The Sect of the Phoenix

Infobox short story |
name = The Sect of the Phoenix
title_orig = La secta del Fénix
translator = Anthony Bonner
author = Jorge Luis Borges
country = flagicon|Argentina Argentina
language = Spanish
series =
genre = Fantasy, short story
published_in = "Ficciones" (2nd ed)
publisher =
media_type = Print
pub_date = 1952
english_pub_date = 1962
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"The Sect of the Phoenix" (original Spanish title: "La secta del Fénix") is a short story by Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, first published in "Sur" in 1952. It was included in the 1956 edition of "Ficciones", part two ("Artifices"). The title has also been translated as "The Cult of the Phoenix".

Plot summary

Borges gives an enigmatic description (or at least, assertion of the existence) of a secret society dating back to ancient times, the members of which "resemble every man in the world" and whose membership consists simply of the performance of a strange ritual.

Essentially the story is an extended riddle, the mysterious description referring to a commonplace fact (as Borges points out in the prologue to "Artifices"). The probable and common answer is that the riddle refers to sexual intercourse, and Borges himself confessed as much [cite book |last=Williamson |first=Edwin |title=Borges, a Life |year=2004 |isbn=0670885794: “years later Borges would tell Ronald Christ that he meant the Secret to refer to sexual intercourse”.] . However, in relation to the debate on Borges' sexual orientation, it is argued by some [Daniel Balderston, "The "Fecal Dialectic": Homosexual Panic and the Origin of Writing in Borges", Borges Studies Online, University of Iowa, [http://borges.uiowa.edu/bsol/bgay.php] ] that the secret Borges had in mind was, more specifically, homosexual intercourse or homosexuality in general; to support this, they point to such clues as “scattered across the face of the earth, […] only one thing — the Secret — unites them and will unite them until the end of time”, which do not fit well with the hypothesis of sexual intercourse in general.

References