The Aleph

The two epigraphs at the start of “The Aleph” introduce the confounding nature of perception. Hamlet claims that even if bound in the most extreme confines, he might consider the space to be infinite should he choose to think of it that way. The second quotation expresses the limits of the perception of time, with the present being so elusive that to grasp it would be to behold eternity. Both time and space seem infinite, yet time is only the present moment, and space is only what is immediately in front of one.

After Beatriz’s death, Borges says, “I realized that the vast unceasing universe was already growing away from her, and that this change was but the first in an infinite series” (118). The narrator’s fixation on the infinite highlights the tragedy of death as the scale of time and space overshadows all lives. Borges’s annual visit to Beatriz’s house is his attempt to repress this reality, an act he performs “without hope, but also without humiliation” (118).

When presented with the idea of the Aleph, Borges replies, “I was amazed that I hadn’t realized until that moment that Carlos Viterbo was a madman” (127).