Space as a Metafictional Marker: Borges' 'Tema del traidor y del héroe' and Bertolucci's Strategia del ragno

In this study, I analyse space as a key marker of the metafictional characteristic of Jorge Luis Borges' story 'Tema del traidor y del héroe' (in Ficciones) and Bernardo Bertolucci's film Strategia del ragno. I contend that the presentation of space – this understudied 'other' with regard to time in criticism of Borges – is a major aspect of the self-referential questioning at stake in his work. The descriptions of changeable places, or the blurring of binary oppositions such as the distinction of a stage versus an audience, highlight this questioning of habitual practices of writing and reading space in the literary medium. Similarly, Bertolucci, in his movie inspired by Borges' short story, presents a plurality of puzzling stages, distortions of spatial differentiations and metafilmic commentaries on the medium's techniques and effects of staging and, therefore, draws attention to the challenges of cinematographic (re)presentation.