Recently I’ve found myself reading through the collected fictions of Jorge Luis Borges, and I’ve been left with questions regarding various short stories of his. Since it’s been not-so-subtly implied that Borges has had an influence on the world of Fallen London, I’ve decided to look here for others, who in reading and understanding his works somewhat better, might be able to give me some answers.
Spoilers abound, so I’ll put the questions themselves in spoiler tags.
[spoiler] Question 1, regarding Ficciones: In "A Survey Of The Works Of Herbert Quain", one of the selected (fictional) works surveyed is a detective story whose ending is plausibly false; the intention being for sharp-eyed readers to navigate back through the story and work out the real solution. The short story in which this fictional detective novel appears is followed by "The Garden Of Forking Paths", which Borges claims in the Preface to be a detective story, with a twist in perspective in the last paragraph.
My question is thus; is there some detail or alternate ending that Borges has hidden in "The Garden Of Forking Paths", which would transform it into the same detective story Borges attributes to the fictional Herbert Quain in the short story that is just previous to The Garden in Ficciones?
Question 2, regarding The Secret Miracle: It’s established near the climax of the story that God had spoken to the protagonist in a dream, and the protagonist recalls that "The dreams of men belong to God". All good and well, but then what did the dream at the start of the short story mean? The one with the game of chess in the secret tower and how he was running across the sand of the desert in the rain.
Also, on a side note, I don’t understand the arguments set forth by the protagonists fictional work ‘A Vindication of Eternity’, nor any of the conclusions the protagonist draws about it. Was it important to the narrative, or was it just an aside?
Question 3, regarding Death and The Compass: At the conclusion of the story, what is Red Scharlach actually promising? [/spoiler]
edited by Cotton Dee on 10/6/2015
edited by Cotton Dee on 10/6/2015
edited by Cotton Dee on 10/6/2015