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{{Bio
|Nome = Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis
|Cognome = Borges Acevedo
|Sesso = M
|LuogoNascita = Buenos Aires
|GiornoMeseNascita = 24 agosto
|AnnoNascita = 1899
|LuogoMorte = Ginevra
|LuogoMorteLink = Ginevra (città)
|GiornoMeseMorte = 14 giugno
|AnnoMorte = 1986
|Attività = scrittore
|Attività2 = poeta
|Nazionalità = argentino
|Immagine = Jorge Luis Borges Hotel.jpg
|Didascalia = Jorge Luis Borges nel [[1969]]
}}
È ritenuto uno dei più importanti e influenti scrittori del [[XX secolo]] ed è stato ispirato tra gli altri da [[Macedonio Fernández]], [[Rafael Cansinos Assens]], dalla [[letteratura inglese]] ([[Gilbert Keith Chesterton|Chesterton]], [[Shaw]]), [[Franz Kafka]], [[Emanuel Swedenborg]] e dal [[Taoismo]]. Narratore, poeta e saggista, è famoso sia per i suoi racconti [[fantastico|fantastici]], in cui ha saputo coniugare idee filosofiche e metafisiche con i classici temi del fantastico (quali: il doppio, le realtà parallele del sogno, i libri misteriosi e magici, gli slittamenti temporali), sia per la sua più ampia produzione poetica, dove, come afferma [[Claudio Magris]], si manifesta "l'incanto di un attimo in cui le cose sembra stiano per dirci il loro segreto".
Oggi l'aggettivo «borgesiano» definisce una concezione della vita come storia (''[[fiction]]''), come menzogna, come opera contraffatta spacciata per veritiera (come nelle sue famose recensioni di libri immaginari).
==Vita e carriera==
===Infanzia ed educazione===
Jorge Luis Borges nacque in una famiglia colta e benestante. Si trovavano in circostanze agiate, ma non abbastanza da vivere nel centro della sua città natale, Buenos Aires; vivevano infatti nel quartiere di [[Palermo (Buenos Aires)|Palermo]]. Si trasferirono poi più in periferia.
La madre di Borges, Leonor Acevedo Suàrez, discendeva da una famiglia [[Uruguay|uruguagliana]] di origine [[creolo|creola]]. La sua famiglia era stata molto attiva nella conquista europea del Sud America e lei parlava frequentemente delle gesta eroiche dei suoi avi<ref Name="LRB">[http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n09/toib01_.html "Don’t abandon me" Tóibín, Colm'' ''London Review of Books'' 2006-05-11.] Retrieved 2009-04-19</ref>. A riguardo il libro di Borges ''Cuaderno San Martín'' ([[1929]]) contiene la poesia "Isidoro Acevedo", che commemora suo nonno, Isidoro de Acevedo Laprida, un soldato dell'esercito di Buenos Aires che combattè nelle battaglie di Cepeda ([[1859]]), Pavòn ([[1861]]) e Los Corrales ([[1880]]). Borges crebbe dunque ascoldando le storie delle ormai scomparse fama e gloria della sua famiglia.
Il padre, invece, Jorge Guillermo Borges Haslam, era in parte spagnolo, in parte portoghese ed in parte inglese. Haslam, la cui madre era inglese, parlava correntemente inglese e portò la sua famiglia spesso e volentieri in Europa. Dunque anche [[Inghilterra]] e inglese influenzavano di non poco la cultura familiare<ref Name="LRB"/>.
Egli era un legale ed un insegnante di psicologia che nutriva passioni per la letteratura. Di lui il figlio disse che "tentò di diventare uno scrittore e fallì nel tentativo". Scrisse anche: {{Quote|Dato che la maggior parte dei miei antenati sono stati soldati e io sapevo che non lo sarei mai stato, finii presto per vergognarmi di essere una persona decisamente più studiosa che d'azione.||As most of my people had been soldiers and I knew I would never be, I felt ashamed, quite early, to be a bookish kind of person and not a man of action.|lingua=en}}
A sette anni Borges scrisse il suo primo racconto (''La visiera fatal'') ed all'età di soli nove anni tradusse in spagnolo il racconto ''Il principe felice'', dalla raccolta di fiabe di [[Oscar Wilde]] ''[[Il principe felice e altri racconti]]''. Esso fu pubblicato in un giornale locale, ma il merito dell'opera fu attribuito al padre<ref>[[Harold Bloom]] (2004) ''Jorge Luis Borges'' (Bloom's biocritiques) Infobase Publishing ISBN 0791078728</ref>.
Borges fu istruito in casa sin dall'età di undici anni, oltre che dal padre e dalla nonna materna, da un'istitutrice inglese; imparò le due lingue dei genitori e cominciò a leggere [[Shakespeare]] a soli dodici anni<ref Name="LRB"/>. Nella casa di famiglia possedeva, infatti, una biblioteca di oltre mille volumi; dirà in seguito:{{Quote|Se chiedessero l'evento principale della mia vita, dovrei rispondere la biblioteca di mio padre.<ref>Borges, Jorge Luis, "Autobiographical Notes", ''The New Yorker'', 19 September 1970.</ref>||if I were asked to name the chief event in my life, I should say my father's library.|lingua=en}}
Nel [[1914]] la famiglia si trasferì a [[Ginevra]] in [[Svizzera]] e trascorse i successivi dieci anni in Europa<ref Name="LRB"/>. Haslam, diventato ceco (come lo sarebbe poi diventato il figlio), fu preso in cura da uno specialista, mentre i figli, Luis con la sorella [[Norah Borges|Nora]], andarono a scuola, dove Borges "junior" imparò il francese. Cominciò anche a fare letture filosofiche in tedesco. Nel [[1917]], all'età di diciotto anni, incontrò Maurice Abramowicz con cui iniziò un'amicizia che durò per il resto della sua vita<ref Name="LRB"/>. Ricevette il [[Maturità francese|Baccalauréat]] l'anno successivo. La famiglia decise di rimanere in Europa fino al [[1921]] per evitare i problemi politici che affigevano il loro Paese. Dopo la prima guerra mondiale vissero infatti in diverse città: [[Lugano]], [[Barcellona]], [[Majorca]], [[Seville]], e [[Madrid]]<ref Name="LRB"/>.
In quel periodo Borges scoprì gli scritti di [[Arthur Schopenhauer]] e lesse ''[[Il Golem (romanzo)|Il Golem]]'' di [[Gustav Meyrink]]. In Spagna Borges divenne membro del movimento [[avanguardia|avanguardista]], antimodernista e [[utltraismo|ultraista]] che si ispirava a [[Apollinaire]] e [[Marinetti]]. La sua prima poesia, ''Himno del mar'' (Inno al Mare), scritta nello stile di [[Walt Whitman]], fu pubblicata sulla rivista ''Grecia''<ref>{{cite book|last=Wilson|first=Jason|title=Jorge Luis Borges|page=37|isbn=1861892861|publisher=Reaktion Books|year=2006}}</ref>. Incontrò sempre in Spagna alcuni noti scrittori come [[Rafael Cansinos Assens]] e [[Ramón Gómez de la Serna]].
===Inizi della carriera letteraria===
[[Image:JorgeLuisBorges.jpg|thumb|Jorge Luis Borges negli anni '40. Fotografia presa da "Historia de la Literatura Argentina Vol II" ([[1968]])]]
Il [[4 marzo]] del 1921, Borges si imbarcò con la sua famiglia per tornare a Buenos Aires. Della sua città scrisse ad un amico che era "infestata da arrivisti, da bravi ragazzi privi di ogni facoltà mentale e da giovani ragazze semplicemente ornamentali"<ref Name="LRB"/>.
Portò con sé il pensiero [[Ultraismo|Ultraista]] e cominciò la sua carriera pubblicando poesie surreali e saggi in giornali letterari. Nel [[1930]], Nestor Ibarra chiamò il poetà il "Grande apostolo del ''criollismo''<ref>Termine spagnolo che indica un stile letterario, chiamato anche ''costumbrismo'', basato sulla rappresentazione realistica di scene, usi e costumi propri del paese da cui l'autore proviene.</ref>", celebrando il regionalismo latino americano<ref>[http://www.borges.pitt.edu/english.php Borges Center, University of Pittsburg]. Accessed 2010-08-16</ref>.
Borges pubblicò la sua prima raccolta di poesie, ''Fervor de Buenos Aires'', nel [[1923]], in cui si prefigurava, come disse lo stesso Borges, tutta la sua opera successiva.
Fu un'edizione preparata in fretta e furia in cui erano presenti alcuni [[refuso|refusi]] ed era priva di [[prologo]]. Per la copertina sua sorella Norah realizzò un'[[incisione]], e ne furono stampate all'incirca trecento copie; le poche che ancora si conservano sono considerate dei tesori dai bibliofili: in alcune sono addirittura rinvenibili correzioni manoscritte realizzate dallo stesso Borges. L'unica copia appartenente alla [[Biblioteca Nazionale Argentina]] è stata rubata nel [[2000]] insieme ad altre prime edizioni di Borges. Lavorò anche per la rivista avanguardista [[Martin Fierro (rivista)|Martin Fierro]], una delle riviste chiave della storia della [[letteratura argentina]] della prima metà del [[XX secolo]].
Nonostante la sua formazione europeista, Borges rivendicò con le tematiche trattate le sue radici argentine, e in particolare "porteñas" (cioè di Buenos Aires), nelle opere come ''Fervore di Buenos Aires'' ([[1923]]), ''[[Luna di fronte]]'' (''Luna de enfrente'') ([[1925]]) e ''[[Quaderno San Martín]]'' (''Cuaderno de San Martín'') ([[1929]]).
Co-fondò anche il giornale ''Prisma'', largamente distribuito incollandone copie sui muri della città, e ''Proa''. Più tardi Borges rimpianse queste sue pubblicazioni giovanili e tentò addirittura di comprarne tutte le copie in circolazione per assicurarsi della loro distruzione<ref>[http://www.utexas.edu/utpress/excerpts/exboroth.html ''Borges: Other Inquisitions 1937-1952''. Full introduction by James Irby. University of Texas ISBN 9780292760028 ] Accessed 2010-08-16</ref>.
Verso la metà degli anni '30 cominciò ad interessarsi alle questioni ed alla letteratura esistenziali. Lavorò con uno stile che Ana María Barrenechea definì poi "irrealismo". Molti altri scrittori latino americani, come [[Juan Rulfo]], [[Juan José Arreola]] e [[Alejo Carpentier]] esplorarono come lui questi temi, sotto l'influenza della [[fenomenologia]] di [[Husserl]] e [[Heidegger]] e dell'[[esistenzialismo]] di [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]. A riguardo, il suo biografo Williamson sottolinea quanto sia importante non trovare fondamenti biografici nei lavori di Borge, dato che questi erano piuttosto una forma di vera ispirazione, di esperienza personale per lui<ref Name="LRB"/>.
Borges collaborò regolarmente anche alla rivista [[Sur (rivista)|Sur]], fondata nel [[1931]] da [[Victoria Ocampo]], sin dal suo primo numero. Diventò in seguito il giornale letterario più importante in Argentina ed aiutò molto il poeta a raggiungere la fama<ref>[http://www.villaocampo.org/ing/historico/cultura_1.htm Ivonne Bordelois, "The Sur Magazine" Villa Ocampo Website]</ref>.
La stessa Ocampo presentò Borges ad [[Adolfo Bioy Casares]], un'altra nota figura nel panorama letterario argentino; i due diventarono amici e collaboratori. Insieme scrissero, infatti, diversi lavori, alcuni sotto il [[pseudonimo|nom de plume]] di H. Bustos Domecq, compresa una [[parodia|parodica]] serie di gialli e alcuni racconti [[fantastico|fantastici]].
Nel [[1933]], Borges ottenne un impiego come redattore dell'inserto letterario per il giornale ''Crítica'', sul quale pubblicò scritti raccolti in seguito nella ''Historia universal de la infamia'' (''Storia universale dell'infamia'', 1935)<ref Name="LRB"/>.
Negli anni seguenti lavorò come consultente letterario per la casa editrice ''Emecé Editores'' e scrisse settimanalmente sul giornale ''El Hogar'', che venne pubblicato dal [[1936]] al [[1939]]. Nel [[1938]] trovò lavoro come primo assistente alla Biblioteca Municipale di Buenos Aires, dove c'erano così pochi libri che gli fu detto che catalogarne più di cento al giorno avrebbe lasciato poco o niente da fare al resto dello staff. I compiti da bibliotecario lo tenevano impegnato ogni giorno per circa un'ora, dopodiché passava il suo tempo nel seminterrato della biblioteca a scrivere articoli, piccole storie e traduzioni<ref Name="LRB"/>.
===La maturità===
[[File:Borges 001.JPG|thumb|Borges nel 1976.]]
Il padre di Borges morì nel [[1938]], ceco ormai da diversi anni, e questo fu una tragedia per lo scrittore, che aveva un rapporto molto intimo con lui. La [[vigilia di Natale]] di quell'annno subì anche una grave ferita alla testa, per la quale, durante le cure, morì quasi di [[setticemia]]. Durante il suo ricovero, Borges cominciò ad esplorare un nuovo stile di scrittura, per la quale sarebbe poi diventato celebre. La sua prima storia dopo quell'evento, "Pierre Menard, autor del Quijote", arrivò nel [[maggio]] [[1939]]; la sua prima raccolta di brevi racconti, intitolata ''El jardín de senderos que se bifurcan'' (''Il giardino dei sentieri che si biforcano'') uscì nel [[1941]], composta prevalentemente da storie già pubblicate sul ''Sur''<ref>Vedi [[#Gli inizi della carriera|sopra]]</ref><ref Name="LRB"/>. Il racconto che dà il titolo alla raccolta parla di un professore cinese in inghilterra, il Dr. Yu Tsun, che fa la spia per la Germania durante la [[Prima Guerra Mondiale]], tentando di provare alle autorità che un asiatico è in grado di ottenere le informazioni che cercano. Attraverso questo libro, che potrebbe essere interpretato in varie maniere, Borges inventò l'[[Ipertesto#Ipertesto_letterario|ipertesto letterario]]<ref>{{cite conference |last1=Bolter |first1=Jay David |last2=Joyce |first2=Michael |title=Hypertext and Creative Writing |booktitle=Hypertext '87 Papers |year=1987 |publisher=ACM |pages=41–50 |url=http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=317431 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Moulthrop |first=Stuart |editor1-last=Delany |editor1-first=Paul |editor2-last=Landow |editor2-first=George P. |title=Hypermedia and Literary Studies |chapter=Reading From the Map: Metonymy and Metaphor in the Fiction of 'Forking Paths' |publisher=The MIT Press |year=1991 |place=Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England }}</ref>.
Composto di otto storie in circa sessanta pagine, il libro ebbe un discreto sucesso, ma non riuscì a far avere al suo autore alcun premio, benché molti se lo aspettassero<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.enotes.com/poetry-criticism/borges-jorge-luis|title=Borges, Jorge Luis (Vol.32)|publisher=enotes|accessdate=2008-12-03}}</ref><ref>Wardrip-Fruin, Noah & Montfort, Nick (2003). ''The New Media Reader''. MIT Press.</ref>.
Ad esso, comunque, la sua amica [[Victoria Ocampo]] dedicò una buona parte del numero della rivista [[Sur (rivista)|Sur]] nel [[luglio]] [[1941]].
All'età di circa trent'anni la sua vista cominciò a calare, come era successo per l'ormai defunto padre e Borges dovette presto ridurre il suo lavoro di scrittore, e cominciando, invece, a tenere conferenze<ref group='Notes' name='a'>"His was a particular kind of blindness, grown on him gradually since the age of thirty and settled in for good after his fifty-eighth birthday." From [[Alberto Manguel|, Alberto Manguel]] (2006) ''With Borges'', London:Telegram Books p 15-16.</ref><ref>[[Alberto Manguel|, Alberto Manguel]] (2006) ''With Borges'', London:Telegram Books p 15-16.</ref><ref>Woodall, J: ''The Man in Mirror of the Book, A Life of Luis Borges'', (1996) Hodder and Stoughton pxxx.</ref>. La sua fama crebbe tanto da ricevere le nomine di Presidente dell'<em>Associazione Argentina degli Scrittori</em> e di progessore di letteratura inglese ed americana all'<em>Associazione Argentina della Cultura Inglese</em>. Il suo breve racconto ''Emma Zunz'' fu trasformato in un film (con il titolo ''Días de odio'', ''Giorni di odio'', diretto nel [[1954]] dal regista argentino [[Leopoldo Torre Nilsson]])<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0046947/|title=Days of Hate|publisher=Imdb|accessdate=2008-12-04}}</ref>. Sempre in questo periodo Borges iniziò a scrivere sceneggiature.
Verso la fine degli [[anni '50]] diventò completamente cieco, ma questo non gli impedì di continuare la sua carriera di scrittore.
{{quote
|<br/>''Nadie rebaje a lágrima o reproche''<br/>
''esta declaración de la maestría''<br/>
''de Dios, que con magnífica ironía''<br/>
''me dio a la vez los libros y la noche.''
|
|<br/>Nessuno pianga o rimproveri<br/>
questa affermazione della maestosità<br/>
di Dio, che con magnifica ironia<br/>
mi ha concesso il dono dei libri e della notte.
|lingua=it
|lingua2=es}}
L'anno seguente Borges fu premiato con il Premio Nazionale per la Letteratura dall'[[Università di Cuyo]] e con il primo di molte altre [[Laurea honoris causa|lauree ad honorem]]. Dal [[1956]] al [[1970]] ricoprì anche il ruolo di professore di letteratura all'[[Università di Buenos Aires]], tenendo frequentemente lezioni anche in altre università.
A causa dei suoi problemi di vista, Borges contò sempre più sull'aiuto della madre. Quando non poté più scrivere né leggere (non imparò mai a leggere il [[Braille]]) sua madre, alla quale era stato sempre molto affezionato, divenne la sua assistente personale.
===Fama internazionale===
Otto dei poemi di Borges furono inseriti nell'[[antologia]] del [[1943]] dei Poeti Spagnoli in America di Hays<ref>H. R. Hays, ed. (1943) ''12 Spanish American Poets''. New Haven: Yale University Press p118-139.</ref>
"[[Il giardino dei sentieri che si biforcano]]", uno dei primi racconti dello scrittore ad essere tradotto in inglese, fu pubblicato sul numero dell'[[agosto]] [[1948]] de ''La rivista di Ellery Queen'', grazie al lavoro di [[Anthony Boucher]]. Benché diverse altre traduzioni di Borges furono pubblicate su diverse riviste ed antologie durante gli [[anni '50]], egli divenne realmente famoso nel [[anni '60|decennio successivo]]<ref>Borges, Jorge Luis (1998) ''Collected Fictions'' Viking Penguin. Translation and notes by Andrew Hurley. Editorial note p 517.</ref>.
Nel [[1961]] ricevetto infatti il primo premio internazionale degli editori, il ''Premio Formentor'', che divise con [[Samuel Beckett]]. Mentre, però, quest'ultimo aveva già guadagnato molta fama in [[Europa]] ed America, Borges era ancora praticamente sconosciuto nel mondo inglese ed il premio attirò molta attenzione sui suoi lavori. Il governo italiano nominò Borges ''Commendatore'' e l'Università di Austin, in Texas, lo assunse per un anno. Questo lo portò al suo primo tour di comizi negli [[Stati Uniti]]. Nel [[1962]] furono pubblicate due raccolte degli scritti di Borges in Inghilterra: ''[[Finzioni]]'' e ''Labirinti''. Nello stesso anno, Borges cominciò un tour di comizi in Europa.
Nel [[1967]] Borges inizio una collaborazione durata cinque anni con il traduttore americano [[Norman Thomas di Giovanni]], che gli consentì di diventare più famoso nel mondo anglofono. Continuò anche a pubblicare libri; tra questi ''El libro de los seres imaginarios'' (1967, scritto con Margarita Guerrero), ''El informe de Brodie'' (1970), e ''El libro de arena'' ('1975).
Tenne anche diverse conferenze, molte di queste raccolte in volumi come ''Siete noches'' e''Nueve ensayos dantescos''.
Nel [[1980]] gli fu conferito il [[Premio Balzan]] (filologia, linguistica e critica letteraria) ed il Premio Mondiale Cino del Duca; ottenne diverse altre onoreficenze lungo gli anni, come il Premio Cervantes, la [[legione d'onore]] francese ([[1983]]) ed anche uno Speciale [[Edgar Award|Premio Edgar Allan Poe]] conferitoglie dall'organizzazione [[Mystery Writers of America]] "per l'illustre contributo al genere giallo".
===Gli ultimi anni===
[[Image:Buenos Aires L1.jpg|thumb|Citazione di Borges nella metropolitana di Madrid:"Mi sa di finzione che Buenos Aires sia mai stata fondata. La reputo eterna come il mare ed il vento"]]
Nel [[1967]] Borges sposò Elsa Astete Millàn, che era rimasta vedova da poco. Gli amici credevano che sua madre, ormai novantenne, volesse trovare qualcuno a cui affidare il figlio, completamente cieco. Lo scrittore, tuttavia, divorziò dopo tre anni e tornò da sua madre, con la quale visse fin quando morì, all'età di novantanove anni<ref>Norman Thomas Di Giovanni, ''The Lessons of the Master''<!-- page number? publication data? --></ref>.
Dal [[1975]] fino alla sua morte lo scrittore prevalentemente viaggiò, accompagnato dall'assistente personale [[María Kodama]], che sposo nell'[[aprile]] [[1986]] in [[Paraguay]], pochi mesi prima della sua morte.
Morì lo stesso anno di [[Carcinoma epatocellulare|cancro al fegato]] a Ginevra e lì fu sepolto nel ''Cimetière des Rois'' (cimitero dei re). Dopo anni di trattative legali riguardo la legittimitò del matrimonio, Kodama, come unica erede di un notevole ammontare di denaro, ottenne il controllo sui suoi lavori. Il passaggio nelle sue mani della gestione del patrimonio del defunto marito fu denunciata dall'editore francese [[Gallimard]], da ''[[Le Nouvel Observateur]]'' e da intellettuali come [[Beatriz Sarlo]], come un serio ostacolo alla lettura delle opere di Borges<ref>{{es icon}} Octavi Martí, Kodama frente a Borges, ''El País'' (Madrid), Edición Impresa, 16 August 2006. [http://www.elpais.es/articulo/revista/agosto/Kodama/frente/Borges/elpporcul/20060816elpepirdv_1/Tes Abstract online]; full text accessible online by subscription only.</ref>.
Con Kodama, furono ritirati tutti i diritti di pubblicazione delle collezioni esistenti delle sue opere in inglese, incluse quelle tradotto da [[Norman Thomas di Giovanni]] (in cui collaborò lo stesso Borges), e furono commissionate nuove traduzioni a [[Andrew Hurley]]<ref>[http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/07/12/1057783281684.html Richard Flanagan, "Writing with Borges", ''[[The Age]]'' (Australia), 12 July 2003.] Accessed 2010-08-16</ref>.
==Opinioni politiche==
===Anti-Comunismo===
In un intervista con Richard Burgin verso la fine degli [[anni '60]], Borges affermò che la sua opposizione al [[Marxismo]] ed al [[Comunismo]] era nata durante la sua infanzia. {{Quote
|Beh, sono stato portato a pensare che l'individeo dovrebbe essere forte e lo stato debole. Non potrei essere entusiasta riguardo teorie in cui lo stato è più importante dell'individuo.<ref>Burgin (1968). P104.</ref>
|
|Well, I have been brought up to think that the individual should be strong and the State should be weak. I couldn't be enthusiastic about theories where the State is more important than the individual.
|lingua=en
|lingua2=it
}}
Dopo il ribaltamento dovuto al colpo di stato di [[Juan Domingo Perón|Peron]] nel [[1955]], Borges appoggiò i tentativi di cacciare dall'argentina il governo peronista. Si infuriò per il fatto che il [[Partito Comunista Argentino]] si fosse opposto a queste forme di ribellione e li criticò duramente sia nelle conferenze che negli scritti. Negli anni seguenti Borges espresse spesso disprezzo per la presenza di ideali comunisti all'interno dell'elite culturale latino-americana. Sempre nell'intervista con Burgin, lo scrittore definì, ad esempio, [[Pablo Neruda]] come "un eccellente poeta", ma anche un "uomo miserabile, per il suo supporto all'[[Unione Sovietica]] e la sua diffidenza verso gli [[Stati Uniti]]<ref>Burgin (1968) p95-6</ref>.
===Opposizione al peronismo===
Quando il presidente [[Juan Domingo Perón]] [[Juan Domingo Perón#Vittoria elettorale|prese il potere]] nel [[1946]] lo [[spoil system]] divenne una cosa abituale e, durante questo periodo, Borges fu informato di essere stato sollevato dal suo incarico alla biblioteca "Miguel Cané" e di averne ricevuto uno come controllore del pollame e dei conigli al mercato municipale di Buenos Aires. Il giorno dopo questo fatto, lo scrittore si licenziò.
Peron's treatment of Borges became a [[cause célèbre]] for the Argentine intelligentsia. The Argentine Society of Writers (SADE) held a formal dinner in his honour. At the dinner, a speech was read which Borges had written for the occasion. It said, <blockquote>"Dictatorships breed oppression, dictatorships breed servility, dictatorships breed cruelty; more loathsome still is the fact that they breed idiocy. Bellboys babbling orders, portraits of [[caudillo]]s, prearranged cheers or insults, walls covered with names, unanimous ceremonies, mere discipline usurping the place of clear thinking... Fighting these sad monotonies is one of the duties of a writer. Need I remind readers of ''[[Martín Fierro]]'' or ''[[Don Segundo]]'' that individualism is an old Argentine virtue."<ref>Williamson (2004) p295</ref></blockquote>
In the aftermath, Borges found himself much in demand as a lecturer and one of the intellectual leaders of the Argentine opposition. In 1951 he was asked by Anti-Peronist friends to run for president of SADE. Borges, then suffering from depression caused by a failed romance, reluctantly accepted. He later recalled that he would awake every morning and remember that Peron was President and feel deeply depressed and ashamed. {{Citation needed|date=August 2010}} Peron's government had seized control of the Argentine mass media and regarded SADE with indifference. Borges later recalled, however, "Many distinguished men of letters did not dare set foot inside its doors."<ref Name="Williamson313">Williamson (2004) p313</ref> Meanwhile, SADE became an increasing refuge for critics of the regime. SADE official Luisa Mercedes Levinson noted, "We would gather every week to tell the latest jokes about the ruling couple and even dared to sing the songs of the [[French Resistance]], as well as '[[La Marseillaise]]'."<ref Name="Williamson313"/>
After Evita's death on July 26, 1952, Borges received a visit from two policemen, who ordered him to put up two portraits of the ruling couple on the premises of SADE. Borges told them he would do nothing of the sort and that it was a ridiculous demand. He was told he would face the consequences."<ref>Williamson (2004) p320.</ref> The regime placed Borges under 24-hour surveillance and sent policemen to sit in on his lectures; in September it ordered SADE to be permanently closed down. Like much of the Argentine opposition to Peron, SADE had become marginalized due to persecution by the State and very few active members remained. Borges later came to believe that the Peronistas had manipulated his appointment in order to destroy his influence over Argentine writers and intellectuals. {{Citation needed|date=July 2010}}
In 1955, after General [[Pedro Eugenio Aramburu]]'s Anti-Peronist [[coup d'etat]], or "[[Revolución Libertadora]]", forced Peron into exile, Borges was overjoyed. The new regime appointed Borges as the Director of the [[National Library of the Argentine Republic|National Library]].<ref>{{es icon}} [http://www.bibnal.edu.ar/paginas/galeriadirec.htm#borges Jorge Luis Borges. Galería de Directores, Biblioteca Nacional (Argentina).], Retrieved 23 December 2006.</ref> {{Dead link|date=August 2010}} However, Peron's fall did not in any way alter Borges' animosity. In an interview with [[Richard Burgin]] in 1967, he said "Peron was a [[humbug]], and he knew it, and everybody knew it. But Peron could be very cruel. I mean, he had people tortured, killed. And his wife was a common prostitute."<ref>Burgin (1969) p121</ref>
When Peron returned from exile in 1973 and regained the Presidency, Borges was enraged. In a 1975 interview for ''[[National Geographic]]'', he said "Damn, the snobs are back in the saddle. If their posters and slogans again defile the city, I'll be glad I've lost my sight. Well, they can't humilate me as they did before my books sold well."<ref Name="Natgeo303">''National Geographic'', March 1975. p303.</ref> After being accused of being unforgiving, Borges quipped, "I resented Peron's making Argentina look ridiculous to the world... as in 1951, when he announced control over [[thermonuclear fusion]], which still hasn't happened anywhere but in the sun and the stars. For a time, Argentinians hesitated to wear bandaids for fear friends would ask, 'Did the [[Atomic Bomb]] go off in your hand?' A shame, because Argentina really has world class scientists."<ref Name="Natgeo303"/>
After Borges' death in 1986, the Peronist ''[[Partido Justicialista]]'' declined to send a delegate to the writer's memorial service in Buenos Aires. A spokesman for the Party stated that this was in reaction to, "certain declarations he had made about the country." <ref Name="William491">Williamson (2004) p491</ref> One Peronist declared that Borges had made statements about Evita Peron which were, "unacceptable." Later, at the City Council of Buenos Aires, a storm raged when Peronist politicians decided to give only conditional support for a condolence on the writer's death. <ref Name="William491"/>
==Works==
{{Main|Bibliography of Jorge Luis Borges}}[[File:Jorge Luis Borges Hotel.jpg|thumb|300px|Borges in [[L'Hôtel]], [[Paris]] ]]
[[Noah Wardrip-Fruin|Wardrip-Fruin]] and [[Nick Montfort|Montfort]] argue that Borges "may have been the most important figure in Spanish-language literature since [[Cervantes]]. But whatever his particular literary rank, he was clearly of tremendous influence, writing intricate poems, short stories, and essays that instantiated concepts of dizzying power." <ref Name="Media">Wardrip-Fruin, Noah, and Nick Montfort, ed. (2003). ''The New Media Reader''. Cambridge: The MIT Press, p29. ISBN 0262232278</ref>
In addition to short stories for which he is most noted, Borges also wrote poetry, essays, screenplays, literary criticism, and edited numerous anthologies. His longest work of fiction was a 14 page story, "The Congress", first published in 1971. <ref Name="LRB"/> He was a prominent translator of English-, French- and German-language literature into Spanish, including works in [[Old English language|Old English]] and [[Old Norse]]. His late-onset blindness strongly influenced his later writing. Borges wrote: "When I think of what I've lost, I ask, 'Who knows themselves better than the blind?' - for every thought becomes a tool." <ref>Borges, Jorge Luis. (1994) ''Siete Noches''. Obras Completas, vol. III. Buenos Aires: Emecé</ref> Paramount among his intellectual interests are elements of mythology, mathematics, theology, integrating these through literature, sometimes playfully, sometimes with great seriousness. {{Citation needed|date=August 2010}}
Borges composed poetry throughout his life. As his eyesight waned (it came and went, with a struggle between advancing age and advances in eye surgery), he increasingly focused on writing poetry, since he could memorize an entire work in progress. His poems embrace the same wide range of interests as his fiction, along with issues that emerge in his critical works and translations, and from more personal musings. For example, his interest [[idealism]] is reflected in the fictional world of Tlön in "[[Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius]]", in his essay "[[A New Refutation of Time]]", "[[On Exactitude in Science]]", and in his poem "Things". Similarly, a common thread runs through his story "[[The Circular Ruins]]" and his poem "[[El Golem]]" ("The Golem"). {{Citation needed|date=August 2010}}
Borges was a notable translator. His first publication, for a Buenos Aires newspaper, was a translation of [[Oscar Wilde]]'s story ''[[The Happy Prince and Other Stories|The Happy Prince]]'' into Spanish when he was nine.<ref>{{cite book | last = Kristal | first = Efraín | title = Invisible Work | publisher = Vanderbilt University Press | ___location = Nashville | year = 2002 | isbn = 0826514081 |page=37}}</ref> At the end of his life he produced a Spanish-language version of [[Snorri Sturluson]]'s [[Prose Edda]]. He also translated (while simultaneously subtly transforming) the works of, among others, [[Edgar Allan Poe]], [[Franz Kafka|Kafka]], [[Hermann Hesse|Hesse]], [[Rudyard Kipling|Kipling]], [[William Faulkner|Faulkner]],[[André Gide|Gide]], [[Walt Whitman|Whitman]] and [[Virginia Woolf|Woolf]]. <ref group='Notes' name='c'>Notable translations also include work by [[Herman Melville|Melville]], [[William Faulkner|Faulkner]], Sir [[Thomas Browne]], and [[G. K. Chesterton]].</ref> Borges wrote and lectured extensively on the art of translation, holding that a translation may improve upon the original, may even be unfaithful to it, and that alternative and potentially contradictory renderings of the same work can be equally valid.<ref> Jorge Luis Borges, ''This Craft of Verse'', [[Harvard University Press]], 2000. Pages 57-76. ''Word Music and Translation'', Lecture, Delivered February 28, 1968.</ref> Borges also employed the devices of literary forgery and the review of an imaginary work, both forms of modern [[Pseudepigraphy|pseudo-epigrapha]].
===Hoaxes and forgeries===
Borges's best-known set of literary forgeries date from his early work as a translator and literary critic with a regular column in the Argentine magazine ''El Hogar''. Along with publishing numerous legitimate translations, he also published original works, for example, in the style of [[Emanuel Swedenborg]]<ref group='Notes' name='d'/> or '' [[One Thousand and One Nights]]'', originally claiming them to be translations of works he had chanced upon. In another case, he added three short, falsely attributed pieces into his otherwise legitimate and carefully researched anthology ''El matrero''.<ref group='Notes' name='d'/> Several of these are gathered in the ''[[A Universal History of Infamy]]''.
At times he wrote reviews of nonexistent work, by some other person. The key example of this is "[[Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote|Pierre Menard, Author of the ''Quixote'']]", which imagines a twentieth-century Frenchman who tries to write [[Miguel de Cervantes]]' ''[[Don Quixote]]'' verbatim, not by having memorized Cervantes' work, but as an "original" narrative of his own invention. Initially the Frenchman tries to immerse himself in sixteenth-century Spain, but dismisses the method as too easy, instead trying to reach ''Don Quixote'' through his own experiences. He finally manages to (re)create "the ninth and thirty-eighth chapters of the first part of Don Quixote and a fragment of chapter twenty-two." Borges's "review" of the work of the fictional Menard uses tongue-in-cheek comparisons to explore the resonances which ''Don Quixote'' has picked up over the centuries since it was written. He discusses how much "richer" Menard's work is than that of Cervantes, even though the actual text is exactly the same.
While Borges was the great popularizer of the review of an imaginary work, Borges developed the idea from [[Thomas Carlyle]]'s ''[[Sartor Resartus]]'', a book-length review of a non-existent German [[transcendentalism|transcendentalist]] work, and the biography of its equally non-existent author. In ''This Craft of Verse'', Borges says that in 1916 in Geneva "[I] discovered, and was overwhelmed by, Thomas Carlyle. I read ''[[Sartor Resartus]]'', and I can recall many of its pages; I know them by heart." <ref>Borges ''This Craft of Verse'' (p104)</ref> In the introduction to his first published volume of fiction, ''The Garden of Forking Paths'', Borges remarks, "It is a laborious madness and an impoverishing one, the madness of composing vast books, setting out in five hundred pages an idea that can be perfectly related orally in five minutes. The better way to go about it is to pretend that those books already exist, and offer a summary, a commentary on them." He then cites both ''Sartor Resartus'' and [[Samuel "Erewhon" Butler|Samuel Butler]]'s ''The Fair Haven'', remarking, however, that "those works suffer under the imperfection that they themselves are books, and not a whit less tautological than the others. A more reasonable, more inept, and more lazy man, I have chosen to write notes on ''imaginary'' books." <ref>Borges ''Collected Fictions'', p67</ref>
===Criticism of Borges' work===
Borges's change in style from regionalist ''[[criollismo]]'' to a more cosmopolitan style brought him much criticism from journals such as ''[[Contorno]]'', a left-of-centre, [[Jean-Paul Sartre|Sartre]]-influenced Argentine publication founded by the Viñas brothers, [[Noé Jitrik]], Adolfo Prieto, and other intellectuals. In the post-Peronist Argentina of the early 1960s, ''Contorno'' met with wide approval from the youth who challenged the authenticity of older writers such as Borges and questioned their legacy of experimentation. Magic realism and exploration of universal truths, they argued, had come at the cost of responsibility and seriousness in the face of society's problems.<ref Name="Katra">Katra, William H. (1988) ''Contorno: Literary Engagement in Post-Perónist Argentina''. Teaneck, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson UP, pp. 56–57</ref> The ''Contorno'' writers acknowledged Borges and [[Eduardo Mallea]] for being "doctors of technique" but argued that their work lacked substance due to their lack of interaction with the reality that they inhabited, an [[existentialist]] critique of their refusal to embrace existence and reality in their artwork.<ref Name="Katra"/>
===Sexuality===
With a few notable exceptions, women are almost entirely absent from the majority of Borges's fictional output.<ref>The Queer Use of Communal Women in Borges's "El muerto" and "La intrusa"], paper presented at XIX Latin American Studies Association (LASA) Congress held in Washington DC in September, 1995.</ref> There are, however, some instances in Borges's writings of romantic love, for example the story "[[Ulrikke (short story)|Ulrikke]]" from ''[[The Book of Sand]]''. The protagonist of the story "El muerto" also lusts after the "splendid, contemptuous, red-haired woman" of Azevedo Bandeira.<ref>[[Andrew Hurley (academic)|Hurley, Andrew]] 1988) ''Jorge Luis Borges: Collected Fictions''. New York: Penguin p197.</ref> and later "sleeps with the woman with shining hair".<ref>[[Andrew Hurley (academic)|Hurley, Andrew]] 1988) ''Jorge Luis Borges: Collected Fictions''. New York: Penguin p200</ref> The plot of ''La Intrusa'' was based on a true story of two friends. Borges turned their fictional counterparts into brothers, excluding the possibility of a homosexual relationship.<ref>{{cite book|last=Keller|first=Gary|coauthors=Karen S. Van Hooft|title=The Analysis of Hispanic Texts: Current Trends in Methodology|editor=Eds. Lisa E. Davis and Isabel C. Tarán|publisher=Bilingual P|year=1976|pages=300–319|chapter=Jorge Luis Borges's `La intrusa:' The Awakening of Love and Consciousness/The Sacrifice of Love and Consciousness.}}</ref>
===Nobel Prize omission===
Borges was never awarded the [[Nobel Prize in Literature]], something which continually distressed the writer.<ref Name="LRB">[http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n09/toib01_.html "Don’t abandon me" Tóibín, Colm'' ''London Review of Books'' 2006-05-11.] Retrieved 2009-04-19</ref> He was one of several distinguished authors who never received the honour.<ref>Feldman, Burton (2000) ''The Nobel Prize: a History of Genius, Controversy and Prestige'', Arcade Publishing p57</ref> Borges commented "Not granting me the Nobel Prize has become a Scandinavian tradition; since I was born they have not been granting it to me."<ref name="profile"/> Some observers speculated that Borges did not receive the award because of his conservative political views; or more specifically, because he had accepted an honour from dictator [[Augusto Pinochet]].<ref>[http://www.nytimes.com/1983/10/07/books/83nobel.html "Briton Wins the Nobel Literature Prize." James M. Markham. ''The New York Times'' 7 October 1983]. Accessed 2010-08-15</ref><ref>Feldman, Burton (2000) ''The Nobel Prize: a History of Genius, Controversy and Prestige'', Arcade Publishing p81</ref>
[[Image:Moneda 2 pesos-Argentina-Borges-1999.jpg|thumb|Special Argentine two-[[Argentine peso|peso]] coin featuring Borges, 1999]]
==Fact, fantasy and non-linearity==
Many of Borges's most popular stories concern the nature of time ("[[The Secret Miracle]]"), infinity "([[The Aleph (short story)|The Aleph]]"), mirrors ("[[Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius]]") and Labyrinths ("[[The Two Kings and the Two Labyrinths]]", "[[The House of Asterion]]", ''[[The Immortal]]'', "[[The Garden of Forking Paths]]"). Williamson writes, "His basic contention was that fiction did not depend on the illusion of reality; what mattered ultimately was an author’s ability to generate 'poetic faith' in his reader." <ref Name="LRB"/>His stories often have fantastical themes, such as a library containing every possible 410-page text ("[[The Library of Babel]]"), a man who [[Eidetic memory|forgets nothing]] he experiences ("[[Funes, the Memorious]]"), an artifact through which the user can see everything in the universe ("[[The Aleph (short story)|The Aleph]]"), and a year of still time given to a man standing before a firing squad ("[[The Secret Miracle]]"). Borges also told realistic stories of South American life, of folk heroes, streetfighters, soldiers, [[gaucho]]s, detectives, historical figures. He mixed the real and the fantastic: fact with fiction. His interest in compounding fantasy, philosophy, and the art of translation are evident in articles such as "The Translators of ''The Book of One Thousand and One Nights''". In ''[[The Book of Imaginary Beings]]'', a thoroughly (and obscurely) researched [[bestiary]] of mythical creatures, Borges wrote, "There is a kind of lazy pleasure in useless and out-of-the-way erudition." <ref Name="Beings">Borges, Luis Borges (1979) ''The Book of Imaginary Beings'' Penguin Books Australia p.11 ISBN 0525475389</ref> Borges's interest in fantasy was shared by [[Adolfo Bioy Casares]], with whom Borges coauthored several collections of tales between 1942 and 1967, often under different pseudonyms including [[H. Bustos Domecq]]. Often, especially [[Jorge Luis Borges#Hoaxes and forgeries|early in his career]], the mixture of fact and fantasy, crossed the line into the realm of hoax or literary forgery. <ref group='Notes' name='d'>His imitations of Swedenborg and others were originally passed off as translations, in his literary column in ''Crítica''. "El Teólogo" was originally published with the note "Lo anterior...es obra de Manuel Swedenborg, eminente ingeniero y hombre de ciencia, que durante 27 años estuvo en comercio lúcido y familiar con el otro mundo." ("The preceding [...] is the work of Emanuel Swedenborg, eminent engineer and man of science, who during 27 years was in lucid and familiar commerce with the other world.") [http://www.uiowa.edu/borges/louis/1934.htm Bibliografía cronológica de la obra de Jorge Luis Borges] ("Chronological bibliography of the work of Jorge Luis Borges"), Borges Center, University of Iowa. Retrieved 7 November 2006.</ref>
"[[The Garden of Forking Paths]]" (1941) presents the idea of forking paths through networks of time, none of which is the same, all of which are equal. Borges uses the recurring image of "a labyrinth that folds back upon itself in infinite regression" so we "become aware of all the possible choices we might make." <ref Name="Murray">Murray, Janet H. "Inventing the Medium" ''The New Media Reader''. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003.</ref> The forking paths have branches to represent these choices that ultimately lead to different endings. Borges saw man's search for meaning in a seemingly infinite universe as fruitless and instead uses the maze as a riddle for time, not space. <ref Name="Murray"/> Borges also examined the themes of universal randomness and madness (''[[The Lottery in Babylon]]'') and (''[[The Zahir]]''). Due to the success of the "Forking Paths" story, the term "Borgesian" came to reflect a quality of narrative [[Nonlinear narrative|non-linearity]]. <ref group='Notes' name='e'>Non-linarity was key to the development of [[digital media]]. See Murray, Janet H. "Inventing the Medium" ''The New Media Reader''. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003</ref>
==Multiculturalism and Argentine literature==
===''Martín Fierro'' and Argentine tradition===
{{main|Borges on Martín Fierro}}
Along with other young Argentine writers of his generation, Borges initially rallied around the fictional character of Martín Fierro. ''[[Martín Fierro]]'', a poem by [[José Hernández (writer)|José Hernández]], was a dominant work of 19th century Argentine literature. Its eponymous hero became a symbol of Argentine sensibility, untied from European values - a [[gaucho]], free, poor, ''[[pampas]]''-dwelling. <ref Name="Irreverence"/>The character Fierro is illegally drafted to serve at a border fort to defend against the Indians but ultimately deserts to become a ''gaucho matrero'', the Argentine equivalent of a North American western outlaw. Borges contributed keenly to the avant garde ''[[Martín Fierro (magazine)|Martín Fierro magazine]]'' in the early 1920s.
As Borges matured, he came to a more nuanced attitude toward the Hernández poem. In his [[Borges on Martín Fierro|book of essays on the poem]], Borges separates his admiration for the aesthetic virtues of the work from his mixed opinion of the moral virtues of its protagonist.<ref>Borges and Guerrero (1953) ''El "Martín Fierro'' ISBN 8420619337</ref> In his essay "The Argentine Writer and Tradition" (1951), Borges celebrates how Hernández expresses the Argentine character. In a key scene in the poem, Martín Fierro and El Moreno compete by improvising songs on universal themes such as time, night, and the sea, reflecting the real-world gaucho tradition of ''payadas'', improvised musical dialogues on philosophical themes. <ref Name="Irreverence">Gabriel Waisman, Sergio (2005) ''Borges and Translation: The Irreverence of the Periphery'' Bucknell University Press pp126-9 ISBN 0838755925</ref><ref Name="Argentine">Borges, Jorge Luis and Lanuza, Eduardo González (1961) "The Argentine writer and tradition" Latin American and European Literary Society</ref> Borges points out that, Hernández evidently knew the difference between actual gaucho tradition of composing poetry, versus the "gauchesque" fashion among Buenos Aires literati.
In his works he refutes the arch-nationalist interpreters of the poem, and disdains others as critic Eleuterio Tiscornia, for their Europeanising approach. Borges denies that Argentine literature should distinguish itself by limiting itself to "local colour", which he equates with cultural nationalism. <ref Name="Argentine"/> [[Racine]] and [[Shakespeare]]'s work, he says, looked beyond their countries' borders. Neither, he argues, need the literature be bound to the heritage of old world Spanish or European tradition. Nor should it define itself by the conscious rejection of its colonial past. He asserts that Argentine writers need to be free to define Argentine literature anew, writing about Argentina and the world from the point of view of those who have inherited the whole of world literature. <ref Name="Argentine"/> Williamson says "Borges's main argument is that the very fact of writing from the margins provides Argentine writers with a special opportunity to innovate without being bound to the canons of the centre, [...] at once a part of and apart from the centre which gives them much potential freedom". <ref Name="Irreverence"/>
===Argentine culture===
Borges focused on universal themes, but also composed a substantial body of literature on themes from Argentine folklore and history. Borges's first book, the poetry collection ''Fervor de Buenos Aires'' (''Passion for Buenos Aires''), appeared in 1923. Borges's writings on things Argentine, include Argentine culture ("History of the Tango"; "Inscriptions on Horse Wagons"), folklore ("Juan Muraña", "Night of the Gifts"), literature ("The Argentine Writer and Tradition", "[[Almafuerte (book)|Almafuerte]]"; "[[Evaristo Carriego]]") and national concerns ("Celebration of The Monster", "Hurry, Hurry", "The Mountebank", "Pedro Salvadores"). Ultra-nationalists, however, continued to question his Argentine identity. <ref Name="Butterflies"/>
Borges's interest in Argentine themes reflects, in part, the inspiration of his family tree. Borges had an English paternal grandmother who, around 1870, married the ''criollo'' Francisco Borges, a man with a military command and a historic role in the civil wars in what is now Argentina and [[Uruguay]]. Spurred by pride in his family's heritage, Borges often used those civil wars as settings in fiction and quasi-fiction (for example, "The Life of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz," "The Dead Man," "Avelino Arredondo") as well as poetry ("General Quiroga Rides to His Death in a Carriage"). Borges's maternal great-grandfather, [[Manuel Isidoro Suárez]] , was another military hero, whom Borges immortalized in the poem "A Page to Commemorate Colonel Suárez, Victor at Junín." The city of [[Coronel Suárez]] in the south of [[Buenos Aires Province]] is named after him.
His non-fiction explores many of the themes found in his fiction. Essays such as "The History of the [[Tango (dance)|Tango]]" or his writings on the epic poem [[Martín Fierro]] explore Argentine themes, such as the identity of the Argentine people and of various Argentine subcultures. The varying genealogies of characters, settings, and themes in his stories, such as "La muerte y la brújula", used Argentine models without pandering to his readers or framing Argentine culture as 'exotic'. <ref Name="Butterflies"/> In his essay "El escritor argentino y la tradición", Borges notes that the very absence of camels in the [[Qur'an]] was proof enough that it was an [[Arabian]] work. He suggested that only someone trying to write an "Arab" work would purposefully include a camel. <ref Name="Butterflies">Takolander, Maria (2007) ''Catching butterflies: bringing magical realism to ground'' Peter Lang Pub Inc pp.55-60 ISBN 3039111930</ref> He uses this example to illustrate how his dialogue with universal existential concerns was just as Argentine as writing about gauchos and tangos.
===Multiculturalism===
Borges's work maintained a perspective that reflected a multi-ethnic Argentina, exposure from an early age to his father's substantial collection of world literature, and lifelong travel experience. At the time of Argentine independence in 1816, the population was predominantly ''[[Criollo people|criollo]]'' (of Spanish ancestry). The [[Argentine Declaration of Independence]] in 1816 led to waves of immigration from Europe and Asia and in the following decades and the Argentine national identity diversified.<ref Name="LRB"/> Borges therefore was writing in a heavily multicultural and strongly European literary context, and worked immersed in Spanish, English, French, German, Italian, [[Old English language|Anglo-Saxon]] and [[Old Norse language|Old Norse]] literature. He also read translations of Near Eastern and Far Eastern works. Borges's writing is also informed by scholarship of Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, and Judaism, including prominent religious figures, heretics, and mystics. Religion and heresy are explored in such stories as "[[Averroes's Search]]", "[[The Writing of the God]]", "[[The Theologians]]" and "[[Three Versions of Judas]]". The curious inversion of mainstream Christian concepts of [[Redemption (theology)|redemption]] in the latter story is characteristic of Borges's approach to theology in his literature.
In describing himself, he said, "I am not sure that I exist, actually. I am all the writers that I have read, all the people that I have met, all the women that I have loved; all the cities that I have visited, all my ancestors." <ref name="profile">[http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/jun/10/jorgeluisborges ''Guardian'' profile. "Jorge Luis Borges" 22 July 2008]. Accessed 2010-08-15</ref> As a young man, he visited the frontier [[pampa|''pampas'']] where the boundaries of Argentina, [[Uruguay]], and [[Brazil]] blurred. He lived and studied in Switzerland and Spain as a young student. As Borges matured, he traveled through Argentina as a lecturer and, internationally, as a visiting professor; he continued to tour the world as he grew older, finally settling in [[Geneva]] where he had spent some of his youth. Drawing on the influence of many times and places, Borges's work belittled nationalism and racism.<ref Name="Butterflies"/> Portraits of diverse coexisting cultures characteristic of Argentina are especially pronounced in the book ''Six Problems for Don Isidoro Parodi'' (co-authored with [[Adolfo Bioy Casares]]) and the story "[[Death and the Compass]]", which may or may not be set in Buenos Aires. Borges wrote that he considered Mexican essayist [[Alfonso Reyes]] "the best prose-writer in the Spanish language of any time."<ref>Borges ''Siete Noches'', p156</ref>
==Influences==
===Modernism===
Borges lived through most of the 20th century, and was rooted in the [[Modernism]] pre-dominant in its early years. He was especially influenced by [[Symbolism (arts)|Symbolism]].<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.2307/3726707|last=Britton|first=R|date=July 1979|title=History, Myth, and Archetype in Borges's View of Argentina|url=http://jstor.org/stable/3726707|journal=The Modern Language Review|publisher=Modern Humanities Research Association|volume=74|issue=3|pages=607–616}}</ref> Like contemporary novelists [[Vladimir Nabokov]] and the older [[James Joyce]], he combined an interest in his native culture with broader perspectives. He also shared their multilingualism and their inventiveness with language. However, while Nabokov and Joyce tended toward progressively larger works as they grew older, Borges remained a miniaturist. Borges's work progressed ''away'' from what he referred to as "the baroque", while Joyce's and Nabokov's moved towards it: his later style is far more transparent and naturalistic than his earlier works. Borges represented the humanist view of media that stressed the social aspect of art driven by emotion. If art represented the tool, then Borges was more interested in how the tool could be used to relate to people.<ref Name="Media"/>
[[Existentialism]] saw its apogee during the years of Borges's greatest artistic production. It has been argued that his choice of topics largely ignored existentialism's central tenets. Critic [[Paul de Man]] notes, "Whatever Borges's existential anxieties may be, they have little in common with Sartre's robustly prosaic view of literature, with the earnestness of Camus' moralism, or with the weighty profundity of German existential thought. Rather, they are the consistent expansion of a purely poetic consciousness to its furthest limits."<ref>de Man, Paul. "A Modern Master", ''Jorge Luis Borges'', Ed. Harold Bloom, New York: Chelsea House Pub., 1986. p.22.</ref>
===Political influences===
As a political conservative, Borges "was repulsed by Marxism in theory and practice. Abhorring sentimentality, he rejected the politics and poetics of cultural identity that held sway in Latin America for so long." <ref>[http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/08/31/reviews/970831.31gonz01.html ''New york Times'' Article. Paid Subscription only]</ref> As a universalist, his interest in world literature reflected an attitude that was also incongruent with the [[Juan Perón|Perónist]] Populist nationalism. That government's confiscation of Borges's job at the Miguel Cané Library fueled his skepticism of government. He labeled himself a ''[[Herbert Spencer|Spencerian]] [[Anarchism|anarchist]]'', following his father.<ref>{{cite book | last = Yudin | first = Florence | title = Nightglow: Borges' Poetics of Blindness | publisher = Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca | ___location = City | year = 1997 | isbn = 847299385X |page=31}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last = Bell-Villada | first = Gene | title = Borges and His Fiction | publisher = University of North Carolina Press | ___location = Chapel Hill | year = 1981 | isbn = 080781458X |page=13}}</ref>
In 1934, extreme Argentine nationalists, sympathetic to the growing [[Nazism|Nazi]] ideology of the time, asserted Borges was secretly Jewish, and by implication, not a full Argentine. Borges responded with the essay "Yo Judío" ("I, a Jew"), a reference to the old "Yo, Argentino" ("I, an Argentine"), a phrase used during nationalistic beatings of Argentine Jews to make it clear to approaching attackers that one was a "true" Argentine, and not a Jew. <ref Name="Humor">De Costa, René (2000) ''Humor in Borges (Humor in Life & Letters).'' Wayne State University Press p49 ISBN 0814328881</ref> In the essay he notes, that he would be proud to be a Jew, with a backhanded reminder that any "pure" Castilian might be likely to have Jewish ancestry from a millennium ago.<ref Name="Humor"/>
===Mathematics===
The essay collection ''Borges y La Matematica'' (Borges and Mathematics, 2003) by Argentine mathematician and writer [[Guillermo Martinez]], outlines how Borges used concepts from mathematics in his work. Martínez states that Borges had, for example, at least a superficial knowledge of [[set theory]], which he handles with elegance in stories such as "[[The Book of Sand]]".<ref>Martinez, Guillermo (2003) ''Borges y La Matematica'' (Spanish Edition) Editorial Universitaria de Buenos Aires ISBN 9502312961</ref> Other books such as ''The Unimaginable Mathematics of Borges' Library of Babel'' by William Goldbloom Bloch (2008) and ''Unthinking Thinking: Jorge Luis Borges, Mathematics, and the New Physics'' by Floyd Merrell (1991) also explore this relationship.
==Notes==
{{Refbegin|colwidth=60em}}
<references group="Notes" />
{{Refend}}
== References ==
{{Reflist|2}}
==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
*{{cite book | last = Agheana | first = Ion | title = The Meaning of Experience in the Prose of Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = P. Lang | ___location = Frankfurt Am Main | year = 1988 | isbn = 0820405957 }}
*{{cite book | last = Agheana | first = Ion | title = The Prose of Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = P. Lang | ___location = Frankfurt Am Main | year = 1984 | isbn = 0820401307 }}
*{{cite book | last = Aizenberg | first = Edna | title = The Aleph Weaver: Biblical, Kabbalistic and Judaic Elements in Borges | publisher = Scripta Humanistica | ___location = Potomac | year = 1984 | isbn = 0916379124 }}
*{{cite book | last = Aizenberg | first = Edna | title = Borges and His Successors | publisher = University of Missouri Press | ___location = Columbia | year = 1990 | isbn = 082620712X }}
*{{cite book | last = Alazraki | first = Jaime | title = Borges and the Kabbalah | publisher = Cambridge University Press | ___location = Cambridge | year = 1988 | isbn = 0521306841 }}
*{{cite book | last = Alazraki | first = Jaime | title = Critical Essays on Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = G.K. Hall | ___location = Boston | year = 1987 | isbn = 0816188297 }}
*{{cite book | last = Balderston | first = Daniel | title = Out of Context | publisher = Duke University Press | ___location = Durham | year = 1993 | isbn = 0822313162 }}
*{{cite book | last = Barnstone | first = Willis | title = With Borges on an Ordinary Evening in Buenos Aires | publisher = University of Illinois Press | ___location = Urbana | year = 1993 | isbn = 0252018885 }}
*{{cite book | last = Bell-Villada | first = Gene | title = Borges and His Fiction | publisher = University of North Carolina Press | ___location = Chapel Hill | year = 1981 | isbn = 080781458X }}
*{{cite book | last = Bioy Casares | first = Adolfo | title = Borges | publisher = Destino Ediciones | ___location = City | year = 2006 | isbn = 9789507320859 }}
*{{cite book | last = Bloom | first = Harold | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Chelsea House Publishers | ___location = New York | year = 1986 | isbn = 0877547211 }}
*Burgin, Richard (1969) ''Conversations with Jorge Luis Borges''. Holt Rhinehart Winston
*{{cite book | last = De Behar | first = Block | title = Borges, the Passion of an Endless Quotation | publisher = State University of New York Press | ___location = Albany | year = 2003 | isbn = 1417520205 }}
*{{cite book | last = Di Giovanni | first = Norman Thomas | title = The Borges Tradition | publisher = Constable in association with the Anglo-Argentine Society | ___location = London | year = 1995 | isbn = 0094738408 }}
*{{cite book | last = Di Giovanni | first = Norman Thomas | title = The Lesson of the Master | publisher = Continuum | ___location = London | year = 2003 | isbn = 0826461107 }}
*{{cite book | last = Dunham | first = Lowell | title = The Cardinal Points of Borges | publisher = University of Oklahoma Press | ___location = Norman | year = 1971 | isbn = 0806109831 }}
*{{cite book | last = Fishburn | first = Evelyn | title = Borges and Europe Revisited | publisher = Univ of London | ___location = City | year = 2002 | isbn = 1900039214 }}
*{{cite book | last = Frisch | first = Mark | title = You Might Be Able to Get There from Here | publisher = Fairleigh Dickinson University Press | ___location = Madison | year = 2004 | isbn = 0838640443 }}
*{{cite book | last = Kristal | first = Efraín | title = Invisible Work | publisher = Vanderbilt University Press | ___location = Nashville | year = 2002 | isbn = 0585408033 }}
*{{cite book | last = Lindstrom | first = Naomi | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Twayne Publishers | ___location = Boston | year = 1990 | isbn = 080578327X }}
*{{cite book | last = Manguel | first = Alberto | title = With Borges | publisher = Telegram | ___location = City | year = 2006 | isbn = 9781846590054 }}
*Manovich, Lev, [http://www.newmediareader.com/book_samples/nmr-intro-manovich-excerpt.pdf New Media from Borges to HTML, 2003]
*{{cite book | last = McMurray | first = George | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Ungar | ___location = New York | year = 1980 | isbn = 0804426082 }}
*{{cite book | last = Molloy | first = Sylvia | title = Signs of Borges | publisher = Duke University Press | ___location = Durham | year = 1994 | isbn = 0822314061 }}
* Murray, Janet H., [http://www.newmediareader.com/book_samples/nmr-intro-murray-excerpt.pdf Inventing the Medium, 2003]
*{{cite book | last = Núñez-Faraco | first = Humberto | title = Borges and Dante | publisher = P. Lang | ___location = Frankfurt Am Main | year = 2006 | isbn = 9783039105113 }}
*{{cite book | last = Racz | first = Gregary | title = Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) as Writer and Social Critic | publisher = Edwin Mellen Press | ___location = Lewiston | year = 2003 | isbn = 0773469044 }}
*{{cite book | last = Rodríguez | first = Monegal | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Dutton | ___location = New York | year = 1978 | isbn = 0525137483 }}
*{{cite book | last = Rodríguez-Luis | first = Julio | title = The Contemporary Praxis of the Fantastic | publisher = Garland | ___location = New York | year = 1991 | isbn = 0815301014 }}
*{{cite book | last = Sarlo | first = Beatriz | title = Jorge Luis Borges: a Writer on the Edge | publisher = Verso | ___location = London | year = 2007 | isbn = 9781844675883 }}
*{{cite book | last = Shaw | first = Donald | title = Borges' Narrative Strategy | publisher = Francis Cairns | ___location = Liverpool | year = 1992 | isbn = 0905205847 }}
*{{cite book | last = Stabb | first = Martin | title = Borges Revisited | publisher = Twayne Publishers | ___location = Boston | year = 1991 | isbn = 080578263X }}
*{{cite book | last = Sturrock | first = John | title = Paper Tigers | publisher = Clarendon Press | ___location = Oxford | year = 1977 | isbn = 0198157460 }}
*{{cite book | last = Todorov | first = Tzvetan | title = Introduction à la littérature fantastique | publisher = Seuil | ___location = Paris | year = 1970 }}
*{{cite book | last = Toro | first = Alfonso | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Vervuert | ___location = Frankfurt Am Main | year = 1999 | isbn = 3893542175 }}
*{{cite book | last = Volek | first = Emil | title = ''"Aquiles y la Tortuga: Arte, imaginación y realidad según Borges". In:'' Cuatro claves para la modernidad. Analisis semiótico de textos hispánicos. | ___location = Madri | year = 1984 }}
*{{cite book | last = Waisman | first = Sergio | title = Borges and Translation | publisher = Bucknell University Press | ___location = Lewisburg Pa. | year = 2005 | isbn = 0838755925 }}
*{{cite book | last = Williamson | first = Edwin | title = Borges: A Life | publisher = Viking | ___location = New York | year = 2004 | isbn = 0670885797 }}
*{{cite book | last = Wilson | first = Jason | title = Jorge Luis Borges | publisher = Reaktion Books | ___location = London | year = 2006 | isbn = 9781861892867 }}
*{{cite book | last = Woscoboinik | first = Julio | title = The Secret of Borges | publisher = University Press of America | ___location = Washington | year = 1998 | isbn = 0761812385 }}
*{{cite book | last = Yates | first = Donald | title = Jorge Luis Borges, Life, Work, and Criticism | publisher = York Press | ___location = Baltimore | year = 1985 | isbn = 0919966470 }}
===Documentaries===
*{{Cite video
| people = [[Montes-Bradley]], Eduardo (Director)
| title = [[Harto The Borges]]
| medium = Feature Documentary
| publisher = Patagonia Film Group, US
| ___location = USA
| date = 1999 }}
*{{cite video |people = Willicher, Ricardo |date = |title = Borges para millones |format = |___location = Argentina }}
{{refend}}
==External links==
{{Sister project links|v=no|s=no|b=no|n=no}}
*[http://anagrammatically.com/category/borges/ A set of English translations of Borges short stories and poems]
*[http://www.fst.com.ar Fundación San Telmo's Jorge Luis Borges Collection. (Spanish)]
*[http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?recid=23874 ''The Norton Lectures'', delivered at Harvard University in the fall of 1967, by Borges]
*[http://www.susanamedina.net/modules/articles/article.php?id=28 An essay from ''Borgesland'' by Susana Medina "Hallucinating Spaces"]
* {{cite journal| url=http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/4331/the-art-of-fiction-no-39-jorge-luis-borges| title=Jorge Luis Borges, The Art of Fiction No. 39| work=Paris Review| date=Winter-Spring 1967| author=Ronald Christ }}
*[http://habitusmag.com/2008/02/231/a-conversation-with-jorge-luis-borges/ 02/14/08 Interview with Borges at the University of Buenos Aires from ''Habitus: A Diaspora Journal'' (in English)]
*[http://www.themodernword.com/borges/index.html Jorge Luis Borges at The Modern Word]
*[http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/inourtime/inourtime_20070104.shtml BBC Radio 4: ''In Our Time''. Historical Discussion on Borges life and work.]
*[http://www.borges.pitt.edu/ Borges Center, University of Pittsburgh]. Multiple resources and archive. Publishes the journal ''Variaciones Borges''.
*[http://www.slate.com/id/2159221/ Slate.com revisionist essay by Clive James "Borges' Bad Politics"]
*[http://amigos-de-borges.net/site/english/main/ The Friends of Jorge Luis Borges Worldwide Society & Associates]
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