(no subject)

[proximoception]

Is the mistake in the first paragraph of "The Library of Babel" deliberate?

The universe (which others call the Library) is composed of an indefinite, perhaps an infinite, number of hexagonal galleries, with enormous ventilation shafts in the middle, encircled by very low railings. From any hexagon the upper or lower stories are visible, interminably. The distribution of the galleries is invariable. Twenty shelves - five long shelves per side - cover all sides except two; their height, which is that of each floor, scarcely exceeds that of an average librarian. One of the free sides gives upon a narrow entrance way, which leads to another gallery, identical to the first and to all the others. To the left and to the right of the entrance way are two miniature rooms. One allows standing room for sleeping; the other, the satisfaction of fecal necessities. Through this section passes the spiral staircase, which plunges down into the abyss and rises up to the heights. In the entrance way hangs a mirror, which faithfully duplicates appearances. People are in the habit of inferring from this mirror that the Library is not infinite (if it really were, why this illusory duplication?); I prefer to dream that the polished surfaces feign and promise infinity...

Or is it there to make you stay up all night with someone trying to work out what all this would look like, only to find that there is exactly enough room for two identical labyrinths to weave through one another infinitely with no foot access between them (and where in the Library could one get a rope to climb down the air shaft?). There wouldn't even need to be another labyrinth: directly above and below every single chamber could be rooms filled with intelligible books, or the fabled smaller magic books, or identical copies of the concordance to the volumes of the library, or of the one true book that saves you, or even with the cylinder-spined book of God. The only way you might ever know these rooms existed - depending on the thickness of the floors and the width of the air shafts - would be upon suicide, in your infinite fall through the shaft, as you saw over and over again, while disintegrating, everything withheld from you your entire life. Could even Borges have imagined such cruelty in the demiurge?

Comments

[grashupfer.livejournal.com]

What's the mistake?

[proximoception.livejournal.com]

"One of the free sides gives upon a narrow entrance way, which leads to another gallery..."

There have to be two narrow entrance ways. It can't be just dyads [o-o] of hexagons because the story mentions going sideways several miles a couple times. Looks like the only way the hexagons can be connected, logistically, is if they go on infinitely [-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-] in parallel lines, and the stairways connect them to other infinite strings of parallel rooms 60 degrees off from the strings above them - then below them the angle of the first layer is resumed. We found about three plans where this seems possible, though there may be others - they differ mainly in hallway lengths.

Chambers in the complex can't be one floor down from chambers exactly above them - that space has to either be empty (or full of rock), contain unconnected chambers, or contain the chambers of that second labyrinth you can't get to from the first one.

[andalus.livejournal.com]

i think the language points to two hallways in each, he only mentions one hallway because it's implied that when one goes down the hallway and finds "another, identical" hex, that hex will have another hallway, plus the one he just came from. which also means only one bathroom per hex.

[proximoception.livejournal.com]

So it's as though we're being led from room to room on a tour? Doesn't really come across that way in the story, to me. And if you were you might not notice the bathroom and sleeproom right behind you as you come into the new chamber, just the ones in front.