Jorge Luis Borges

"Borges" redirects here. For other people with the surname, see Borges (surname). For other uses, see Borges (disambiguation).
"Jorge Borges" redirects here. For the Cape Verdean politician, see Jorge Borges (politician).
In this Spanish name, the first or paternal surname is Borges and the second or maternal family name is Acevedo.

Jorge Luis Borges
Borges in 1951
Borges in 1951
BornJorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo
(1899-08-24)24 August 1899
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Died14 June 1986(1986-06-14) (aged 86)
Geneva, Switzerland
Occupation
  • Writer
  • poet
  • philosopher
  • translator
  • editor
  • critic
  • librarian
LanguageSpanish
Notable works
Notable awardsCommandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (1962)[1]
Relatives
Signature
Jorge Luis Borges's voice
Recorded 1962

Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (/ˈbɔːrhɛs/ BOR-hess;[2] Spanish: [ˈxoɾxe ˈlwis ˈboɾxes] ⓘ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known works, Ficciones (transl. Fictions) and El Aleph (transl. The Aleph), published in the 1940s, are collections of short stories exploring motifs such as dreams, labyrinths, chance, infinity, archives, mirrors, fictional writers and mythology.[3] Borges's works have contributed to philosophical literature and the fantasy genre, and have had a major influence on the magic realist movement in 20th century Latin American literature.[4]

Born in Buenos Aires, Borges later moved with his family to Switzerland in 1914, where he studied at the Collège de Genève. The family travelled widely in Europe, including Spain. On his return to Argentina in 1921, Borges began publishing his poems and essays in surrealist literary journals. He also worked as a librarian and public lecturer.[5] In 1955, he was appointed director of the National Public Library and professor of English Literature at the University of Buenos Aires. He became completely blind by the age of 55. Scholars have suggested that his progressive blindness helped him to create innovative literary symbols through imagination.[Note 1] By the 1960s, his work was translated and published widely in the United States and Europe. Borges himself was fluent in several languages.

In 1961, Borges came to international attention when he received the first Formentor Prize, which he shared with Samuel Beckett. In 1971, he won the Jerusalem Prize. His international reputation was consolidated in the 1960s, aided by the growing number of English translations, the Latin American Boom, and by the success of García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude.[6] He dedicated his final work, The Conspirators, to the city of Geneva, Switzerland.[7] Writer and essayist J. M. Coetzee said of him: "He, more than anyone, renovated the language of fiction and thus opened the way to a remarkable generation of Spanish-American novelists."[8] David Foster Wallace wrote: "The truth, briefly stated, is that Borges is arguably the great bridge between modernism and post-modernism in world literature. He is modernist in that his fiction shows a first-rate human mind stripped of all foundations of religious or ideological certainty – a mind turned wholly inward on itself. His stories are inbent and hermetic, with the oblique terror of a game whose rules are unknown and its stakes everything."[9]

  1. ^ Troop Software Factory. "Jorge Luis Borges".
  2. ^ "Borges". Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary; accessed 1 April 2016.
  3. ^ *David Wheatley (Director) (1983). Profile of a Writer: Borges and I (Feature Documentary). Arena.
  4. ^ Theo L. D'Haen (1995) "Magical Realism and Postmodernism: Decentering Privileged Centers", in: Louis P. Zamora and Wendy B. Faris, Magical Realism: Theory, History and Community. Duhan and London, Duke University Press, pp. 191–208.
  5. ^ di Giovanni, Thomas (2008). "Jorge Luis Borges: The Blind Librarian with Extraordinary Vision" (PDF). University of Hawai'i.
  6. ^ (in Portuguese) Masina, Lea. (2001) "Murilo Rubião, o mágico do conto". In: O pirotécnico Zacarias e outros contos escolhidos. Porto Alegre: L & PM, pg. 5.
  7. ^ Borges on Life and Death, Interview by Amelia Barili.
  8. ^ Coetzee, J.M. "Borges' Dark Mirror", New York Review of Books, Volume 45, Number 16. 22 October 1998.
  9. ^ David Foster Wallace (7 November 2004). "Borges on the Couch". The New York Times.


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