Storytelling it Is Somewhat Remarkable

¶ … Storytelling

It is somewhat remarkable that given the breadth of human experience and knowledge, much of the art and literature produced by humanity revolves around only a handful of similar themes. Sex and love are probably at the top of the list of most common artistic and literary themes -- as the most universal of experiences (everyone up until modern medical breakthroughs was a participant in -- as the result -- at least one sexual encounter), it makes sense that sex and those things related to it should be the leading common feature in human expression. Only slightly less common, both in life and in literature, is the notion of defining one's place in the world, or often of redefining the world in order to make it show one's place therein. Many people go through such a struggle, often during adolescence but also during later stages in life, perhaps many times over. Such struggles often make for some of the most interesting and easily identifiable characters and stories. Reading is itself a way to escape into an alternate definition of the world and living, so in a very real way this is the goal of every piece of literature ever written. Yet somehow every human culture in each generation finds a need to explore this same theme on their own terms, often in surprising and even controversial ways.

To say that themes of literature are common and often repeated in no way means that the stories that develop or come out of these themes are the same -- far from it. This is the even more remarkable thing about humanity; our similarities also serve to highlight our differences. Two stories written decades apart in two different countries -- two different languages, even -- will necessarily have many differences even when written on the same general theme. Two such stories, both dealing with the theme of finding the self and/or redefining the world, are "The Aleph" by Jorge Luis Borges and Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie.

Both of these stories are also related to the genre of magical realism, though such a genre did not really exits when either text was written. Certain elements of science-fiction and fantasy novels have been seen to appear in works that do not neatly fit these genres, and the new genre of magical realism is still in its defining stages as older and newer works are incorporated into it. In both Haroun and "The Aleph," ideas about the universe and the way it works are explored through fanciful and fantastical elements of magical realism. The main characters in both works must -- or are forced to -- redefine themselves and their world using these elements. In this way, both works see the so-called subjective reality of the world the way it is traditionally viewed as misleading or even downright fraudulent, and suggest new ways of re-imagining and re-viewing the world and the universe that creates massive character changes.

In "The Aleph," the protagonist is a fictional representation of the author himself, and the story details this characters intellectual relationship with the cousin of a woman whom he had loved but who passed away leaving him unrequited. This cousin, Carlos Argentino Daneri, is writing a poem about the whole world, and it is revealed later in the story that his inspiration for doing so is an Aleph he has discovered in his basement. This Aleph -- a patch of space no bigger than an inch wide -- allows one to see the entire world simultaneously, an experience that is impossible to put into words: "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?" (Borges, par. 40). Borges fills this section with supreme irony; at the very climax of the story, words fail utterly to capture the moment.

In many ways, this story is about the character of Borges' inability to form real relationships -- and so any true sense of identity -- in his world. He loved a woman who did not return his affections and was even "annoyed" by him, and ends up "befriending" her cousin after her death even though he secretly detests him, and suspects Carlos of the same feelings towards him (Borges, par. 1; par. 32). His experience with the Aleph, and his inability to relate this experience to the reader, is evidence of his disconnect with the world. His world also used to have a very narrow focus -- i.e. Beatriz, the woman he loved -- and the Aleph serves to instantly and infinitely expand his world while at the same time deepening his disconnect with it, rather than helping to rectify it with more identifiable features. The character of Borges is a man wrapped up in his own head, and no experience is able to shake him out of this.

Rushdie includes a very similarly self-focused character in Haroun and the Sea of Stories, that of Haroun's mother Soraya. Soraya abandons her husband Rashid and her son Haroun in favor of a more boring and less imaginative life with her neighbor, Mr. Sengupta. Haroun finds himself beginning to doubt his father, wondering "What's the use of stories that aren't even true?" (Rushdie, 20). He had already begun to doubt his father, believing that stories has to come from somewhere and therefore disbelieving in any notion of pure imagination. This is hugely ironic given the fanciful and imaginative nature of the world he inhabits; in an ironic and paradoxical twist, the book suggests that the wonders of reality are evidence of imagination.