Comparative Literature Ph.D., Librarian of Babel

The cover of the book Tar for Mortar: The Library of Babel and the Dream of Totality by Jonathan Basile. It consists of a beehive pattern of interlocking hexagons, the floor plan of the Library of Babel.
Available in English and Portuguese translation

“Basile [...] has written a brilliant book about Borges — that would be enough of a great thing for me — which also has important things to say about intellectual ambition, irony, language, and the things that the Digital Humanities can and cannot reveal.” -Steve Mentz


The cover of the book Massa Por Argamassa, Portuguese translation of Tar for Mortar. It consists of the title in a black hexagon, over a picture of a material like broken asphalt.

The Epic of Genesis: Catherine Malabou and the gêne of Epigenetics

Derrida Today, 16(2), Nov 2023


Symbioautothanatosis: Science as Symbiont in the Work of Lynn Margulis

Síntesis: Revista de Filosofía, 4(2), 2021


Other Matters: Karen Barad's Two Materialisms and the Science of Undecidability

Angelaki, 25(5), Sep 2020


Kant's Parasite: Sublime Biodeconstruction

CR: The New Centennial Review, Winter 2019


Massa por Argamassa: A “Biblioteca de Babel” e o Sonho de Totalidade [Portuguese Translation of Tar for Mortar]

punctum books [Open Access], August 2019


Life/Force: Novelty and New Materialism in Jane Bennett’s Vibrant Matter

SubStance, 48(2), August 2019


How the Other Half-Lives: Life as Identity and Difference in Bennett and Schrödinger

Postmodern Culture [Open Access], 29(1), September 2018


The New Novelty: Corralation as Quarantine in Speculative Realism and New Materialism

Derrida Today, 11(2), November 2018


Borges y Yo, Eiron y Alazon: Irony in “The Library of Babel” and “Pierre Menard”

Variaciones Borges, 46, November 2018


Misreading Generalised Writing: From Foucault to Speculative Realism and New Materialism

Oxford Literary Review, 40(1), July 2018


Tar for Mortar: “The Library of Babel” and the Dream of Totality

punctum books [Open Access], March 2018



REVIEWS:
Review: Derrida, Jacques. Life Death

Philosophy Today, 65(2), Spring 2021


Review: Stijn De Cauwer, ed. Critical Theory at a Crossroads: Conversations on Resistance in Times of Crisis

Environmental Philosophy, 16(1), Spring 2019


Review: Biodeconstruction: Jacques Derrida and the Life Sciences, by Francesco Vitale

Critical Inquiry, October 2018 (online), Autumn 2019 46.1 (print)



E-mail

jonathan [dot] e [dot] basile [at] gmail [dot] com


Curriculum Vitae


Necrophage

minor literature[s], 8.24.2016


Sacral

Litro, 1.24.2016


Derrida and the New: Deconstruction, Speculative Realism, and New Materialism

A summary of The New Novelty

Edinburgh University Press Blog, 11.19.2018


You Don’t Know Jacques: Speculative Realism, New Materialism, and the Denial of Deconstruction

A summary of Misreading Generalised Writing

Edinburgh University Press Blog, 6.15.2018


Striking Resemblances

UIUC graduate workers’ action is part of a nationwide movement

Public Books, 4.5.2018


Excerpt from Tar for Mortar

Blog of the APA, 3.19.2018


Review: Stolen Oranges by Max Yeh

minor literature[s], 3.2.2018


Borges and Philosophy

Blog of the APA, 2.21.2018


Translating Babel

Inventory, Winter 2017


Publish It Yourself: The End of Alienated Labor in the Academic Publishing Industry

Berfrois, 11.7.2016


Derrida’s Seminars: Writing Before Writing Before the Letter

3:AM Magazine, 9.12.2016


Who’s Afraid of AAARG?

Academic publishing and the uncertain future of the humanities.
Guernica, 8.25.2016 | 中文, 微批 Paratext, 10.4.2016


Putting Borges’ Infinite Library on the Internet

Electric Lit, 6.21.2016,
Note: The editor chose the title, thus the erroneous "infinite"


On Exactitude in Maps

On Borges and Distant Reading
Territory, 5.4.2016


(Re)Creating Borges’ Library of Babel

kadar koli 10: Off the Books, 1.23.2016


Construir La Biblioteca de Babel. Entrevista con Jonathan Basile

Nexos, 8.23.2015
Published in Perfil, 8.16.2015, Print only


The Library of Babel as Seen from Within

The Paris Review Daily, 7.23.2015


Brooklyn Author Recreates Borges’ Library of Babel

Flavorwire, 4.23.2015
Note: I was living in DC at the time.


Borges’ “Library of Babel” comes to virtual life

Los Angeles Times, 4.29.2015


Jorge Luis Borges’ “Library of Babel” Is Now a Real Website. Borges Would Be Alarmed.

Slate (browbeat), 4.30.2015


Virtual Library of Babel Makes Borges’s Infinite Store of Books a Reality - Almost

The Guardian, 5.4.2015


Jorge Luis Borges fan brings his infinite library to life online

The Independent, 5.4.2015


La “biblioteca totale” di Borges realizzata al pc

La Stampa, 5.22.2015


Jorge Luis Borges’s infinite “Library of Babel” has been digitized

Quartz, 7.7.2015


El bibliotecario de Babel: la ficción de Borges hecha realidad virtual

La Nacion, 7.23.2015


This Digital Library Contains Every Phrase That Could Ever Be Uttered

Smithsonian Magazine, October 2015


How Do You Design a UX for Infinity?

Co.Design, 12.18.2015


Il a créé la bibliothèque infinie

Paris Match, 7.3.2016


Borges, esencial para el presente

Excelsior, 5.24.2019
Note: Most of the quotations here are the opposite of what I said in the interview


Babel ou la bibliothèque infinie, regorge de textes qui n'existent pas encore

Sciences et Avenir, 7.26.2020

libraryofbabel.info

Universal Library Modeled after Borges’s


Babel Image Archives

Universal Image Archives


libraryofbabel.info algorithm/code

Open Source on GitHub


libraryofbabel.info External Resource Locator

Browser Extension: Chrome | Firefox | Safari


Messages For the Future

VSauce Explains the Algorithm


El universo, que otros llaman la biblioteca...

TEDx USagradoCorazón, 10.16.2015


Uninventional

Recess Art, 11.9.2015


Borges’ “The Library of Babel”

Modified English translation


Unpublished di Giovanni Translations (design by Dan Visel)

The Garden of Branching Paths | The Maker