Order, Memory, and Anxiety in Borges Fiction :: Reading Memorize Memory Essays

Order, Memory, and Anxiety in Borges' Fiction The fundamental questions of how and why we read have an infinitude of answers, none of which entirely 'do the job', simply because they bear too closely upon the automatic, (and therefore, to us, secret) processes of the mind; the act of reading is too closely related to the act of living in the world for us to comprehend definitively. There are few writers who understand and exploit this primal link more persistently than Jorge Luis Borges. One of the ways in which he forces us to examine the parallels between reading and existing (I use the word 'force' because it is not always a pleasant confrontation) is through the thematic use of memory. I. Total Recall "It is because I forget that I read." -Roland Barthes, S/Z One of the most masterful treatments of the memory theme is in "Funes the Memorious", the brilliantly, (and somewhat absurdly), touching story of a man who cannot live under the strain of his natural and inescapable ability to remember everything perfectly. The story begins with the words "I recall", and immediately we are plunged into the realm of memory-we understand that what we are about to read is a semblance of a reminisence. Jon Stewart calls attention to the importance of the repetition of this verb in the opening paragraphs of the story: "The continual use of this verb clearly foreshadows the most important element of the character of Funes-his prodigious mnemonic powers: but there is more to it than this. Borges continually uses the same verb and with it brings together a number of scattered and seemingly chaotic memories that he has of Funes. The point of this repetition is to underscore his own impoverished memory of Funes." (p.74) But Stewart neglects to take this point to its logical and important conclusion; the narrator's 'impoverished memory' is not merely a foreshadowing of Funes' infinitely rich one-it comes to be, in fact, the necessary circumstance, and the subject of the story. Borges tells us that the story grew out of his own bouts of insomnia: "I remember that I used to lie down and try to forget everything, and that led me, inevitably, to remember everything. I imagined the books on the shelves, the clothes on the chair, and even my own body on the bed... and so, since I could not erase memory, I kept thinking of those things, and also thinking: if only I could forget, I would certainly be able to sleep.