Visit to the Scriptorium

William and Adso visit the scriptorium, where they meet the librarian Malachi of Hildesheim and other monks. They see the illuminated manuscripts of the dead Adelmo, which are filled with grotesque and fantastical marginalia. This leads to a heated debate with the blind old monk Jorge of Burgos, who condemns laughter and such images as sinful. The debate touches on the nature of truth, the use of metaphor, and the lost second book of Aristotle's Poetics.