A short story The Secret Miracle by Jorge Luis Borges is written in the genre of magic realism and contains such characteristics of this genre as a mix of unreal events and reality and emphasis of mystery that can be found in usual life. Being in jail, Jaromir faces the miracle forces that help him to continue writing his drama. The storyteller wants to emphasize the cruel reality of life and that the horror of War can be replaced by another magic world of dreams where Jewish are not considered as the lower race and should be eliminated and where Jaromir can find relaxation and inspiration.
The story begins when a man named Jaromir has a dream about the chess game. Thus, the readers can comprehend that this man lives in a surreal or magic world not related to the reality: “The dreamer ran across the sands of a rainy desert – and he could not remember the chessmen or the rules of chess” (Borges). One of the major characters of magic realism is an attempt by the main hero to find God. He sees a dream that describes his traveling around the Clementinum library where he tries to find God. A man tells him that God contains in one of the letters of one of the thousands of books in this library. Jaromir does not have enough time to find it.
During the Second World War, one can find refuge only in dreams. This idea is a good example of how magic can cross reality which seems surreal due to the terrible events happening around. Jaromir considers himself as an unsuccessful writer who is ready to meet his death. However, some mysterious power encourages him to write and, “faithful to this feeble magic”, he inspires to finish his best drama and dies killed by the Nazis.
Works Cited
Borges, Jorge Luis. The Secret Miracle. Web.