The Garden of Forking Paths – The Obvious Choice
Our reading of The Garden of the Forking Paths by Jorge Luis Borges was extremely refreshing. In my opinion the reason for this sense of refreshment was because of the welcoming change it brought about. Let me explain!
(PS: This is a 20th century piece, maybe that’s why it’s refreshing.)
It seems as if before this literary piece came about, the readings showed characters who in their minds saw only on way to live. By “one way to live”, I mean, the authors never showed us another option or choice for these characters. Here are some quick examples of what I mean. Firstly, Bartleby, he saw a flaw in society and refused to do any more work than his job described. There was never another option for him, he was join to do what he believed until the end (his death). Next, Hedda Gabler, who once again saw a flaw in society, with power and social class. Therefore, she used manipulation to get power. Once she saw her power coming to an end, she killed herself. There was never another option for her, it was her way or no way. These are just two examples of what i meant by characters with no other option. Obviously these characters had options because of free will, but they refused to even attempt a different way of life.
What this literary piece, The Garden of the Forking Paths shows, is, is exactly what the title says. This fork in the road is a metaphor for the option the narrator wanted to choose. This 20th century story describes how an attack against Serre-Montauban in World War had to be delayed 5 days because of torrential rains. Without getting into any more plot details, let’s discuss what this author did so well.
In my opinion Borges attempts to create a vision in our (the readers) heads using things that can’t be pictured. He does this by using metaphors and time. He shows us how the notion of time is connected to his metaphor. The metaphor being, we all have choices to make and life can take you one way depending on what you chose or vise versa. At any one moment we could be at any number of places depending on decisions being made across the world. This is shown by the narrators decisions to take action and try to extend his life, causing things to change based off that. These choices are free will and it was nice to see the literature show that.