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. . . at least not in terms of literary influence ...Read the full article
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Dave T from midwest, Canada writes: “Whole sight; or all the rest is desolation” was how an English novelist began an acclaimed novel in the 1970s. Whole sight: for the character in the novel and its creator, both the power and struggle of vision to liberate insight from memory -just one dilemma of postmodern man-and to use that insight in a way that informs premonition and instinct. In Borges world, whole sight might be described as the inventive power of the imagination coursing through the senses, the mental vision of an alternative reality, fabrications of cultural identity, events at times defying the logic of the senses rather than the kind of derangement Rimbaud envisioned. If the miraculous is really anything that approaches the unfathomable, then Borges’ inventiveness approaches the former. In one of his stories, the person sitting next to you on the park bench is…well, you, …transported through time at a earlier age, part bilocation it would seem, part Doppelganger, an interesting forerunner of the Matrix effect. Hence, Borges as part of a new aesthetic, writing at the time of Andre Breton, Cesar Vallejo, Robert Desnos, Fernando Pessoa. Kundera once wrote that Kafka made Marquez possible; I agree with that sentiment and would add Borges as a literary descendant of Kafka as well. And then, there is Cesar Vallejo: a poet among whose work Trilce arrived sooner than the earliest work of Borges, and who also stands out among the first avant-garde writers from the more remote parts of South America. Borges the poet stands out too, as anyone who reads through the nearly 600 plus pages of his collected poems will attest. As for Kafka: a writer destined for this list, and Borges, an interesting selection in light of Kafka’s influence, perhaps a hand from the lexicon of imaginary places and things not unlike that in Ficciones, well behind the visible curtain, obscuring the farthest distance attainable by whole sight.
- Posted 19/07/08 at 10:00 PM EST | Alert an Editor | Link to Comment
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Tom G from Canada writes: Is Ficciones actually published independently of Borges other works these days? I realize it is or may be, but I'm sure it is not the edition that most North American readers are introduced to. That would probably be Labyrinths. I can't think of Ficciones as a distinct and separate entity. It is usually coupled with Borges essays and parables, which aren't as creatively entrancing or intellectually stimulating (arguable), but still constitute the brilliant meat of what I perceive as Borges best work. Together, these varied works do justice to the man and should be read in tandem. This is the work that most people have access to. What is the point? It is that Ficciones is like Moby Dick without the chapters and paragraphs of natural history and whale fishing add-ons. It makes Borges feel abridged.
- Posted 27/07/08 at 10:53 AM EST | Alert an Editor | Link to Comment
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