Borges and Mathematics

Preface

I owe the impulse and initial idea for this book to a trip I made to the United States in 2001, and more specifically to an invitation by Professor Alicia Borinsky during that visit to lecture at Boston University on the connection between Borges and mathematics. Until then, and ever since adolescence, I had read Borges with the same intensity and hypnotic sense of wonder his writings provoke in any aspiring writer, but only in successive, partial attempts, in cautious doses, with the hesitant attraction of an iron filing toward a powerful magnet. Perhaps for that reason, and despite the fact that while reading Borges I myself was “an arduous disciple of Pythagoras ,” I hadn’t paid too much attention to the obvious and apparent references to mathematical concepts in his texts. Interspersed with so many other markers of erudition and knowledge, these can easily be passed over at first glance. And yet, as soon as I began to review his complete works in a methodical, “mathematical” way, Borges’ lifelong, enduring fascination and curiosity about that discipline emerged in all their lucidity : his pride in those aspects he had mastered, the little lessons he Preface| ix | presented in some of his essays, the reviews, and readings of mathematical books. Suffice it to say that I was able to find almost 200 citations with mathematical allusions throughout his oeuvre, and a bibliography of 45 mathematical works consulted or cited.1 Beyond this rather impressive body of references, most interesting and revealing for me was the discovery of clear traces of some mathematical ideas behind several of his fictions, and an awareness of the subtle way in which mathematical concepts were transmuted and imbued with new life within a context of literary intentions. To study Borges’appropriation of these ideas and to analyze them within each fictional work without separating them from those literary intentions , with the facets and layers of meaning they add, is the fundamental purpose of this book. I believe that to disregard the profusion of mathematical footprints would be to ignore some of the objectives and deliberate meanings that Borges attempted to convey, and thus to miss one of the dimensions of his work. On the other hand, to isolate or overemphasize this aspect, to examine the references with a high-powered magnifying glass or an arsenal of hyper-sophisticated mathematical tools would be an error of excess. Therefore I have tried to maintain a careful equilibrium in my approach: for me the game of interpretation is, above all, a balancing act. In Borges the essayist there is also the unmistakable sign of a way of thinking that is akin to logical argumentation and mathematics, both in his choice and execution of style and in various statements of his artistic credo. This is something that this book also proposes to explore. On too many occasions, when I was still a professional mathematician and I was publishing my first novels, I heard the incredulous question: “But how is it possible . . . when literature and mathematics are such opposite worlds?” It was of little use to invoke the names Lewis Carroll, Raymond Queneau, Stanisław Lem, Robert Musil, and Nicanor Parra. The suspicions hardly abated, as if I were referring to exotic anomalies. The articles on mathematics and literature| x | in the second half of this book suggest examples of ties between the two worlds, the two cultures, with the objective of allaying that skepticism and showing, as Borges himself has said, that “Imagination and mathematics are not contradictory; they complement one another like lock and key.” I would like to thank Ariel de la Fuente for his interest, diligence, and encouragement in publishing this book with Purdue University Press, and also my editor, Charles Watkinson, for his patient efforts in acquiring the translation rights for the citations. Very special thanks to Andrea Labinger for her outstanding, meticulous work on the translation. Finally, I am grateful to the Latino Cultural Center at Purdue University and its Director, Maricela Alvarado. Their generous support helped make the book available in English. Buenos Aires, May 2012 Note 1. This list (in Spanish) can be found at www.guillermomartinezweb.blogspot.com. Editor’s note MALBAstands for Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires.| xi | ...