Latin American Philosophy of Literature

Neste artigo argumentamos que os temas da ação e da história presentes em alguns contos de Jorge Luis Borges antecipam alguns pontos que apareceram nas discussões pós-estruturalistas - nos campos da história, filosofia, antropologia - das últimas décadas do século XX. No seu labirinto literário-filosófico, especialmente por meio da ideia de destino, Borges explora elementos chave que se tornaram parte da noção de crítica que enfatiza as ideias de contingência e da impossibilidade de controle deliberado dos efeitos da ação humana (...) em seu curso temporal. It is argued in this paper that the themes action and history present in some of Jorge Luis Borges's short stories have anticipated certain aspects of the post-structuralist debates - on history, philosophy, and anthropology - in the last decades of the twentieth century. In his literary and philosophical labyrinth, especially through the idea of destiny, Borges explores key elements that became part of the notion of critique that emphasize the idea of contingency and the impossibility of deliberated control of the effects of human action in its temporal course. (shrink)

In his short story “The Library of Babel” (1941), Argentinean writer Jorge LuisBorges (1899–1986) examines the nature of reality, in particular epistemologicalboundaries to knowing in the world and universe. In this tale Borges is concerned withepistemic certainty, whether the universe is decipherable by use of reason, philosophy,or scientific investigation. I examine Borges’ tale as an allegory of the dilemma modernsfind themselves in, in an age when the moorings which have anchored us, belief inGod, religious faith, moral absolutes, the idea of (...) progress, that language can mirrorreality, have all been subject to radical critique. In this regard, Borges stands at the cuspof postmodernism and can be seen as a precursor of this movement. Borges finds thesearch for meaning a noble yet frustrating human endeavor, underlain with a fear weare denied contact with the reality of things. The Library offers hope of revelation ofthe universe’s secrets, yet presents formidable barriers to understanding. In his visionBorges presents thought-provoking images of society, the search for knowledge, and ofhuman-imposed order on a chaotic reality. Keywords: Epistemology, knowledge, certainty, postmodernism, mathematics, North Carolina,USA. (shrink)

A provocative examination of the artistic interpretation of twelve of Borges’s most famous stories.

Introducción -- Los rostros de la crítica -- Después del posmodernismo -- El concepto y la metáfora -- Las imágenes y las formas del entendimiento -- Citas memorables -- El oficio de la filosofía.

“There’s no need for DNA tests to prove that One Hundred Years of Solitude is Don Quixote’s heir.” G. Rabassa This paper is a personal attempt to relate the concept of language games as portrayed by the Austrian Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein with the literary magic of Gabriel García Márquez. The topic came up to me after reading an essay of the Colombian writer Carlos Patiño Roselli. His exposition on the language games in Wittgenstein triggered a series ofassociations in me that (...) made me see spoken language as the actor that plays the leading role in both authors. In order to address this topic I will first summarize Wittgenstein’s notion of language-games, on one hand, and then I will remind us of what we commonly understand under “magical realism” in GGM; then, I will propose a free interpretation of §103 in PhU relating it to Melquiades’ return from death to live in a story he tells in some papyrus. And now, “Back to the rough ground!”. (shrink)

The idea that is possible to produce new forms of subjectivity, trough an intelligent use of expression, has been recurring in modern and contemporary literature. Fiction, in this sense, has played a central role in the construction of national identities. Even if programmatically he always stud up on the antipodes of literary commitment, in his youth Borges saw in art a «political compensatory function » of this type. Namely, he claimed that, in order to escape from the tight spots in (...) which we get enclosed, literature can help us in the work of reinvent ourselves as individual and collective subjects. Using concepts from Deleuze and Foucault, Rancière and Burgoyne, this article tries to analyze that secret borgean politics, as a case study of a wider aspiration of literature to operate on the agency of the forms we have to say «I» and «Us». (shrink)

The following article discusses a certain concrete ethical-historical sensibility that opens, in part, in the work of Hegel and serves as an introduction to two figures of spirit beyond Hegel’s onto-theological thought: namely, Frantz Fanon and Gabriel García Márquez. The discussion seeks to introduce a “thinking sensibility,” i.e., an opening toward the articulate understanding of history in and through its singularities. This figures a space for a way of thinking arising in the concrete unfolding of spirits out of singularities that (...) overwhelm any single or universal call for unity. In terms of history, this concerns not a thinking that gives sense to history through concepts, but a thought that from its specificity and situation unfolds diverse articulations, and hence configurations of the senses of spirit or histories. (shrink)

When valuing any a esthetic manifestation of art, including contemporary Colombian Literature, it is necessary to discuss the concept of literary art which lays at the heart of any proposal. Such proposal allows us to find the causes of the loss of its universal character and its docility in relation to modern tendecies which suggest that ther is a shallow treatment of related topics. Therefore, based on four authoritative texts I attempt to define degree of universality that nacional (colombian) literature (...) has reached. (shrink)

In Jorge Luis Borges’ short story, “Borges and I,” one character, referred to in the first person, complains about his strained and complex relation with another character, called “Borges.” But the characters are both presumably the author of the short story. I try to use ideas from the philosophy of language to explain how Borges uses language to express complex thoughts, and then discuss two interpretations of the story.

Se comenta el artículo de Marisa Moyano y Hugo Aguilar sobre "El ensayo de interpretación continental: lecturas performativas y pensamiento identitario en ‘Ariel’ ". Ni reflejo pasivo de una realidad previa, ni palabra demiúrgica inventora de una realidad imaginada, los discursos identitarios son momentos reflexivos en una red inter-narrativa e inter-subjetiva de palabras, gestos y actos que afirman y constituyen a un grupo humano como sujeto político y cultural.

La autora construye aquí una suerte de itinerario que da cuenta de la estética como un pensamiento fecundo en busca de identidad propia. La obra se estructura a modo de diálogo histórico entre filósofos, que se inicia en el año de 1913 con la instauración en México de la cátedra de estética, a cargo de Antonio Caso, y que termina con el ocaso del siglo XX. En su conjunto, este volumen es una recolección de hallazgos de filósofos renombrados y de (...) otros menos conocidos que, al afianzar o descubrir alguna idea, han cimentado el edificio teórico o han derrumbado algunos supuestos que se creían inamovibles. (shrink)

Jorge Luis Borges is acknowledged as one of the great Spanish writers of the twentieth century. On the broader literary scene, he is recognized as a modern master. His fascination with philosophy - especially metaphysics - sets him apart from his contemporaries. Borges appreciated and formulated rigorous philosophical arguments, but also possessed the unique ability to present the most abstract ideas imaginatively in metaphors and symbols. Borges wandered among the great masters seeking a firm purchase that he could not find, (...) and therefore expressed a nostalgia for metaphysics as he lost himself in his labyrinths. Borges and Philosophy traces Borges' philosophical concerns in his tales, essays, and poems and argues that despite his apparent skepticism in philosophical matters, a careful reading of Borges' texts reveals a coherent philosophical path that underlies his work. (shrink)

Se realiza una lectura de algunos relatos de Jorge Luis Borges para trazar, a partir de ellos, la pregunta acerca de los lí­mites y la superación del lenguaje. Se ha afirmado que, ante la insuficiencia del lenguaje para reproducir una experiencia determinada, se abre el ámbito del silencio que trasciende la palabra en el éxtasis. El silencio, entonces, no aniquilarí­a la palabra sino que engendrarí­a la posibilidad de la polisemia. Además, se agrega que ésta apertura a la ausencia del verbo (...) va más allá de las múltiples significaciones y expresa la presencia de un sentido imposible de ser englobado y contenido dentro de las estructuras racionales de la conciencia."œBorges: The silent word"A reading of some of Jorge Luis Borges "™ short stories is done in order to trace, using these stories as a starting point, the question about the limits and the triumph over language. It has been stated that, faced with the insuficiency of language to reproduce a certain experience, the sphere of silence is opened that transcends the word in extasis. Silence, thus, would not annihilate the word but instead it would engender the possibility of polysemy. In addition, it is added that this opening to the absence of the verb goes beyond multiple meanings and expresses the presence of a meaning which is impossible to be included and contained within the rational structures of the consciousness. (shrink)

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This dissertation presents a broad diachronic overview of the writings of Jorge Luis Borges. Unlike most critical approaches, which have tended to focus primarily on 'content', this work is concerned with the stylistic, rhetorical, and philosophical strategies that govern the operation of his texts as a whole. It attempts to describe the emergence, predominance, and eventual exhaustion of these principles within the operation of Borges' texts. ;Borges' oeuvre is characterized as a machine, in the sense in which Systems Theory speaks (...) of non-trivial, unreliable machines. This mechanism is described as unstable, complex, and autopoietic. It is unstable because the rules of its operation, its generative principles, do not remain constant, but are fluid and unpredictable, thus justifying a diachronic approach. The machine dismantles and reassembles itself, generating textual fluidity in a manner akin to deconstruction. Its complexity is described in part in terms of a quantitative accumulation of materials, and in terms of surprise generating devices such as emergence and paradox. As an autopoietic entity, it has operative closure, which accounts for the assimilation to a Borgesian 'logic' of numerous and diverse materials, as well as the operations of self-observation, or re-entry, that define its instability. ;The diachronical description of the main 'generative principles' governing the operation of Borges' work is organized in three main periods: 1923--30, 1931--55, and 1955--86. Some of these principles include: minor literature, fragmentation, baroque style, humor, distinctions, identity, stylistic tension, compression, exponential literature, quoting and assimilation, 'enactive' thought, paradox, abduction, blindness, orality, understatement, and ethics. The analysis operates in an interface between content and style. Borges' style is described, in a manner close to Aristotelian rhetoric, as having philosophical implications. ;In its conclusions, this work discards the possibility of a Borgesian teleology. There is no end to the instability of the machine's operation. Nevertheless, it is possible to allude to a productive and not merely deconstructive component in his texts. In spite of its fluidity, the accumulation generates a somewhat ghostly configuration, which is described in terms of residues, gaps, and imminence. (shrink)

In this short paper I try to present William James’s connection with the Argentinian writer Macedonio Fernández (1874-1952), who was in some sense a mentor of Borges and might be considered the missing link between Borges and James.