1. Borges, Averroes, Aristotle: The Poetics of PoeticsAuthor(s): Daniel BalderstonReviewed work(s):Source: Hispania, Vol. 79, No. 2 (May, 1996), pp. 201-207Published by: American Association of Teachers of Spanish and PortugueseStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/344881 .Accessed: 23/09/2012 12:16Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org..American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserveand extend access to Hispania.http://www.jstor.org

2. 201Borges, Averroes, Aristotle: The Poetics of PoeticsDaniel BalderstonTulane UniversityAbstract: Borgessappropriations literarytheoryaremischievous,undermining grand,universalizing oftheclaims of theory. His strategies are clearly exemplifiedin "Labusca de Averroes," which shows not onlyinAverroessdifficulties explicatingAristotlesPoeticsbut also Borgessowndifficulties depicting in Averroesin his othernessin twelfth-centuryIslamicSpain.Ultimately storyis a parableofthe impossibility theory, the ofa swervefromthe generalto the particular.KeyWords: Borges (Jorge"Busca Averroes," Luis),Averroes,de Aristotle,theory,Orientalismpoetics,literaryLa palabracorsariascorre el albur de despertarunrecuerdovagamente inc6modo: de unadescoloridaelzarzuela,con sus teoriasde evidentesmucamas,quehaciande piratascoreogrificasen mares de notablecart6n. Borges, Obrascompletas(306)1 Asreminds intheopen- frequentedby "theory," andlow, pureBorges ushigh ing sentence of "Laviuda Ching,andapplied.InwhatfollowsI willbe mostly kpirata" (in Historiauniversalde laconcernedwith the presence of the found-ininfamia,1935),theory Greekmeant"fes-ing text of literarytheory,AristotlesPoet-tival"or "procession." Dariouses the word ics,in the 1947story"Labuscade Averroes,""teoria" the same unusual sense in "El in hopingto suggest new ways to readthe re-reino interior"(1896):"Porel lado derecho lationbetween "Borges" "theory." anddel camino adelante, / el paso leve, una From Genette and Foucaultto de Manadorable teoria / virginal. Siete blancas and Bloom,fromPierreMachereyto Johndoncellas, semejantes / a siete blancas Frow,Borges is invokedat any numberofrosas de graciay de armonia/ que el albakey momentsin the theoreticaldiscussionsconstelara de perlas y diamantes" (67). of the last thirty years. Borges has beenBorgess use of the word is considerablysubjectedto all types of readings:structur-more transgressivethan Dariosin that healist, Bakhtinian, Derridean, Marxist,shoves the wordfroma "high" culturalcon-Lacanian,feministandqueer,philosophical,text to a "low"one. By carnivalizingthisscientific,new historicistandculturalstud-solemn philosophicalword,by turningtheies, postcolonial,religious,etc. etc. In fact,Greek word from religious procession to the MLAbibliography lists "applicationsofcan-can, Borges, as is often his wont,the theories of the following to Borges:deflates the notion of high seriousness orBarthes, Lacan,Derrida, Spitzer, Girard,pure abstraction,here with a grotesque, Bakhtin, Peirce, Eco, Robbe-Grillet,even a pathetic image: the "evidentes Genette, Amado Alonso, Jung, de Man,mucamas"are domestic servantswho as-Eliade, MarioValdes, Ricoeur,Berkeley,pire to be vaudeville dancers but do notCarlyle,Propp,Greimas,Benjamin,Said,quite succeed. But if "Laviuda Ching, Cassirer,Steiner,andothers,as well as thepirata" ends up as a vindicationof the life applicationsof such other kinds of theoryof a female pirate,movingfrom the ridicu- as chaos theory, game theory, semiotics,lous to the sublime,so Borges is-at least quantumtheory,translationtheory and soforourtime-one of the worldauthorsmostforth. It seems from this astonishingcata- 3. 202 HISPANIA 79 MAY 1996logue thatwe are only lackinga Buddhist- cade), only to reveal at the end that theLeninistreading of El librode arena with phrase is by Aeschylus, and as such is as-applications the theoriesof Eve Kosofsky ofsociated with remote antiquityand its se-Sedgwick and Joseph Campbell, but no vere beauty(Elidiomadelosargentinos 90-doubt someone, somewhere is writing a91). This stunt of interpretation greatly isdissertationor an articlealong those lines.extended in "PierreMenard,"apropos ofBorgess writings show his great famil-Menardsrewriting,underthe influenceofiaritywithliterary criticism: JohnLivingston William James, of the phrase fromLowess TheRoad to Xanadu, Dante criti-Cervantes "Laverdad, cuya madre es lacism, OldNorse andOldEnglishcriticism, historia,emula del tiempo,dep6sitode lasValery, Eliot, Stuart Gilberts book onacciones, testigo de lo pasado, ejemplo yUlysses(praisedas being worthreadingin-aviso de lo presente, advertencia lo pordestead of the Joyce novel itself [232]), criti- venir"(449).cism of gauchesque poetry,etc. He seems It is noteasy to accomodate Borgessdis-less interested in literary theory per se. parate ideas into a system or coherentThere are two key referencesto Aristotles theory,as Shumway Santhave pointed andPoetics-in "Labusca de Averroes"and in out. Some have argued, for instance, that"Elpudorde la historia"(583,754), the lat- Otrasinquisiciones advocatesa literaryhis-ter to remarkthatAeschylusincreasedthe torywithoutauthorsnames,butthe essaysnumberof actors from one to two-and aon Wildeand Valkryundercutthis idea byfew scattered references to Croce, arguingthatthese authorscanbe valuedforColeridge,Arnold, Eliot, and the James/their sincerity (a word seldom associatedStevenson debates on narrative theory. withWilde)or personality(notviewed as aBorges makes no direct reference to thevirtue by Valkry). Borges uses paradoxRussianformalists,Burke,the New Critics, throughouthis criticalwritingsas a way ofeven to ForstersAspectsof theNovel,or-resisting generalizations; can be seenthisperhaps becauseofblindness,perhapsfrom in "PierreMenard"itself. CarlaCorduasdisinterest-to more recent schools ofinsightintoBorgessuses of metaphysicsistheory.germane here: Borges does not "do"phi-But the theory/criticism distinction islosophy-or theory-but does not just re-underminedin Borges because "theoreti- fer to it either. By "doing"theory differ-cal" arguments may be embedded in fic- ently-by resistingthe impulseto general-tional plots, in criticalessays, even in the ize, by contradictinghimselffromone textshort prose pieces of El hacedor.For in- to another,by thinkingthroughparadoxinstance, the central theoretical insight in much of his work-Borges proves exem-"PierreMenard,autordel Quijote"-that a plaryas a criticattentiveto the particularstext comes to be when readandrewritten-of the text he comments,and can be usedfirst appears in an essay, "La fruici6nproductively almosteveryturnof contem- atliteraria,"in El idioma de los argentinosporary theoretical work, although one(1928), and predates the Konstanzschoolwouldhaveto say thathe is in butnotofthatof the "aestheticsof reception" Stanleyandtextualuniverse.Corduanotes:Fishs "readerresponse theory"by some Los frutosde la teoria [de la metafisica]son tratadosfortyyears.In "Lafruici6n literaria,"Borges porBorges,antesquenada,comoproductos la fan- deproposesa conundrum: the meaningofthat tasia y a los cultivadoreshist6ricosde la filosofialosa text varies greatlydependingon its attri-tiene poramablesilusos encandilados la quimeraporbution. Working with a phrase "Elincendio, de la verdad.ParaBorges la teoriafue siempreunacon feroces mandibula[s], devora el campo,"actividad otros que trae al mundociertos objetosde en extremo raros y sugerentes. Esta perspectiva,he inquires what this would mean if written completamente inusual,si lo pensamosbien, puedeby a fire survivor, by a Chinese poet, by an ser ilamada,creo, una interpretaci6nest6tica de laavant garde poet (of the kind he had beenfilosofia.(630)himself at the beginning of the same de- 4. BORGES, AVERROES, ARISTOTLE:THE POETICS OF POETICS 203If Borges chooses (in "Laviuda Ching"know it), the consensus among his listen-andelsewhere)to returnto the Greek-out ers is that it is unnecessaryto use numer-of an interest in etymology, calling in hisous people to tell a story when one wouldessay "Elidiomainfinito" a returnto the for in suffice.The issue arisesin the Poetics, the"primordialmeaning" a word (El tamahioof passage cited by Borges in "Elpudorde lade mi esperanza 2-so his story"La 41)buscahistoria," when Aristotle recalls thatde Averroes" shapedby anotherkind of isAeschylus increasedthe numberof actorsdesireforreturn: returnto the veryoriginsafrom one to two (Janko 6); Borges com-of literary theory, Aristotles Poetics.3ments on this passagein thatessay at someBorgessstoryopenswithan epigraphfromlength, finallynoting:RenansAverroeset laverroisme endsandwith an evocationof the same author,thus ...nuncasabremossi [Esquilo]presinti6,siquieradede un modo imperfecto, significativo aquelpasaje losuggesting that Renanis Borgess primary del uno al dos, de la unidada la pluralidad asi a lo yor perhapsonlysource.BorgessAverroes, Conel segundoactorentraron didlogo las infinito. elyor ibn Rushd,as he is known in Arabic,is indefinidas posibilidades la reacci6nde unoscarac-dedisturbedby a "philological" doubtrelatedteres sobre otros. (754-55)to his commentary on the Poetics at themomenthe is penningthe eleventhchapter The same issue-showing vs. telling-,of his TahafutAl-Tahafut (Incoherence the ofnow wholly transposedinto the art of nar-Incoherence), his attack on al-Ghazalis rative, preoccupied Henry James and hisTahafut Al-Filasifa(Incoherence thePhi-of followers, notably Percy Lubbock;in thelosophers), its turn an attackon philoso-in story,Farach, scholarof the Koran,the saysphyas an illegitimate branchof theology.(Itof the Chinese theater that has been de-should be noted that Averroeswas exiled "En scribedby his guestAlbucasim: talcasonear the end of his life and some of his ... no se requerian veintepersonas.Un solobooks burntin a similarbattlebetweenthe- hablista puede referircualquiercosa, porology andphilosophy;Borges does not saycomplejo que sea" (586). (John Sturrockso, butthe stakesin this disputewerehigh.) rightlycalls attentionto the unusualwordAverroess"philological" doubt,thatserves"hablista"instead of "hablante" "narra-or histo interrupt philosophyforan afternoon dor"[284].)andan evening,has to do withtwounknown Butthe central pointof the storyis, as the andwords, "tragedy" "comedy." Now, anynarratorstates at the end, "el proceso dereaderofAristotlesPoeticswillconcurthat una derrota[,]... el caso de un hombrequean inability to decipher these words willse proponeun fin que no estavedadoa losgravely impede an understanding of otros, pero si a 1"(587-88). For the narra-Aristotlestext, and Averroes shares thattor, and presumably the reader,a read- forpreoccupation: "Esasdos palabrasarcanasing of AristotlesPoeticsby someone with-pululabanen el texto de la Poetica;impo- out knowledge and experience of the the-sible eludirlas"(583). ater is unthinkable, such is the case of butMuchof the Borges storyis a discussion Averroes in twelfth-centuryAl-Andalus.with Abulcasim al-Ashari (the name isIronically, course,the narrator atten- ofcallsbased on that of one of Averroessbiogra-tion to boys in the street pretendingto bephers) aboutwhetherit is betterto show ormuezzinandcongregation(playing, is, thatto tell. Al-Asharitells of his experience of at the theater), and the conversation athaving attended a theater in China-Farachshouse, as we have seen, turns on"Imaginemos que alguien muestra unaAbulcisims account of a visit to a theaterhistoriaen vez de referirla"(585)-and be-in China.4 readingof the Poeticsby some-Acause he does not tell of the experiencein one who thinksthattragedyis panegyricora way that is clearlyunderstandable (eveneulogy and comedy is satire seems ludi-to Averroes,who is hungryfor information crous, as Renanremarksin his Averroesetaboutpreciselythis art,though he maynotlaverroisme (in the same passage from 5. 204 HISPANIA 79 MAY 1996which Borges took the epigraph to the Middle Commentary particularratherarestory, "Simagininant la trag6dienest than generalin scope.queautrechose quelartde louer"): "Cette para- As Averroes argues in his TahafutAl-phrase accuse ... lignorance la plus com- Tahafut[orIncoherence theIncoherence]:ofplkte de la litt6raturegrecque" (He imag-ines thattragedyis nothingif not the artof The theory of the philosophersthat universalsexistpraising. This paraphrase reveals ... the onlyin the mind,notinthe external world,onlymeansmost complete ignorance of Greek litera-thatthe universals exist actually onlyin the mind,andnot in the externalworld,not thatthey do not exist atture. 48).5 all in the externalworld,forthe meaningis thatthey Let me confess now to having readexist potentially,not actuallyin the externalworld;Averroess Middle Commentary on indeed,if they did not exist at all in the outsideworldAristotlesPoetics,translated Englishin into they wouldbe false. (65)1986by CharlesE. Butterworth.6 work, ThisSo here with the poetics. Borgess sum-as Butterworthnotes, is almostunknown inmary of the eleventh chapterof Tahafutisthe Arabic-speakingworld, having only exact in the story: "se mantiene,contraelbeen publishedin the last 125years and in asceta persa Ghazali,autordel Tahafut-ul-scholarlyeditionsthathave apparentlycir-falasifa (Destrucci6n de fil6sofos), que laculated little;the two Arabicmanuscripts divinidads61oconoce las leyes generalesare preservedin librariesin Florence and del universo,lo concernientealas especies,Leiden. Renan knew the work through no al individuo"(582).8Averroes himselftranslationsof translationsof the original, writesat the end of the chapterin question:remarkingat one point that the works of And concerningboth universalsand individuals is itAverroes that were availableto him were true of Him that He knows them and does not knowLatin oftranslations Hebrewtranslations ofthem. This is the conclusionto which the principlesa commentarymade upon Arabictransla-of the ancientphilosophersled;but those who maketions of Syriactranslationsof Greek origi-a distinction,and say that Godknows universalsbutnals (52); Averroess inability to read does notknowparticulars, notfullygraspedtheirhaveAristotledirectlyis morethancompensated theory, and this is not a consequence of their prin-ciples. For all humansciences are passivitiesandim-by his readers inability (from Thomaspressionsfromthe existents,andthe existentsoperateAquinasto Borges) to read him directly.If on them. But the knowledgeof the Creatoroperatesit were not for Butterworths notes,on existents, and the existents receivethe activitiesAverroessquotationsfromandreflectionsof His knowledge.(269)on Arabic poetry and poetics would be Knowingand not knowing:in this paradoxnearly incomprehensiblefor the Westernresides one of Averroessfundamental in-non-Arabistreader (as they were for one ofsights.his medieval translators, HermannIn one of his essays on Dante, BorgesAlemann),just as Averroescouldnotmake writes:"Laprecisi6nque acabo de indicarmuch sense of Aristotles references to no es un artificioret6rico;es afirmaci6n deGreek poetry. But this is not entirely thela probidad,de la plenitud, con que cadapoint.Averroesacknowledgesat the outset incidente del poema ha sido imaginado"that Aristotle comments on aspects of (Nueveensayos dantescos Inthe case of 88).Greekpoetrythat do not have readyanalo- BorgessAverroes,whatis at stakein argu-gies in Arabic poetry, or in the poetry ofising for "precisi6n" not the minimalrefer-"most or all nations,"to use his frequent ences to the local colorof MoslemSpain-phrase; he sets as his task the adaptation of the fountain, the harem, and so forth-butAristotlesargumentto Arabicpoetry,a di- the intellectual rigor with which Averroessmension Stavans does not explore in thismental world has been recreated: the rightarticle on the story. Thus, he argues chapter of the Tahafut is mentioned, thethrough his commentary that Aristotle did names of the Arabic translators of Aristotlenot set out the rules for all poetry and that are correctly cited, the Hellenistic commen-he will not do so either; the Poetics and the tator on Aristotle (Alexanderof Aphrodisias) 6. BORGES, AVERROES, ARISTOTLE:THE POETICS OF POETICS 205is consulted at the right moment. John rance with a sense of superiority. (OneSturrockgets it profoundly wrongwhen heproblem with the casting of this story ascalls Borgesseruditionintoquestionhere, tragedyis its genre:the short storyis a nar-doubting the existence of Alexander of ration,withoutthe independent existenceofAphrodisias (279)andstatingof the Ghazalicharacters,or theirpresenceon the stage.)Tahafutand of Averroessreply:"Whether Forundertaking translation the Poeticsa ofthese are real works of early Arabic without a sense of what theater is (muchthought,orwhetherBorgeshas madethemless the distinction between tragedy andup, I do not know.Their existence is, so tocomedy) is surely an act of hubris.0speak,immaterial"(280). On the contrary: Averroessfailure("quisenarrar proceso elBorges may not have known how to readde una derrota"[587]) is mirroredin theArabicor Hebrew but he made excellentnarrators failure, Averroessdisappearanceuse of the Latinand modernmaterial(not,before the mirrorsignallingthe failureofas the ineffableMr.Sturrock wouldhave it,the narratorsimagination."immaterial") available him. to Vander Bergh states in his introduction As alreadynoted, "PierreMenard,"liketo the Tahafut:"Averroes the last greatwas"La fruici6nliteraria" beforeit, complicates philosopher in Islamin the twelfthcentury,the matterof literaryinterpretation in-byand is the most scholarlyand scrupuloussisting that the meaningof a text dependscommentatorof Aristotle.He is far betternot only on the conditionsof its productionknown in Europethan in the Orient [sic],(who wrote it, when, and under what cir- where few of his worksarestillin existencecumstances)butalso of its reception. thisIn andwherehe hadno influence, beingthe hestory the same idea is broachedin the dis- last great philosopherof his culture"(xii).cussion of whether a metaphorin a classicYet he is knowablehere only throughhisArabicpoem (destinyseen as a blindcamel) otherness.As FloydMerrellhas arguedinhas become a mere cliche;Averroesargueshis briefdiscussion of the story:to the contrarythatan imagepennedin the The conceptsof tragedyandcomedyexist withintheArabiandesertacquiresnewlayersof mean- culturalmilieuof the West, and hence the pairis foring centuries later in Al-Andalus:"Dos Borges adequatelyintelligible,but not for Averroes.terminosteniala figuray hoy tiene cuatro"Borges, on the otherhand, endeavorsto constructa(587). The two new terms added to thenarrativethat lies withinAverroessIslamicform offigure (whichinitiallyconsisted of "camel" life, a task equallyas impossibleas thatof Averroes. The self-reflectiveinjunctionboth men give them-and"destiny") "Zuhair," Arabicarethe poetselves is tantamount to the paradoxical Socraticwho composed the image, and "nuestrosknowledge paradox[sic], which pragmaticallyputspesares," the sufferings and sorrows ofone in an untenablesituation,for to know that oneZuhairsSpanish readers, so distantfromknows, one must alreadyknow, and if one alreadythe Arabian desert. By the same token, knows, then one cannot conscientiously set out toAristotles is enrichedon being readby textobeythe injunction. in a manner speaking,Yet, ofboth tasks are possible,for Borges doescompletehis nar-Averroes,andAverroesson being readbyrative,howeverinadequate mayclaimit to be, and heBorges, althoughthe "difference"betweenAverroesdid somehowsolve his problem,forhis an-one and anothermaybe as invisibleas that swervaguelycorrespondsto AristotlesPoetics.... Inbetween Menards and Cervantess ver-this manner, paradox in a sense been resolved, the hassions of "la verdad, cuya madre es layet it has notbeen trulyresolved,since bothAverroes andthe narrator apparentlymerelymuddledtheirwayhistoria"(449).throughto an answer;there is no way of theirknow- "La buscade Averroes," then,is the storying absolutelyhow they stumbleduponit or whetherof the founding text of literary theory, asor not it was correct.(75-76)misunderstood-or better still, as reimag-ined-in a different cultural context. TheKnowing and not knowing again: instory is cast as a tragedy in Aristotles terms: Merrells formulation, an insight into thethe philosophers quest is undone by his particular, gained by "mere muddlingignorance, and by his masking of his igno- through," by "vague correspondences," is 7. 206 HISPANIA 79 MAY 1996not sufficientknowledgeof the whole, but ing "Labuscade Averroes": focuseshis discussionheit is knowledgeof some sort. (less productively, my view) on "Laescrituradel innotes thatAverroesdios,"a storythatis set in post-Conquest Guatemala, (likeas I have arguedin Outof Context(69-80).Corbin afterhim,in the letterto Can Dante Grandediscussed Borgesandso4Cf.Aristotle:"what possibleis believable; do is webynot believethatwhathas neverhappenedis possible,manyothers) arguesfor the coexistence ofbut things which have happenedare obviouslypos-exoteric (zahir)meaningsandone or moresible-they would not have happened,if they wereesoteric (batin) meanings (245);the nextimpossible"(Jankotrans.,12).Julia5Surprisingly Kushigiandoes notdiscussthestoryin ElAlephis precisely"ElZahir."The"Orientalist"tendenciesin this story,whichshe men-insubtlediscussionof metaphor Averroesstions in passing in her chapter on Borges inMiddleCommentary (fullerthan the corre- Orientalism theHispanicLiteraryin Tradition(24).spondingdiscussionin Aristotle)suggests 6Oddly, Stavans Ilan callsthe MiddleCommentary"ahoraextraviado" although(17),Butterworths trans-the importancefor him of suggestion and lationof it was publishedtwo yearsbeforehis article.connotation,a refusal of hermeneuticclo-7SeeButterworthstointroduction his translationsure, as does the successionof commentar- of the MiddleCommentary andRenan(211-12). (xii)ies thathe wroteto Aristotle,fromthe short8StavansarguesthatBorgescouldnothaveknowninitialones to the later"middle" "great"and the Tahafut because he couldnot readArabicor He-brew (16), forgettingthat Borges was an excellentcommentaries(see Fakhry273 and Peters Latinistand could have read the book in Latin.It is95 on the variouskinds of commentaries).worth rememberingthat Averroes,as ButterworthHe mighthaveapprovedBorgessdefinitionandothers have remarked, morewidelypublishedisof esthetics (andbeauty,andpoetics):"esta in Latinthanin Arabic.inminencia de una revelaci6n, que no se 90n Zohair, see Butterworths introduction,Averroes,MiddleCommentary(61).produce,es, quiza,el hecho estetico"(635).100fcourse critics who do have knowledge andIn placing a resistance to closure and to experienceof the theaterhavehadmyriad otherprob-system at the end of "Lamuralla y los lems of interpretation the Poetics,e.g. Else, Davis,oflibros," firstessay of Otrasthe inquisiciones,Janko,andthe essays in the Rortycollection.his primarybook of essays, Borges mocks "I am gratefulto GwenKirkpatrick her care-forful readingandcritiqueof a draftof this article.(in advance)the folly of those who wouldtryto box him in to one or anothertheoreti- N WORKS CITEDcal approach,and by stressing the "immi-nence"of an (endlesslypostponed)revela- Alvarez,NicolasE. 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