Contact: Rick Peterson, Manager of News Services, 920-832-6590
For Immediate Release
April 24, 2000

Works of Acclaimed Argentinean Writer Jorge Borges Discussed in Lawrence
Lecture


     APPLETON, WIS. -- The works of internationally acclaimed
Argentinean poet, essayist and short-story author Jorge Luis Borges and
his fascination with the broad themes of space and time, linearity and
nonlinearity, infinity and finitude will be examined in a Lawrence
University Main Hall Forum.
     Floyd Merrell, professor of Spanish and semiotics at Purdue
University, presents, "Borges and the Paradoxical Nature of the World,"
Tuesday, May 2 at 4:30 p.m. in Main Hall, Room 109.  The event is free
and open to the public.
     Obsessed with concepts that still puzzle physicists, philosophers
and mathematicians, Borges wrote tales of fantasy and dream worlds that
have become classics of 20th-century world literature.  Merrell will
discuss the relevance of Borges' short stories with respect to current
scientific interpretations of relativity, quantum theory and chaos
theory.  Among the Borges' works that Merrell will focus on are "The
Zahir," "The Library of Babel," and łThe Garden of Forking Paths." 
     A specialist in contemporary Spanish-American prose and the author
of the book, "Unthinking Thinking: Jorge Luis Borges, Mathematics and
the ŚNew Physics,'" Merrell has taught at Purdue since 1973.  He earned
his Ph.D. at the University of New Mexico.