Elisabeth Jeremko

For Borges’ story, “The Lottery in Babylon”, I was immediately enthralled within the first paragraph. Borges jam-packs emotions, philosophies, poetry, mathematics, and belief-systems all into one paragraph. Some sense of hierarchy or difference between this narrator to others. I love how Borges uses such images as being invisible and the moon in conjunction with the idea of knowing uncertainty. Furthermore, I think its neat that Borges then goes on to attribute this uncertainty and all other qualities mentioned in the first paragraph to the Lottery. By organizing the story in such a way, the Lottery is pronounced to be of great significance, without the reader even realizing how it operates or what exactly it is. This is an example of how Borges can add complexity to a short story. I really like how Borges presents the discourse of chance and the possibility of a God-driven series of incidents through the whole organization of the Company and the Lottery. I am still confused as to what the Company itself represents and if it is painted as completely positive or negative. “That silent functioning, like God’s, inspires all manner of conjectures” ( Borges, 106) makes the Company seem neither good nor bad. Does Borges not really even make a judgment here in this story? Or is the Company criticized? This I am still not really sure.