O God, I could be bounded in a nutshelland count myself a King of infinite space.

Hamlet, II, 2

But they will teach us that Eternity is the Standing still of the Present Time,aNunc-stans(as the schools call it); which neither they, nor any else understand,no more than they would aHic-stansfor an Infinite greatness of Place.

Leviathan, IV, 46

La candente maana de febrero en que Beatriz Viterbo muri, despus de una imperiosa agona que no se rebaj un solo instante ni al sentimentalismo ni al miedo, not que las carteleras de fierro de la Plaza Constitucin haban renovado no s qu aviso de cigarrillos rubios; el hecho me doli, pues comprend que el incesante y vasto universo ya se apartaba de ella y que ese cambio era el primero de una serie infinita. Cambiar el universo pero yo no, pens con melanclica vanidad; alguna vez, lo s, mi vana devocin la haba exasperado; muerta yo poda consagrarme a su memoria, sin esperanza, pero tambin sin humillacin. Consider que el treinta de abril era su cumpleaos; visitar ese da la casa de la calle Garay para saludar a su padre y a Carlos Argentino Daneri, su primo hermano, era un acto corts, irreprochable, tal vez ineludible. De nuevo aguardara en el crepsculo de la abarrotada salita, de nuevo estudiara las circunstancias de sus muchos retratos. Beatriz Viterbo, de perfil, en colores; Beatriz, con antifaz, en los carnavales de 1921; la primera comunin de Beatriz; Beatriz, el da de su boda con Roberto Alessandri; Beatriz, poco despus del divorcio, en un almuerzo del Club Hpico; Beatriz, en Quilmes, con Delia San Marco Porcel y Carlos Argentino; Beatriz, con el pekins que le regal Villegas Haedo; Beatriz, de frente y de tres cuartos, sonriendo, la mano en el mentn... No estara obligado, como otras veces, a justificar mi presencia con mdicas ofrendas de libros: libros cuyas pginas, finalmente, aprend a cortar, para no comprobar, meses despus, que estaban intactos.On the burning February morning Beatriz Viterbo died, after braving an agony that never for a single moment gave way to self-pity or fear, I noticed that the sidewalk billboards around Constitution Plaza were advertising some new brand or other of American cigarettes. The fact pained me, for I realised that the wide and ceaseless universe was already slipping away from her and that this slight change was the first of an endless series. The universe may change but not me, I thought with a certain sad vanity. I knew that at times my fruitless devotion had annoyed her; now that she was dead, I could devote myself to her memory, without hope but also without humiliation. I recalled that the thirtieth of April was her birthday; on that day to visit her house on Garay Street and pay my respects to her father and to Carlos Argentino Daneri, her first cousin, would be an irreproachable and perhaps unavoidable act of politeness. Once again I would wait in the twilight of the small, cluttered drawing room, once again I would study the details of her many photographs: Beatriz Viterbo in profile and in full colour; Beatriz wearing a mask, during the Carnival of 1921; Beatriz at her First Communion; Beatriz on the day of her wedding to Roberto Alessandri; Beatriz soon after her divorce, at a luncheon at the Turf Club; Beatriz at a seaside resort in Quilmes with Delia San Marco Porcel and Carlos Argentino; Beatriz with the Pekingese lapdog given her by Villegas Haedo; Beatriz, front and three-quarter views, smiling, hand on her chin... I would not be forced, as in the past, to justify my presence with modest offerings of books -- books whose pages I finally learned to cut beforehand, so as not to find out, months later, that they lay around unopened.

Beatriz Viterbo muri en 1929; desde entonces, no dej pasar un treinta de abril sin volver a su casa. Yo sola llegar a las siete y cuarto y quedarme unos veinticinco minutos; cada ao apareca un poco ms tarde y me quedaba un rato ms; en 1933, una lluvia torrencial me favoreci: tuvieron que invitarme a comer. No desperdici, como es natural, ese buen precedente; en 1934, aparec, ya dadas las ocho, con un alfajor santafecino; con toda naturalidad me qued a comer. As, en aniversarios melanclicos y vanamente erticos, recib las graduales confidencias de Carlos Argentino Daneri.Beatriz Viterbo died in 1929. From that time on, I never let a thirtieth of April go by without a visit to her house. I used to make my appearance at seven-fifteen sharp and stay on for some twenty-five minutes. Each year, I arrived a little later and stay a little longer. In 1933, a torrential downpour coming to my aid, they were obliged to ask me for dinner. Naturally, I took advantage of that lucky precedent. In 1934, I arrived, just after eight, with one of those large Santa Fe sugared cakes, and quite matter-of-factly I stayed to dinner. It was in this way, on these melancholy and vainly erotic anniversaries, that I came into the gradual confidences of Carlos Argentino Daneri.

Beatriz era alta, frgil, muy ligeramente inclinada; haba en su andar (si el oxmoron* es tolerable) una como graciosa torpeza, un principio de xtasis; Carlos Argentino es rosado, considerable, canoso, de rasgos finos. Ejerce no s qu cargo subalterno en una biblioteca ilegible de los arrabales del Sur; es autoritario, pero tambin es ineficaz; aprovechaba, hasta hace muy poco, las noches y las fiestas para no salir de su casa. A dos generaciones de distancia, la ese italiana y la copiosa gesticulacin italiana sobreviven en l. Su actividad mental es continua, apasionada, verstil y del todo insignificante. Abunda en inservibles analogas y en ociosos escrpulos. Tiene (como Beatriz) grandes y afiladas manos hermosas. Durante algunos meses padeci la obsesin de Paul Fort, menos por sus baladas que por la idea de una gloria intachable. "Es el Prncipe de los poetas de Francia", repeta con fatuidad. "En vano te revolvers contra l; no lo alcanzar, no, la ms inficionada de tus saetas."* Oxmoron: Combinacin en una misma estructura sintctica de dos palabras o expresiones de significado opuesto, que originan un nuevo sentido. Ejemplo: "un silencio atronador".Beatriz had been tall, frail, slightly stooped; in her walk there was (if the oxymoron may be allowed) a kind of uncertain grace, a hint of expectancy. Carlos Argentino was pink-faced, overweight, gray-haired, fine-featured. He held a minor position in an unreadable library out on the edge of the Southside of Buenos Aires. He was authoritarian but also unimpressive. Until only recently, he took advantage of his nights and holidays to stay at home. At a remove of two generations, the Italian "S" and demonstrative Italian gestures still survived in him. His mental activity was continuous, deeply felt, far-ranging, and -- all in all -- meaningless. He dealt in pointless analogies and in trivial scruples. He had (as did Beatriz) large, beautiful, finely shaped hands. For several months he seemed to be obsessed with Paul Fort -- less with his ballads than with the idea of a towering reputation. "He is the Prince of poets," Daneri would repeat fatuously. "You will belittle him in vain -- but no, not even the most venomous of your shafts will graze him."

El treinta de abril de 1941 me permit agregar al alfajor una botella de coac del pas. Carlos Argentino lo prob, lo juzg interesante y emprendi, al cabo de unas copas, una vindicacin del hombre moderno.On the thirtieth of April, 1941, along with the sugared cake I allowed myself to add a bottle of Argentine cognac. Carlos Argentino tasted it, pronounced it "interesting," and, after a few drinks, launched into a glorification of modern man.

-Lo evoco -dijo con una animacin algo inexplicable- en su gabinete de estudio, como si dijramos en la torre albarrana de una ciudad, provisto de telfonos, de telgrafos, de fongrafos, de aparatos de radiotelefona, de cinematgrafos, de linternas mgicas, de glosarios, de horarios, de prontuarios, de boletines..."I view him," he said with a certain unaccountable excitement, "in his inner sanctum, as though in his castle tower, supplied with telephones, telegraphs, phonographs, wireless sets, motion-picture screens, slide projectors, glossaries, timetables, handbooks, bulletins..."

Observ que para un hombre as facultado el acto de viajar era intil; nuestro siglo XX haba transformado la fbula de Mahoma y de la montaa; las montaas, ahora, convergan sobre el moderno Mahoma.He remarked that for a man so equipped, actual travel was superfluous. Our twentieth century had inverted the story of Mohammed and the mountain; nowadays, the mountain came to the modern Mohammed.

Tan ineptas me parecieron esas ideas, tan pomposa y tan vasta su exposicin, que las relacion inmediatamente con la literatura; le dije que por qu no las escriba. Previsiblemente respondi que ya lo haba hecho: esos conceptos, y otros no menos novedosos, figuraban en el Canto Augural, Canto Prologal o simplemente Canto-Prlogo de un poema en el que trabajaba haca muchos aos, sinrclame, sin bullanga ensordecedora, siempre apoyado en esos dos bculos que se llaman el trabajo y la soledad. Primero, abra las compuertas a la imaginacin; luego, haca uso de la lima. El poema se titulabaLa Tierra; tratbase de una descripcin del planeta, en la que no faltaban, por cierto, la pintoresca digresin y el gallardo apstrofe**.** Apstrofe: Figura que consiste en dirigir la palabra con vehemencia en segunda persona a una o varias, presentes o ausentes, vivas o muertas, a seres abstractos o a cosas inanimadas, o en dirigrsela a s mismo en iguales trminos.So foolish did his ideas seem to me, so pompous and so drawn out his exposition, that I linked them at once to literature and asked him why he didn't write them down. As might be foreseen, he answered that he had already done so -- that these ideas, and others no less striking, had found their place in the Proem, or Augural Canto, or, more simply, the Prologue Canto of the poem on which he had been working for many years now, alone, without publicity, with fanfare, supported only by those twin staffs universally known as work and solitude. First, he said, he opened the floodgates of his fancy; then, taking up hand tools, he resorted to the file. The poem was entitledThe Earth; it consisted of a description of the planet, and, of course, lacked no amount of picturesque digressions and bold apostrophes.

Le rogu que me leyera un pasaje, aunque fuera breve. Abri un cajn del escritorio, sac un alto legajo de hojas de block estampadas con el membrete de la Biblioteca Juan Crisstomo Lafinur y ley con sonora satisfaccin:I asked him to read me a passage, if only a short one. He opened a drawer of his writing table, drew out a thick stack of papers -- sheets of a large pad imprinted with the letterhead of the Juan Crisstomo Lafinur Library -- and, with ringing satisfaction, declaimed:

He visto, como el griego, las urbes de los hombres,los trabajos, los das de varia luz, el hambre;no corrijo los hechos, no falseo los nombres,pero elvoyageque narro, es...autour de ma chambre.Mine eyes, as did the Greek's, have known men'stowns and fame,The works, the days in light that fades to amber;I do not change a fact or falsify a name --ThevoyageI set down is...autourde ma chambre.

-Estrofa a todas luces interesante -dictamin-. El primer verso granjea el aplauso del catedrtico, del acadmico, del helenista, cuando no de los eruditos a la violeta, sector considerable de la opinin; el segundo pasa de Homero a Hesodo (todo un implcito homenaje, en el frontis del flamante edificio, al padre de la poesa didctica), no sin remozar un procedimiento cuyo abolengo est en la Escritura, la enumeracin, congerie o conglobacin; el tercero -barroquismo, decadentismo; culto depurado y fantico de la forma?- consta de dos hemistiquios gemelos; el cuarto, francamente bilinge, me asegura el apoyo incondicional de todo espritu sensible a los desenfadados envites de la facecia. Nada dir de la rima rara ni de la ilustracin que me permite, sin pedantismo!, acumular en cuatro versos tres alusiones eruditas que abarcan treinta siglos de apretada literatura: la primera a laOdisea, la segunda a losTrabajos y das, la tercera a la bagatela inmortal que nos depararan los ocios de la pluma del saboyano... Comprendo una vez ms que el arte moderno exige el blsamo de la risa, elscherzo. Decididamente, tiene la palabra Goldoni!"From any angle, a greatly interesting stanza," he said, giving his verdict. "The opening line wins the applause of the professor, the academician, and the Hellenist -- to say nothing of the would-be scholar, a considerable sector of the public. The second flows from Homer to Hesiod (generous homage, at the very outset, to the father of didactic poetry), not without rejuvenating a process whose roots go back to Scripture -- enumeration, congeries, conglomeration. The third -- baroque? decadent? example of the cult of pure form? -- consists of two equal hemistichs. The fourth, frankly bilingual, assures me the unstinted backing of all minds sensitive to the pleasures of sheer fun. I should, in all fairness, speak of the novel rhyme in lines two and four, and of the erudition that allows me -- without a hint of pedantry! -- to cram into four lines three learned allusions covering thirty centuries packed with literature -- first to theOdyssey, second toWorks and Days, and third to the immortal bagatelle bequathed us by the frolicking pen of the Savoyard, Xavier de Maistre. Once more I've come to realise that modern art demands the balm of laughter, the scherzo. Decidedly, Goldoni holds the stage!"

Otras muchas estrofas me ley que tambin obtuvieron su aprobacin y su comentario profuso. Nada memorable haba en ellas; ni siquiera las juzgu mucho peores que la anterior. En su escritura haban colaborado la aplicacin, la resignacin y el azar; las virtudes que Daneri les atribua eran posteriores. Comprend que el trabajo del poeta no estaba en la poesa; estaba en la invencin de razones para que la poesa fuera admirable; naturalmente, ese ulterior trabajo modificaba la obra para l, pero no para otros. La diccin oral de Daneri era extravagante; su torpeza mtrica le ved, salvo contadas veces, trasmitir esa extravagancia al poema(n1).He read me many other stanzas, each of which also won his own approval and elicited his lengthy explications. There was nothing remarkable about them. I did not even find them any worse than the first one. Application, resignation, and chance had gone into the writing; I saw, however, that Daneri's real work lay not in the poetry but in his invention of reasons why the poetry should be admired. Of course, this second phase of his effort modified the writing in his eyes, though not in the eyes of others. Daneri's style of delivery was extravagant, but the deadly drone of his metric regularity tended to tone down and to dull that extravagance.

Una sola vez en mi vida he tenido ocasin de examinar los quince mil dodecaslabos delPolyolbion, esa epopeya topogrfica en la que Michael Drayton registr la fauna, la flora, la hidrografa, la orografa, la historia militar y monstica de Inglaterra; estoy seguro de que ese producto considerable, pero limitado, es menos tedioso que la vasta empresa congnere de Carlos Argentino. ste se propona versificar toda la redondez del planeta; en 1941 ya haba despachado unas hectreas del estado de Queensland, ms de un kilmetro del curso del Ob, un gasmetro al norte de Veracruz, las principales casas de comercio de la parroquia de la Concepcin, la quinta de Mariana Cambaceres de Alvear en la calle Once de Septiembre, en Belgrano, y un establecimiento de baos turcos no lejos del acreditado acuario de Brighton. Me ley ciertos laboriosos pasajes de la zona australiana de su poema; esos largos e informes alejandrinos carecan de la relativa agitacin del prefacio. Copio una estrofa:

Sepan. A manderecha del poste rutinario(viniendo, claro est, desde el Nornoroeste)se aburre una osamenta -Color? Blanquiceleste-que da al corral de ovejas catadura de osario.Only once in my life have I had occasion to look into the fifteen thousand alexandrines of thePolyolbion, that topographical epic in which Michael Drayton recorded the flora, fauna, hydrography, orography, military and monastic history of England. I am sure, however, that this limited but bulky production is less boring than Carlos Argentino's similar vast undertaking. Daneri had in mind to set to verse the entire face of the planet, and, by 1941, had already dispatched a number of acres of the State of Queensland, nearly a mile of the course run by the River Ob, a gasworks to the north of Veracruz, the leading shops in the Buenos Aires parish of Concepcin, the villa of Mariana Cambaceres de Alvear in the Belgrano section of the Argentine capital, and a Turkish baths establishment not far from the well-known Brighton Aquarium. He read me certain long-winded passages from his Australian section, and at one point praised a word of his own coining, the colour "celestewhite," which he felt "actuallysuggeststhe sky, an element of utmost importance in the landscape of the Down Under." But these sprawling, lifeless hexameters lacked even the relative excitement of the so-called Augural Canto.

-Dos audacias -grit con exultacin-, rescatadas, te oigo mascullar, por el xito. Lo admito, lo admito. Una, el epteto rutinario, que certeramente denuncia,en passant, el inevitable tedio inherente a las faenas pastoriles y agrcolas, tedio que ni las gergicas ni nuestro ya laureadoDon Segundose atrevieron jams a denunciar as, al rojo vivo. Otra, el enrgico prosasmose aburre una osamenta, que el melindroso querr excomulgar con horror pero que apreciar ms que su vida el crtico de gusto viril. Todo el verso, por lo dems, es de muy subidos quilates. El segundo hemistiquio entabla animadsima charla con el lector; se adelanta a su viva curiosidad, le pone una pregunta en la boca y la satisface... al instante. Y qu me dices de ese hallazgo, blanquiceleste? El pintoresco neologismo sugiere el cielo, que es un factor importantsimo del paisaje australiano. Sin esa evocacin resultaran demasiado sombras las tintas del boceto y el lector se vera compelido a cerrar el volumen, herida en lo ms ntimo el alma de incurable y negra melancola....

Hacia la medianoche me desped.Along about midnight, I left.

Dos domingos despus, Daneri me llam por telfono, entiendo que por primera vez en la vida. Me propuso que nos reuniramos a las cuatro, "para tomar juntos la leche, en el contiguo saln-bar que el progresismo de Zunino y de Zungri -los propietarios de mi casa, recordars- inaugura en la esquina; confitera que te importar conocer". Acept, con ms resignacin que entusiasmo. Nos fue difcil encontrar mesa; el "saln-bar", inexorablemente moderno, era apenas un poco menos atroz que mis previsiones; en las mesas vecinas, el excitado pblico mencionaba las sumas invertidas sin regatear por Zunino y por Zungri. Carlos Argentino fingi asombrarse de no s qu primores de la instalacin de la luz (que, sin duda, ya conoca) y me dijo con cierta severidad:Two Sundays later, Daneri rang me up -- perhaps for the first time in his life. He suggested we get together at four o'clock "for cocktails in the salon-bar next door, which the forward-looking Zunino and Zungri -- my landlords, as you doubtless recall -- are throwing open to the public. It's a place you'll really want to get to know." More in resignation than in pleasure, I accepted. Once there, it was hard to find a table. The "salon-bar," ruthlessly modern, was only barely less ugly than what I had excepted; at the nearby tables, the excited customers spoke breathlessly of the sums Zunino and Zungri had invested in furnishings without a second thought to cost. Carlos Argentino pretended to be astonished by some feature or other of the lighting arrangement (with which, I felt, he was already familiar), and he said to me with a certain severity,

-Mal de tu grado habrs de reconocer que este local se parangona con los ms encopetados de Flores."Grudgingly, you'll have to admit to the fact that these premises hold their own with many others far more in the public eye."

Me reley, despus, cuatro o cinco pginas del poema. Las haba corregido segn un depravado principio de ostentacin verbal: donde antes escribiazulado, ahora abundaba enazulino, azulencoy hastaazulillo. La palabralechosono era bastante fea para l; en la impetuosa descripcin de un lavadero de lanas, preferalactario, lacticinoso, lactescente, lechal... Denost con amargura a los crticos; luego, ms benigno, los equipar a esas personas, "que no disponen de metales preciosos ni tampoco de prensas de vapor, laminadores y cidos sulfricos para la acuacin de tesoros, pero que pueden indicar a los otros el sitio de un tesoro". Acto continuo censur laprologomana, "de la que ya hizo mofa, en la donosa prefacin delQuijote, el Prncipe de los Ingenios". Admiti, sin embargo, que en la portada de la nueva obra convena el prlogo vistoso, el espaldarazo firmado por el plumfero de garra, de fuste. Agreg que pensaba publicar los cantos iniciales de su poema. Comprend, entonces, la singular invitacin telefnica; el hombre iba a pedirme que prologara su pedantesco frrago. Mi temor result infundado: Carlos Argentino observ, con admiracin rencorosa, que no crea errar en el epteto al calificar de slido el prestigio logrado en todos los crculos por lvaro Melin Lafinur, hombre de letras, que, si yo me empeaba, prologara con embeleso el poema. Para evitar el ms imperdonable de los fracasos, yo tena que hacerme portavoz de dos mritos inconcusos: la perfeccin formal y el rigor cientfico, "porque ese dilatado jardn de tropos, de figuras, de galanuras, no tolera un solo detalle que no confirme la severa verdad". Agreg que Beatriz siempre se haba distrado con lvaro.He then reread me four or five different fragments of the poem. He had revised them following his pet principle of verbal ostentation: where at first "blue" had been good enough, he now wallowed in "azures," "ceruleans," and "ultramarines." The word "milky" was too easy for him; in the course of an impassioned description of a shed where wool was washed, he chose such words as "lacteal," "lactescent," and even made one up -- "lactinacious." After that, straight out, he condemned our modern mania for having books prefaced, "a practice already held up to scorn by the Prince of Wits in his own grafeful preface to theQuixote." He admitted, however, that for the opening of his new work an attention-getting foreword might prove valuable -- "an accolade signed by a literary hand of renown." He next went on to say that he considered publishing the initial cantos of his poem. I then began to understand the unexpected telephone call; Daneri was going to ask me to contribute a foreword to his pedantic hodgepodge. My fear turned out unfounded; Carlos Argentino remarked, with admiration and envy, that surely he could not be far wrong in qualifying with the ephitet "solid" the prestige enjoyed in every circle by lvaro Melin Lafinur, a man of letters, who would, if I insisted on it, be only too glad to dash off some charming opening words to the poem. In order to avoid ignominy and failure, he suggested I make myself spokesman for two of the book's undeniable virtues -- formal perfection and scientific rigour -- "inasmuch as this wide garden of metaphors, of figures of speech, of elegances, is inhospitable to the least detail not strictly upholding of truth." He added that Beatriz had always been taken with lvaro.

Asent, profusamente asent. Aclar, para mayor verosimilitud, que no hablara el lunes con lvaro, sino el jueves: en la pequea cena que suele coronar toda reunin del Club de Escritores. (No hay tales cenas, pero es irrefutable que las reuniones tienen lugar los jueves, hecho que Carlos Argentino Daneri poda comprobar en los diarios y que dotaba de cierta realidad a la frase.) Dije, entre adivinatorio y sagaz, que antes de abordar el tema del prlogo, describira el curioso plan de la obra. Nos despedimos; al doblar por Bernardo de Irigoyen, encar con toda imparcialidad los porvenires que me quedaban: a) hablar con lvaro y decirle que el primo hermano aquel de Beatriz (ese eufemismo explicativo me permitira nombrarla) haba elaborado un poema que pareca dilatar hasta lo infinito las posibilidades de la cacofona y del caos; b) no hablar con lvaro. Prev, lcidamente, que mi desidia optara por b.I agreed -- agreed profusely -- and explained for the sake of credibility that I would not speak to lvaro the next day, Monday, but would wait until Thursday, when we got together for the informal dinner that follows every meeting of the Writers' Club. (No such dinners are ever held, but it is an established fact that the meetings do take place on Thursdays, a point which Carlos Argentino Daneri could verify in the daily papers, and which lent a certain reality to my promise.) Half in prophecy, half in cunning, I said that before taking up the question of a preface I would outline the unusual plan of the work. We then said goodbye. Turning the corner of Bernardo de Irigoyen, I reviewed as impartially as possible the alternatives before me. They were:a)to speak to lvaro, telling him the first cousin of Beatriz' (the explanatory euphemism would allow me to mention her name) had concocted a poem that seemed to draw out into infinity the possibilities of cacophony and chaos:b)not to say a word to lvaro. I clearly foresaw that my indolence would opt forb.

A partir del viernes a primera hora, empez a inquietarme el telfono. Me indignaba que ese instrumento, que algn da produjo la irrecuperable voz de Beatriz, pudiera rebajarse a receptculo de las intiles y quiz colricas quejas de ese engaado Carlos Argentino Daneri. Felizmente, nada ocurri -salvo el rencor inevitable que me inspir aquel hombre que me haba impuesto una delicada gestin y luego me olvidaba.But first thing Friday morning, I began worrying about the telephone. It offended me that that device, which had once produced the irrecoverable voice of Beatriz, could now sink so low as to become a mere receptacle for the futile and perhaps angry remonstrances of that deluded Carlos Argentino Daneri. Luckily, nothing happened -- except the inevitable spite touched off in me by this man, who had asked me to fulfill a delicate mission for him and then had let me drop.

El telfono perdi sus terrores, pero a fines de octubre, Carlos Argentino me habl. Estaba agitadsimo; no identifiqu su voz, al principio. Con tristeza y con ira balbuce que esos ya ilimitados Zunino y Zungri, so pretexto de ampliar su desaforada confitera, iban a demoler su casa.Gradually, the phone came to lose its terrors, but one day toward the end of October it rang, and Carlos Argentino was on the line. He was deeply disturbed, so much so that at the outset I did not recognise his voice. Sadly but angrily he stammered that the now unrestrainable Zunino and Zungri, under the pretext of enlarging their already outsized "salon-bar," were about to take over and tear down this house.

-La casa de mis padres, mi casa, la vieja casa inveterada de la calle Garay! -repiti, quiz olvidando su pesar en la meloda."My home, my ancestral home, my old and inveterate Garay Street home!" he kept repeating, seeming to forget his woe in the music of his words.

No me result muy difcil compartir su congoja. Ya cumplidos los cuarenta aos, todo cambio es un smbolo detestable del pasaje del tiempo; adems, se trataba de una casa que, para m, aluda infinitamente a Beatriz. Quise aclarar ese delicadsimo rasgo; mi interlocutor no me oy. Dijo que si Zunino y Zungri persistan en ese propsito absurdo, el doctor Zunni, su abogado, los demandaraipso factopor daos y perjuicios y los obligara a abonar cien mil nacionales.It was not hard for me to share his distress. After the age of fifty, all change becomes a hateful symbol of the passing of time. Besides, the scheme concerned a house that for me would always stand for Beatriz. I tried explaining this delicate scruple of regret, but Daneri seemed not to hear me. He said that if Zunino and Zungri persisted in this outrage, Doctor Zunni, his lawyer, would sueipso factoand make them pay some fifty thousand dollars in damages.

El nombre de Zunni me impresion; su bufete, en Caseros y Tacuar, es de una seriedad proverbial. Interrogu si ste se haba encargado ya del asunto. Daneri dijo que le hablara esa misma tarde. Vacil y con esa voz llana, impersonal, a que solemos recurrir para confiar algo muy ntimo, dijo que para terminar el poema le era indispensable la casa, pues en un ngulo del stano haba un Aleph. Aclar que un Aleph es uno de los puntos del espacio que contienen todos los puntos.Zunni's name impressed me; his firm, although at the unlikely address of Caseros and Tacuar, was nonetheless known as an old and reliable one. I asked him whether Zunni had already been hired for the case. Daneri said he would phone him that very afternoon. He hesitated, then with that level, impersonal voice we reserve for confiding something intimate, he said that to finish the poem he could not get along without the house because down in the cellar there was an Aleph. He explained that an Aleph is one of the points in space that contains all other points.

-Est en el stano del comedor -explic, aligerada su diccin por la angustia-. Es mo, es mo: yo lo descubr en la niez, antes de la edad escolar. La escalera del stano es empinada, mis tos me tenan prohibido el descenso, pero alguien dijo que haba un mundo en el stano. Se refera, lo supe despus, a un bal, pero yo entend que haba un mundo. Baj secretamente, rod por la escalera vedada, ca. Al abrir los ojos, vi el Aleph."It's in the cellar under the dining room," he went on, so overcome by his worries now that he forgot to be pompous. "It's mine -- mine. I discovered it when I was a child, all by myself. The cellar stairway is so steep that my aunt and uncle forbade my using it, but I'd heard someone say there was a world down there. I found out later they meant an old-fashioned globe of the world, but at the time I thought they were referring to the world itself. One day when no one was home I started down in secret, but I stumbled and fell. When I opened my eyes, I saw the Aleph."

-El Aleph? -repet."The Aleph?" I repeated.

-S, el lugar donde estn, sin confundirse, todos los lugares del orbe, vistos desde todos los ngulos. A nadie revel mi descubrimiento, pero volv. El nio no poda comprender que le fuera deparado ese privilegio para que el hombre burilara el poema! No me despojarn Zunino y Zungri, no y mil veces no. Cdigo en mano, el doctor Zunni probar que esinajenablemi Aleph."Yes, the only place on earth where all places are -- seen from every angle, each standing clear, without any confusion or blending. I kept the discovery to myself and went back every chance I got. As a child, I did not foresee that this privilege was granted me so that later I could write the poem. Zunino and Zungri will not strip me of what's mine -- no, and a thousand times no! Legal code in hand, Doctor Zunni will prove that my Aleph is inalienable."

Trat de razonar.I tried to reason with him.

-Pero, no es muy oscuro el stano?"But isn't the cellar very dark?" I said.

-La verdad no penetra en un entendimiento rebelde. Si todos los lugares de la tierra estn en el Aleph, ah estarn todas las luminarias, todas las lmparas, todos los veneros de luz."Truth cannot penetrate a closed mind. If all places in the universe are in the Aleph, then all stars, all lamps, all sources of light are in it, too."

-Ir a verlo inmediatamente."You wait there. I'll be right over to see it."

Cort, antes de que pudiera emitir una prohibicin. Basta el conocimiento de un hecho para percibir en el acto una serie de rasgos confirmatorios, antes insospechados; me asombr no haber comprendido hasta ese momento que Carlos Argentino era un loco. Todos esos Viterbo, por lo dems... Beatriz (yo mismo suelo repetirlo) era una mujer, una nia de una clarividencia casi implacable, pero haba en ella negligencias, distracciones, desdenes, verdaderas crueldades, que tal vez reclamaban una explicacin patolgica. La locura de Carlos Argentino me colm de maligna felicidad; ntimamente, siempre nos habamos detestado.I hung before he could say no. The full knowledge of a fact sometimes enables you to see all at once many supporting but previously unsuspected things. It amazed me not to have suspected until that moment that Carlos Argentino was a madman. As were all the Viterbos, when you came down to it. Beatriz (I myself often say it) was a woman, a child, with almost uncanny powers of clairvoyance, but forgetfulness, distractions, contempt, and a streak of cruelty were also in her, and perhaps these called for a pathological explanation. Carlos Argentino's madness filled me with spiteful elation. Deep down, we had always detested each other.

En la calle Garay, la sirvienta me dijo que tuviera la bondad de esperar. El nio estaba, como siempre, en el stano, revelando fotografas. Junto al jarrn sin una flor, en el piano intil, sonrea (ms intemporal que anacrnico) el gran retrato de Beatriz, en torpes colores. No poda vernos nadie; en una desesperacin de ternura me aproxim al retrato y le dije:On Garay Street, the maid asked me kindly to wait. The master was, as usual, in the cellar developing pictures. On the unplayed piano, beside a large vase that held no flowers, smiled (more timeless than belonging to the past) the large photograph of Beatriz, in gaudy colours. Nobody could see us; in a seizure of tenderness, I drew close to the portrait and said to it,

-Beatriz, Beatriz Elena, Beatriz Elena Viterbo, Beatriz querida, Beatriz perdida para siempre, soy yo, soy Borges."Beatriz, Beatriz Elena, Beatriz Elena Viterbo, darling Beatriz, Beatriz now gone forever, it's me, it's Borges."

Carlos entr poco despus. Habl con sequedad; comprend que no era capaz de otro pensamiento que de la perdicin del Aleph.Moments later, Carlos came in. He spoke dryly. I could see he was thinking of nothing else but the loss of the Aleph.

-Una copita del seudo coac -orden- y te zampuzars en el stano. Ya sabes, el decbito dorsal es indispensable. Tambin lo son la oscuridad, la inmovilidad, cierta acomodacin ocular. Te acuestas en el piso de baldosas y fijas los ojos en el decimonono escaln de la pertinente escalera. Me voy, bajo la trampa y te quedas solo. Algn roedor te mete miedo fcil empresa! A los pocos minutos ves el Aleph. El microcosmo de alquimistas y cabalistas, nuestro concreto amigo proverbial, elmultum in parvo!"First a glass of pseudo-cognac," he ordered, "and then down you dive into the cellar. Let me warn you, you'll have to lie flat on your back. Total darkness, total immobility, and a certain ocular adjustment will also be necessary. From the floor, you must focus your eyes on the nineteenth step. Once I leave you, I'll lower the trapdoor and you'll be quite alone. You needn't fear the rodents very much -- though I know you will. In a minute or two, you'll see the Aleph -- the microcosm of the alchemists and Kabbalists, our true proverbial friend, themultum in parvo!./i."

Ya en el comedor, agreg:Once we were in the dining room, he added,

-Claro est que si no lo ves, tu incapacidad no invalida mi testimonio... Baja; muy en breve podrs entablar un dilogo con todas las imgenes de Beatriz."Of course, if you don't see it, your incapacity will not invalidate what I have experienced. Now, down you go. In a short while you can babble withallof Beatriz' images."

Baj con rapidez, harto de sus palabras insustanciales. El stano, apenas ms ancho que la escalera, tena mucho de pozo. Con la mirada, busqu en vano el bal de que Carlos Argentino me habl. Unos cajones con botellas y unas bolsas de lona entorpecan un ngulo. Carlos tom una bolsa, la dobl y la acomod en un sitio preciso.Tired of his inane words, I quickly made my way. The cellar, barely wider than the stairway itself, was something of a pit. My eyes searched the dark, looking in vain for the globe Carlos Argentino had spoken of. Some cases of empty bottles and some canvas sacks cluttered one corner. Carlos picked up a sack, folded it in two, and at a fixed spot spread it out.

-La almohada es humildosa -explic-, pero si la levanto un solo centmetro, no vers ni una pizca y te quedas corrido y avergonzado. Repantiga en el suelo ese corpachn y cuenta diecinueve escalones."As a pillow," he said, "this is quite threadbare, but if it's padded even a half-inch higher, you won't see a thing, and there you'll lie, feeling ashamed and ridiculous. All right now, sprawl that hulk of yours there on the floor and count off nineteen steps."

Cumpl con sus ridculos requisitos; al fin se fue. Cerr cautelosamente la trampa; la oscuridad, pese a una hendija que despus distingu, pudo parecerme total. Sbitamente comprend mi peligro: me haba dejado soterrar por un loco, luego de tomar un veneno. Las bravatas de Carlos transparentaban el ntimo terror de que yo no viera el prodigio; Carlos, para defender su delirio, para no saber que estaba loco, tena que matarme. Sent un confuso malestar, que trat de atribuir a la rigidez, y no a la operacin de un narctico. Cerr los ojos, los abr. Entonces vi el Aleph.I went through with his absurd requirements, and at last he went away. The trapdoor was carefully shut. The blackness, in spite of a chink that I later made out, seemed to me absolute. For the first time, I realised the danger I was in: I'd let myself be locked in a cellar by a lunatic, after gulping down a glassful of poison! I knew that back of Carlos' transparent boasting lay a deep fear that I might not see the promised wonder. To keep his madness undetected, to keep from admitting he was mad,Carlos had to kill me. I felt a shock of panic, which I tried to pin to my uncomfortable position and not to the effect of a drug. I shut my eyes -- I opened them. Then I saw the Aleph.

Arribo, ahora, al inefable centro de mi relato; empieza, aqu, mi desesperacin de escritor. Todo lenguaje es un alfabeto de smbolos cuyo ejercicio presupone un pasado que los interlocutores comparten; cmo transmitir a los otros el infinito Aleph, que mi temerosa memoria apenas abarca? Los msticos, en anlogo trance, prodigan los emblemas: para significar la divinidad, un persa habla de un pjaro que de algn modo es todos los pjaros; Alanus de Insulis, de una esfera cuyo centro est en todas partes y la circunferencia en ninguna; Ezequiel, de un ngel de cuatro caras que a un tiempo se dirige al Oriente y al Occidente, al Norte y al Sur. (No en vano rememoro esas inconcebibles analogas; alguna relacin tienen con el Aleph.) Quiz los dioses no me negaran el hallazgo de una imagen equivalente, pero este informe quedara contaminado de literatura, de falsedad. Por lo dems, el problema central es irresoluble: la enumeracin, siquiera parcial, de un conjunto infinito. En ese instante gigantesco, he visto millones de actos deleitables o atroces; ninguno me asombr como el hecho de que todos ocuparan el mismo punto, sin superposicin y sin transparencia. Lo que vieron mis ojos fue simultneo: lo que transcribir, sucesivo, porque el lenguaje lo es. Algo, sin embargo, recoger.I arrive now at the ineffable core of my story. And here begins my despair as a writer. All language is a set of symbols whose use among its speakers assumes a shared past. How, then, can I translate into words the limitless Aleph, which my floundering mind can scarcely encompass? Mystics, faced with the same problem, fall back on symbols: to signify the godhead, one Persian speaks of a bird that somehow is all birds; Alanus de Insulis, of a sphere whose center is everywhere and circumference is nowhere; Ezekiel, of a four-faced angel who at one and the same time moves east and west, north and south. (Not in vain do I recall these inconceivable analogies; they bear some relation to the Aleph.) Perhaps the gods might grant me a similar metaphor, but then this account would become contaminated by literature, by fiction. Really, what I want to do is impossible, for any listing of an endless series is doomed to be infinitesimal. In that single gigantic instant I saw millions of acts both delightful and awful; not one of them occupied the same point in space, without overlapping or transparency. What my eyes beheld was simultaneous, but what I shall now write down will be successive, because language is successive. Nonetheless, I'll try to recollect what I can.

En la parte inferior del escaln, hacia la derecha, vi una pequea esfera tornasolada, de casi intolerable fulgor. Al principio la cre giratoria; luego comprend que ese movimiento era una ilusin producida por los vertiginosos espectculos que encerraba. El dimetro del Aleph sera de dos o tres centmetros, pero el espacio csmico estaba ah, sin disminucin de tamao. Cada cosa (la luna del espejo, digamos) era infinitas cosas, porque yo claramente la vea desde todos los puntos del universo. Vi el populoso mar, vi el alba y la tarde, vi las muchedumbres de Amrica, vi una plateada telaraa en el centro de una negra pirmide, vi un laberinto roto (era Londres), vi interminables ojos inmediatos escrutndose en m como en un espejo, vi todos los espejos del planeta y ninguno me reflej, vi en un traspatio de la calle Soler las mismas baldosas que hace treinta aos vi en el zagun de una casa en Fray Bentos, vi racimos, nieve, tabaco, vetas de metal, vapor de agua, vi convexos desiertos ecuatoriales y cada uno de sus granos de arena, vi en Inverness a una mujer que no olvidar, vi la violenta cabellera, el altivo cuerpo, vi un cncer en el pecho, vi un crculo de tierra seca en una vereda, donde antes hubo un rbol, vi una quinta de Adrogu, un ejemplar de la primera versin inglesa de Plinio, la de Philemon Holland, vi a un tiempo cada letra de cada pgina (de chico, yo sola maravillarme de que las letras de un volumen cerrado no se mezclaran y perdieran en el decurso de la noche), vi la noche y el da contemporneo, vi un poniente en Quertaro que pareca reflejar el color de una rosa en Bengala, vi mi dormitorio sin nadie, vi en un gabinete de Alkmaar un globo terrqueo entre dos espejos que lo multiplican sin fin, vi caballos de crin arremolinada, en una playa del Mar Caspio en el alba, vi la delicada osatura de una mano, vi a los sobrevivientes de una batalla, enviando tarjetas postales, vi en un escaparate de Mirzapur una baraja espaola, vi las sombras oblicuas de unos helechos en el suelo de un invernculo, vi tigres, mbolos, bisontes, marejadas y ejrcitos, vi todas las hormigas que hay en la tierra, vi un astrolabio persa, vi en un cajn del escritorio (y la letra me hizo temblar) cartas obscenas, increbles, precisas, que Beatriz haba dirigido a Carlos Argentino, vi un adorado monumento en la Chacarita, vi la reliquia atroz de lo que deliciosamente haba sido Beatriz Viterbo, vi la circulacin de mi oscura sangre, vi el engranaje del amor y la modificacin de la muerte, vi el Aleph, desde todos los puntos, vi en el Aleph la tierra, y en la tierra otra vez el Aleph y en el Aleph la tierra, vi mi cara y mis vsceras, vi tu cara, y sent vrtigo y llor, porque mis ojos haban visto ese objeto secreto y conjetural, cuyo nombre usurpan los hombres, pero que ningn hombre ha mirado: el inconcebible universo.On the back part of the step, toward the right, I saw a small iridescent sphere of almost unbearable brilliance. At first I thought it was revolving; then I realised that this movement was an illusion created by the dizzying world it bounded. The Aleph's diameter was probably little more than an inch, but all space was there, actual and undiminished. Each thing (a mirror's face, let us say) was infinite things, since I distinctly saw it from every angle of the universe. I saw the teeming sea; I saw daybreak and nightfall; I saw the multitudes of America; I saw a silvery cobweb in the center of a black pyramid; I saw a splintered labyrinth (it was London); I saw, close up, unending eyes watching themselves in me as in a mirror; I saw all the mirrors on earth and none of them reflected me; I saw in a backyard of Soler Street the same tiles that thirty years before I'd seen in the entrance of a house in Fray Bentos; I saw bunches of grapes, snow, tobacco, lodes of metal, steam; I saw convex equatorial deserts and each one of their grains of sand; I saw a woman in Inverness whom I shall never forget; I saw her tangled hair, her tall figure, I saw the cancer in her breast; I saw a ring of baked mud in a sidewalk, where before there had been a tree; I saw a summer house in Adrogu and a copy of the first English translation of Pliny -- Philemon Holland's -- and all at the same time saw each letter on each page (as a boy, I used to marvel that the letters in a closed book did not get scrambled and lost overnight); I saw a sunset in Quertaro that seemed to reflect the colour of a rose in Bengal; I saw my empty bedroom; I saw in a closet in Alkmaar a terrestrial globe between two mirrors that multiplied it endlessly; I saw horses with flowing manes on a shore of the Caspian Sea at dawn; I saw the delicate bone structure of a hand; I saw the survivors of a battle sending out picture postcards; I saw in a showcase in Mirzapur a pack of Spanish playing cards; I saw the slanting shadows of ferns on a greenhouse floor; I saw tigers, pistons, bison, tides, and armies; I saw all the ants on the planet; I saw a Persian astrolabe; I saw in the drawer of a writing table (and the handwriting made me tremble) unbelievable, obscene, detailed letters, which Beatriz had written to Carlos Argentino; I saw a monument I worshipped in the Chacarita cemetery; I saw the rotted dust and bones that had once deliciously been Beatriz Viterbo; I saw the circulation of my own dark blood; I saw the coupling of love and the modification of death; I saw the Aleph from every point and angle, and in the Aleph I saw the earth and in the earth the Aleph and in the Aleph the earth; I saw my own face and my own bowels; I saw your face; and I felt dizzy and wept, for my eyes had seen that secret and conjectured object whose name is common to all men but which no man has looked upon -- the unimaginable universe.

Sent infinita veneracin, infinita lstima.I felt infinite wonder, infinite pity.

-Tarumba habrs quedado de tanto curiosear donde no te llaman -dijo una voz aborrecida y jovial-. Aunque te devanes los sesos, no me pagars en un siglo esta revelacin. Qu observatorio formidable, che Borges!"Feeling pretty cockeyed, are you, after so much spying into places where you have no business?" said a hated and jovial voice. "Even if you were to rack your brains, you couldn't pay me back in a hundred years for this revelation. One hell of an observatory, eh, Borges?"

Los zapatos de Carlos Argentino ocupaban el escaln ms alto. En la brusca penumbra, acert a levantarme y a balbucear:Carlos Argentino's feet were planted on the topmost step. In the sudden dim light, I managed to pick myself up and utter,

-Formidable. S, formidable."One hell of a -- yes, one hell of a."

La indiferencia de mi voz me extra. Ansioso, Carlos Argentino insista:The matter-of-factness of my voice surprised me. Anxiously, Carlos Argentino went on.

-Lo viste todo bien, en colores?"Did you see everything -- really clear, in colours?"

En ese instante conceb mi venganza. Benvolo, manifiestamente apiadado, nervioso, evasivo, agradec a Carlos Argentino Daneri la hospitalidad de su stano y lo inst a aprovechar la demolicin de la casa para alejarse de la perniciosa metrpoli, que a nadie crame, que a nadie! perdona. Me negu, con suave energa, a discutir el Aleph; lo abrac, al despedirme, y le repet que el campo y la serenidad son dos grandes mdicos.At that moment I found my revenge. Kindly, openly pitying him, distraught, evasive, I thanked Carlos Argentino Daneri for the hospitality of his cellar and urged him to make the most of the demolition to get away from the pernicious metropolis, which spares no one -- believe me, I told him, no one! Quietly and forcefully, I refused to discuss the Aleph. On saying goodbye, I embraced him and repeated that the country, that fresh air and quiet were the great physicians.

En la calle, en las escaleras de Constitucin, en el subterrneo, me parecieron familiares todas las caras. Tem que no quedara una sola cosa capaz de sorprenderme, tem que no me abandonara jams la impresin de volver. Felizmente, al cabo de unas noches de insomnio, me trabaj otra vez el olvido.Out on the street, going down the stairways inside Constitution Station, riding the subway, every one of the faces seemed familiar to me. I was afraid that not a single thing on earth would ever again surprise me; I was afraid I would never again be free of all I had seen. Happily, after a few sleepless nights, I was visited once more by oblivion.

Posdata del primero de marzo de 1943. A los seis meses de la demolicin del inmueble de la calle Garay, la Editorial Procusto no se dej arredrar por la longitud del considerable poema y lanz al mercado una seleccin de "trozos argentinos". Huelga repetir lo ocurrido; Carlos Argentino Daneri recibi el Segundo Premio Nacional de Literatura(n2). El primero fue otorgado al doctor Aita; el tercero, al doctor Mario Bonfanti; increblemente, mi obraLos naipes del tahrno logr un solo voto. Una vez ms, triunfaron la incomprensin y la envidia! Hace ya mucho tiempo que no consigo ver a Daneri; los diarios dicen que pronto nos dar otro volumen. Su afortunada pluma (no entorpecida ya por el Aleph) se ha consagrado a versificar los eptomes del doctor Acevedo Daz...i.Postscript of March first, 1943-- Some six months after the pulling down of a certain building on Garay Street, Procrustes & Co., the publishers, not put off by the considerable length of Daneri's poem, brought out a selection of its "Argentine sections". It is redundant now to repeat what happened. Carlos Argentino Daneri won the Second National Prize for Literature2. First Prize went to Dr. Aita; Third Prize, to Dr. Mario Bonfanti. Unbelievably, my own bookThe Sharper's Cardsdid not get a single vote. Once again dullness and envy had their triumph! It's been some time now that I've been trying to see Daneri; the gossip is that a second selection of the poem is about to be published. His felicitous pen (no longer cluttered by the Aleph) has now set itself the task of writing an epic on our national hero, General San Martn.

Dos observaciones quiero agregar: una, sobre la naturaleza del Aleph; otra, sobre su nombre. ste, como es sabido, es el de la primera letra del alfabeto de la lengua sagrada. Su aplicacin al disco de mi historia no parece casual. Para la Cbala, esa letra significa el En Soph, la ilimitada y pura divinidad; tambin se dijo que tiene la forma de un hombre que seala el cielo y la tierra, para indicar que el mundo inferior es el espejo y es el mapa del superior; para laMengenlehre, es el smbolo de los nmeros transfinitos, en los que el todo no es mayor que alguna de las partes. Yo querra saber: Eligi Carlos Argentino ese nombre, o lo ley,aplicado a otro punto donde convergen todos los puntos, en alguno de los textos innumerables que el Aleph de su casa le revel? Por increble que parezca, yo creo que hay (o que hubo) otro Aleph, yo creo que el Aleph de la calle Garay era un falso Aleph.I want to add two final observations: one, on the nature of the Aleph; the other, on its name. As is well known, the Aleph is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Its use for the strange sphere in my story may not be accidental. For the Kabbala, the letter stands for theEn Soph, the pure and boundless godhead; it is also said that it takes the shape of a man pointing to both heaven and earth, in order to show that the lower world is the map and mirror of the higher; for Cantor'sMengenlehre, it is the symbol of transfinite numbers, of which any part is as great as the whole. I would like to know whether Carlos Argentino chose that name or whether he read it -- applied to another point where all points converge - - in one of the numberless texts that the Aleph in his cellar revealed to him. Incredible as it may seem, I believe that the Aleph of Garay Street was a false Aleph.

Doy mis razones. Hacia 1867 el capitn Burton ejerci en el Brasil el cargo de cnsul britnico; en julio de 1942 Pedro Henrquez Urea descubri en una biblioteca de Santos un manuscrito suyo que versaba sobre el espejo que atribuye el Oriente a Iskandar Z al-Karnayn, o Alejandro Bicorne de Macedonia. En su cristal se reflejaba el universo entero. Burton menciona otros artificios congneres -la sptuple copa de Kai Josr, el espejo que Trik Benzeyad encontr en una torre (1001 Noches, 272), el espejo que Luciano de Samosata pudo examinar en la luna (Historia verdadera, I, 26), la lanza especular que el primer libro delSatyriconde Capella atribuye a Jpiter, el espejo universal de Merlin, "redondo y hueco y semejante a un mundo de vidrio" (The Faerie Queene, III, 2, 19)-, y aade estas curiosas palabras: "Pero los anteriores (adems del defecto de no existir) son meros instrumentos de ptica. Los fieles que concurren a la mezquita de Amr, en el Cairo, saben muy bien que el universo est en el interior de una de las columnas de piedra que rodean el patio central... Nadie, claro est, puede verlo, pero quienes acercan el odo a la superficie, declaran percibir, al poco tiempo, su atareado rumor... La mezquita data del siglo VII; las columnas proceden de otros templos de religiones anteislmicas, pues como ha escrito Abenjaldn:En las repblicas fundadas por nmadas es indispensable el concurso de forasteros para todo lo que sea albailera".Here are my reasons. Around 1867, Captain Burton held the post of British Consul in Brazil. In July, 1942, Pedro Henrquez Urea came across a manuscript of Burton's, in a library at Santos, dealing with the mirror which the Oriental world attributes to Iskander Zu al-Karnayn, or Alexander Bicornis of Macedonia. In its crystal the whole world was reflected. Burton mentions other similar devices -- the sevenfold cup of Kai Kosru; the mirror that Tariq ibn-Ziyad found in a tower (Thousand and One Nights, 272); the mirror that Lucian of Samosata examined on the moon (True History, I, 26); the mirrorlike spear that the first book of Capella'sSatyriconattributes; Merlin's universal mirror, which was "round and hollow... and seem'd a world of glas" (The Faerie Queene, III, 2, 19) -- and adds this curious statement: "But the aforesaid objects (besides the disadvantage of not existing) are mere optical instruments. The Faithful who gather at the mosque of Amr, in Cairo, are acquainted with the fact that the entire universe lies inside one of the stone pillars that ring its central court... No one, of course, can actually see it, but those who lay an ear against the surface tell that after some short while they perceive its busy hum... The mosque dates from the seventh century; the pillars come from other temples of pre-Islamic religions, since, as ibn-Khaldun has written: 'In nations founded by nomads, the aid of foreigners is essential in all concerning masonry.'"

Existe ese Aleph en lo ntimo de una piedra? Lo he visto cuando vi todas las cosas y lo he olvidado? Nuestra mente es porosa para el olvido; yo mismo estoy falseando y perdiendo, bajo la trgica erosin de los aos, los rasgos de Beatriz.Does this Aleph exist in the heart of a stone? Did I see it there in the cellar when I saw all things, and have I now forgotten it? Our minds are porous and forgetfulness seeps in; I myself am distorting and losing, under the wearing away of the years, the face of Beatriz.

A Estela Canto

N. 1. Recuerdo, sin embargo, estas lneas de una stira que fustig con rigor a los malos poetas:

Aqueste da al poema belicosa armaduraDe erudiccin; estotro le da pompas y galas.Ambos baten en vano las ridculas alas...Olvidaron, cuidados, el factor HERMOSURA!

Slo el temor de crearse un ejrcito de enemigos implacables y poderosos lo disuadi (me dijo) de publicar sin miedo el poema.VUELTA AL TEXTO[Among my memories are also some lines of a satire in which he lashed out unsparingly at bad poets.

After accusing them of dressing their poems in the warlike armourof erudition, and of flapping in vain their unavailing wings,he concluded with this verse:But they forget, alas, one foremost fact -- BEAUTY!

Only the fear of creating an army of implacable and powerful enemies dissuaded him (he told me) from fearlessly publishing this poem.].

N. 2. "Recib tu apenada congratulacin", me escribi. "Bufas, mi lamentable amigo, de envidia, pero confesars -aunque te ahogue!- que esta vez pude coronar mi bonete con la ms roja de las plumas; mi turbante, con el ms califa de los rubes."VUELTA AL TEXTON. 2 ["I received your pained congratulations," he wrote me. "You rage, my poor friend, with envy, but you must confess -- even if it chokes you! -- that this time I have crowned my cap with the reddest of feathers; my turban with the most caliph of rubies."]

FIN

Tln, Uqbar, Orbis TertiusEdicin bilinge, espaol- ingls, de Miguel Garci-Gomez. Dept. Romance Stydies

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Debo a la conjuncin de un espejo y de una enciclopedia el descubrimiento de Uqbar. El espejo inquietaba el fondo de un corredor en una quinta de la calle Gaona, en Ramos Meja; la enciclopedia falazmente se llama TheAnglo-American Cyclopaeda(New York, 1917) y es una reimpresin literal, pero tambin morosa, de laEncyclopaedia Britannicade 1902. El hecho se produjo har unos cinco aos. Bioy Casares haba cenado conmigo esa noche y nos demor una vasta polmica sobre la ejecucin de una novela en primera persona, cuyo narrador omitiera o desfigurara los hechos e incurriera en diversas contradicciones, que permitieran a unos pocos lectores -a muy pocos lectores- la adivinacin de una realidad atroz o banal. Desde el fondo remoto del corredor, el espejo nos acechaba. Descubrimos (en la alta noche ese descubrimiento es inevitable) que los espejos tienen algo monstruoso. Entonces Bioy Casares record que uno de los heresiarcas de Uqbar haba declarado que los espejos y la cpula son abominables, porque multiplican el nmero de los hombres. Le pregunt el origen de esa memorable sentencia y me contest queThe Anglo-American Cyclopaediala registraba, en su artculo sobre Uqbar. La quinta (que habamos alquilado amueblada) posea un ejemplar de esa obra. En las ltimas pginas del volumen XLVI dimos con un artculo sobre Upsala; en las primeras del XLVII, con uno sobreUral-Altaic Languages, pero ni una palabra sobre Uqbar. Bioy, un poco azorado, interrog los tomos del ndice. Agot en vano todas las lecciones imaginables: Ukbar, Ucbar, Ookbar, Oukbahr... Antes de irse, me dijo que era una regin del Irak o del Asia Menor. Confieso que asent con alguna incomodidad. Conjetur que ese pas indocumentado y ese heresiarca annimo eran una ficcin improvisada por la modestia de Bioy para justificar una frase. El examen estril de uno de los atlas de Justus Perthes fortaleci mi duda.I owe the discovery of Uqbar to the conjunction of a mirror and an encyclopedia. The mirror troubled the depths of a corridor in a country house on Gaona Street in Ramos Mejia; the encyclopedia is fallaciously calledThe Anglo-American Cyclopaedia(New York, 1917) and is a literal but delinquent reprint of theEncyclopedia Britannicaof 1902. The event took place some five years ago. Bioy Casares had had dinner with me that evening and we became lengthily engaged in a vast polemic concerning the composition of a novel in the first person, whose narrator would omit or disfigure the facts and indulge in various contradictions which would permit a few readers - very few readers - to perceive an atrocious or banal reality. From the remote depths of the corridor, the mirror spied upon us. We discovered (such a discovery is inevitable in the late hours of the night) that mirrors hare something monstrous about them. Then Bioy Casares recalled that one of the heresiarchs of Uqbar had declared that mirrors and copulation are abominable, because they increase the number or men. I asked him the origin of this memorable observation and he answered that it was reproduced inThe Anglo-American Cyclopaedia, in its article on Uqbar. The house (which we had rented furnished) had a set of this work. On the last pages of Volume XLVI we found an article on Upsala; on the first pages of Volume XLVII, one on Ural-Altaic Languages, but not a word about Uqbar. Bioy, a bit taken aback, consulted the volumes of the index. In vain he exhausted all of the imaginable spellings: Ukbar, Ucbar, Ooqbar, Ookbar, Oukbahr... Before leaving, he told me that it was a region of Iraq of or Asia Minor. I must confess that I agreed with 1 some discomfort. I conjectured that this undocumented country and its anonymous heresiarch were a fiction devised by Bioy's modesty in order to justify a statement. The fruitless examination of one of Justus Perthes' atlases fortified my doubt.Al da siguiente, Bioy me llam desde Buenos Aires. Me dijo que tena a la vista el artculo sobre Uqbar, en el volumen XXVI de la Enciclopedia. No constaba el nombre del heresiarca, pero s la noticia de su doctrina, formulada en palabras casi idnticas a las repetidas por l, aunque -tal vez- literariamente inferiores. l haba recordado:Copulation and mirrors are abominable. El texto de la Enciclopedia deca: Para uno de esos gnsticos, el visible universo era una ilusin o (ms precisamente) un sofisma. Los espejos y la paternidad son abominables(mirrors and fatherhood are hateful)porque lo multiplican y lo divulgan. Le dije, sin faltar a la verdad, que me gustara ver ese artculo. A los pocos das lo trajo. Lo cual me sorprendi, porque los escrupulosas ndices cartogrficos de laErdkundede Ritter ignoraban con plenitud el nombre de Uqbar.The following day, Bioy called me from Buenos Aries. He told me he had before him the article on Uqbar, in volume XLVI of the encyclopedia. The heresiarch's name was not forthcoming, but there was a note on his doctrine, formulated in words almost identical to those he had repeated, though perhaps literally inferior. He had recalled:Copulation and mirrors are abominable. The text of the encyclopedia said:For one of those gnostics, the visible universe was an illusion or(more precisely) a sophism. Mirrors and fatherhood are abominablebecausethey multiply and disseminate that universe. I told him, in all truthfulness, that I should like to see that article. A few days later he brought it. This surprised me, since the scrupulous cartographical indices of Ritter'sErdkundewere plentifully ignorant of the name Uqbar.El volumen que trajo Bioy era efectivamente el XXVI de laAnglo-American Cyclopaedia. En la falsa cartula y en el lomo, la indicacin alfabtica (Tor-Ups) era la de nuestro ejemplar, pero en vez de 917 pginas constaba de 921. Esas cuatro pginas adicionales comprendan al artculo sobre Uqbar; no previsto (como habr advertido el lector) por la indicacin alfabtica. Comprobamos despus que no hay otra diferencia entre los volmenes. Los dos (segn creo haber indicado) son reimpresiones de la dcimaEncyclopaedia Britannica. Bioy haba adquirido su ejemplar en uno de tantos remates.The tome Bioy brought was, in fact, Volume XLVI of theAnglo-American Cyclopaedia. On the half-title page and the spine, the alphabetical marking (Tor-Ups) was that of our copy but, instead of 917, it contained 921 pages. These four additional pages made up the article on Uqbar, which (as the reader will have noticed) was not indicated by the alphabetical marking. We later determined that there was no other difference between the volumes. Both of them (as I believe I have indicated) are reprints of the tenthEncyclopaedia Britannica. Bioy had acquired his copy at some sale or other.Lemos con algn cuidado el artculo. El pasaje recordado por Bioy era tal vez el nico sorprendente. El resto pareca muy verosmil, muy ajustado al tono general de la obra y (como es natural) un poco aburrido. Releyndolo, descubrimos bajo su rigurosa escritura una fundamental vaguedad. De los catorce nombres que figuraban en la parte geogrfica, slo reconocimos tres -Jorasn, Armenia, Erzerum-, interpolados en el texto de un modo ambiguo. De los nombres histricos, uno solo: el impostor Esmerdis el mago, invocado ms bien como una metfora. La nota pareca precisar las fronteras de Uqbar, pero sus nebulosos puntos de referencias eran ros y crteres y cadenas de esa misma regin. Lemos, verbigracia, que las tierras bajas de Tsai Jaldn y el delta del Axa definen la frontera del sur y que en las islas de ese delta procrean los caballos salvajes. Eso, al principio de la pgina 918. En la seccin histrica (pgina 920) supimos que a raz de las persecuciones religiosas del siglo trece, los ortodoxos buscaron amparo en las islas, donde perduran todava sus obeliscos y donde no es raro exhumar sus espejos de piedra. La seccinidioma y literaturaera breve. Un solo rasgo memorable: anotaba que la literatura de Uqbar era de carcter fantstico y que sus epopeyas y sus leyendas no se referan jams a la realidad, sino a las dos regiones imaginarias de Mlejnas y de Tln... La bibliografa enumeraba cuatro volmenes que no hemos encontrado hasta ahora, aunque el tercero -Silas Haslam:History of the Land Called Uqbar, 1874-figura en los catlogos de librera de Bernard Quaritch(n1). El primero,Lesbare und lesenswerthe Bemerkungen ber das Land Ukkbar in Klein-Asien, data de 1641 y es obra de Johannes Valentinus Andre. El hecho es significativo; un par de aos despus, di con ese nombre en las inesperadas pginas de De Quincey (Writings, decimotercero volumen) y supe que era el de un telogo alemn que a principios del siglo XVII describi la imaginaria comunidad de la Rosa-Cruz -que otros luego fundaron, a imitacin de lo prefigurado por l.We read the article with some care. The passage recalled by Bioy was perhaps the only surprising one. The rest of it seemed very plausible, quite in keeping with the general tone of the work and (as is natural) a bit boring. Reading it over again, we discovered beneath its rigorous prose a fundamental vagueness. Of the fourteen names which figured in the geographical part, we only recognized three - Khorasan, Armenia, Erzerum - interpolated in the text in an ambiguous way. Of the historical names, only one: the impostor magician Smerdis, invoked more as a metaphor. The note seemed to fix the boundaries of Uqbar, but its nebulous reference points were rivers and craters and mountain ranges of that same region. We read, for example, that the lowlands of Tsai Khaldun and the Axa Delta marked the southern frontier and that on the islands of the delta wild horses procreate. All this, on the first part of page 918. In the historical section (page 920) we learned that as a result of the religious persecutions of the thirteenth century, the orthodox believers sought refuge on these islands, where to this day their obelisks remain and where it is not uncommon to unearth their stone mirrors. The section on Language and Literature was brief. Only one trait is worthy of recollection: it noted that the literature of Uqbar was one of fantasy and that its epics and legends never referred to reality, but to the two imaginary regions of Mlejnas and Tln... The bibliography enumerated four volumes which we have not yet found, though the third - Silas Haslam:History of the Land Called Uqbar, 1874 - figures in the catalogs of Bernard Quartich's book shop 1. The first,Lesbare und lesenswertheBemerkungen uber das Land Ukkbar in Klein-Asien, dates from 1641 and is the work of Johannes Valentinus Andrea. This fact is significant; a few years later, I came upon that name in the unsuspected pages of De Quincey (Writings, Volume XIII) and learned that it belonged to a German theologian who, in the early seventeenth century, described the imaginary community of Rosae Crucis - a community that others founded later, in imitation of what he had prefigured.Esa noche visitamos la Biblioteca Nacional. En vano fatigamos atlas, catlogos, anuarios de sociedades geogrficas, memorias de viajeros e historiadores: nadie haba estado nunca en Uqbar. El ndice general de la enciclopedia de Bioy tampoco registraba ese nombre. Al da siguiente, Carlos Mastronardi (a quien yo haba referido el asunto) advirti en una librera de Corrientes y Talcahuano los negros y dorados lomos de laAnglo-American Cyclopaeda... Entr e interrog el volumen XXVI. Naturalmente, no dio con el menor indicio de Uqbar.That night we visited the National Library. In vain we exhausted atlases, catalogs, annuals of geographical societies, travelers' and historians' memoirs: no one had ever been in Uqbar. Neither did the general index of Bioy's encyclopedia register that name. The following day, Carlos Mastronardi (to whom I had related the matter) noticed the black and gold covers of theAnglo-American Cyclopaediain a bookshop on Corrientes and Talcahuano... He entered and examined Volume XLVI. Of course, he did not find the slightest indication of Uqbar.

II

II

Algn recuerdo limitado y menguante de Herbert Ashe, ingeniero de los ferrocarriles del Sur, persiste en el hotel de Adrogu, entre las efusivas madreselvas y en el fondo ilusorio de los espejos. En vida padeci de irrealidad, como tantos ingleses; muerto, no es siquiera el fantasma que ya era entonces. Era alto y desganado y su cansada barba rectangular haba sido roja. Entiendo que era viudo, sin hijos. Cada tantos aos iba a Inglaterra: a visitar (juzgo por unas fotografas que nos mostr) un reloj de sol y unos robles. Mi padre haba estrechado con l (el verbo es excesivo) una de esas amistades inglesas que empiezan por excluir la confidencia y que muy pronto omiten el dilogo. Solan ejercer un intercambio de libros y de peridicos; solan batirse al ajedrez, taciturnamente... Lo recuerdo en el corredor del hotel, con un libro de matemticas en la mano, mirando a veces los colores irrecuperables del cielo. Una tarde, hablamos del sistema duodecimal de numeracin (en el que doce se escribe 10). Ashe dijo que precisamente estaba trasladando no s qu tablas duodecimales a sexagesimales (en las que sesenta se escribe 10). Agreg que ese trabajo le haba sido encargado por un noruego: en Rio Grande do Sul. Ocho aos que lo conocamos y no haba mencionado nunca su estada en esa regin... Hablamos de vida pastoril, decapangas, de la etimologa brasilera de la palabragaucho(que algunos viejos orientales todava pronunciangacho) y nada ms se dijo -Dios me perdone- de funciones duodecimales.Some limited and waning memory of Herbert Ashe, an engineer of the southern railways, persists in the hotel at Adrogue, amongst the effusive honeysuckles and in the illusory depths of the mirrors. In his lifetime, he suffered from unreality, as do so many Englishmen; once dead, he is not even the ghost he was then. He was tall and listless and his tired rectangular beard had once been red. I understand he was a widower, without children. Every few years he would go to England, to visit (I judge from some photographs he showed us) a sundial and a few oaks. He and my father had entered into one of those close (the adjective is excessive) English friendships that begin by excluding confidences and very soon dispense with dialog. They used to carry out an exchange of books and newspapers and engage in taciturn chess games... I remember him in the hotel corridor, with a mathematics book in his hand, sometimes looking at the irrecoverable colors of the sky. One afternoon, we spoke of the duodecimal system of numbering (in which twelve is written as 10). Ashe said that he was converting some kind of tables from the duodecimal to the sexagesimal system (in which sixty is written as 10). He added that the task had been entrusted to him by a Norwegian, in Rio Grande du Sul. We had known him for eight years and he had never mentioned in sojourn in that region... We talked of country life, of thecapangas, of the Brazilian etymology of the wordgaucho(which some old Uruguayans still pronouncegaucho) and nothing more was said - may God forgive me - of duodecimal functions.En setiembre de 1937 (no estbamos nosotros en el hotel) Herbert Ashe muri de la rotura de un aneurisma. Das antes, haba recibido del Brasil un paquete sellado y certificado. Era un libro en octavo mayor. Ashe lo dej en el bar, donde -meses despus- lo encontr. Me puse a hojearlo y sent un vrtigo asombrado y ligero que no describir, porque sta no es la historia de mis emociones sino de Uqbar y Tln y Orbis Tertius. En una noche del Islam que se llama la Noche de las Noches se abren de par en par las secretas puertas del cielo y es ms dulce el agua en los cntaros; si esas puertas se abrieran, no sentira lo que en esa tarde sent. El libro estaba redactado en ingls y lo integraban 1001 pginas. En el amarillo lomo de cuero le estas curiosas palabras que la falsa cartula repeta:A First Encyclopaedia of Tln. vol. XI. Hlaer to Jangr. No haba indicacin de fecha ni de lugar. En la primera pgina y en una hoja de papel de seda que cubra una de las lminas en colores haba estampado un valo azul con esta inscripcin:Orbis Tertius. Haca dos aos que yo haba descubierto en un tomo de cierta enciclopedia prctica una somera descripcin de un falso pas; ahora me deparaba el azar algo ms precioso y ms arduo. Ahora tena en las manos un vasto fragmento metdico de la historia total de un planeta desconocido, con sus arquitecturas y sus barajas, con el pavor de sus mitologas y el rumor de sus lenguas, con sus emperadores y sus mares, con sus minerales y sus pjaros y sus peces, con su lgebra y su fuego, con su controversia teolgica y metafsica. Todo ello articulado, coherente, sin visible propsito doctrinal o tono pardico.In September of 1937 (we were not at the hotel), Herbert Ashe died of a ruptured aneurysm. A few days before, he had received a sealed and certified package from Brazil. It was a book in large octavo. Ashe left it at the bar, where - months later - I found it. I began to leaf through it and experienced an astonished and airy feeling of vertigo which I shall not describe, for this is not the story of my emotions but of Uqbar and Tln and Orbis Tertius. On one of the nights of Islam called the Night of Nights, the secret doors of heaven open wide and the water in the jars becomes sweeter; if those doors opened, I would not feel what I felt that afternoon. The book was written in English and contained 1001 pages. On the yellow leather back I read these curious words which were repeated on the title page:A First Encyclopedia of Tln. Vol. XI. HlaertoJangr. There was no indication of date or place. On the first page and on a leaf of silk paper that covered on of the color plates there was stamped a blue oval with this inscription:Orbis Tertius. Two years before I had discovered, in a volume of a certain pirated encyclopedia, a superficial description of a nonexistent country; now chance afforded me something more precious and arduous. Now I held in my hands a vast methodical fragment of an unknown planet's entire history, with its architecture and its playing cards, with the dread of its mythologies and the murmur of its languages, with its emperors and its seas, with its minerals and its birds and its fish, with its algebra and its fire, with its theological and metaphysical controversy. And all of it articulated, coherent, with no visible doctrinal intent or tone of parody.En el "onceno tomo" de que hablo hay alusiones a tomos ulteriores y precedentes. Nstor Ibarra, en un artculo ya clsico de la N. R. F., ha negado que existen esos alteres; Ezequiel Martnez Estrada y Drieu La Rochelle han refutado, quiz victoriosamente, esa duda. El hecho es que hasta ahora las pesquisas ms diligentes han sido estriles. En vano hemos desordenado las bibliotecas de las dos Amricas y de Europa. Alfonso Reyes, harto de esas fatigas subalternas de ndole policial, propone que entre todos acometamos la obra de reconstruir los muchos y macizos tomos que faltan:ex ungue leonem. Calcula, entre veras y burlas, que una generacin detlnistaspuede bastar. Ese arriesgado cmputo nos retrae al problema fundamental: Quines inventaron a Tln? El plural es inevitable, porque la hiptesis de un solo inventor -de un infinito Leibniz obrando en la tiniebla y en la modestia- ha sido descartada unnimemente. Se conjetura que estebrave new worldes obra de una sociedad secreta de astrnomos, de bilogos, de ingenieros, de metafsicos, de poetas, de qumicos, de algebristas, de moralistas, de pintores, de gemetras... dirigidos por un oscuro hombre de genio. Abundan individuos que dominan esas disciplinas diversas, pero no los capaces de invencin y menos los capaces de subordinar la invencin a un riguroso plan sistemtico. Ese plan es tan vasto que la contribucin de cada escritor es infinitesimal. Al principio se crey que Tln era un mero caos, una irresponsable licencia de la imaginacin; ahora se sabe que es un cosmos y las ntimas leyes que lo rigen han sido formuladas, siquiera en modo provisional. Bsteme recordar que las contradicciones aparentes del Onceno Tomo son la piedra fundamental de la prueba de que existen los otros: tan lcido y tan justo es el orden que se ha observado en l. Las revistas populares han divulgado, con perdonable exceso, la zoologa y la topografa de Tln; yo pienso que sus tigres transparentes y sus torres de sangre no merecen, tal vez, la continua atencin de todos los hombres. Yo me atrevo a pedir unos minutos para su concepto del universo.In the "Eleventh Volume" which I have mentioned, there are allusions to preceding and succeeding volumes. In an article in the N. R. F. which is now classic, Nestor Ibarra has denied the existence of those companion volumes; Ezequiel Martinez Estrada and Drieu La Rochelle have refuted that doubt, perhaps victoriously. The fact is that up to now the most diligent inquiries have been fruitless. In vain we have upended the libraries of the two Americas and of Europe. Alfonso Reyes, tired of these subordinate sleuthing procedures, proposes that we should all undertake the task of reconstructing the many and weighty tomes that are lacking:ex ungue leonem. He calculates, half in earnest and half jokingly, that a generation oftlonistasshould be sufficient. This venturesome computation brings us back to the fundamental problem: Who are the inventors of Tln? The plural is inevitable, because the hypothesis of a lone inventor - an infinite Leibniz laboring away darkly and modestly - has been unanimously discounted. It is conjectured that this brave new world is the work of a secret society of astronomers, biologists, engineers, metaphysicians, poets, chemists, algebraists, moralists, painters, geometers... directed by an obscure man of genius. Individuals mastering these diverse disciplines are abundant, but not so those capable of inventiveness and less so those capable of subordinating that inventiveness to a rigorous and systematic plan. This plan is so vast that each writer's contribution is infinitesimal. At first it was believed that Tln was a mere chaos, and irresponsible license of the imagination; now it is known that is a cosmos and that the intimate laws which govern it have been formulated, at least provisionally. Let it suffice for me to recall that the apparent contradictions of the Eleventh Volume are the fundamental basis for the proof that the other volumes exist, so lucid and exact is the order observed in it. The popular magazines, with pardonable excess, have spread news of the zoology and topography of Tln; I think its transparent tiger and towers of blood perhaps do not merit the continued attention ofallmen. I shall venture to request a few minutes to expound its concept of the universe.Hume not para siempre que los argumentos de Berkeley no admiten la menor rplica y no causan la menor conviccin. Ese dictamen es del todo verdico en su aplicacin a la tierra; del todo falso en Tln. Las naciones de ese planeta son -congnitamente- idealistas. Su lenguaje y las derivaciones de su lenguaje -la religin, las letras, la metafsica- presuponen el idealismo. El mundo para ellos no es un concurso de objetos en el espacio; es una serie heterognea de actos independientes. Es sucesivo, temporal, no espacial. No hay sustantivos en la conjeturalUrsprachede Tln, de la que proceden los idiomas "actuales" y los dialectos: hay verbos impersonales, calificados por sufijos (o prefijos) monosilbicos de valor adverbial. Por ejemplo: no hay palabra que corresponda a la palabraluna, pero hay un verbo que sera en espaollunecerolunar.Surgi la lunasobre el rose dicehlr u fang axaxaxas mlo sea en su orden: hacia arriba (upward) detrs duradero-fluir luneci. (Xul Solar traduce con brevedad: upa tras perfluyue lun.Upward, behind the onstreaming it mooned.Hume noted for all time that Berkeley's arguments did not admit the slightest refutation nor did they cause the slightest conviction. This dictum is entirely correct in its application to the earth, but entirely false in Tln. The nations of this planet are congenitally idealist. Their language and the derivations of their language - religion, letters, metaphysics - all presuppose idealism. The world for them is not a concourse of objects in space; it is a heterogeneous series of independent acts. It is successive and temporal, not spatial. There are no nouns in Tln's conjecturalUrsprache, from which the "present" languages and the dialects are derived: there are impersonal verbs, modified by monosyllabic suffixes (or prefixes) with an adverbial value. For example: there is no word corresponding to the word "moon,", but there is a verb which in English would be "to moon" or "to moonate." "The moon rose above the river" ishlor u fang axaxaxas mlo, or literally: "upward behind the onstreaming it mooned."Lo anterior se refiere a los idiomas del hemisferio austral. En los del hemisferio boreal (de cuyaUrsprachehay muy pocos datos en el Onceno Tomo) la clula primordial no es el verbo, sino el adjetivo monosilbico. El sustantivo se forma por acumulacin de adjetivos. No se diceluna: sedice areo-claro sobre oscuro-redondooanaranjado-tenue-de1 cieloo cualquier otra agregacin. En el caso elegido la masa de adjetivos corresponde a un objeto real; el hecho es puramente fortuito. En la literatura de este hemisferio (como en el mundo subsistente de Meinong) abundan los objetos ideales, convocados y disueltos en un momento, segn las necesidades poticas. Los determina, a veces, la mera simultaneidad. Hay objetos compuestos de dos trminos, uno de carcter visual y otro auditivo: el color del naciente y el remoto grito de un pjaro. Los hay de muchos: el sol y el agua contra el pecho del nadador, el vago rosa trmulo que se ve con los ojos cerrados, la sensacin de quien se deja llevar por un ro y tambin por el sueo. Esos objetos de segundo grado pueden combinarse con otros; el proceso, mediante ciertas abreviaturas, es prcticamente infinito. Hay poemas famosos compuestos de una sola enorme palabra. Esta palabra integra unobjeto poticocreado por el autor. El hecho de que nadie crea en la realidad de los sustantivos hace, paradjicamente, que sea interminable su nmero. Los idiomas del hemisferio boreal de Tln poseen todos los nombres de las lenguas indoeuropeas y otros muchos ms.The preceding applies to the languages of the southern hemisphere. In those of the northern hemisphere (on whoseUrsprachethere is very little data in the Eleventh Volume) the prime unit is not the verb, but the monosyllabic adjective. The noun is formed by an accumulation of adjectives. They do not say "moon," but rather "round airy-light on dark" or "pale-orange-of-the-sky" or any other such combination. In the example selected the mass of adjectives refers to a real object, but this is purely fortuitous. The literature of this hemisphere (like Meinong's subsistent world) abounds in ideal objects, which are convoked and dissolved in a moment, according to poetic needs. At times they are determined by mere simultaneity. There are objects composed of two terms, one of visual and another of auditory character: the color of the rising sun and the faraway cry of a bird. There are objects of many terms: the sun and the water on a swimmer's chest, the vague tremulous rose color we see with our eyes closed, the sensation of being carried along by a river and also by sleep. These second-degree objects can be combined with others; through the use of certain abbreviations, the process is practically infinite. There are famous poems made up of one enormous word. This word forms apoetic objectcreated by the author. The fact that no one believes in the reality of nouns paradoxically causes their number to be unending. The languages of Tln's northern hemisphere contain all the nouns of the Indo-European languages - and many others as well.No es exagerado afirmar que la cultura clsica de Tln comprende una sola disciplina: la psicologa. Las otras estn subordinadas a ella. He dicho que los hombres de ese planeta conciben el universo como una serie de procesos mentales, que no se desenvuelven en el espacio sino de modo sucesivo en el tiempo. Spinoza atribuye a su inagotable divinidad los atributos de la extensin y del pensamiento; nadie comprendera en Tln la yuxtaposicin del primero (que slo es tpico de ciertos estados) y del segundo -que es un sinnimo perfecto del cosmos-. Dicho sea con otras palabras: no conciben que lo espacial perdure en el tiempo. La percepcin de una humareda en el horizonte y despus del campo incendiado y despus del cigarro a medio apagar que produjo la quemazn es considerada un ejemplo de asociacin de ideas.It is no exaggeration to state that the classic culture of Tln comprises only one discipline: psychology. All others are subordinated to it. I have said that the men of this planet conceive the universe as a series of mental processes which do not develop in space but successively in time. Spinoza ascribes to his inexhaustible divinity the attributes of extension and thought; no one in Tln would understand the juxtaposition of the first (which is typical only of certain states) and the second - which is a perfect synonym of the cosmos. In other words, they do not conceive that the spatial persists in time. The perception of a cloud of smoke on the horizon and then of the burning field and then of the half-extinguished cigarette that produced the blaze is considered an example of association of ideas.Este monismo o idealismo total invalida la ciencia. Explicar (o juzgar) un hecho es unirlo a otro; esa vinculacin, en Tln, es un estado posterior del sujeto, que no puede afectar o iluminar el estado anterior. Todo estado mental es irreductible: el mero hecho de nombrarlo -id est, de clasificarlo- importa un falseo. De ello cabra deducir que no hay ciencias en Tln -ni siquiera razonamientos. La paradjica verdad es que existen, en casi innumerable nmero. Con las filosofas acontece lo que acontece con los sustantivos en el hemisferio boreal. El hecho de que toda filosofa sea de antemano un juego dialctico, unaPhilosophie des Als Ob, ha contribuido a multiplicarlas. Abundan los sistemas increbles, pero de arquitectura agradable o de tipo sensacional. Los metafsicos de Tln no buscan la verdad ni siquiera la verosimilitud: buscan el asombro. Juzgan que la metafsica es una rama de la literatura fantstica. Saben que un sistema no es otra cosa que la subordinacin de todos los aspectos del universo a uno cualquiera de ellos. Hasta la frase "todos los aspectos" es rechazable, porque supone la imposible adicin del instante presente y de los pretritos. Tampoco es lcito el plural "los pretritos", porque supone otra operacin imposible... Una de las escuelas de Tln llega a negar el tiempo: razona que el presente es indefinido, que el futuro no tiene realidad sino como esperanza presente, que el pasado no tiene realidad sino como recuerdo presente.(n2)Otra escuela declara que ha transcurrido yatodo el tiempoy que nuestra vida es apenas el recuerdo o reflejo crepuscular, y sin duda falseado y mutilado, de un proceso irrecuperable. Otra, que la historia del universo -y en ellas nuestras vidas y el ms tenue detalle de nuestras vidas- es la escritura que produce un dios subalterno para entenderse con un demonio. Otra, que el universo es comparable a esas criptografas en las que no valen todos los smbolos y que slo es verdad lo que sucede cada trescientas noches. Otra, que mientras dormimos aqu, estamos despiertos en otro lado y que as cada hombre es dos hombres.This monism or complete idealism invalidates all science. If we explain (or judge) a fact, we connect it with another; such linking, in Tln, is a later state of the subject which cannot affect or illuminate the previous state. Every mental state is irreducible: there mere fact of naming it - i.e., of classifying it - implies a falsification. From which it can be deduced that there are no sciences on Tln, not even reasoning. The paradoxical truth is that they do exist, and in almost uncountable number. The same thing happens with philosophies as happens with nouns in the northern hemisphere. The fact that every philosophy is by definition a dialectical game, aPhilosophie des Als Ob, has caused them to multiply. There is an abundance of incredible systems of pleasing design or sensational type. The metaphysicians of Tln do not seek for the truth or even for verisimilitude, but rather for the astounding. They judge that metaphysics is a branch of fantastic literature. The