On Uncle J-, Borges, (and how people are different than books).
Issue #006 of Brief Notes on Life.
On Uncle J-, Borges, (and how people are different than books).
My uncle J- was a highly introspective man. He was not married, and spent most of his time in the City club while not at work. Sometimes he would visit our house instead of the club, and spend time sitting on the veranda talking at length with my father. They spoke on politics, old acquaintances, their college days and life in general. I was young then and doing a program on journalism. I was also trying my hand at writing. A few of my articles had been published in the local Kannada weekly.
It was late evening, and a powerful wind was blowing out from the sea towards the village, carrying the salty tinge of the sand and sea water. Father had not come home yet. Uncle J was sitting in the armchair, waiting for him and watching the moon rise over the coconut trees across the twilight sky. I showed him a rough draft of my article. It was a critique of the local novelist's latest work. A pipe dangled dangerously from his mouth, as he reclined in the easy chair, reading from the sheaf of papers. A particular phrase seemed to agitate him.
"You may wish to read people like books but that's highly impossible. People aren't books." He scoffed. "Books are constant. The words in the pages, the chapters, the sequence of pages don't change. It's not like tiny antsy letters dance off in the night when nobody is looking and wonder off to some other page, creating new words.
He paused, letting out a puff of smoke. "Although it would be fun if they could do so. Every couple of days you could have a different story, a new truth staring at you from the pages."
"Won't that be like gibberish?" I wondered.
"Not necessarily. Have you read Borges?"
"No."
"Borges was an Argentine author. And a bold one. Lot of writers stay within the conventional. Borges was not afraid of writing that which may seem improbable. The mad, the unconventional. The things that you can see if only you give permission to your self to go a bit loony. Are you getting me?"
"No."
He smiled. "You do not have to be mad. But bold enough to let your mind be free; wander beyond the ‘rules’ to glimpse into madness from the pit-side. Borges was such a man. In one of his stories, he writes about a library of endless hexagonal rooms containing books of all possible combinations of letters. Every possible word that can ever be formed and it's infinite variations. The logic is plain. See, all the letters forming the English is already there. They just have to find their way. And if the letters are really creative they may even come up with a French book."
"Or an Italian." I chuckled.
"People are more like a collection, an assortment of experiences...." he seemed searching for words.. . " like a river, constantly moving, changing shape, seeking new paths. People change and yet they remain the same. A river of time, a stream of experiences flowing smoothly along a time line. And we give the collection of experiences a name."
He was silent for some time. A motor bike (two-wheeler used by my father) revving up towards the house could be heard at a distance.
Author’s Note:
You can read Borges’ masterpiece ‘The Library of Babel’ - a short story referenced in the above story here.
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I always felt like Borges was just beyond my grasp reading his stories. I had the same feeling reading Cortarzar’s Hopscotch