Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote

One feature of “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” is the unique and paradoxical nature of Borges’s exploration of The Relationship Between Reader and Author. The absurdity of Menard’s quest to fully recreate Don Quixote from scratch is taken seriously by the fictional critic. This creates a clear sense of dramatic irony; the reader seems to be the only person privy to the idea that Menard’s project might be ridiculous and futile.

The absurd nature of the fictional project serves to highlight the tension between the stated intentions of an author and that author’s reception by readers. The majority of the text serves one of two functions for the reader: either stressing the importance of Menard’s literary credentials or analyzing the comparative weight of his Don Quixote versus the original.

The first half of the text is primarily concerned with making the reader aware of the literary importance of Pierre Menard. Early on, the critic states his whole reason for writing this piece of criticism: He wants to defend Menard’s reputation against the “omissions and additions perpetrated by Mme. Henri Bachelier in a deceitful catalogue” (Paragraph 1). Thus, Mme. Henri Bachelier is commentating on a recreation of Don Quixote, and the unnamed critic is responding to Bachelier’s response. As more layers of removal occur from the original work, Borges emphasizes the ludicrous nature of literary criticism.

The tone of the story Is, on the outside, one of righteous indignation. Menard’s reputation, the critic seems to be implying, is so important to the field that Mme. Bachelier’s errors could have a severe impact. This defensiveness is followed by many indications of the wide influence of Menard, as well as a long list of his publications, which grow in obscurity and density throughout. This serves to prime the reader’s expectations for the rest of the story—the critic’s comedic obsession with literary obscurity allows the reader to participate in critique—that of the critic himself.

However, the project that Menard never completed was self-evidently absurd and impossible. The tension between Menard’s importance and the nature of his project creates a paradox in the reader’s head: The public and critical response to a piece of literature always depends, at least partially, on the reader’s knowledge of the author and the time period in which the work was written.

The paradoxical nature of this work marks it in contrast to many of the ideals of Modernism, despite the narrative’s use of Modernist literary techniques. Modernism claims to represent deeper truths about human nature than were previously accessed by other movements. However, by creating this paradox, the narrative rejects the idea that accessing truth is even possible in art. The paradox implies that two contrasting concepts—the best way to interpret art is as contextually neutral as possible, and it is impossible to be fully neutral when interpreting—exist simultaneously. Thus, the narrative implies that accessing the objective meaning of a text is an impossible undertaking.

The second half of the narrative, which is primarily concerned with comparing the two versions of Don Quixote, reinforces this concept. The critic declares that Menard’s Don Quixote is actually “more subtle than Cervantes” (Paragraph 31), due to the intervening four centuries of historical context between their two compositions even though the two texts are identical. The critic analyzes the choices that each author made in their narratives in terms of setting, characterization, writing style, and themes and makes the argument that identical choices become non-identical through their contexts; in the novel by Cervantes, the 1^6th-century Spanish setting is “crude,” while that same setting is considered interesting and inspired in the hands of Menard.

This tension between historical context and context-neutral interpretation is one of the central disagreements between Modernism and Postmodernism. The choice of form for this story, that of a work of literary criticism, also can be viewed through this lens. In choosing to parody this form, Borges allows an exploration of The Nature of Literary Criticism by exaggerating some of its elements, primarily its intertextuality and density, both of which are taken to their extremes in this story. However, that prose density serves to parody the self-important style of literary critics. This playfulness is typical of Borges; in his work, he constantly engages with and simultaneously critiques the literary scene around him. In that way, “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” is a great example of Borges’s style and perspective. His ability to create, interpret, and explore impossibilities and paradoxes is one of the reasons that he is often considered a transitional figure between Modernism and Postmodernism.

However, Borges does not just parody literary critics, but also Don Quixote itself. In that book, the protagonist, a nobleman from La Mancha named Don Quixote, reads so many chivalric romances (which were a major literary fad at the time) that he decides to embark on a foolish quest to become a knight-errant. Menard’s quest to recreate this story is just as impossible and futile. However, Menard’s obsession with Don Quixote, to the point where he wants to embody its compositional process, is just as unrealistic. By making the absurdity of Menard’s project a reflection of Don Quixote’s original quest, Borges illustrates the way in which literature can be reflective of reality, but also the way in which reality can reflect literature. In revering Menard’s rendition and casting aside the identical original, Borges highlights the analytic pageantry that can accompany literary reviews and the world of literature at large.

All of these various paradoxes and impossibilities also show the narrative’s perspective on Finding Meaning in Literature. Both Menard’s and Cervantes’s texts are identical, so the meaning that can be inferred (and that the critic does infer) stems entirely from the historical context of their compositions. Therefore, the conclusions that the critic draws about the comparative subtlety of Menard’s Don Quixote act more as a referendum on the current literary scene in which the critic is a part, rather than the work itself. The narrative seems to be implying, then, that literary works hold no inherent meaning; meaning, rather, is externally imposed by those who read and interpret the text. Texts can only create meaning in comparison to other texts, and to reinforce this notion, the story is extremely intertextual, and constantly references and critiques other works of art and criticism.