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Borgesiana

The Library of Babel

Babel-Dante-Salatino-2008

The universe (which others call the Library) is composed of an indefinite and perhaps infinite number of hexagonal galleries…

For a long time it was believed that these impenetrable books corresponded to past or remote languages. It is true that the most ancient men, the first librarians, used a language quite different from the one we now speak…

…the Library is total and that its shelves register all the possible combinations of the twenty-odd orthographical symbols (a number which, though extremely vast, is not infinite): Everything: the minutely detailed history of the future, the archangels' autobiographies, the faithful catalogues of the Library, thousands and thousands of false catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of those catalogues, the demonstration of the fallacy of the true catalogue…

Tu, che mi leggi, sei sicuro d'intendere la mia lingua ?
 
You, who read me, are you certain you understand my language ?
 
Toi qui me lis, es-tu sûr de comprendre ma langue ?
 
Tú, que me lees, ¿estás seguro de entender mi lenguaje?
 
Você, que me lê, tem certeza de entender minha linguagem ?

 Bist du, Leser, denn sicher, daß du meine Sprache verstehst ?


 

 

Like all the men of Babylon, I have been proconsul; like all, I have been a slave. I have known omnipotence, ignominy, imprisonment
(The Lottery in Babylon)

Borges, 1963, foto: Alicia Daminco

Jorge Luis Borges