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Article published In:
Translation and Interpreting Studies
Vol. 12:1 (2017) ► pp.49–70

The Gospel according to Borges

The spiny authorial roles of Bible interpreters and translators

| Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis
Borges’s “Gospel According to Mark,” written 1,900 years after the first biblical Gospel by the same name, provides a compelling illustration of how translators always play a visible, creative role in the work they perform (even when they do not realize it or want this role). The characters’ interaction with the Bible is an ideal platform to explore some complex notions that stem from postmodern conceptions of translation, such as the complicated relationship established between translators, their translations and audience. Furthermore, it is worth noting that Mark had a considerable impact on two of the three other Gospel authors, and that the Bible has had immeasurable impact on the general interpretation and translation of texts around the world. Borges’s story may seem to portray an absurd misreading of the Mark, but I propose that this radical misreading is not altogether different from the millions of interactions with the texts that have been responsible for creating and disseminating the Bible. Through brief histories of both Mark and the Vulgate in tandem with Borges’s text, we can understand that millions of nameless translators, interpreters and scribes have been responsible for actually creating what is now, in a fragmented nature, the Bible.
Keywords: Borges, the Bible, “The Gospel according to Mark”, postmodern translation theory
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • The events at Los Alamos
  • Spiny authority
  • Early manuscripts of Mark
  • Evolution of the Vulgate
  • Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References


This article is currently available as a sample article.

Published online: 13 April 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tis.12.1.03van
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