Editing Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius (section)

==Fact and fiction==

{{Original research section|date=May 2024}}

It is by no means simple to sort out fact and fiction within this story. The picture is further complicated by the fact that other authors (both in print and on the web) have chosen to join Borges in his game and write about one or another fictional aspect of this story either as if it were non-fiction or in a manner that could potentially confuse the unwary reader. One online example is the Italian-language website ''La Biblioteca di Uqbar'', which treats Tlön itself as duly fictional, but writes as if the fictional Silas Haslam's entirely imaginary ''History of the Land Called Uqbar'' were a real work.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.uqbar.it |title=La Biblioteca di Uqbar |access-date=3 August 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060609025716/http://www.uqbar.it/ |archive-date=June 9, 2006 }}</ref>

As a result, simply finding a reference to a person or place from "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" in a context seemingly unrelated to Borges's story is not enough to be confident that the person or place is real. See, for example, the discussion below of the character Silas Haslam.{{citation needed|date=April 2015}}

There in fact exists an ''Anglo-American Encyclopedia'', which is a plagiarism, differently paginated, of the tenth edition of the Encyclopedia, and in which the 46th volume is ''TOT-UPS'', ending on p.&nbsp;917 with Upsala,  and followed by [[Ural–Altaic languages|Ural–Altaic]] in the next volume; Uqbar would fall in between.{{citation needed|date=February 2022}} In the ''11th'' edition of the ''Britannica'', Borges's favorite, there is an article in between these on "[[Ur]]"; which may, in some sense, therefore ''be'' Uqbar. Different articles in the 11th edition mention that ''Ur'', as the name of a city, means simply "''the'' city", and that ''Ur'' is also the [[aurochs]], or the evil god of the [[Mandaeans]]. Borges may be punning on the sense of "primaeval" here with his repeated use of ''[[Ursprache]]'',<ref>Conjecture due to Alan White, "An Appalling or Banal Reality" ''Variaciones Borges'' 15, 47-91. p. 52. Also,[http://www.williams.edu/philosophy/faculty/awhite/borges%202.htm White's web site, un itled], accessed 3 August 2006.  The Tenth Edition of the Britannica in fact has two alphabets of articles (one a reprint of the Ninth Edition, the other a supplement); the Anglo-American Encyclopedia merged these into one alphabet. One of the two parts of the Britannica also breaks at UPS. The other meanings of UR are not additional articles in the 11th, but they can be found in the index.</ref> or on the story's own definition of "ur" in one of Tlön's languages as "a thing produced by suggestion, an object elicited by hope".

===Levels of reality===
There are several levels of reality (or unreality) in the story:

* Most (but not all) of the people mentioned in the story are real, but the events in which they are involved are mostly fictional, as are some of the works attributed to them. This is discussed in detail in the section below on real and fictional people.
* The main portion of the story is a fiction set in a naturalistic world; in the postscript, magical elements have entered the narrator's world. The main portion could certainly be seen as a false document; the postscript may dissolve the illusion.
* The land of Uqbar is fictional from the point of view of the world of the story. The supposed ''Anglo-American Cyclopaedia'' article on Uqbar proves, within the story, to be a [[fictitious entry]].
* Mlejnas, and Tlön as it is first introduced, are fictional from the point of view of Uqbar. In the course of the story, Tlön becomes more and more "real": first it moves from being a fiction of Uqbar to being a fiction of the narrator's own naturalistic world, then it begins (first as idea and then physically) taking over that world, to the point of finally threatening to annihilate normal reality.

===Real and fictional places===
[[File:LocationUqbar (1917).png|thumb|300px|Possible location of Uqbar{{dubious|date=June 2016}}]]
'''Uqbar''' in the story is [[Story within a story|''doubly'' fictional]]: even within the world of the story it turns out to be a fictional place. The [[fictitious entry]] described in the story furnishes deliberately meager indications of Uqbar's location: "Of the fourteen names which figured in the geographical part, we only recognized three – [[Khorasan Province|Khorasan]], [[Armenia]], [[Erzerum]] – interpolated in the text in an ambiguous way."  Armenia and Erzerum lie in the eastern highlands of [[Asia Minor]] (in and near modern [[Turkey]], perhaps corresponding to [[Urartu]]), while Khorasan is in northeastern [[Iran]], though there is also a [[Horasan]] in eastern Turkey.  However, it was said to have cited an equally nonexistent German-titled book – ''Lesbare und lesenswerthe Bemerkungen über das Land Ukkbar in Klein-Asien'' ("Legible and valuable observations about the land of Uqbar in Asia Minor") – whose title claims unambiguously that Uqbar was in [[Asia Minor]].

The boundaries of Uqbar were described using equally nonexistent reference points; for instance, "the lowlands of Tsai Khaldun and the Axa Delta marked the southern frontier".  This would suggest that the rivers of Borges' Uqbar should rise in highlands to the north; in fact, the mountainous highlands of eastern Turkey are where not one but two Zab Rivers rise, the [[Great Zab]] and the [[Little Zab|Lesser Zab]].  They run a couple of hundred miles south into the [[Tigris]].

The only points of Uqbar's history mentioned relate to religion, literature, and craft.  It was described as the home of a noted [[heresiarch]], and the scene of religious persecutions directed against the orthodox in the thirteenth century; fleeing the latter, its orthodox believers built obelisks in their southerly place of exile, and made mirrors – seen by the heresiarch as abominable – of stone.  Crucially for the story, Uqbar's "epics and legends never referred to reality, but to the two imaginary regions of Mlejnas and Tlön."

Although the culture of Uqbar described by Borges is fictional, there are two real places with similar names. These are:

# The medieval city of [[Ukbara|‘Ukbarâ]] on the left bank of the [[Tigris]] between [[Samarra]] and [[Baghdad]] in what is now [[Iraq]].  This city was home to the great [[Islam]]ic [[grammar]]ian, [[philology|philologist]], and religious scholar [[Al-Ukbari|Al-‘Ukbarî]] (c. 1143–1219) – who was blind, like Borges's father and like Borges himself was later to become – and to two notable early [[Jewish]]/[[Karaite Judaism|Karaite]] "[[heresiarch]]s" (see above), leaders of Karaite movements opposed to [[Anan ben David]], [[Ishmael al-Ukbari]] and [[Meshwi al-Ukbari]], mentioned in the ''[[Jewish Encyclopedia]]'' of 1901–1906.<ref>Singer, Isidore and Broydé, Isaac,  [http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=504&letter=M Meshwi al-‘Ukbari], ''[[Jewish Encyclopedia]]'', 1901–1906. Accessed online 9 September 2006.</ref>
# ‘Uqbâr in the [[Atlas Mountains]] of [[Algeria]]; the [[minaret]]s of the latter's area might relate to the "obelisks" of Uqbar in the story.

''Tsai Khaldun'' is undoubtedly a tribute to the great historian [[Ibn Khaldun]], who lived in [[Andalusia]] for a while; his history focuses on [[North Africa]] and was probably a major source for Borges.  Additionally, "tsai" most likely comes from Turkish "çay" which is an uncommon word for river.

===Real and fictional people===
Listed here in order of their appearance in the story:

* [[Jorge Luis Borges]] (1899–1986)—Author and first person narrator of the story.
* [[Adolfo Bioy Casares]] (1914–1999)—non-fictional, Argentinian fiction-writer, a friend and frequent collaborator of Borges.<ref name=Guia>{{cite web |url=http://www.cce.ufsc.br/~espanhol/projborges/tlon.htm |title=Guía de lectura de ''Ficciones'', de Jorge Luis Borges |website=Universidade Federal de Santa Caterina (Brazil) |access-date=3 August 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060810201023/http://www.cce.ufsc.br/~espanhol/projborges/tlon.htm |archive-date=10 August 2006 }}</ref>
* An unnamed "heresiarch of Uqbar" is credited for the statement that "mirrors and copulation are abominable because they increase the number of men". This echoes Borges' own summary of the teachings of [[Al-Muqanna]] (d. ca. 783), a Persian prophet regarded by his orthodox Muslim contemporaries as a heresiarch. In the previously-published short story collection ''[[A Universal History of Infamy]]'', Borges wrote the following as part of a summary of his message: "The world we live in is a mistake, a clumsy parody. Mirrors and fatherhood, because they multiply and confirm the parody, are abominations."<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Jáen |first1=Didier T. |title=The Esoteric Tradition in Borges' "Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" |journal=Studies in Short Stories |date=January 1, 1984 |volume=21 |issue=Winter84 |pages=25–39 }}</ref>
* [[Justus Perthes]] (1749–1816)—non-fictional, 18th century founder of a German publishing firm that bears his name; undoubtedly, the story is accurate in implying the firm's atlases do not mention Uqbar.
* [[Carl Ritter]] (1779–1859)—one of the founders of modern [[geography]]. In the story, Borges notes the absence of any mention of Uqbar in Ritter's cartographic index ''Erdkunde''. (In the story, only the surname is given.)<ref name=Guia />
* [[Smerdis]] (d. 522 BC)—The story refers in passing to "the impostor, Smerdis the Magician".<ref name="tlon113" /> After the death of the actual Smerdis (son of [[Cyrus the Great]] of [[Achaemenid Empire|Persia]]) a [[Magi]]an priest named [[Gaumata]] successfully impersonated him for several months and ruled in his stead.
* [[Bernard Quaritch]] (1819–1899)—An actual nineteenth-century [[bookseller]] in [[London]].<ref name=Guia /> The bookstore bearing his name still survives.<ref>[http://www.quaritch.com/ Bernard Quaritch, Antiquarian bookseller], official site. Accessed 14 November 2006.</ref> In the story, his catalogues include Silas Haslam's ''History of the Land Called Uqbar''.
* Silas Haslam—Entirely fictional, but based on Borges' English ancestors. "Haslam" was Borges's paternal grandmother's maiden name.<ref name=Guia /> In the story, besides the 1874 ''History of the Land Called Uqbar'', a footnote informs us that Haslam is also the author of ''A General History of Labyrinths'' ([[labyrinth]]s as well as playfully fake literary references are a recurring theme in Borges's work). Silas Haslam is an entirely fictional character.<ref name=Guia/> However, Haslam's "General History of Labyrinths" has been cited twice in reputable, peer-reviewed scientific literature: in "Complexity of two-dimensional patterns", by Kristian Lindgren, Christopher Moore, and Mats Nordahl (published in the June 1998 edition of the ''Journal of Statistical Physics'') and "Order parameter equations for front transitions: Nonuniformly curved fronts," by A. Hagberg and E. Meron (published in the November 15, 1998 issue of ''Physica D'').<ref>Lindgren, Moore, Nordahl, [http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/publications/Working-Papers/97-03-023.ps Complexity of Two-Dimensional Patterns] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030817214558/http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/publications/Working-Papers/97-03-023.ps |date=2003-08-17 }} (2000). [http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/350354.html Citation list and access to article in various formats] at CiteSeer accessed 3 August 2006. Hagberg and Meron's citation is from the [[Institute for Scientific Information]]'s [[Web of Science]]([http://portal.isiknowledge.com/portal.cgi?DestApp=WOS&Func=Frame link]) (university subscription necessary), which notes both the Lindgren et al. citation and that of Hagberg and Meron in [http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/505714/description#description Physica D] (Nov 15 1998, pg. 460–473). Accessed September 9, 2006.</ref>
*[[Johannes Valentinus Andreä]] (1586–1654)—[[Germany|German]] [[theology|theologian]], and the real author of ''Chymische Hochzeit Christiani Rosencreutz anno 1459'' (''[[Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz]]''), one of the three founding works of the [[Rosicrucian]]s, but not of the ''Lesbare und lesenswerthe Bemerkungen über das Land Ukkbar in Klein-Asien'' (''Readable and worthwhile remarks about the country of Ukkbar in Asia Minor'') attributed to him in this story.
* [[Thomas De Quincey]] (1785–1859)—best known for his autobiographical works ''[[Confessions of an English Opium-Eater]]'' and ''[[Lake Reminiscences]]''.<ref name=Guia /> Mentioned in passing in the story (by his surname) for his ostensible (not independently verified) mention of Andreä.
* [[Carlos Mastronardi]] (1901–1976)—Argentinian writer, member of the [[Florida group|Martín Fierro group]] (also known as Florida group), and a close friend of Borges.<ref name=Guia /> In the story, he finds a copy of the ''Anglo-American Cyclopaedia'' that omits the Uqbar pages.
* Herbert Ashe (d. 1937)—presumably fictional, based on one or more of Borges's father's English friends. He shares with [[Xul Solar]] (see below) an interest in the [[duodecimal]] numeral system (in which twelve is written as 10.)
* Néstor Ibarra, [[Ezequiel Martínez Estrada]] (1895–1964), and [[Pierre Drieu La Rochelle|(Pierre) Drieu La Rochelle]] (1893–1945)—all historical, described in the story as engaged in a dispute over whether the discovery of ''A First Encyclopaedia of Tlön. Volume XI. Hlaer to Jangr'' implies the existence of the other volumes to which it makes references. Ibarra was a noted Argentinian poet (and Borges's translator into [[French language|French]]);<ref name=Guia /> Estrada, an Argentinian, was the author of, among other works, ''Muerte y transfiguración de Martín Fierro'' ("Death and Transfiguration of Martín Fierro"), a major commentary on Argentina's most famous nineteenth century literary work.<ref name=Guia /> [[Pierre Drieu La Rochelle|Drieu La Rochelle]], who was to commit suicide after becoming infamous for his collaboration with the [[Nazism|Nazis]] during the [[France during World War II|Occupation of France]], was one of the few foreign contributors to ''[[Sur (magazine)|Sur]]'', [[Victoria Ocampo]]'s Argentine journal to which Borges was a regular contributor.
* [[Alfonso Reyes]] (1889–1959)—[[Mexico|Mexican]] diplomat who served for a time in Argentina and was a mentor figure for young Borges.<ref name=Guia /> In the story, he proposes to recreate the missing volumes of ''A First Encyclopaedia of Tlön''.
* The philosopher [[Gottfried Leibniz|Leibniz]] (1646–1716) is mentioned in passing, and [[David Hume|Hume]] (1711–1776) is mentioned for finding Berkeley "unanswerable but thoroughly unconvincing."<ref name="tlon115" />
* Bishop [[George Berkeley]] (1685–1753), a driving engine of the story, was the founder of the modern school of philosophical [[idealism]].<ref name=Guia />
* [[Xul Solar]] (1887–1963)—adopted name of Oscar Agustín Alejandro Schulz Solari, Argentinian [[watercolor]]ist, esotericist, and (presumably most relevant here) inventor of imaginary languages.<ref name=Guia /> In the real world a close associate of Borges and a member of the Florida group; in the story, he skillfully translates one of the languages of the Southern Hemisphere of Tlön.
* [[Alexius Meinong]] (1853–1920)—Austrian psychologist and philosopher, who wrote ''Gegenstandstheorie'' ("The theory of objects"), where he wrote at length about the notion of objects that exist only in our minds. He is referred to by his surname in the story;<ref name=Guia /> his theories are alluded to by way of explaining the languages of the northern hemisphere of Tlön. Presumably, Borges is acknowledging where he got the idea for this imaginary family of languages.
* [[Bertrand Russell]] (1872–1970)—British philosopher. In a footnote, the story refers (accurately) to his conjecture that (in Borges's words) "[[Omphalos hypothesis#Five-minute hypothesis|our planet was created a few moments ago, and provided with a humanity which 'remembers' an illusory past]]."<ref>''The Analysis of Mind'', 1921, p. 159, cited in "Guía de lectura…"</ref>
* [[Baruch Spinoza]] (1632–1677)—[[Netherlands|Dutch]] / [[Portugal|Portuguese]] [[Jew]]ish philosopher, referred to in the story by his surname, and accurately paraphrased: "Spinoza attributes to his inexhaustible divinity the attributes of extension and of thought."
* Similarly, the story's use of the [[German language|German-language]] phrase ''Philosophie des Als Ob'' refers to philosopher [[Hans Vaihinger]] (1852–1933), whose book of this name (first edition: 1911) puts forward the notion that some human concepts are simply useful fictions.
* The [[Ancient Greece|ancient Greek]] philosopher [[Zeno of Elea|Zeno]] (490–430 BC) is accurately alluded to in the story for [[Zeno's paradoxes|his paradoxes]] denying the possibility of motion, based on the indivisibility of [[time]].
* The philosopher [[Arthur Schopenhauer]] (1788–1860), as with Meinong, is acknowledged, in this case for his ''[[Parerga and Paralipomena|Parerga und Paralipomena]]'',<ref name=Guia /> which Borges (apparently falsely) claims parallels a Tlönist "idealist [[pantheism]]". This is really the [[absolute idealism]] of Schopenhauer's despised rival, [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|Hegel]] (1770–1831), which was derived from [[Spinoza]]'s [[pantheism]]. Schopenhauer does not assert that there is only one subject and that this one subject is every being in the universe; on the contrary, he asserts that each individual observing animal is a unique subject, having its own point of view of the objects that it experiences. Presumably Borges's related remark about preserving a psychological basis for the sciences is something of a joke on preserving a scientific basis for psychology.
* [[William Shakespeare]] (1564–1616)—English poet, playwright, and actor. Merely alluded to in the story, without fictional embellishment.
* Gunnar Erfjord is presumably not a real person. The name is a combination of Gunnar Lange and Berta Erfjord, parents of Argentinian author [[Norah Lange]],<ref>Fredrik Wandrup, [http://www.dagbladet.no/kultur/1999/10/07/179473.html Vår mann i Latin-Amerika], ''Dagbladet'' (Norway), 7 October 1999. Accessed 3 August 2006.</ref> another member of the Martín Fierro group. At the beginning of the postscript to the story, a letter from Gunnar Erfjord clears up the mystery of the "benevolent secret society" that devised Tlön.<ref>"Tlön…", p. 119–20</ref> He is presumably also the "[[Norway|Norwegian]] in [[Rio Grande do Sul]]" mentioned early in the story.<ref name="tlon113" />
* [[Charles Howard Hinton]] (1853–1907) was an eccentric British mathematician, associated with the [[Theosophy (Blavatskian)|theosophists]]; Borges later edited and wrote a prologue for a translation of Hinton's "scientific romances", and also alludes to him in the story "There are More Things", in the ''Book of Sand'' (1975). In "Tlön...", the letter from Gunnar Erfjord is found "in a volume of Hinton", presumably invoked for his interest in extra dimensions and parallel worlds.
* [[George Dalgarno]] (1626–1687), seventeenth-century [[Scotland|Scottish]] intellectual with an interest in linguistics, and inventor of a language for [[Deaf-mute|deaf mutes]].<ref name=Guia /> He is alluded to by his last name as an early member (along with Berkeley) of the fictional secret society that sets in motion the story of the doubly fictional Uqbar (and the triply fictional Tlön).
* Ezra Buckley (d. 1848), the eccentric American benefactor who expands the scale of the Uqbarist enterprise to a full Tlönist encyclopedic undertaking, is entirely fictional. It has been conjectured that there is an allusion to [[Ezra Pound]].<ref name=Guia /> His nationality and greater aspiration can also be a reference to American ambition.
* María Lidia Lloveras (1898–?)—Argentinian, married into an old French [[nobility|noble]] family, making her Princess Faucigny Lucinge. She lived in Buenos Aires and was a friend of Borges. In the story, under her royal title, she stumbles across one of the first objects from Tlön to appear in our world.
* [[Enrique Amorim]] (1900–1960)<ref name=Guia />—[[Uruguay]]an novelist.<ref name=Guia /> In the story, along with Borges, he witnesses the Tlönic coins that have fallen from the pocket of a dead man.
* [[Francisco de Quevedo]] (1580–1645)—[[Baroque]] [[Spain|Spanish]] poet and [[picaresque]] novelist, is alluded to here simply for his writing style.
* [[Thomas Browne]] (1605–1682), seventeenth-century English physician and essayist, is indeed the author of ''[[Hydriotaphia, Urn Burial|Urn Burial]]'',<ref name=Guia /> which at the end of the story the fictional Borges is translating, though without intent to publish.