UID:
almahu_9948030296102882
Format:
XXV, 126 p. 1 illus.
,
online resource.
ISBN:
9783030047177
Series Statement:
Literatures of the Americas
Content:
This book follows the renunciation story in Borges and beyond, arguing for its centrality as a Borgesian compositional trope and as a Borgesian prism for reading a global constellation of texts. The renunciation story at the heart of Buddhism, that of a king who leaves his palace to become an ascetic, fascinated Borges because of its cross-cultural adaptability and metamorphic nature, and because it resonated so powerfully across philosophy, politics and aesthetics. From the story and its many variants, Borges’s essays formulated a 'morphological' conception of literature (borrowing the idea from Goethe), whereby a potentially infinite number of stories were generated by transformation of a finite number of 'archetypes'. The king-and-ascetic encounter also tells a powerful political story, setting up a confrontation between power and authority; Borges’s own political predicament is explored against the rich background of truth-telling renouncers. In its poetic variant, the renunciation archetype morphs into stories about art and artists, with renunciation a key requirement of the creative process: the discussion weaves in and out of Borges to highlight modern writers’ debt to asceticism. Ultimately, the enigmatic appeal of the renunciation story aligns it with the open-endedness of modern parables.
Note:
1. Introduction: Leaving the Palace -- 2. A Borgesian Morphology: Renunciation, Morphology and World Literature -- 3. A Lesson for the King: Renunciation and Politics -- 4. From Ascetic to Poet: Poetic Renunciation -- 5. Modernity’s Enigmatic Parables of Renunciation -- 6. Conclusion: Renunciation Stories and Wandering Kings.
In:
Springer eBooks
Additional Edition:
Printed edition: ISBN 9783030047160
Additional Edition:
Printed edition: ISBN 9783030047184
Language:
English
DOI:
10.1007/978-3-030-04717-7
URL:
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04717-7
