Contents
On the threshold of the world of Borges, we are dizzy. Borges seems to grab us with pincers, but at the same time attracts and fascinates. Everything that seemed natural before him becomes unreal, huge, endless with him. And it is in the whirlwind of his countless abstractions and references, his impossible plots that something makes us savor this intoxicating taste of the complexity and intricacies of everything in the world.
keys to understanding
Transforming your own history
Borges shows a person in the infinity of his abilities and skills. Life is an interweaving of endless branching paths: before each event, we are free to choose from different “future options”, that is, different alternatives. Our personal lives are but a thread in an endless web of possible realities. An eternal game of chess with unpredictable possibilities.
Read more:
- Can I forgive myself?
double maze
The image of a mirror, often present in the works of Borges, refers us to the splitting-multiplication of personality, to other “Selves” that live in each of us. The labyrinth with its false paths symbolizes the inhospitable attitude of reality towards life, which comes from only one mind. In addition, the labyrinth is a symbol of loss: it is with this that the search for Something in the endless cycle of life ends, Something (God or man) in which one can find oneself.
inner eye
As Italo Calvino wrote, “Borges always had the ability to ‘see’ things and help readers see them.” Borges, the blind seer, teaches us to look not with our eyes, but with our inner eye, in the hopeless darkness. Life is not only reality and consciousness, but also dreams, memory, unconscious activity, secrets, something inexpressible, gods and demons. Cyberspace. Not only what can be seen and touched, but also what does not exist, what cannot be touched or seen – all this is part of our life and therefore equally valuable. Reality is not always the way we see it. Reality (physical and mental) is always mixed with fiction.
Jorge Luis Borges
“Book of books. Volume of Secrets”
“I always imagined Paradise as something like a library,” admitted Jorge Luis Borges, the famous Argentine writer, who also won the fame of “the most important reader of the twentieth century.” Borges was a librarian for 27 years. A great systematizer and mystifier, he embodied his passion for books not only in his own work, but also in compiling anthologies.
The pleasure of reading
“I’ve always been more of a reader than a writer.” Borges lived among books, with books, in books – real and invented. Reading was for Borges one of the forms of happiness. He said that “no one obliges us to read a book from the first to the last page. If the book is boring to you, put it down – it means it was not written for you. Borges also teaches us to live literature as an act of creation, adhering to everyday life. In other words, to let your own knowledge into your relationship with life. The book offers, asks and calls, comes to life, while the reader, with the help of the book and his imagination, returns to forgotten places, resurrects memories and different states of mind. Thus the reader becomes in his imagination the author of the book he is reading.
Read more:
- What is the meaning of life: a question that has no answer?
its dates
- 1899: Born August 24 in Buenos Aires. His father, Jorge Guillermo, was a lawyer, as well as a professor of English and psychology.
- 1906: Borges writes his first short story, The Decisive Visor, inspired by an episode from Don Quixote. Three years later, El pais published his Spanish translation of Oscar Wilde’s The Happy Prince.
- 1914–1921: Borges travels to Europe with his parents. During his studies he attends lectures in Lugano, Geneva and Spain.
- 1923: Returning to Argentina, Borges publishes his first poetry collection, The Fire of Buenos Aires, and establishes a literary magazine.
- 1937: Borges gets his first job at the city library as an assistant.
- 1941: Borges publishes the collection of short stories “Fictions”, in 1949 – the collection “Aleph”, and in 1952 – the collection “New Investigations”.
- 1955: Borges is appointed director of the national library.
- 1970: Borges publishes The Brody Message, a collection of 11 short stories dedicated to his elderly mother.
- 1972: Borges’ collection “Gold of the Tigers” is released.
- 1986: Borges dies of cancer on June 14 in Geneva. Until his death, he was greatly supported by his second wife, Maria Kodama.