The Aleph of J.L. Borges: SUMMARY of the story and characters

Jorge Luis Borges He is one of the best known and most applauded Latin American authors of the 20th century. He is an Argentine writer who is considered a cult writer due to the depth of his texts and, above all, to the metaphysical reading of his stories. It's about a scholarly writer which was the predecessor of the Latin American Boom and that he is highly valued as a short story writer, especially dedicated to narrating fantastic and metaphorical stories. In unPROFESOR we want to talk to you about one of the most popular and great stories by the author and, therefore, we offer you a summary of The Aleph with its most important characters, so that you understand the importance of this story in the history of contemporary literature.

Index

1. Brief introduction to El Aleph by Jorge Luis Borges
2. Summary of The Aleph: Part One
3. Summary of the second part of The Aleph
4. Third part of The Aleph
5. The Aleph Characters

Before beginning with the summary of El Aleph, it is important that we make a brief introduction to this tale by Borges. It is a tale that appeared in September 1945 and his name (Aleph) refers to the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. This letter and its symbolism is related to the origin of the universe; in fact, in mathematics there are aleph numbers that refer to a type of numbering that has infinite numbers.

Therefore, in the story of The Aleph we find all this symbolism: the author will talk about the eternal present. In this narrative, Borges's aleph represents a point that includes all other points of the universe; that is, everyone who looks at that point can see the entire universe at a single glance. The question of infinite that we find ourselves in this story, also exists in other narratives of the author, since it was a subject that generated a lot of interest to him; in "The Sand Book" we also find that infinity is present in the plot.

In The Aleph appears an alter-ego of Borges, a resource that the author used on a regular basis and that shows us a fictional Borges, a protagonist who has the same name as the writer himself. In this story we meet Borges-character who is mourning the death of his wife. Next, we begin with the summary of The Aleph so that you know better its plot and history.

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Let's dive right into the subject to know a summary of El Aleph, Borges's best known and most studied story.

The story begins in 1943. As we have already mentioned, in El Aleph the protagonist of the narrative is Borges himself (but the Borges-character) who tells us about the love he felt for his wife Beatriz who died in 1929. In order not to forget his love and honor his wife, every year he goes to visit Beatriz's family on her birthday.

It is at these dinners that philosophical conversations take place in which Daneri deals with topics such as modern man or the journey of life. Borges encourages Daneri to write down everything he is thinking and Daneri shows him a poem in which he includes all these concepts and with which he has been working for many years. The poem is titled "The Earth" and it is a composition that aims to unite the entire universe in the form of a verse.

After two weeks, Daneri and Borges meet again to continue talking about the poem. Daneri wants to publish it and, for this, he asks Borges for help, since he is an outstanding writer and with influences in the literary sector. In addition, he asks Borges to write the prologue for him so that, thus, he can take advantage of Borges's media pull to better sell his creation.

At first, Borges accepts Daneri's proposal. But, after hours, he declares that Daneri is a "self-important fool" and that he is not going to do anything as agreed. The issue stays up in the air until, a few months later. Daneri calls Borges worried about something unusual: there is an Aleph in his basement.

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Daneri has just called his friend Borges to tell her that an Aleph has crept into his basement. But what exactly is an Aleph? As Daneri himself says, it is a point in space that encompasses all points of the cosmos. Therefore, he needs the Aleph to finish composing his poem, his universal poem. But Daneri understands that the Aleph is precisely what he was looking for with his poem: it is the only place in the world that includes all the places in the universe. Therefore, discover the Aleph means accepting that his poem cannot be written.

After this conversation, Borges believes that Daneri has gone mad, but he is intrigued and agrees to go and discover that Aleph. He goes to Daneri's house and Daneri offers him a brandy that Borges fears that he has been poisoned. He takes him to the basement and tells him to lie down on the floor, at the point where the stairs begin and, above all, to look at step number 19. Daneri leaves and Borges is left alone in the basement without really knowing what to do.

But then the protagonist will see the Aleph and describe it as a point of about an inch but inside which you can see the entire universe. He tries to explain everything he is seeing but realizes that language is insufficient to describe some experiences of the life. Because of this, Borges indicates to the reader that he will never be able to understand what he really is. Aleph, because humans have no other tool than the word to define the world and communicate. To try to describe what Borges sees and feels, he makes a list of different images that he has seen during his meeting: the sea, tigers, grapes, horsehair, an army, his wife Beatriz and his own face.

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We finish this summary of The Aleph to talk about the outcome of the story. When Daneri returns to the basement and meets Borges he asks him if he has been able to see the Aleph, but Borges prefers not be honest with him and recommends that he demolish the house and move away from the city, in the middle nature.

As he leaves home, Borges reflects on what he has seen and fears that never again in his life will he be surprised by something. But, after days, nights, weeks, Borges ends up forgetting the experience and the encounter with the Aleph, with the infinite, with the eternal, seems like something from another life.

After this, the tale sends us back to the present, a present in which Borges tells us that Daneri finally demolished his house and that his poem won a major literary award. He will end up accepting that the Aleph he saw at Daneri's house he was nothing but a "false Aleph" and so the story ends.

Now that you've been able to see a summary of El Aleph, let's focus on the characters in this well-known tale by Jorge Luis Borges. We will analyze the most important characters so you can better analyze this text.

Borges: the protagonist of El Aleph

The main character of El Aleph is Borges, the alter-ego of the author himself and that generates a feeling of greater realism in the text of him. The protagonist coincides with the biography of Borges himself: an Argentine writer who is known in the literary world; in fact, Daneri asks for his influence to be able to succeed with the poem. However, Borges character is saddened by the death of Beatriz, her wife and, in order not to forget her, he regularly visits Beatriz's cousin: Daneri.

Upon discovering that the Aleph lives in Daneri's basement, he becomes angry because he considers it unfair that something as important as the Aleph is in the home of such a basic and bland being; Therefore, he will encourage Daneri to collapse the house and for the Aleph to be destroyed. With this attitude we can see how Borges is envious and spiteful and that he prefers to destroy the Aleph before he is in this character's house. Also, he doesn't want Daneri to finish his poem and believes that without the Aleph he won't be able to do it. However, he did finally win an important award, something that infuriates Borges.

Carlos Argentino Daneri

Another character in The Aleph is Daneri, Beatriz's cousin, Borges's deceased wife. He is a bombastic and foolish man who loves to listen to himself. Borges does not take it seriously and we see his contempt in his words and in the way he describes him. But Daneri is more intelligent than he may seem and, this intelligence shown in a poem, puts Borges on alert. The appearance of the Aleph in his house is one more reason for jealousy and envy on the part of Borges and proof that Daneri has learned and has become someone important to the universe.

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