur. Kum kitabını okuyunca da sorum karşılığını bulamadı. 13 kısa öykü yer alıyor kitapta, bir kaç tanesi çok iyi (Kongre, Avelino Arredondo, Kum Kitabı). Borges’te takıntı olan diller konusu (çağdaş, yaşayan diller ve eski diller) sıklıkla karşımıza çıkıyor öykülerde. Çok sayıda dil bilmesi veya uzun yıllar kütüphanede yaşamını geçirmesinden sanırım kitap ve dil ana konuları oluyor.
Kitabın başında James Woodall’ın nefis bir “ Önzöz”ü var, öykülerden daha çok ilgimi çeken Borges’i tanımamızı sağlayan bir yazı.