Jorge Luis Borges Criticism
Jorge Luis Borges, an eminent Argentinian author, stands as a pivotal figure in 20th-century literature, celebrated for his innovative narratives that blur the boundaries between reality and fiction. His literary oeuvre spans a diverse array of genres, including short stories, poetry, essays, and translations, marked by a unique blend of fantasy and realism that engages themes such as time, infinity, and identity. Borges's initial foray into literature was influenced by the avant-garde Ultraísta movement, which is evident in his early poetry characterized by metaphor and abstraction. However, as seen in his later work, Borges adopted a neoclassical style, emphasizing formal precision and classical poetic elements, as highlighted by Thorpe Running.
Borges's narrative mastery is perhaps most evident in his seminal collections such as Ficciones and The Aleph, which remain foundational texts in his legacy. These works explore philosophical and existential themes, creating complex worlds that challenge conventional understandings of time and reality. His short stories often feature paradoxical and labyrinthine plots, a style that has influenced the magical realism of Latin American literature, impacting writers such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Julio Cortázar, as discussed by James Neilson.
Borges's influence extends beyond Latin America, reaching global literary figures like Umberto Eco. As Leo Corry examines, Borges's work has significantly impacted Eco's The Name of the Rose. Borges's fascination with language and its possibilities, as explored by Jon Stewart, further underscores his lasting influence on literary and philosophical thought.
Borges's work is often praised for its intellectual rigor and imaginative depth. Critics such as Mark Couture highlight the metaphysical intensity of his poetry, which, despite being overshadowed by his fiction, holds significant depth. His essays, like those in Other Inquisitions, analyzed by James E. Irby, delve into a range of philosophical and aesthetic questions, challenging readers to engage with complex ideas.
Despite his complex and sometimes controversial political views, Borges's literary achievements remain his defining legacy. His critique of authoritarian regimes, along with his support for figures like Pinochet, adds a layer of complexity to his public persona. Nevertheless, his prolific career and the profound impact of his work on global literature cement his status as a cornerstone of 20th-century literary innovation. Borges's exploration of existential themes and the fictive nature of literature, as discussed by Carter Wheelock, continues to captivate and challenge audiences worldwide.
Contents
- Principal Works
- Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 6)
- Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 3)
- Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 8)
- Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 4)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 83)
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Labyrinths
(summary)
Irby provides an overview of Borges's main themes and literary techniques, discussing his transition from poetry to short narratives and the evolution of his work in response to the changing socio-political landscape. He highlights Borges's shift from nationalistic themes to a broader context of universal processes, illustrating how Borges's later works reflect a coherent fictional world of intelligence amidst physical and societal turmoil.
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Dreamtigers
(summary)
In the following excerpt from his introduction to Dreamtigers, Enguídanos discusses why Borges felt this collection of story fragments, parables, and poems was the culmination of his literary career. Borges considered El hacedor—translated as Dreamtigers—his book most likely to be remembered when all the rest are forgotten, and that it would make his earlier works unnecessary. Enguídanos reflects on the nature of El hacedor as a miscellany that corresponds to a high poetic criterion, creating a book that mirrors a life of internal reflection and solitude.
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Other Inquisitions
(summary)
In the following essay—his introduction to Other Inquisitions—Irby discusses the varied subjects and subtle interconnections of Borges's essays. Otras inquisiciones (Other Inquisitions) is Borges' best collection of essays, and forms a necessary complement to the stories of Ficciones and El Aleph, which have made him famous. The present collection's curiously ancillary title is therefore ambiguous and ironic. 'Other' can mean 'more of the same' or 'different,' reflecting the essays' pursuit of multiple meanings and dubitative style.
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Borges and Film
(summary)
In the following essay, which originally appeared in Spanish in 1980, Cozarinsky examines Borges's narrative techniques, arguing that his style is strongly influenced by classical Hollywood film editing and the 'serializing' of 'significant moments.'
- Jorge Luis Borges with Roberto Alifano (interview date 1981–1983)
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Borges's Significance as an International Literary Figure
(summary)
In the following essay, Neilson discusses Borges's significance as an international literary figure, assessing the strengths and weaknesses of his work as well as his relationship with Argentine and Latin American culture.
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Stanton Hager (essay date 1985)
(summary)
In the following essay, Hager examines the ways in which Borges's works poignantly satirize humanity's attempts to construct rational, systematic explanations of the universe.
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The Literature of Exhaustion
(summary)
Epstein qualifies his enthusiasm for Borges's writings with the argument that, ultimately, Borges's work does not match the standards set by Marcel Proust, Franz Kafka, and James Joyce.
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Borges and the Feminine: The Representation of Women in Borges's Work
(summary)
In the following essay, Brodzki analyzes Borges's representation of female characters and their role in his attempts to discuss the absolute, the 'unrepresentable.' She examines the relationship between woman and representation in Borges's work, focusing on how symbols of the feminine serve his mystical interests and how the machismo cult inscribes women within a classic erotic triangle. Brodzki argues that Borges's concept of the universal does not exclude the feminine and that gender considerations extend our understanding of his poetics.
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Edna Aizenberg (essay date 1992)
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Aizenberg discusses the influence Borges's work has on postcolonial literature and criticism.
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Labyrinths
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 19)
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Martin S. Stabb
(summary)
In the following essay, Martin S. Stabb explores Borges's poetry, particularly in works like Fervor de Buenos Aires and Luna de enfrente, arguing that they reveal a more sincere, introspective, and affective side of Borges, distinct from the playful nature of his prose, while addressing themes of time, memory, and the nature of reality.
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Jaime Alazraki
(summary)
In the following essay, Jaime Alazraki argues that Jorge Luis Borges uses metaphysical and theological themes in his stories to explore the nature of reality, identity, and the universe, presenting them through symbols, allegories, and a blend of fiction and philosophy that challenges the boundaries between abstraction and concrete reality.
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Books Considered: 'Chronicles of Bustos Domecq'
(summary)
In the following essay, Clarence Brown analyzes Borges' "Chronicles of Bustos Domecq," highlighting its humorous and daring self-parody of both Borges' own works and the broader Western literary tradition, while emphasizing Borges' unique style and the tension between his modernist imagination and traditionalist temperament.
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Borges on the Right
(summary)
In the following essay, Katherine Singer KováCs explores Borges's belief in the interchangeable identities of authors and readers, highlighting how Borges's dismissal of personal biography reflects his monistic view that individual identity is an illusion, and emphasizing the reader’s crucial role in the creative process as illustrated in works like "Pierre Menard."
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Psychological Motivation in Borges' 'Emma Zunz'
(summary)
In the following essay, Joseph Chrzanowski explores the complex psychological motivations behind Emma Zunz's actions, arguing that Borges's protagonist is driven by a neurotic love-hate conflict with incestuous undertones towards her father, rather than a straightforward desire for vengeance, thereby highlighting the depth of her characterization.
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'You, Fictional Reader …': Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, A. E. Dyson examines Jorge Luis Borges's use of skepticism, his playful treatment of art and life as games, and his critique of religious and political ideologies, emphasizing his creation of vivid images and paradoxes that invite readers to explore profound metaphysical and existential questions.
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Mirror of Words: Language in Agnon and Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Murray Baumgarten explores the thematic and structural parallels between the works of Jorge Luis Borges and S. Y. Agnon, focusing on their shared use of language as a self-reflexive, dreamlike narrative tool that challenges realist conventions, while both authors engage with their cultural and literary traditions to create texts infused with symbolic and interpretative depth.
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Doubles and Counterparts: Patterns of Interchangeability in Borges' 'The Garden of Forking Paths'
(summary)
In the following essay, Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan explores how Jorge Luis Borges' "The Garden of Forking Paths" uses structural analogies between characters and narrative levels to challenge classical oppositions, thereby highlighting themes of paradox, the disintegration and redefinition of identity, and the interchangeability of concepts such as time and timelessness, speech and action.
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Martin S. Stabb
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 10)
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The Reality of Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Robert Scholes explores Borges's intricate relationship with the themes of fiction and reality, arguing that Borges's works challenge the boundaries between language and reality, illustrating that fiction acts as both a mirror and a map, leading readers toward deeper truths beyond mere representation.
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Robert Martin Adams
(summary)
In the following essay, Robert Martin Adams argues that Borges's fiction, characterized by logical paradoxes and structuralist tendencies, presents a self-reflective labyrinth of ideas that questions identity and reality, differentiating his work from contemporaries like Joyce through a mesmerizing, intellectual exploration rather than emotional engagement.
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Jorge Luis Borges and the Loss of Being: Structuralist Themes in 'Dr. Brodie's Report'
(summary)
In the following essay, Robert Magliola analyzes "Dr. Brodie's Report" through a structuralist lens, exploring how Borges employs techniques such as binary opposition, recurring themes, and language as a non-referential system to illustrate a world where man has lost primordial contact with Being.
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The Reality of Borges
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 13)
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Borges, Courage, and Will
(summary)
In the following essay, Carter Wheelock argues that Jorge Luis Borges's exploration of duels and acts of courage in his stories symbolizes a deeper philosophical inquiry into the concepts of will, identity, and existential choice, portraying courage not as mere physical bravado but as a metaphor for personal autonomy and the rejection of authoritarian doctrines.
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John Sturrock
(summary)
In the following essay, John Sturrock argues that Jorge Luis Borges's works explore the interplay between fiction and reality, employing metaphysical and philosophical concepts to highlight the fictive nature of literature, while emphasizing language's limitations in representing reality and the crucial role of isolation and imagination in the creative process.
- Anthony Kerrigan
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Gold and Sand
(summary)
In the following essay, Grace Schulman explores the complex interplay of symbols and themes such as blindness, sight, solitude, unity, and the pursuit of truth in Borges's later works, The Gold of the Tigers and The Book of Sand, highlighting their reflection on human insight and the illusory nature of reality.
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Borges as a Writer of Parables: Reversal and Infinite Regression
(summary)
In the following essay, Robin Lydenberg examines Jorge Luis Borges's literature as a complex interplay of paradox and reversal, challenging readers' assumptions and expectations, and argues that despite Borges's claims of avoiding moral instruction, his works function similarly to parables by engaging readers in a dialogue that blurs the lines between reality and fiction.
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Borges, Courage, and Will
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 32)
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Whitman as Inscribed in Borges
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Bastos argues that Walt Whitman is a major influence on Borges's poetry.
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The Eye of the Mind: Borges and Wallace Stevens
(summary)
In the following essay, Cañas explores affinities between Borges and the poet Wallace Stevens.
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Borges and Emerson: The Poet as Intellectual
(summary)
In the following essay, Holditch examines Borges's appreciation of and affinity with Ralph Waldo Emerson as a poet.
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Borges and Browning: A Dramatic Dialogue
(summary)
In the following essay, Jones explores Borges's debt to Robert Browning, especially, in his adaptation of the dramatic monologue.
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Oriental Influences in Borges' Poetry: The Nature of the Haiku and Western Literature
(summary)
In the following essay, Kodama discusses Borges's use of the traditional Japanese poetic forms of tanka and haiku.
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Enumerations as Evocations: On the Use of a Device in Borges' Late Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Alazraki discusses Borges' use of the device of enumeration in his poetry.
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Outside and Inside the Mirror in Borges' Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Alazraki discusses the significance of mirrors in Borges's poetry.
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Language as a Musical Organism: Borges' Later Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Alazraki examines Borges's later poetry, and praises its ability to convey “verbal music.”
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The Mystical Experience in Borges: A Problem of Perception
(summary)
In the following essay, Giskin explores the role and significance of mythical experience in Borges's work.
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The Making of a Writer
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Stabbs examines Borges's early poetry, noting that while Borges became famous as a writer through his prose, he began as a poet and reveals more of himself in his verse. The poetry reflects a different side of Borges, contrasting with the capriciousness of his prose.
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A Late Harvest
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Stabb offers a brief survey of Borges's later poetry.
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A review of The Preface and John 1:14
(summary)
In the following essay, Polette finds similarities in the conception of God held by Borges and that of seventeenth-century Puritan minister, Edward Taylor.
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Medieval Germanic Elements in the Poetry of Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Tyler demonstrates Borges's interest in medieval Germanic literature, and points to elements of it in his poetry.
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The Ghost of Whitman in Neruda and Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Coleman demonstrates the strong influence of Walt Whitman on the poetry of both Borges and the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. Coleman focuses on the contrasting effects of this influence on the two poets.
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Manometre (1922–28) and Borge's First Publications in France
(summary)
In the following essay, Shaw introduces two of Borges's earliest poems, including variants and a French translation of one, which were discovered in a little-known magazine published in Paris in the 1920s.
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What to Make of an Even More Diminished Thing: A Borgesian Sonnet Considered in a Frosty Light
(summary)
In the following essay, Wink praises Borges as a writer of sonnets.
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'Todos queriamos ser heroes de anecdotas triviales': Words, Action and Anecdote in Borges' Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Sanger considers the function of 'self-enacting discourse' in Borges's poetry.
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Borges and Girondo: Who Led the Vanguardia?
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Strong contrasts the relationship of Borges and his fellow Argentine writer Oliviero Girondo to the Spanish modernist movement known as Ultraísmo.
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Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Hirsch discusses Borge’s love of reading and of languages, focusing on his conception of poetry as “a collaborative act between writer and the reader.”
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Empty Words: Vanity in the Writings of Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Couture discusses the centrality of “vanity” as a word and as a concept in Borges's writing.
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One Mind at Work
(summary)
In the following essay, diGiovani discusses the process of collaborating with Borges in the translation of his poetry.
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Selected Poems
(summary)
In the following review, Parini discusses the volume Selected Poems of Borges (1999), edited by Alexander Coleman.
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Whitman as Inscribed in Borges
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol. 22)
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Borges and Dis-Reality: An Introduction to His Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Foster argues that Borges creates an atmosphere of "dis-reality" in Fervor de Buenos Aires, which transcends the ordinary boundaries of time and space.
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The Greater Voice: On the Poetry of Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Murchison argues that Borges's poetic voice is at once humble and intended to be the voice of the eternal creator.
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In Praise of Darkness
(summary)
In the following review, the unsigned critic responds to the idiosyncratic imagination of Borges's poetry in In Praise of Darkness.
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In Praise of Darkness
(summary)
In the following review, Barnstone offers a positive assessment of In Praise of Darkness, a unified sequence of profound observations about people and things, dreams and darkness, showing that Borges, in giving primacy to poetry, is right.
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Borges: His Recent Poetry
(summary)
In the following interview, H. Ernest Lewald and Jorge Luis Borges discuss recurring themes in Borges's poetry, including the cult of courage, the influence of his military forefathers, the Nordic spirit, and the Zeitgeist of Buenos Aires, while also exploring Borges’s fascination with the concept of the Doppelgänger and existential themes.
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Chess and Mirrors: Form as Metaphor in Three Sonnets of Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Mandlove explores Borges's use of archetypal patterns in his sonnets "Ajedrez I, " "Ajedrez II, " and "A un poeta del siglo XIII."
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The Nightmare, That Tiger of the Dream
(summary)
In the following interview, Borges, in conversation with Willis Barnstone, elucidates the profound influence of Walt Whitman's poetic style and democratic ethos on literature, highlighting Whitman's innovative creation of a multi-faceted narrative persona that merges the poet, myth, and reader into a singular epic consciousness.
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Borges' Early Love Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Maier endeavors to establish Borges's early poetry as romantic love poetry.
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The 'Secret Complexity' of Jorge Luis Borges's Poetry
(summary)
In the following essay, Running studies the 'secret complexity' of Borges's poetry, which arises from the poet's awareness of the ambiguity of language and of human experience.
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Borges and Dis-Reality: An Introduction to His Poetry
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Short Story Criticism)
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The Mark of the Knife: Scars as Signs in Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Balderston discusses the significance of scars in Borges's work.
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Structure as Meaning in ‘The South’
(summary)
In the following essay, Alazraki argues that the structure of Borges's story, “The South,” is instrumental in creating a complexity in the text that allows two contradictory value systems to be represented as coexisting.
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According to the Eye of the Beholder
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Merrell explores Borges's use of paradox.
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The Canonical Texts
(summary)
In the following discussion of Borges's fiction, Stabb analyzes the elements that define the pieces as characteristically Borgesian.
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Jorge Borges, Author of The Name of the Rose
(summary)
In the following essay, Corry shows the influence of Borges's fictions on Umberto Eco's novel The Name of the Rose.
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A Note on a Note in ‘The Library at Babel’
(summary)
In the following essay, Ammon interprets Borges's “The Library of Babel” as a commentary on the philosopher Ludwig Wittegenstein's Tractatus.
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The False Artaxerxes: Borges and the Dream of Chess
(summary)
In the following essay, Irwin uses psychoanalytic methodology to postulate the symbolic significance of chess for Borges.
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Borges on Immortality
(summary)
In the following essay, Stewart explicates Borges's concept of immortality, discussing various cultural conceptions of immortality and the human fear of death alongside the hope for a better future beyond mundane existence.
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On the Threshold of Otherness: British India in ‘El hombre en el umbral’
(summary)
In the following essay, Balderston examines Borges's use of colonial India in his fiction, and his attitude toward colonialism, contrasting Borges's story “The Man on the Threshold” with Rudyard Kipling's “On the City Wall.”
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Borges ‘The Draped Mirrors’
(summary)
In the following note on “The Draped Mirrors,” Gonzalez describes how Borges uses the concept of narcissism.
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Don Quixote Rides Again!
(summary)
In the following essay, Wreen presents a philosophical argument for reading Borges's story “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” as a version of Don Quixote.
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The Queer Use of Women in Borges' ‘El Muerto’ and ‘La Intrusa’
(summary)
In the following essay originally published in 1995, Brant argues that the relationship between male characters in two of Borges's stories is defined by a repressed homoeroticism.
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J. L. Borges's Lovecraftian Tale: ‘There Are More Things’ in the Dream Than We Know
(summary)
In the following essay on Borges's debt to the writer H. P. Lovecraft, Buchanan discusses the nature of the minotaur in the Borgesian labyrinth.
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The Mark of the Phallus: Homoerotic Desire in Borges' ‘La forma de la espada’
(summary)
In the following explication of Borges's short story “The Shape of the Sword,” Brant suggests a homosexual subtext motivates the story's manifest content.
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Borges's ‘Ulrike’—Signature of a Literary Life
(summary)
In the following essay, Petersen defends Borges's later fiction against criticism that it is inferior to his earlier work.
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The Library of Forking Paths
(summary)
In the following essay on the proliferation of versions of a manuscript in Borges's story “The Garden of Forking Paths,” Chibka examines the significance of the proliferation of alternative, apparently trivial, details in several editions of the Spanish and English texts of that story.
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Tlön, Pilgrimages, and Postmodern Banality
(summary)
In the following essay, referring to Borges's story “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius,” Almond considers Borges's relation to postmodernism.
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'Borges and I,' A Narrative Sleight of Hand
(summary)
In the following essay, Zubizarreta advances interpretive strategies for reading 'Borges and I' as a short story.
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Vestiges of Empire: Toward a Contrapuntal Reading of Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Pennington relies on the historical and social contexts surrounding Borges's “The Ethnographer” to elucidate the text. This essay takes as a point of departure the Borges short story titled “El etnógrafo,” found in Elogio de la sombra (1969) and classified in the general category of Borges's later prose. In addition to commenting on its literary structure, I will examine its application to the world outside the text: the milieu from which the structure sprang. That is, rather than a strictly literary interpretation centering on the important narratorial silences and the denial of the text, this discussion will include observations on cultural and historical referents in the text. It is hoped that, in the end, the literary and the socio-historical will be seen as equally significant in the analysis of this story and that we may envision a closer relationship between the two spheres.
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Borges's Dark Mirror
(summary)
In the following review of Collected Fictions, a new translation of Borges's short fiction, Coetzee traces the development of Borges's stories, evaluates the new translation, and discusses the peculiar problems that arise when the author has translated some of his own work.
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Now in English Revision of Collected Fictions
(summary)
In the following review, Bell-Villada praises Collected Fictions.
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The English Borges
(summary)
In the following review, Stavans evaluates the Andrew Hurley translation of Borges's Collected Fictions, and offers comparisons with other translations.
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Jorge Luis Borges Big Man, Much to Say
(summary)
In the following review of the Collected Fictions, the writer sees Borges as a “master of intellectual subtleties.”
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Death and Denial in Borges's Later Prose
(summary)
In the following essay, Pennington interprets one of Borges's later stories, “El disco,” as a criticism of his critics.
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The Stories of Emma Zunz
(summary)
In the following essay, Wardi applies psychoanalytic techniques to the interpretation of Borges's story “Emma Zunz,” suggesting that the manifest story of a daughter's revenge masks a classical Oedipal story motivated by trauma and compulsion.
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Facciones: Fictional Identity and the Face in Borges's ‘La Forma de la Espada’
(summary)
In the following essay, Laraway considers the implications of Borges's strategy of moving between first-and third-person narration in “The Mark of the Sword.”
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The Mark of the Knife: Scars as Signs in Borges
(summary)
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Borges, Jorge Luis (Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism)
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Borges, Poet of Ecstasy
(summary)
In the following essay, Barnstone examines how Borges transformed himself into a seer.
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The Return of the Repressed: Objects in Borges' Literature
(summary)
In the following essay, Lagos discusses the shift in Borges's experience of himself and of the world which is indicated by a shift in his poetic subjects and images during the 1930's.
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Modernismo and Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Paulau de Nemes examines the “modernist” aspects of Borges's early poetry.
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Eliot, Borges, and Tradition
(summary)
In the following essay, Shumway considers the similarities between Borges and T. S. Eliot regarding their ideas about tradition and individual talent.
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Borges and the Kabbalah
(summary)
In the following essay, Alazraki traces the significance of the Jewish mystical doctrine of the Kabbalah in Borges's work.
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Spinoza in Borges' Looking-Glass
(summary)
In the following essay, originally published in 1989, Abadi compares Borges's two sonnets about the philosopher Benedict de Spinoza.
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Narrative Authority in Fiction and Film: The Case of Borges's ‘El Muerto’
(summary)
In the following essay, Arrington describes the translation of Borges's “El Muerto” from short story to film.
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Laughter and the Radical Utopia: The Orient of Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Kushigian explores the significance of 'Orientalism' in Borges's fiction, examining how the Orient serves as a metaphor for infinite time, fantasy, and utopia, and how Borges's ironic stance challenges fixed interpretations of reality.
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Metaphysics of Deceit
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Merrell discusses the place of Nominalism and Idealism in Borges's work.
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Borges, De Quincey and the Interpretation of Words
(summary)
In the following essay, Stephens examines Borges's debt to De Quincey.
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Borges in Tahar Ben Jelloun's L'Enfant de sable: Beyond Intertextuality
(summary)
In the following essay, Fayad examines Borges's influence on Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun's novel L'Enfant de sable, in which Borges appears as a character.
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To Have and Have Not: Modernist Literature as Fetishism
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Read subjects Borges's fiction to a Marxist-psychoanalytic critique.
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Borges and Argentine Literature
(summary)
In the following essay, Sarlo examines the influence of Argentine literature on Borges's writing.
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Atemporal Labyrinths in Time: J. L. Borges and the New Physicists
(summary)
In the following essay, Mosher argues that Borges's formulation of the nature of time and space is the same as the one advanced in modern physics.
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Mempo Giardinelli and the Anxiety of Borges's Influence
(summary)
In the following essay, Stone discusses Borges's influence on Mempo Giardinelli's short story “La entrevista.”
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The ‘Fecal Dialectic’: Homosexual Panic and the Origin of Writing in Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Balderston suggests defense against repressed homosexuality as a motive for and motif in Borges's fiction.
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Biography of an Immortal
(summary)
In the following essay contrasting Borges with several literary predecessors, Jullien explores the process by which Borges moves his characters from “existence to essence,” and what the meaning of “immortality” is for him.
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Borges on Language and Translation
(summary)
In the following essay, using Borges's tale “Averroes' Search,” Stewart considers the cultural determination of language and understanding.
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The Unconscious of Representation (‘Death and the Compass’)
(summary)
In the following essay, using Borges's story “Death and the Compass,” Ostergard formulates a definition of the unconscious as the difference between the reality of a situation and the representation of that situation.
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Spatialised Time and Circular Time: A Note on Time in the Work of Gerald Murnane and Jorge-Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Bartoloni compares the use of time and travel in the fictions of Borges and the Australian writer, Gerald Murane.
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For the Love of Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Durbin recounts the history of Borges's relationship with María Kodama, whom he married shortly before his death.
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The Nature of Postmodern Time in Jorge Luis Borges's ‘Theme of the Traitor and Hero’ and Alain Robbe-Grillet's The Man Who Lies
(summary)
In the following essay, Fragola compares the concept of time in works by Borges and the French New Novelist, Alain Robbe-Grillet.
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Stranger Than Ficción
(summary)
In the following essay, Howard discusses the nature of Borges's collaboration with Norman Thomas di Giovanni, one of his English translators.
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Borges and Sur
(summary)
In the following essay, Strong outlines Borges's literary and political attitudes by tracing those of Sur, an Argentine journal with which he was closely associated, and in which “Pierre Menard” was first published.
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Borges: Cultural Iconoclast, Dissident Creator of Semantic Traps
(summary)
In the following essay, Stiehm argues that Borges criticizes established cultural values through manipulation of the common meaning of words.
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Strategies of Self-Conscious Representation in the Early Essays of Jorge Luis Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Stojkov discusses Borges's early essays and his “formalist” theory of literature. This study is concerned principally with establishing a number of theoretical concerns presented in Borges's earliest essays as a possible unifying feature for a narrative “oeuvre” that has often been described as self-conscious fiction or metafiction.
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Jorge Luis Borge and the Plural I
(summary)
In the following essay, Ormsby praises some new editions of Borges's work.
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Missing From the Library: The Uncollected Borges
(summary)
In the following essay, Weinberger, editor of Borges's Selected Non-Fictions, discusses Borges's uncollected texts and deplores the absence of well-edited editions of the published works.
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Letter from … Barcelona
(summary)
In the following column, one of Borges's biographers sketches a portrait of the writer.
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An Endless Happiness
(summary)
In the following essay, Manguel argues that Borges's significance as a writer derives from his delight in language and his faith in literature.
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Borges: Tradition and the Avant-Garde
(summary)
In the following essay, Sarlo links the avant-garde movement in the Argentina of the 1920's, in which Borges participated, with the literary movement to define Argentine national tradition and local color.
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Borges, Poet of Ecstasy
(summary)
- Further Reading