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El informe de Brodie
Gran parte de estos cuentos giran en torno al cumplimiento de un destino que se repite y que suele prefigurar un enfrentamiento. A veces los protagonistas son los hombres como en "El otro duelo" o "Guayaquil"; otras, son sus armas: dos cuchillos que se buscan largamente hasta por fin encontrarse y pelear. También puede ocurrir, como en "Historia de Rosendo Juárez", que en ese enfrentamiento uno se convierta en espejo del otro, uno sea él mismo y su enemigo. O que, como le sucede a Brodie, el otro le produzca horror y fascinación. Once relatos en los que el autor dice haber encontrado su verdadera voz:"La ya avanzada edad me ha enseñado la resignación de ser Borges".
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
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4156 people want to read
About the author
Jorge Luis Borges
1,954 books14.1k followersJorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo 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. 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.
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. 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. 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, he 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 Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. He dedicated his final work, The Conspirators, to the city of Geneva, Switzerland. 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."
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. 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. 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, he 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 Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. He dedicated his final work, The Conspirators, to the city of Geneva, Switzerland. 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."
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May 11, 2024
“…my stories are realistic,” declares Jorge Luis Borges in the preface to this collection. Sure, but he resides in his own special reality…
The Gospel According to Mark is the weirdest and fatal interpretation of Holy Writ by the local peasantry.
The collection comprises the tales of courage and cowardice, fidelity and treason, friendship and feud, rivalry and knife fights…
The stories are vivid and brief and every story boasts some peculiar twist.
The title tale, Doctor Brodie’s Report is a journey of a kind Lemuel Gulliver and Baron Munchausen used to take…
Reality is rich and vast so everyone can choose to one’s own liking.
…the generations of men, throughout recorded time, have always told and retold two stories – that of a lost ship which searches the Mediterranean seas for a dearly loved island, and that of a god who is crucified on Golgotha.
The Gospel According to Mark is the weirdest and fatal interpretation of Holy Writ by the local peasantry.
The collection comprises the tales of courage and cowardice, fidelity and treason, friendship and feud, rivalry and knife fights…
Even after their gauchos were dust, the knives – the knives, not their tools, the men – knew how to fight. And that night they fought well.
The stories are vivid and brief and every story boasts some peculiar twist.
The title tale, Doctor Brodie’s Report is a journey of a kind Lemuel Gulliver and Baron Munchausen used to take…
Every male born into the tribe is subjected to a painstaking examination; if he exhibits certain stigmata, the nature of which were not revealed to me, he is elevated to the rank of king of the Yahoos. So that the physical world may not lead him from the paths of wisdom, he is gelded on the spot, his eyes are burned, and his hands and feet are amputated.
Reality is rich and vast so everyone can choose to one’s own liking.
July 12, 2021
Welcome to the many universes of Jorge Luis Borges. For those new to the author, this is an excellent place to start with Borges since these stories are accessible and straightforward, containing very little of the baroque complexity characteristic of his earlier collections.
To share the wisdom nectar of these eleven Borges tales, I will focus on the title story. And let me tell you, I have read a number of books on indigenous tribes by cultural anthropologists such as Raymond Firth and Colin Turnbull, but I have never encountered a study quite like Brodie's Report.
STRANGE FIND
The narrator relates how he discovers a manuscript tucked inside the cover of Thousand and One Nights, a manuscript written by one David Brodie, a Scottish missionary who preached in the jungles of Brazil, a manuscript he is now making known to the world; and, the narrator says, how he will take pains to reproduce the manuscript’s colorless language verbatim. Such a mysterious find is classic Borges: the narrator is only the messenger, any actual firsthand experience of unfolding peculiar events belongs to another.
BARE FACTS
Here are the raw facts about this bestial, wild, brutish tribe Brodie calls Yahoos: vowels are absent in their harsh language; the number of their tribe never exceeds seven hundred; they sleep wherever they find themselves at night and only a few have names; they call one another by flinging mud or throwing themselves in the dirt; their diet consists of fruits, roots, reptiles and milk from cats and bats; they hide themselves while eating but have sex out in the open; they walk about naked since clothing and tattoos are unknown to them; they prefer to huddle in swamps rather than grasslands with springs of fresh water and shade trees; they devour the raw flesh of their king, queen and witch doctors so as to imbibe their respective virtues.
For an author like Borges, a highly cultivated, refined, aesthetically attuned urbane gentleman and man of letters, life among this tribe of Yahoo could be seen as his worst nightmare. And, of course, Yahoos bring to mind that memorable tale by Jonathan Swift.
QUESTIONABLE HONOR
The tribe is ruled over by a king whose power is absolute. Each male child is closely examined to see if he possess bodily signs, both secret and sacred, revealing him as their future king. Once a child is chosen as king of the Yahoos, he is immediately castrated, blinded, and his hands and feet cut off so as he will not be distracted by the outside world, setting him free to imbibe inner wisdom. The king is then taken to a cavern where only witch doctors and a pair of female slaves are permitted entry to serve the king and smear his body with dung.
By this extreme social custom, I think Borges is asking us to ponder the perennial philosophical question: is our basic, corrupt human nature improved by society and culture, a view held by such as Plato and Aristotle; or, are we, as according to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, good by nature and corrupted by society? However we approach this question, one thing is for sure: no other non-human primate tribe would inflict such brutal dismemberment on their leader.
VISION AND CREATIVITY
The queen looks at Brodie and then, in full sight of her attendants, offers herself to him. He declines but then the queen does something unexpected – she pricks Brodie with a pin, a pin manufactured elsewhere since the Yahoos are incapable of manufacturing even the simplest objects. Pin pricking from the queen is seen by the Yahoo as an honor -the queen projects that Brodie will not feel any pain since all the Yahoos are insensitive to pain and pleasure with the exception of the pleasure they take in gorging on raw and rancid food and smelling its noxious odor.
On the heels of this episode, Brodie make a startling pronouncement: lack of imagination makes them cruel. To my mind, one of the most powerful statements within the story: linking cruelty with an individual’s lack of imagination and also linking cruelty with a society’s lack of imagination. How far removed are we from the Yahoos in this respect, really?
BIZARRE
Brodie reports how the Yahoo number system is unique, how they count one, two, three, four, and then immediately go to infinity. Also unique is the power the witch doctors have to transform anyone into an ant or a tortoise; as proof of this truth, the Yahoo point out red ants swarming on an anthill. Then we arrive something truly unique: the Yahoo have virtually no memory, they barely have any recollection of past time beyond yesterday.
On this topic, Brodie makes a general philosophically point: memory is no less marvelous than prophesy since the ancient happenings we easily recall (the building of the pyramids; the parting of the Red Sea) are much more distant in time than tomorrow. As we all know, our very human capacity to remember can be a mixed blessing: although our humanity is enriched, we can frequently be burdened by continually bringing to mind not only nasty and sad memories but tragic and horrific memories. Not the Yahoo - they only go back as far as yesterday.
THEOLOGY
Since Brodie is a Scottish missionary, predictably his report includes the Yahoo system of religious belief. Turns out, the Yahoo believe both heaven and hell are underground: their hell is bright, dry and inhabited by the old, the sick, the mistreated as well as Arabs, leopards and the Apemen. Yes, Brodie reports how the Yahoo have to fend off attacks by the Apemen.
No further detail is given on the Apemen which makes the whole report a bit spooky. Anyway, the Yahoo heaven is dark and marsh-like and the afterlife reward for kings, queens, witch doctors along with the happy, the hardhearted and the bloodthirsty. I can just imagine what Jorge Luis Borges must have been thinking outlining such a Yahoo theology, a theology that really stretches our more conventional views of the afterlife, to say the least.
THE ARTS
Brodie’s report includes the two Yahoo sports: organized cat fights and executions. Sound like fun? I wonder if they would sell tickets to outsiders. Then Brodie reports on how a poet is a Yahoo who can string together six or seven enigmatic words. The poet will then shriek out these mysterious words surrounded by his fellow Yahoo who consider the poet no longer a man but a god. And as a god, they have the right to kill the poet on the spot. However, if the poet can escape the circle, he can seek refuge in a desert to the north of the jungle. Again, I wonder what was going through the mind of Borges when he envisioned poetry and the Yahoo – certainly enough to make a refined aesthete’s skin crawl.
HOME SWEET HOME
Bordie reports now that he’s home in Scotland, he still dreams of the Yahoo and how the Yahoo are not that far removed from the streets of Glasgow, since, after all, the Yahoo have institutions, a king, speak a language based on abstract concepts, believe in the divine origin of poetry and also believe the soul survives death. Lastly, let me note the following: based on their rather abstract language, Brodie reports the Yahoo are not a primitive people but a degenerative people; in other words, they are a people whose ancestors were once highly civilized, perhaps even European. A rather chilling thought.
February 27, 2019
In his old age, Borges--using Kipling's Plain Tales from the Hills as his model--crafted these deceptively straightforward narratives in a new laconic style. Argentinian history, the half-savage Pampas, the criminals of the Buenos Aires' slums, and duels (both actual and metaphorical) are the subjects of these tales.
They are all worthwhile, and three of them--The Interloper, The Encounter, and the Gospel According to Mark--are as good as anything he ever wrote.
June 30, 2024
Cel mai influent prozator din secolul XX. În opinia mea, firește. Roberto Bolaño recomanda să-l citim periodic. Ofer doar două citate din Prolog:
Scopul unei povestiri: emoția, amuzamentul
„Nu sînt, și nici n-am fost vreodată, ceea ce înainte se numea un născocitor de povești sau un predicator de parabole, iar acum se numește scriitor angajat. Nu aspir să fiu un Esop. Povestirile mele, la fel ca acelea din O mie și una de nopți, vor să distreze și să emoţioneze, nu să convingă”.
Mijlocul de a-l realiza: simplitatea stilistică
„Mulţi ani am crezut că-mi va fi dat să obţin o pagină reușită cu ajutorul variaţiunilor și noutăților [verbale]; acum, cînd am împlinit șaptezeci de ani, cred că mi-am găsit glasul propriu. Modificările verbale nu vor strica, nici nu vor îmbunătăţi ceea ce dictez, în afară de cazul în care pot să ușureze o propoziţie încărcată sau să atenueze o emfază. Fiecare limbaj este o tradiţie; fiecare cuvint, un simbol împărtășit; ceea ce un inovator e în stare să modifice este lipsit de importanţă...”.
Scopul unei povestiri: emoția, amuzamentul
„Nu sînt, și nici n-am fost vreodată, ceea ce înainte se numea un născocitor de povești sau un predicator de parabole, iar acum se numește scriitor angajat. Nu aspir să fiu un Esop. Povestirile mele, la fel ca acelea din O mie și una de nopți, vor să distreze și să emoţioneze, nu să convingă”.
Mijlocul de a-l realiza: simplitatea stilistică
„Mulţi ani am crezut că-mi va fi dat să obţin o pagină reușită cu ajutorul variaţiunilor și noutăților [verbale]; acum, cînd am împlinit șaptezeci de ani, cred că mi-am găsit glasul propriu. Modificările verbale nu vor strica, nici nu vor îmbunătăţi ceea ce dictez, în afară de cazul în care pot să ușureze o propoziţie încărcată sau să atenueze o emfază. Fiecare limbaj este o tradiţie; fiecare cuvint, un simbol împărtășit; ceea ce un inovator e în stare să modifice este lipsit de importanţă...”.
January 3, 2023
خب میتونم بگم نصف داستان ها رو دوست داشتم و نصف دیگه رو مِه!
حقیقتش اگر بخوام یه کتاب واقعگرایانه بخونم ترجیح میدم سراغ اشتاین بک یا بالزاک برم و نه بورخس.
...
هدیه عزیزی از دوستی خیلی مهم ♡
حقیقتش اگر بخوام یه کتاب واقعگرایانه بخونم ترجیح میدم سراغ اشتاین بک یا بالزاک برم و نه بورخس.
...
هدیه عزیزی از دوستی خیلی مهم ♡
April 18, 2017
"I do not aspire to be Aesop. My stories, like those of the Thousand and One Nights, try to be entertaining or moving but not persuasive."
Most of the stories reveal in their real themes in spoilers. So, won't talk about them specificaly. But one thing in common in all of them is that none of them are fantastic. Except perhaps, the titular one, in which a priest discovers and tries to convert to Christianitya community that look like and is called by him Yahoos. The difference between Doctor Brodie's (no relation to Miss Jean Brodie) Yahoos and Guliver's Yahoos is that the former aren't primitave rather, narrator speculates on the basis of their language, but rather a more advanced age who forgot how to read and write. Given the ever shortening attention span of our generation, it might be happening any time soon to rest of us.
About the king of Yahoos:
“So that the physical world may not lead him from the paths of wisdom, he is gelded on the spot, his eyes are burned, and his hands and feet are amputated. Thereafter, he lives confined in a cavern called the Castle (“Qzr”), into which only the four witch doctors and the two slave women who attend him and anoint him with dung are permitted entrance. Should war arise, the witch doctors remove him from his cavern, display him to the tribe to excite their courage, and bear him, lifted onto their shoulders after the manner of a flag or a talisman, to the thick of the fight. In such cases, he dies almost immediately under the hail of stones flung at him by the Ape-men.”
On the way they count:
“I shall speak now of the witch doctors. I have already recorded that they are four, this number being the largest that their arithmetic spans. On their fingers they count thus: one, two, three, four, many. Infinity begins at the thumb.”
Yahoo can see into future but no longer than 15 minutes which makes Brodie reflect:
“Knowing that past, present, and future already exist, detail upon detail, in God’s prophetic memory, in His Eternity, what baffles me is that men, while they can look indefinitely backward, are not allowed to look one whit forward.
And why did they loose all the civilisation they might have gained in past? No idea. But I think it might be they started prosecuting freedom of speech and arts:
“Another of the tribe’s customs is the discovery of poets. Six or seven words, generally enigmatic, may come to a man’s mind. He cannot contain himself and shouts them out, standing in the center of a circle formed by the witch doctors and the common people, who are stretched out on the ground. If the poem does not stir them, nothing comes to pass, but if the poet’s words strike them they all draw away from him, without a sound, under the command of a holy dread. Feeling then that the spirit has touched him, nobody, not even his own mother, will either speak to him or cast a glance at him. Now he is a man no longer but a god, and anyone has license to kill him."
Most of the rest of the stories are about rivalries, knives, gangsters etc. Often stories though realistic, are such that an alternative interpretation suggested by author becomes possible. Sometimes objects seem to have personalities of their own, sometimes the events of a story are suspiciously similar to those that occurred in past though with a decline in settings and people.
Even prefaces written by Borges are awesome.
From the story about a really old woaman:
“Now all my dreams are of dead people” was one of the last things she was heard to say."
"No one had ever thought of her as a fool, but as far as I know she had never enjoyed the pleasures of the mind; the last pleasures left her would be those of memory and, later on, of forgetfulness.
More quotes:
"I prefer the Platonic idea of the Muse to that of Poe, who reasoned, or feigned to reason, that
the writing of a poem is an act of the intelligence. It never fails to amaze me that the classics
hold a romantic theory of poetry, and a romantic poet a classical theory."
"Maybe their poor and monotonous lives held nothing else for them than their hatred, and that was why they nursed it. In the long run, without suspecting it, each of the two became a slave to
the other."
"Cardoso drew the Red’s official cutthroat, a man from Corrientes well along in years, who, to comfort a condemned man, would pat him on the shoulder and tell him, “Take heart, friend. Women go through far worse when they give birth.”
"In tough neighborhoods a man never admits to anyone—not even to himself— that a woman matters beyond lust and possession, but the two brothers were in love. This, in some way, made them feel ashamed."
"I felt (in the words of the poet Lugones) the fear of what is suddenly too late"
"I do not know how long it lasted; there are events that fall outside the common measure of time."
"I often considered revealing the story to some friend, but always I felt that there was a greater pleasure in being the keeper of a secret than in telling it."
"Certain devices of a literary nature and one or two longish sentences led me to suspect that
this was not the first time he had told the story."
"Sleeping, as we all know, is the most secret of our acts. We devote a third of our lives to it,
and yet do not understand it."
"Two men met face to face at Guayaquil; if one of them was master, it was because of his stronger will, not because of the weight of arguments."
“Words, words, words. Shakespeare, insuperable master of words, held them in scorn.
Most of the stories reveal in their real themes in spoilers. So, won't talk about them specificaly. But one thing in common in all of them is that none of them are fantastic. Except perhaps, the titular one, in which a priest discovers and tries to convert to Christianitya community that look like and is called by him Yahoos. The difference between Doctor Brodie's (no relation to Miss Jean Brodie) Yahoos and Guliver's Yahoos is that the former aren't primitave rather, narrator speculates on the basis of their language, but rather a more advanced age who forgot how to read and write. Given the ever shortening attention span of our generation, it might be happening any time soon to rest of us.
About the king of Yahoos:
“So that the physical world may not lead him from the paths of wisdom, he is gelded on the spot, his eyes are burned, and his hands and feet are amputated. Thereafter, he lives confined in a cavern called the Castle (“Qzr”), into which only the four witch doctors and the two slave women who attend him and anoint him with dung are permitted entrance. Should war arise, the witch doctors remove him from his cavern, display him to the tribe to excite their courage, and bear him, lifted onto their shoulders after the manner of a flag or a talisman, to the thick of the fight. In such cases, he dies almost immediately under the hail of stones flung at him by the Ape-men.”
On the way they count:
“I shall speak now of the witch doctors. I have already recorded that they are four, this number being the largest that their arithmetic spans. On their fingers they count thus: one, two, three, four, many. Infinity begins at the thumb.”
Yahoo can see into future but no longer than 15 minutes which makes Brodie reflect:
“Knowing that past, present, and future already exist, detail upon detail, in God’s prophetic memory, in His Eternity, what baffles me is that men, while they can look indefinitely backward, are not allowed to look one whit forward.
And why did they loose all the civilisation they might have gained in past? No idea. But I think it might be they started prosecuting freedom of speech and arts:
“Another of the tribe’s customs is the discovery of poets. Six or seven words, generally enigmatic, may come to a man’s mind. He cannot contain himself and shouts them out, standing in the center of a circle formed by the witch doctors and the common people, who are stretched out on the ground. If the poem does not stir them, nothing comes to pass, but if the poet’s words strike them they all draw away from him, without a sound, under the command of a holy dread. Feeling then that the spirit has touched him, nobody, not even his own mother, will either speak to him or cast a glance at him. Now he is a man no longer but a god, and anyone has license to kill him."
Most of the rest of the stories are about rivalries, knives, gangsters etc. Often stories though realistic, are such that an alternative interpretation suggested by author becomes possible. Sometimes objects seem to have personalities of their own, sometimes the events of a story are suspiciously similar to those that occurred in past though with a decline in settings and people.
Even prefaces written by Borges are awesome.
From the story about a really old woaman:
“Now all my dreams are of dead people” was one of the last things she was heard to say."
"No one had ever thought of her as a fool, but as far as I know she had never enjoyed the pleasures of the mind; the last pleasures left her would be those of memory and, later on, of forgetfulness.
More quotes:
"I prefer the Platonic idea of the Muse to that of Poe, who reasoned, or feigned to reason, that
the writing of a poem is an act of the intelligence. It never fails to amaze me that the classics
hold a romantic theory of poetry, and a romantic poet a classical theory."
"Maybe their poor and monotonous lives held nothing else for them than their hatred, and that was why they nursed it. In the long run, without suspecting it, each of the two became a slave to
the other."
"Cardoso drew the Red’s official cutthroat, a man from Corrientes well along in years, who, to comfort a condemned man, would pat him on the shoulder and tell him, “Take heart, friend. Women go through far worse when they give birth.”
"In tough neighborhoods a man never admits to anyone—not even to himself— that a woman matters beyond lust and possession, but the two brothers were in love. This, in some way, made them feel ashamed."
"I felt (in the words of the poet Lugones) the fear of what is suddenly too late"
"I do not know how long it lasted; there are events that fall outside the common measure of time."
"I often considered revealing the story to some friend, but always I felt that there was a greater pleasure in being the keeper of a secret than in telling it."
"Certain devices of a literary nature and one or two longish sentences led me to suspect that
this was not the first time he had told the story."
"Sleeping, as we all know, is the most secret of our acts. We devote a third of our lives to it,
and yet do not understand it."
"Two men met face to face at Guayaquil; if one of them was master, it was because of his stronger will, not because of the weight of arguments."
“Words, words, words. Shakespeare, insuperable master of words, held them in scorn.
November 17, 2023
It is easy to miss Borges. You have to navigate the inextricable South American wars of the 19th century, one of his favorite theaters. It would help if you got used to its stories of thugs and gauchos, where knife fights are ubiquitous. And more than anything, you have to get used to a specific form of savagery and bestiality from which, without anyone understanding why, very complex behaviors suddenly emerge, like the remains of a civilization buried under barbarism, which would suddenly occur.
This small collection of a dozen short stories can be quite destabilizing. Most had set in 1850s Argentina, a young, barely independent country, where hidalgos and their noble traditions rub shoulders with pampas cowboys and a host of miserable European newcomers. Life there is complex and often short. They are picky about honor, and quarrels settle quickly.
But the latest novel is the most curious. That's a kind of exploration report where a pastor tells of having met people in Africa with strange, cruel, and destabilizing mores. They have a king, to whom they cut off hands and feet, and they gouge out eyes and eardrums so that contact with the world does not defile him. They believe in the divine origin of poetry and, therefore, kill anyone whose inspiration suddenly causes words to line up; the story ends with a plea in their favor from the explorer, who points out that despite their frankly repugnant mores, they are nonetheless men, having established a specific form of culture.
This small collection of a dozen short stories can be quite destabilizing. Most had set in 1850s Argentina, a young, barely independent country, where hidalgos and their noble traditions rub shoulders with pampas cowboys and a host of miserable European newcomers. Life there is complex and often short. They are picky about honor, and quarrels settle quickly.
But the latest novel is the most curious. That's a kind of exploration report where a pastor tells of having met people in Africa with strange, cruel, and destabilizing mores. They have a king, to whom they cut off hands and feet, and they gouge out eyes and eardrums so that contact with the world does not defile him. They believe in the divine origin of poetry and, therefore, kill anyone whose inspiration suddenly causes words to line up; the story ends with a plea in their favor from the explorer, who points out that despite their frankly repugnant mores, they are nonetheless men, having established a specific form of culture.
August 15, 2025
As far as I am concerned, the short story 'The Gospel According to Mark' stands out from the rest of the stories in this collection.
It is an absolutely devastating, scary and suspensful tale of the perils of miscommunication in the matters of religion and faith.
The story actually mirrors the Gospel according Mark. The Gutres family, three illiterate local people who can hardly ever speak or articulate their emotions, 'find' faith through the protagonist, an educated young man called Espinosa who is, indifferent to religion. He just keeps reading 'The Gospel to Mark' to them to pass time during the flood. The process of the Gutres coming to faith is depicted with irony and this irony dramatically contrasts with the tragic consequences of the misunderstanding of the two different worlds.
The final image of this brillian story where natural beauty is mixed with horrific sacrifice is really memorable.
'A bird sang out. A goldfinch, he thought. The shed was without a roof; they had pulled down the beams to make the cross.'
It is an absolutely devastating, scary and suspensful tale of the perils of miscommunication in the matters of religion and faith.
The story actually mirrors the Gospel according Mark. The Gutres family, three illiterate local people who can hardly ever speak or articulate their emotions, 'find' faith through the protagonist, an educated young man called Espinosa who is, indifferent to religion. He just keeps reading 'The Gospel to Mark' to them to pass time during the flood. The process of the Gutres coming to faith is depicted with irony and this irony dramatically contrasts with the tragic consequences of the misunderstanding of the two different worlds.
The final image of this brillian story where natural beauty is mixed with horrific sacrifice is really memorable.
'A bird sang out. A goldfinch, he thought. The shed was without a roof; they had pulled down the beams to make the cross.'
July 27, 2015
”I can’t say whether the story was true; the important thing… was that it had been told and believed.”
I have the Collected Fictions (with copious translator's notes), but am splitting my review of that into its components, listed in publication order: Collected Fictions - all reviews. This is the seventh, published in 1970.
The Encounter is a crucial story, describing a seminal episode in JLB’s childhood, suggesting the roots of so many of his recurring themes.
Foreword
This prepares the chronological reader for a significant change of style: these are “plain tales” that avoid unexpected endings, in the mould of Kipling. JLB asserts that he (JLB) is not “a fabulist or spinner of parables” and that his tales “are intended not to persuade readers, but to entertain and touch them.”
Most have an introductory section, explaining the (allegedly true) roots of the story, while conceding he may yield “to the literary temptation to heighten or insert the occasional small detail”.
“For many years I believed that it would be my fortune to achieve literature through variations and novelties; now that I am seventy years old I think I have found my own voice.”
I confess I was slightly disappointed; this led me to expect something closer to A Universal History of Iniquity than the more extraordinary pieces in between that and this. But I was heartened by the fact they are set “at some distance in both time and space” and that although they are “realistic… two of the stories… can be opened with the same fantastic key… I am decidedly monotonous.” Having finished this collection, they are deeper and more mysterious than those in A Universal History, but more straightforward than those in between.
For all that these are “plain”, two stories suggest the importance of imagination. In The Other Duel, it’s the familiarity of killing animals and the lack of imagination that makes killing people so easy, and in Brodie’s Report, the Yahoos’ “lack of imagination makes them cruel”.
He makes no mention here or in the stories themselves of his blindness (unlike In Praise of Darkness, reviewed as part of Dreamtigers). I suppose he was long used to it by then.
The Interloper
This concerns knife fighters in harsh neighbourhoods. Familiar territory, but not really my thing. I assumed (incorrectly) that this would set the tone for all those that followed.
Fortunately, this was deeper and more complex than it seemed at first sight. Unfortunately, it was pretty grim.
Brothers (who might be deemed “white trash” in the US) are very close: “falling out with one of them was to earn yourself two enemies”. The eponymous interloper is a woman, who cleaves them (in both senses) to/from each other.
They are dreadful men, who treat women appallingly. There’s no suggestion JLB approves, but it still left a nasty taste.
The notes mention a queer interpretation of this (and some of his others), which makes one see it in a whole new light. However, other sources say it’s based on a true story of friends; by switching the protagonists to be brothers, JLB seems to be ruling out a sexual triangle.
Unworthy
Class, friendship, betrayal, and reformation – about a Jewish boy, but with Biblical echoes.
A respectable bookshop owner was an unlikely gang member in his teens. He was shy, red-headed, Jewish, and wanted to fit in (he changed his first name to something more Catholic). When his mother and aunt were insulted, gangster Ferrari stepped in. Young Fischbein was impressed (the women were more equivocal: “a gentleman that demands respect for ladies” or “a ruffian who won’t allow competition”?), and is taken under the wing of Ferrari.
Which of them is unworthy of the other?
At first, Fischbein denies his friendship with Ferrari for fear it would be bragging. Then things take a more definite turn, for unspecified reasons.
The Story from Rosendo Juarez
This is another version of Man on Pink Corner, from A Universal History of Iniquity. Both include the line “Rosendo, I think you’re needing this” as a woman hands him his own knife, from up his sleeve.
A rough kid learns to fight, kills a man, is arrested, but “turned into a gorilla for the party” and now sees himself as a reasonable man, fully reformed.
The Encounter 6*
Young JLB (unknowingly) sowing the seeds for much of his adult work: labyrinth, knives, storytelling, and a mysterious twist and a tacit lesson of being careful what you wish for.
Aged about ten, he went to stay with a cousin, but “being a boy among men”, he was lonely, so slipped out to explore the large and unfamiliar house. “A big house that one has never been in before… means more to a boy than an unexplored country to a traveller”. He gets lost, but is found by the owner, who shows him an extensive knife collection.
Some of the men, playing cards, fight. JLB “was not drunk from wine but I was drunk from adventure; I yearned for someone to be killed, so that I could tell about it later.” The honest and plausible thoughts of a ten year old, but nevertheless shocking.
“I always suspected I derived more pleasure from keeping the secret than I would from telling it.” JLB doesn’t state if that remains true.
Juan Murana
A reclusive widow “confuses her man, her tiger, with that cruel object he has bequeathed to her, the weapon of his bloody deeds.”
The Elderly Lady
An aged widow remembers little of the minor hero who was her father, so the celebrations pass her by. The historical notes are almost as long as the story. Too many characters and generations and too much Argentine context for me to get much from.
The Duel
A knife-free duel! And female protagonists! Paintbrushes at the ready…
An ambassador’s widow decided to become an abstract artist. So begins a tacit battle with a friend, who is also an artist. “In the course of that private duel they acted with perfect loyalty to one another.”
“There were no defeats or victories, nor even so much as an open clash”, so what was the point? Back to duality (a favourite Borgesian them.
The Other Duel
A simmering feud between two men. Duality and futility again (not that the story is futile!).
“Perhaps their only passion… was their hatred, and therefore they saved it and stored it up. Without suspecting, each of the two became the other’s slave.”
Guayaquil
The title is a city in Ecuador that was important in Argentina’s battle for independence. The story is about rival interpretations of Bolivar’s role in that, and hence about truth in general.
Can you trust historical documents? Of course not. “Even if they were written by Bolivar himself… that does not mean they contain the whole truth.”
The Gospel According to Mark, 5*
In his foreword to the Brodie’s Report collection, JLB describes this as “the best story of the volume”.
The protagonist is a medical student and a man of contradictions. His name is Espinosa, meaning “thorny”, which has echoes of the crown of thorns.
He spends the summer at his cousin’s ranch, but the cousin goes away to deal with floods. Espinosa is left as de facto master of the house, with a family of illiterate staff. He finds an old Bible, with the Gutres family’s genealogy at the back. They were originally Scottish, but English (and literacy) has died out in the 100 years since their forebears arrived. Evolution does not always go forwards (see Brodie’s Report, below, and The Immortal in The Aleph).
“Throughout history, humankind has told two stories: the story of a lost ship sailing the Mediterranean seas in quest of a beloved isle, and the story of a god who allows himself to be crucified on Golgotha.” Which will this be? Both, perhaps.
The student decides to read aloud from this Bible, after supper, and he picks Mark’s gospel. The family are transfixed, even though they don’t understand it. He does this each evening. There’s a similar scene in The Congress (in The Book of Sand).
Brodie’s Report 5*
Gulliver’s Travels is a clear inspiration (it even features a primitive tribe called the Yahoos). A Borgesian aspect is that it purports to be the (incomplete) notes of a Scottish missionary in Brazil, found in the pages of a copy of 1001 Nights. Is the story of its finding true? What about the contents? The comic – and sometimes grisly - implausibility suggest not the latter. But it could be a fake document, genuinely found, as Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius claims to be.
There’s no particular narrative, just a string of provocative descriptions, ending with an indirect and unanswered question.
The Yahoo diet is strange, “fruits, tubers, and reptiles”. Reptiles, but not mammals? They catch fish with their hands (fair enough) but also “drink cat’s and bat’s milk”!
Every newborn boy is examined for a specific (but secret) pattern of stigmata. If he has them, he is immediately king – and therefore “he is gelded, blinded with a fiery stick, and his hands and feet are cut off, so that the world will not distract him from wisdom”, though given how primitive they are, and the fact they “smear his body with dung”, I doubt such kings will survive long enough to develop much wisdom.
Their counting system is 1, 2, 3, 4, many and “the Yahoos have no memory”, so if someone mentions a leopard attack, no one knows if it happened to them, their parents, or in a dream.
“Philosophically speaking, memory is no less marvellous than prophesying the future” as witch doctors can do. Does that require the assumption of one past and only one future? If we believe in multiple possible outcomes (as JLB suggests in other stories), this claim doesn’t make much sense.
The lack of conversion to Christianity is original: “The phrase ‘Our Father’ disturbed them, since they lack any concept of paternity. They do not understand that an act performed nine months ago may somehow be related to the birth of a child… and… all women engage in carnal commerce, though not all are mothers.”
Their language is strange and simultaneously simple and complex. “The intellectual power of abstraction demanded by such a language suggests to me that the Yahoos… are not a primitive people but a degenerate one” Indecipherable runes nearby seem to confirm that. Like the Gutres family in The Gospel According to Mark, above, and the immortals in the story of that name in The Aleph?
Would you die for art? In this culture, spontaneous poetry is revered – but in a perverse way. “If the poem does not excite the tribe, nothing happens, but if the words of the poet surprise or astound the listeners… he is no longer a man, but a god, and anyone may kill him.”
Brodie finally lists the Yahoos’ redeeming qualities, upholds an obligation to save them (from the occasional attacks by Ape-men, or from colonialism and Christianisation?) and says “I hope Her Majesty’s government will not turn a deaf ear to the remedy this report has the temerity to suggest.” What does it suggest? We will never know.
Quotes
• “Literature is naught but guided dreaming.”
• “We all come to resemble the image others have of us.”
• “The newspapers… made him the hero that perhaps he never was, but that I had dreamed of.”
• “Friendship is as mysterious as love… the only thing that holds no mystery is happiness because it is its own justification.”
• “Time cannot be measured in days the way money is measured in pesos and centavos, because all pesos are equal, while very day, perhaps every hour, is different.”
• “Newspapers told loyal untruths.”
• “Sleeping… is the most secret thing we do.”
• Wearing a bow-tie and “a well-trimmed, military-style moustache; during the course of our conversation he lighted a cigar, and at that, I felt there were too many things on that face. Trop meuble, I said to myself.”
I have the Collected Fictions (with copious translator's notes), but am splitting my review of that into its components, listed in publication order: Collected Fictions - all reviews. This is the seventh, published in 1970.
The Encounter is a crucial story, describing a seminal episode in JLB’s childhood, suggesting the roots of so many of his recurring themes.
Foreword
This prepares the chronological reader for a significant change of style: these are “plain tales” that avoid unexpected endings, in the mould of Kipling. JLB asserts that he (JLB) is not “a fabulist or spinner of parables” and that his tales “are intended not to persuade readers, but to entertain and touch them.”
Most have an introductory section, explaining the (allegedly true) roots of the story, while conceding he may yield “to the literary temptation to heighten or insert the occasional small detail”.
“For many years I believed that it would be my fortune to achieve literature through variations and novelties; now that I am seventy years old I think I have found my own voice.”
I confess I was slightly disappointed; this led me to expect something closer to A Universal History of Iniquity than the more extraordinary pieces in between that and this. But I was heartened by the fact they are set “at some distance in both time and space” and that although they are “realistic… two of the stories… can be opened with the same fantastic key… I am decidedly monotonous.” Having finished this collection, they are deeper and more mysterious than those in A Universal History, but more straightforward than those in between.
For all that these are “plain”, two stories suggest the importance of imagination. In The Other Duel, it’s the familiarity of killing animals and the lack of imagination that makes killing people so easy, and in Brodie’s Report, the Yahoos’ “lack of imagination makes them cruel”.
He makes no mention here or in the stories themselves of his blindness (unlike In Praise of Darkness, reviewed as part of Dreamtigers). I suppose he was long used to it by then.
The Interloper
This concerns knife fighters in harsh neighbourhoods. Familiar territory, but not really my thing. I assumed (incorrectly) that this would set the tone for all those that followed.
Fortunately, this was deeper and more complex than it seemed at first sight. Unfortunately, it was pretty grim.
Brothers (who might be deemed “white trash” in the US) are very close: “falling out with one of them was to earn yourself two enemies”. The eponymous interloper is a woman, who cleaves them (in both senses) to/from each other.
They are dreadful men, who treat women appallingly. There’s no suggestion JLB approves, but it still left a nasty taste.
The notes mention a queer interpretation of this (and some of his others), which makes one see it in a whole new light. However, other sources say it’s based on a true story of friends; by switching the protagonists to be brothers, JLB seems to be ruling out a sexual triangle.
Unworthy
Class, friendship, betrayal, and reformation – about a Jewish boy, but with Biblical echoes.
A respectable bookshop owner was an unlikely gang member in his teens. He was shy, red-headed, Jewish, and wanted to fit in (he changed his first name to something more Catholic). When his mother and aunt were insulted, gangster Ferrari stepped in. Young Fischbein was impressed (the women were more equivocal: “a gentleman that demands respect for ladies” or “a ruffian who won’t allow competition”?), and is taken under the wing of Ferrari.
Which of them is unworthy of the other?
At first, Fischbein denies his friendship with Ferrari for fear it would be bragging. Then things take a more definite turn, for unspecified reasons.
The Story from Rosendo Juarez
This is another version of Man on Pink Corner, from A Universal History of Iniquity. Both include the line “Rosendo, I think you’re needing this” as a woman hands him his own knife, from up his sleeve.
A rough kid learns to fight, kills a man, is arrested, but “turned into a gorilla for the party” and now sees himself as a reasonable man, fully reformed.
The Encounter 6*
Young JLB (unknowingly) sowing the seeds for much of his adult work: labyrinth, knives, storytelling, and a mysterious twist and a tacit lesson of being careful what you wish for.
Aged about ten, he went to stay with a cousin, but “being a boy among men”, he was lonely, so slipped out to explore the large and unfamiliar house. “A big house that one has never been in before… means more to a boy than an unexplored country to a traveller”. He gets lost, but is found by the owner, who shows him an extensive knife collection.
Some of the men, playing cards, fight. JLB “was not drunk from wine but I was drunk from adventure; I yearned for someone to be killed, so that I could tell about it later.” The honest and plausible thoughts of a ten year old, but nevertheless shocking.
“I always suspected I derived more pleasure from keeping the secret than I would from telling it.” JLB doesn’t state if that remains true.
Juan Murana
A reclusive widow “confuses her man, her tiger, with that cruel object he has bequeathed to her, the weapon of his bloody deeds.”
The Elderly Lady
An aged widow remembers little of the minor hero who was her father, so the celebrations pass her by. The historical notes are almost as long as the story. Too many characters and generations and too much Argentine context for me to get much from.
The Duel
A knife-free duel! And female protagonists! Paintbrushes at the ready…
An ambassador’s widow decided to become an abstract artist. So begins a tacit battle with a friend, who is also an artist. “In the course of that private duel they acted with perfect loyalty to one another.”
“There were no defeats or victories, nor even so much as an open clash”, so what was the point? Back to duality (a favourite Borgesian them.
The Other Duel
A simmering feud between two men. Duality and futility again (not that the story is futile!).
“Perhaps their only passion… was their hatred, and therefore they saved it and stored it up. Without suspecting, each of the two became the other’s slave.”
Guayaquil
The title is a city in Ecuador that was important in Argentina’s battle for independence. The story is about rival interpretations of Bolivar’s role in that, and hence about truth in general.
Can you trust historical documents? Of course not. “Even if they were written by Bolivar himself… that does not mean they contain the whole truth.”
The Gospel According to Mark, 5*
In his foreword to the Brodie’s Report collection, JLB describes this as “the best story of the volume”.
The protagonist is a medical student and a man of contradictions. His name is Espinosa, meaning “thorny”, which has echoes of the crown of thorns.
He spends the summer at his cousin’s ranch, but the cousin goes away to deal with floods. Espinosa is left as de facto master of the house, with a family of illiterate staff. He finds an old Bible, with the Gutres family’s genealogy at the back. They were originally Scottish, but English (and literacy) has died out in the 100 years since their forebears arrived. Evolution does not always go forwards (see Brodie’s Report, below, and The Immortal in The Aleph).
“Throughout history, humankind has told two stories: the story of a lost ship sailing the Mediterranean seas in quest of a beloved isle, and the story of a god who allows himself to be crucified on Golgotha.” Which will this be? Both, perhaps.
The student decides to read aloud from this Bible, after supper, and he picks Mark’s gospel. The family are transfixed, even though they don’t understand it. He does this each evening. There’s a similar scene in The Congress (in The Book of Sand).
Brodie’s Report 5*
Gulliver’s Travels is a clear inspiration (it even features a primitive tribe called the Yahoos). A Borgesian aspect is that it purports to be the (incomplete) notes of a Scottish missionary in Brazil, found in the pages of a copy of 1001 Nights. Is the story of its finding true? What about the contents? The comic – and sometimes grisly - implausibility suggest not the latter. But it could be a fake document, genuinely found, as Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius claims to be.
There’s no particular narrative, just a string of provocative descriptions, ending with an indirect and unanswered question.
The Yahoo diet is strange, “fruits, tubers, and reptiles”. Reptiles, but not mammals? They catch fish with their hands (fair enough) but also “drink cat’s and bat’s milk”!
Every newborn boy is examined for a specific (but secret) pattern of stigmata. If he has them, he is immediately king – and therefore “he is gelded, blinded with a fiery stick, and his hands and feet are cut off, so that the world will not distract him from wisdom”, though given how primitive they are, and the fact they “smear his body with dung”, I doubt such kings will survive long enough to develop much wisdom.
Their counting system is 1, 2, 3, 4, many and “the Yahoos have no memory”, so if someone mentions a leopard attack, no one knows if it happened to them, their parents, or in a dream.
“Philosophically speaking, memory is no less marvellous than prophesying the future” as witch doctors can do. Does that require the assumption of one past and only one future? If we believe in multiple possible outcomes (as JLB suggests in other stories), this claim doesn’t make much sense.
The lack of conversion to Christianity is original: “The phrase ‘Our Father’ disturbed them, since they lack any concept of paternity. They do not understand that an act performed nine months ago may somehow be related to the birth of a child… and… all women engage in carnal commerce, though not all are mothers.”
Their language is strange and simultaneously simple and complex. “The intellectual power of abstraction demanded by such a language suggests to me that the Yahoos… are not a primitive people but a degenerate one” Indecipherable runes nearby seem to confirm that. Like the Gutres family in The Gospel According to Mark, above, and the immortals in the story of that name in The Aleph?
Would you die for art? In this culture, spontaneous poetry is revered – but in a perverse way. “If the poem does not excite the tribe, nothing happens, but if the words of the poet surprise or astound the listeners… he is no longer a man, but a god, and anyone may kill him.”
Brodie finally lists the Yahoos’ redeeming qualities, upholds an obligation to save them (from the occasional attacks by Ape-men, or from colonialism and Christianisation?) and says “I hope Her Majesty’s government will not turn a deaf ear to the remedy this report has the temerity to suggest.” What does it suggest? We will never know.
Quotes
• “Literature is naught but guided dreaming.”
• “We all come to resemble the image others have of us.”
• “The newspapers… made him the hero that perhaps he never was, but that I had dreamed of.”
• “Friendship is as mysterious as love… the only thing that holds no mystery is happiness because it is its own justification.”
• “Time cannot be measured in days the way money is measured in pesos and centavos, because all pesos are equal, while very day, perhaps every hour, is different.”
• “Newspapers told loyal untruths.”
• “Sleeping… is the most secret thing we do.”
• Wearing a bow-tie and “a well-trimmed, military-style moustache; during the course of our conversation he lighted a cigar, and at that, I felt there were too many things on that face. Trop meuble, I said to myself.”
May 18, 2016
Siempre es para mí un placer leer un libro de Borges.
Este libro en particular reúne cuentos y relatos que involucra a malevos, cuchilleros, guapos y tahúres listos para el duelo por el honor o la mujer compartida. En otros nos habla de antiguas señoras de época o gauchos devenidos en soldados. Duelos, entreveros y desafíos forman parte de estas historias.
Hay dos cuentos que me sorprendieron por sus finales tan shockeantes y son “Juan Muraña” y “El Evangelio según San Marcos”.
Puedo abrir cualquier libro de Borges y elegir un cuento al azar y sé que el Maestro nunca me decepcionará.
Este libro en particular reúne cuentos y relatos que involucra a malevos, cuchilleros, guapos y tahúres listos para el duelo por el honor o la mujer compartida. En otros nos habla de antiguas señoras de época o gauchos devenidos en soldados. Duelos, entreveros y desafíos forman parte de estas historias.
Hay dos cuentos que me sorprendieron por sus finales tan shockeantes y son “Juan Muraña” y “El Evangelio según San Marcos”.
Puedo abrir cualquier libro de Borges y elegir un cuento al azar y sé que el Maestro nunca me decepcionará.
August 17, 2022
Not as good as the volume containing The Aleph, and not even in the same ballpark as Ficciones. Borges shows some fascination with knives and gauchos in Ficciones, so the evidence is there, but it really blooms here, popping up in what seems like every other story. My main issue with this collection is that I don’t live in Argentina and have never visited the counties and neighbourhoods that Borges brings up so often. Here, more than in other collections, it’s quite salient. Previous collections held prompts that provided a lifetime of food for thought, bushels of it. Those stories are not abundant in this volume.
The first section, In Praise of Darkness, starts with a banger – one of the classic Borgesian bombs that are 2 pages in length and leave you thinking for days afterward. This story is The Ethnographer. The second part, Brodie’s Report, has two fantastic tales at the very end: The Gospel According to Mark and the title story of Brodie’s Report. The rest are not essential, but Borges is always readable.
The first section, In Praise of Darkness, starts with a banger – one of the classic Borgesian bombs that are 2 pages in length and leave you thinking for days afterward. This story is The Ethnographer. The second part, Brodie’s Report, has two fantastic tales at the very end: The Gospel According to Mark and the title story of Brodie’s Report. The rest are not essential, but Borges is always readable.
December 16, 2018
Brief Tales Composed in a Plain Style
In the Foreword to this short collection, Borges pays tribute to the late "tortured and labyrinthine" stories of Rudyard Kipling, which he compares favourably to those of Franz Kafka and Henry James.
However, his real interest and inspiration for these stories was Kipling's earlier stories, which Borges describes as "a series of brief tales composed in a plain style" that amount to "laconic masterpieces". He speculates that, if a "young man of genius" can achieve these standards, then perhaps "a man [such as himself, then aged 70] beginning to get along in years and who knows his craft might, without immodesty, himself attempt."
Predicating the Universe
Borges claims that his stories are plain tales, though not necessarily simple:
The Influence of "Thousand and One Nights"
Here, he alludes to "Thousand and One Nights", which like his own tales, "are intended not to persuade readers, but to entertain and touch them."
He describes his stories as "realistic", for "they abound in the circumstantial details that writers are required to invent." Despite his continuing affection for Poe, he claims to have "renounced the shocks of a baroque style as well as those afforded by unforeseen or unexpected endings."
Of the 11 stories in this collection, most make use of a framing story, in the manner of "Thousand and One Nights". (The manuscript in the titular story is actually found tucked inside a copy of the book.)
Here, however, the substantive story purports to be someone else's tale, that has been brought to Borges for him to retell or record. There is almost an expectation that, Borges being a writer of renown, he will embellish the original plain tale, and somehow make it more entertaining, memorable or eternal.
Borges covenants to tell the story "conscientiously", though "I can forsee myself yielding to the literary temptation to heighten or insert the occasional small detail." Any tale, especially when retold, is re-invented, in the voice of the story-teller.
In "Unworthy", the bookseller Santiago Fischbein "confided to me an episode of his life, and today I can tell it. I will change the occasional detail - as is only to be expected."
In the next story, Rosendo Juarez says of Nicolas Paredes:
He proceeds to tell Borges "the truth behind the lies you wrote" about a knife fight in the tough underworld neighbourhood of Palermo in Buenos Aires.
The Stuff of Memory
In "The Encounter", the tale teller witnesses another knife fight, and yearns for "someone to be killed, so that I could tell about it later, and remember it." The story becomes the vehicle for not just entertainment, but recollection and memory, and therefore history.
The story is the alternative to silence, to secrecy:
At the end of the story, he ventures, "Things last longer than men," with a hint that perhaps stories last longer than things, that perhaps stories never end:
Perhaps a story is a station on the line to eternity or even infinity?
Told and Believed
In "Juan Murana", the narrator says, "I can't say whether the story was true; the important thing at the time was that it had been told and believed."
This observation can apply equally to fiction in general. Verisimilitude becomes not just a skill, but an object of play in the game between writer and reader.
Even the detail in the description is designed to convince us, without necessarily pulling the wool over our eyes. This is a description of his aunt's house:
You believe it, because you can visualise it.
You and Oblivion
The story is partly the memory of a knife fight, and partly the memory of a room and its occupant. Tomorrow, when the memory is gone and the room forgotten, there will be only oblivion, what Borges calls "the common oblivion". In "The Duel", Borges concludes that "the story that moved in darkness ends in darkness." Darkness could be the oblivion of forgottenness, which all good stories battle to overcome, even if told in a plain style. Like Borges' early stories, these stories too are laconic masterpieces.
Oma und Opa
[A Short Tall Tale]
I never met my paternal grandparents. What I know of them, my father and his sisters told me. This is all I remember now:
My grandfather spent his early life in Edinburgh. He was interested in philosophy all through school, and in 1930 he travelled to Germany so he could study under Martin Heidegger at the University of Freiburg. There he also met my grandmother, the daughter of a Jewish professor of biology. Oma was highly intelligent and a keen reader, but was no student, although she was very supportive of Opa's endeavours. So much so that, shortly after their marriage, she conceived and gave birth to my father in 1932.
Once married, and even more so when my father was born, my grandfather couldn't hide Oma's racial identity from Heidegger, and eventually Opa was expelled from the University at Heidegger's direction, once he became Rektor.
Oma and Opa caught a boat to Buenos Aires, where Opa gained a position as a private tutor in philosophy. Unfortunately, despite the relative comfort in which they lived, Oma caught tuberculosis and died. Opa was forced to leave Argentina, from where he went initially to Dunedin on the south island of New Zealand, and then to Melbourne, where his brother and sister-in-law worked in an architectural firm.
They lived together in an apartment building in St Kilda, until Opa was lucky enough to negotiate an appointment as a lecturer in jurisprudence at the University of Melbourne. As part of his remuneration package, he was able to live and work as a tutor in a hall of residence on the campus. He also acquired a girlfriend who was happy enough to marry him and share the burden of taking care of my father. They subsequently had two daughters, my aunts, one of whom became a professor of literature and the other a musician (she played the cello, the sound of which still reminds me of Melbourne, even though I was 17 when I left there to study in Canberra, where, incidentally, I listened to much Baroque and early music).
SOUNDTRACK:
In the Foreword to this short collection, Borges pays tribute to the late "tortured and labyrinthine" stories of Rudyard Kipling, which he compares favourably to those of Franz Kafka and Henry James.
However, his real interest and inspiration for these stories was Kipling's earlier stories, which Borges describes as "a series of brief tales composed in a plain style" that amount to "laconic masterpieces". He speculates that, if a "young man of genius" can achieve these standards, then perhaps "a man [such as himself, then aged 70] beginning to get along in years and who knows his craft might, without immodesty, himself attempt."
Predicating the Universe
Borges claims that his stories are plain tales, though not necessarily simple:
"There is not a simple page, a simple word, on earth - for all pages, all words, predicate the universe, whose most notorious attribute is its complexity."
The Influence of "Thousand and One Nights"
Here, he alludes to "Thousand and One Nights", which like his own tales, "are intended not to persuade readers, but to entertain and touch them."
He describes his stories as "realistic", for "they abound in the circumstantial details that writers are required to invent." Despite his continuing affection for Poe, he claims to have "renounced the shocks of a baroque style as well as those afforded by unforeseen or unexpected endings."
Of the 11 stories in this collection, most make use of a framing story, in the manner of "Thousand and One Nights". (The manuscript in the titular story is actually found tucked inside a copy of the book.)
Here, however, the substantive story purports to be someone else's tale, that has been brought to Borges for him to retell or record. There is almost an expectation that, Borges being a writer of renown, he will embellish the original plain tale, and somehow make it more entertaining, memorable or eternal.
Borges covenants to tell the story "conscientiously", though "I can forsee myself yielding to the literary temptation to heighten or insert the occasional small detail." Any tale, especially when retold, is re-invented, in the voice of the story-teller.
In "Unworthy", the bookseller Santiago Fischbein "confided to me an episode of his life, and today I can tell it. I will change the occasional detail - as is only to be expected."
In the next story, Rosendo Juarez says of Nicolas Paredes:
"That old man was something. I'll tell you - the stories he'd tell...Not so as to fool anyone, of course - just to be entertaining."
He proceeds to tell Borges "the truth behind the lies you wrote" about a knife fight in the tough underworld neighbourhood of Palermo in Buenos Aires.
The Stuff of Memory
In "The Encounter", the tale teller witnesses another knife fight, and yearns for "someone to be killed, so that I could tell about it later, and remember it." The story becomes the vehicle for not just entertainment, but recollection and memory, and therefore history.
The story is the alternative to silence, to secrecy:
"In the years that followed, I thought more than once about confiding the story to a friend, but I always suspected that I derived more pleasure from keeping the secret than I would from telling it."
At the end of the story, he ventures, "Things last longer than men," with a hint that perhaps stories last longer than things, that perhaps stories never end:
"Who can say whether the story ends here; who can say that they will never meet again?"
Perhaps a story is a station on the line to eternity or even infinity?
Told and Believed
In "Juan Murana", the narrator says, "I can't say whether the story was true; the important thing at the time was that it had been told and believed."
This observation can apply equally to fiction in general. Verisimilitude becomes not just a skill, but an object of play in the game between writer and reader.
Even the detail in the description is designed to convince us, without necessarily pulling the wool over our eyes. This is a description of his aunt's house:
"Her room smelled musty. In one corner stood the iron bed, with a rosary hanging on one of the bedposts; in another, the wooden wardrobe for her clothes. On one of the whitewashed walls there was a lithograph of the Virgen del Carmen. A candlestick sat on the nightstand."
You believe it, because you can visualise it.
You and Oblivion
The story is partly the memory of a knife fight, and partly the memory of a room and its occupant. Tomorrow, when the memory is gone and the room forgotten, there will be only oblivion, what Borges calls "the common oblivion". In "The Duel", Borges concludes that "the story that moved in darkness ends in darkness." Darkness could be the oblivion of forgottenness, which all good stories battle to overcome, even if told in a plain style. Like Borges' early stories, these stories too are laconic masterpieces.
Oma und Opa
[A Short Tall Tale]
I never met my paternal grandparents. What I know of them, my father and his sisters told me. This is all I remember now:
My grandfather spent his early life in Edinburgh. He was interested in philosophy all through school, and in 1930 he travelled to Germany so he could study under Martin Heidegger at the University of Freiburg. There he also met my grandmother, the daughter of a Jewish professor of biology. Oma was highly intelligent and a keen reader, but was no student, although she was very supportive of Opa's endeavours. So much so that, shortly after their marriage, she conceived and gave birth to my father in 1932.
Once married, and even more so when my father was born, my grandfather couldn't hide Oma's racial identity from Heidegger, and eventually Opa was expelled from the University at Heidegger's direction, once he became Rektor.
Oma and Opa caught a boat to Buenos Aires, where Opa gained a position as a private tutor in philosophy. Unfortunately, despite the relative comfort in which they lived, Oma caught tuberculosis and died. Opa was forced to leave Argentina, from where he went initially to Dunedin on the south island of New Zealand, and then to Melbourne, where his brother and sister-in-law worked in an architectural firm.
They lived together in an apartment building in St Kilda, until Opa was lucky enough to negotiate an appointment as a lecturer in jurisprudence at the University of Melbourne. As part of his remuneration package, he was able to live and work as a tutor in a hall of residence on the campus. He also acquired a girlfriend who was happy enough to marry him and share the burden of taking care of my father. They subsequently had two daughters, my aunts, one of whom became a professor of literature and the other a musician (she played the cello, the sound of which still reminds me of Melbourne, even though I was 17 when I left there to study in Canberra, where, incidentally, I listened to much Baroque and early music).
SOUNDTRACK:
July 23, 2018
Os onze contos incluídos neste livro, são dos últimos publicados por Jorge Luis Borges e, ao contrário dos anteriores, são de leitura directa, ou seja, focam-se na realidade e não na fantasia. Alguns contos têm finais surpreendentes e muito cruéis.
Títulos, tópicos e o quanto gostei de cada um:
A intrusa (5*)
dois irmãos apaixonados pela mesma mulher.
O indigno (4*)
amizade, confiança e traição.
História de Rosendo Juárez (2*)
para que este conto tenha sentido é necessário ler O homem da esquina rosada, incluído em A História Universal da Infâmia (eu fui reler mas ainda assim não lhe achei qualquer interesse).
O encontro (3*)
jogo, bebedeira e duelo de punhais.
Juan Muraña (4*)
amor, assassínio, loucura e vingança.
A velha senhora (3*)
uma festa de arromba para comemorar o centenário de uma senhora que "possivelmente, já não sabia quem era."
O duelo (3*)
amizade, competição e dependência entre duas pintoras.
O outro duelo (5*)
uma disputa entre vizinhos.
Guayaquil (1*)
não sei... chato...
O Evangelho segundo Marcos (5*)
isolado por uma tempestade na fazenda de um amigo, um estudante entretém-se a ensinar a Bíblia ao caseiro e aos dois filhos, que não sabiam ler e pouco falavam e entendiam. Asneira...
O Relatório de Brodie (5*)
um explorador encontra, nas regiões selvagens do Brasil, a tribo Yahoo, "talvez o povo mais bárbaro do mundo", com uma cultura fascinante.
Títulos, tópicos e o quanto gostei de cada um:
A intrusa (5*)
dois irmãos apaixonados pela mesma mulher.
O indigno (4*)
amizade, confiança e traição.
História de Rosendo Juárez (2*)
para que este conto tenha sentido é necessário ler O homem da esquina rosada, incluído em A História Universal da Infâmia (eu fui reler mas ainda assim não lhe achei qualquer interesse).
O encontro (3*)
jogo, bebedeira e duelo de punhais.
Juan Muraña (4*)
amor, assassínio, loucura e vingança.
A velha senhora (3*)
uma festa de arromba para comemorar o centenário de uma senhora que "possivelmente, já não sabia quem era."
O duelo (3*)
amizade, competição e dependência entre duas pintoras.
O outro duelo (5*)
uma disputa entre vizinhos.
Guayaquil (1*)
não sei... chato...
O Evangelho segundo Marcos (5*)
isolado por uma tempestade na fazenda de um amigo, um estudante entretém-se a ensinar a Bíblia ao caseiro e aos dois filhos, que não sabiam ler e pouco falavam e entendiam. Asneira...
O Relatório de Brodie (5*)
um explorador encontra, nas regiões selvagens do Brasil, a tribo Yahoo, "talvez o povo mais bárbaro do mundo", com uma cultura fascinante.
January 13, 2022
Вчора купив за 1 грн електронну книгу "Повідомлення Броуді" Хорхе Луїса Борхеса, а сьогодні вже її прочитав.
Ну що сказати? Борхес це Борхес. Суцільне задоволення від читання. Сувора реальність життя гаучо, війни, смерть, кров, і фірмова магія слів.
За на позір простою мовою та сюжетами його новел ховаються неозорі пласти знань про богів, кумирів, героїв, про міфи, історію, літературу нашого світу.
Читаючи Борхеса ти ніби досліджуєш своєрідний адвент-календар з інтелектуальними скарбами і таємницями історії. Ніколи не знаєш, яких глибин або далей сягне він своїми алюзіями, з епосу якого народу зачерпне відерцем мудрості, про яких фантастичних істот розповість, у які світи прочинить двері...
"Повідомлення Броуді" це збірка новел, які можуть здатися документальними, адже автор лише переповідає те, що начебто почув від когось іншого. Але ми добре знаємо, що Хорхе Луїс Борхес — ще той вигадник та оповідач.
Тонкою червоною лінією крізь книгу проходять історії та сюжети з Біблії, її етика та інтерпретації. Ці оповідання, за власними словами автора, покликані зовсім не до повчання, лише щоби зворушити та розважити читача.
Повірите чи ніт, але це їм дуже добре вдається 🖤
Ну що сказати? Борхес це Борхес. Суцільне задоволення від читання. Сувора реальність життя гаучо, війни, смерть, кров, і фірмова магія слів.
За на позір простою мовою та сюжетами його новел ховаються неозорі пласти знань про богів, кумирів, героїв, про міфи, історію, літературу нашого світу.
Читаючи Борхеса ти ніби досліджуєш своєрідний адвент-календар з інтелектуальними скарбами і таємницями історії. Ніколи не знаєш, яких глибин або далей сягне він своїми алюзіями, з епосу якого народу зачерпне відерцем мудрості, про яких фантастичних істот розповість, у які світи прочинить двері...
"Повідомлення Броуді" це збірка новел, які можуть здатися документальними, адже автор лише переповідає те, що начебто почув від когось іншого. Але ми добре знаємо, що Хорхе Луїс Борхес — ще той вигадник та оповідач.
Тонкою червоною лінією крізь книгу проходять історії та сюжети з Біблії, її етика та інтерпретації. Ці оповідання, за власними словами автора, покликані зовсім не до повчання, лише щоби зворушити та розважити читача.
Повірите чи ніт, але це їм дуже добре вдається 🖤
January 31, 2018
Borges'in kör olduktan sonra yazdığı (yahut yazdırdığı) öykü kitabı Brodie Raporu. Borges'in Alef'teki oyunbazlığı, labirentler ören, okuyucunun üstünde güçlü hakimiyet kuran duruşu değişmiş, yerini daha gerçekçi, daha sakin bir üslup almış.
Hikâyeler genel olarak düello temasından ilerliyor ve çeşitli versiyonlarını görüyoruz. Araya Giren ve Nankör ve Markos'a Göre İncil hikâyelerini çok beğendim. Hikâyelerin hiçbirine de kötü diyemem ama genel olarak Borges seviyesinin altında diyebilirim.
Bir şeyler okurken elimin altında bir Borges kitabının bulunması güzel. Canım sıkılınca açıp bir öyküsünü okuyorum ve keyfim yerine geliyor.
Ama çeviriyi beğendiğimi söyleyemeyeceğim. Basit göründüğü halde bazı cümleleri beş altı kez okudum, yine de ne anlama geldiğini çözemedim. Çok büyük engel değil her şeye rağmen.
Hikâyeler genel olarak düello temasından ilerliyor ve çeşitli versiyonlarını görüyoruz. Araya Giren ve Nankör ve Markos'a Göre İncil hikâyelerini çok beğendim. Hikâyelerin hiçbirine de kötü diyemem ama genel olarak Borges seviyesinin altında diyebilirim.
Bir şeyler okurken elimin altında bir Borges kitabının bulunması güzel. Canım sıkılınca açıp bir öyküsünü okuyorum ve keyfim yerine geliyor.
Ama çeviriyi beğendiğimi söyleyemeyeceğim. Basit göründüğü halde bazı cümleleri beş altı kez okudum, yine de ne anlama geldiğini çözemedim. Çok büyük engel değil her şeye rağmen.
December 6, 2021
O colectie de povestiri scurte, insa atat de puternice si surprinzatoare prin modul in care efectele actiunii se tot propaga dupa final, ca un ecou.
August 22, 2017
Borges è uno scrittore di cui riconosco senza fatica la grandezza, ma faccio davvero molta fatica a capirlo. I suoi racconti (penso a "Finzioni" su tutti) sono bellissime costruzioni dell'immaginazione che hanno un certo fascino (soprattutto perchè riescono ad essere paradossali mantenendo una certa coerenza interna) ma dai quali è molto difficile recepire un messaggio, una tridimensionalità, qualcosa di materico.
Come ha potuto uno scrittore sudamericano di quel periodo arrivare a tanto aereo onirismo (che potrebbe fare il paio senza sminuirsi col miglior Murakami) è un dubbio che trova risposta proprio in questo "Il manoscritto di Brodie".
E' una piccola raccolta di racconti, che però gronda carnalità da ogni singola parola. Leggendo queste pagine si può veramente cogliere il rovente sole della Pampa argentina, il suono accorato e triste del bandoneòn che accompagna i duelli mortali scatenati dal vino e dalla sanguigna passione di quella terra. E' l'Argentina come tutti noi sempre l'abbiamo pensata e vista, ma non sembra essere Jorge Luis Borges.
O almeno così potrebbe sembrare ad una primissima impressione, perchè questo ritorno al realismo dopo i viaggi di Finzioni è solo apparente: anzi è strumentale ad una miglior resa del messaggio fantastico, restituisce una realtà trasfigurata dalle ossessioni, dai dubbi, dalle superstizioni del feroce mondo contadino della pampa.
E' una sorta di realismo magico, ma assai più diretto, immediato ed efficace per esempio di quello di Gabriel Garcia Marquez in "Cent'anni di solitudine".
In questo mondo psicologizzato e popolato di incubi assolutamente autentici nella loro matericità, prendono vita e coscienza di sé gli oggetti inanimati, i pensieri più astratti generano in modo imprevisto le più concrete conseguenze...
Nonostante quest'opera sia tutto sommato poco conosciuta, secondo me questo è un grande Borges ed è il suo libro che più ho apprezzato finora. Perchè è in grado allo stesso tempo di restituire l'uomo della Pampa Argentina in tutta la sua concretezza, ed allo stesso tempo di avvolgerlo in quella sfuggente tenebra che è uno dei punti forti di Borges.
Sono le fortune di andare alla pesca nelle bancarelle, un hobby alò quale un lettore dovrebbe sempre trovare il tempo di dedicare qualche ora.
Come ha potuto uno scrittore sudamericano di quel periodo arrivare a tanto aereo onirismo (che potrebbe fare il paio senza sminuirsi col miglior Murakami) è un dubbio che trova risposta proprio in questo "Il manoscritto di Brodie".
E' una piccola raccolta di racconti, che però gronda carnalità da ogni singola parola. Leggendo queste pagine si può veramente cogliere il rovente sole della Pampa argentina, il suono accorato e triste del bandoneòn che accompagna i duelli mortali scatenati dal vino e dalla sanguigna passione di quella terra. E' l'Argentina come tutti noi sempre l'abbiamo pensata e vista, ma non sembra essere Jorge Luis Borges.
O almeno così potrebbe sembrare ad una primissima impressione, perchè questo ritorno al realismo dopo i viaggi di Finzioni è solo apparente: anzi è strumentale ad una miglior resa del messaggio fantastico, restituisce una realtà trasfigurata dalle ossessioni, dai dubbi, dalle superstizioni del feroce mondo contadino della pampa.
E' una sorta di realismo magico, ma assai più diretto, immediato ed efficace per esempio di quello di Gabriel Garcia Marquez in "Cent'anni di solitudine".
In questo mondo psicologizzato e popolato di incubi assolutamente autentici nella loro matericità, prendono vita e coscienza di sé gli oggetti inanimati, i pensieri più astratti generano in modo imprevisto le più concrete conseguenze...
Nonostante quest'opera sia tutto sommato poco conosciuta, secondo me questo è un grande Borges ed è il suo libro che più ho apprezzato finora. Perchè è in grado allo stesso tempo di restituire l'uomo della Pampa Argentina in tutta la sua concretezza, ed allo stesso tempo di avvolgerlo in quella sfuggente tenebra che è uno dei punti forti di Borges.
Sono le fortune di andare alla pesca nelle bancarelle, un hobby alò quale un lettore dovrebbe sempre trovare il tempo di dedicare qualche ora.
October 22, 2022
Colonialism, barbarie, tribalism, masculinitate toxică și un strop de violență feroce. O urmă de fericire nu mi-a adus cartea asta. Și, sincer, m-am trezit înjurându-l pe Borges.
Apoi la sfârșit am înțeles.
Apoi la sfârșit am înțeles.
August 24, 2021
- La Intrusa ⭐⭐⭐
- El Indigno ⭐⭐⭐
- Historia de Rosendo Juárez ⭐⭐
- El Encuentro ⭐⭐⭐
- Juan Muraña ⭐⭐⭐
- La Señora Mayor ⭐
- El Duelo ⭐⭐
- El Otro Duelo ⭐⭐
- Guayaquil ⭐
- El Evangelio Según Marcos ⭐⭐
- El Informe de Brodie ⭐⭐⭐⭐
- El Indigno ⭐⭐⭐
- Historia de Rosendo Juárez ⭐⭐
- El Encuentro ⭐⭐⭐
- Juan Muraña ⭐⭐⭐
- La Señora Mayor ⭐
- El Duelo ⭐⭐
- El Otro Duelo ⭐⭐
- Guayaquil ⭐
- El Evangelio Según Marcos ⭐⭐
- El Informe de Brodie ⭐⭐⭐⭐
December 19, 2012
I am so wrapped up in the several worlds of Jorge Luis Borges that I am sometimes taken aback by the reactions of other readers. Doctor Brodie's Report is late Borges, and not at all in the same metaphysical vein as the stories in, say, Ficciones, Labyrinths, or The Aleph. It was written, in fact, after a long spell of writing virtually no fiction at all (the poetry, however, continued unabated).
Doctor Brodie's Report harks back to early Borges, to the works of the 1920s and 1930s he has not only disparaged but tried to actively suppress. I refer to his early stories and essays about what he calls the "suburbs" of Buenos Aires, when one-story dwellings stretched out to where the pampas began, and slaughterhouses and knife-wielding toughs abounded to process the beef that was exported to Europe. While no gangster himself, Borges was fascinated by the men who lived on the outskirts of the city -- men like Juan Murana and Evaristo Carriego. These noir heroes perhaps represented what Borges would have liked to be in a different reality.
After all, he is the descendent of military heroes, and one of his antecedents, Manuel Isidoro Suarez, was instrumental in winning the Battle of Junin (1824) during the Peruvian war of independence. But both he and his father were bookish sorts, and during the First World War, he was educated in Switzerland. The Argentina he returned to fascinated him, and it took him many years before he found his stride with the volumes I have mentioned above.
Still, I like all of the man's work, even his fascination with knife-wielding hooligans who had their own inarticulate code of bravery. These stories are not quite so popular as "The Library of Babel" or "The Garden of the Forking Paths" or "Death and the Compass." But they are pure Borges nonetheless and well worth reading.
Would I recommend this as the first work by the author one reads? By no means. I would pick one of the more famous collections. Only when the Argentinean has firmly taken root in the reader's heart do I recommend the minor works, of which this is one.
Doctor Brodie's Report harks back to early Borges, to the works of the 1920s and 1930s he has not only disparaged but tried to actively suppress. I refer to his early stories and essays about what he calls the "suburbs" of Buenos Aires, when one-story dwellings stretched out to where the pampas began, and slaughterhouses and knife-wielding toughs abounded to process the beef that was exported to Europe. While no gangster himself, Borges was fascinated by the men who lived on the outskirts of the city -- men like Juan Murana and Evaristo Carriego. These noir heroes perhaps represented what Borges would have liked to be in a different reality.
After all, he is the descendent of military heroes, and one of his antecedents, Manuel Isidoro Suarez, was instrumental in winning the Battle of Junin (1824) during the Peruvian war of independence. But both he and his father were bookish sorts, and during the First World War, he was educated in Switzerland. The Argentina he returned to fascinated him, and it took him many years before he found his stride with the volumes I have mentioned above.
Still, I like all of the man's work, even his fascination with knife-wielding hooligans who had their own inarticulate code of bravery. These stories are not quite so popular as "The Library of Babel" or "The Garden of the Forking Paths" or "Death and the Compass." But they are pure Borges nonetheless and well worth reading.
Would I recommend this as the first work by the author one reads? By no means. I would pick one of the more famous collections. Only when the Argentinean has firmly taken root in the reader's heart do I recommend the minor works, of which this is one.
January 28, 2021
"Dr. Brodie's Report" is a rather joyless collection of what Borges describes as "realistic that satisfy expectation rather than provide startling shocks" (p. 10-11.) Readers hoping for wondrous tales of infinity, doubles, mirrors and labyrinths will be disappointed. Borges argues that he is simply re-iterating his basic contention that our universe is a mystery. The stories in "Dr. Brodie's Report" have endings that can be foreseen or anticipated but they still do not elucidate the world that we live in.
Borges' real world is dominated that conflict that typically leads to violence. Blood vendettas abound in the collection. Only artists seem capable of using competition for a positive good. "The Duel" tells the story of two lady painters who conduct a battle to promote their opposing aesthetic values. Their "one upmanship" is severe. One goes so far as to arrange for other to receive a prize because by doing so she puts herself into a position of moral superiority.
Unfortunately most of the stories lack wit. One of Borges' main focus is to attack gaucho culture; that is to say the mythologizing of the cowboys of the Argentinean Pampas as pure and noble heroes that embody the national spirit. Borges' gauchos are rather brainless thugs who kill each other with knives. I know gaucho culture by reputation but have difficulty believing that its fault are sufficient to justify Borges' mean-spirited attack.
Most of tales in this collection even those with no gauchos feature the protagonists drift into conflict with other characters and spend their lives pursuing pointless and destructive feuds. All in all one has a sour time reading this book. I recommend it only to those who are determined to go deep into the Borges catalogue.
Borges' real world is dominated that conflict that typically leads to violence. Blood vendettas abound in the collection. Only artists seem capable of using competition for a positive good. "The Duel" tells the story of two lady painters who conduct a battle to promote their opposing aesthetic values. Their "one upmanship" is severe. One goes so far as to arrange for other to receive a prize because by doing so she puts herself into a position of moral superiority.
Unfortunately most of the stories lack wit. One of Borges' main focus is to attack gaucho culture; that is to say the mythologizing of the cowboys of the Argentinean Pampas as pure and noble heroes that embody the national spirit. Borges' gauchos are rather brainless thugs who kill each other with knives. I know gaucho culture by reputation but have difficulty believing that its fault are sufficient to justify Borges' mean-spirited attack.
Most of tales in this collection even those with no gauchos feature the protagonists drift into conflict with other characters and spend their lives pursuing pointless and destructive feuds. All in all one has a sour time reading this book. I recommend it only to those who are determined to go deep into the Borges catalogue.
December 20, 2019
Od samih Borhesovih priča u "Brodijevom izveštaju" značajnije su mi njegove motivacije za svaku pojedinačnu priču. Neverovatno je s kakvom jednostavnošću i lakoćom je uspeo da ispripoveda ovih jedanaest pripovedaka i rekonstruiše svet gaučosa, veštih rukovalaca noževima i uopšte prostor Latinske Amerike s kraja XIX i početka XX veka.
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January 18, 2022İnsanın nesneyle olan ilişkisi Borges'in her zaman ilgilendiği konulardan birisi olmuştur. Yalnızca insanın nesneyle olan ilişkisi değil, nesnenin kendi varoluşu da... Borges, diğer başka kitaplarında da sıkca bir taşın taş, bir ağacın ağaç, bir leoparın leopar olarak kalma arzusu taşıdığını dile getirir.
Bu kitabında da nesne, zamanda insandan daha uzun bir yer kapladığı için tekrar vurgu konusu olur:
"Nesneler insanlardan daha çok yaşarlar. " (s.76) nesnenin varoluşunu bir başka yaşama şekli olarak gören Borges, zamana da farklı yönden bir izafilik atfeder; ölçümümüz de izafidir:
"Bu sıkıntıların ne kadar sürdüğünü bilmiyorum. Bir gün merhum babam paranın centavo ile ya da peso ile ölçüldüğü gibi zamanın günlerle ölçülemeyeceğini söyledi bize, çünkü peso hep aynı pesoydu, ama her gün hatta her saat değişiyordu. Ne demek istediğini pek anlayamamıştım ama tümce kafama takılıp kalmıştı." (s.79)
Borges, sıklıkla dile getirdiği bir metaforda; zamanı bir bakıma özetler. Adamın birisi dokuz bozuk para düşürmüştür. Sonraki gün üç tanesini, sonraki gün iki tanesini, sonraki gün de kalanını bulur. Paranın dokuza tamamlanmış olması, buldukları paraların düşürdükleri paralarla aynı olduğu anlamına gelir mi? İşte bir bakıma bizim zamanda yaptığımız da budur. Sayının bir sayıya tamamlanması bizim için yeterli oluyordur.
Bu kitap, duellolar kitabı. İnsanın yalnızca insanla değil, insanın kendisiyle ve uzamla ve zamanla olan duellolarını da güzel öykülerle anlatmış.
"... çimlere serildi. O zaman çok alçak bir ses:
'Ne tuhaf' dedi. 'Her şey bir düş gibi'." (s.74)
Bu öyküler gerçekçi öyküler, ancak düşten yapılma bir gerçeklikten bahsedersek...
Bu kitabında da nesne, zamanda insandan daha uzun bir yer kapladığı için tekrar vurgu konusu olur:
"Nesneler insanlardan daha çok yaşarlar. " (s.76) nesnenin varoluşunu bir başka yaşama şekli olarak gören Borges, zamana da farklı yönden bir izafilik atfeder; ölçümümüz de izafidir:
"Bu sıkıntıların ne kadar sürdüğünü bilmiyorum. Bir gün merhum babam paranın centavo ile ya da peso ile ölçüldüğü gibi zamanın günlerle ölçülemeyeceğini söyledi bize, çünkü peso hep aynı pesoydu, ama her gün hatta her saat değişiyordu. Ne demek istediğini pek anlayamamıştım ama tümce kafama takılıp kalmıştı." (s.79)
Borges, sıklıkla dile getirdiği bir metaforda; zamanı bir bakıma özetler. Adamın birisi dokuz bozuk para düşürmüştür. Sonraki gün üç tanesini, sonraki gün iki tanesini, sonraki gün de kalanını bulur. Paranın dokuza tamamlanmış olması, buldukları paraların düşürdükleri paralarla aynı olduğu anlamına gelir mi? İşte bir bakıma bizim zamanda yaptığımız da budur. Sayının bir sayıya tamamlanması bizim için yeterli oluyordur.
Bu kitap, duellolar kitabı. İnsanın yalnızca insanla değil, insanın kendisiyle ve uzamla ve zamanla olan duellolarını da güzel öykülerle anlatmış.
"... çimlere serildi. O zaman çok alçak bir ses:
'Ne tuhaf' dedi. 'Her şey bir düş gibi'." (s.74)
Bu öyküler gerçekçi öyküler, ancak düşten yapılma bir gerçeklikten bahsedersek...
February 9, 2022
Люблю Боргеса. Це письменник, який пише про незначні події у геніальній манері легкого психоделічного тріпу. Шкодую, що він не писав про Львів, мікрорайони, гопників і соціальне дно - було би не менш геніально, ніж про Аргентину.
July 8, 2016
اينجا ديگر خبري از هزارتوها و افسانه ها نيست.در عوض "دشنه" واژه اي است كه در همه جاي اين كتاب به چشم مي آيد.بيشتر داستان هارا مي توان-به تعبير خود بورخس-با كليدي خيالي گشود و به هم ربط داد:دگرگونيِ ناگهاني آدم هايي كه از يك جايي به بعد بدون دليل مشخصي تصميم مي گيرند دست از كاري بكشند.
تا قبل از خواندن اين كتاب فكر مي كردم بورخس هفتاد و يك ساله ديگر چيزي براي غافلگير كردن من ندارد ولي اشتباه مي كردم.داستان هاي "خرمگس معركه"، "رويارويي"، "بانوي سالخورده"، "دوئلي ديگر"، "انجيل به روايت مرقيون" و "گزارش برودي" فوق العاده بودند.به نظرم بقيه ي داستان ها هم خوب بودند و داستان بد در كتاب وجود نداشت.
براي نشر "كتاب پارسه" متاسفم كه حتي فهرست كتاب را هم بازبيني نكرده و اسم چند داستان را در فهرست اشتباه آورده
تا قبل از خواندن اين كتاب فكر مي كردم بورخس هفتاد و يك ساله ديگر چيزي براي غافلگير كردن من ندارد ولي اشتباه مي كردم.داستان هاي "خرمگس معركه"، "رويارويي"، "بانوي سالخورده"، "دوئلي ديگر"، "انجيل به روايت مرقيون" و "گزارش برودي" فوق العاده بودند.به نظرم بقيه ي داستان ها هم خوب بودند و داستان بد در كتاب وجود نداشت.
براي نشر "كتاب پارسه" متاسفم كه حتي فهرست كتاب را هم بازبيني نكرده و اسم چند داستان را در فهرست اشتباه آورده
December 26, 2023
U fotofinišu, još jedno argentinsko djelo za ovu godinu. Iako se najavljivalo kako je ovo nešto potpuno drugačije od očekivanog Borhesa (ruku na srce, to je i sam autor učinio u predgovoru) iznenađujuće je koliko ova knjiga ne odudara od onoga što smatramo Borhesom. Iako su sižei realističniji, precizan stil pročišćen od svakog bespotrebnog ukrasa, barokni u svojoj učenosti i sadržini, ali ponekad suv u svojoj škrstosti, ostaje i dalje isti. Autoru često nije važna sama priča koliko pričanje. Čest postupak preuzimanja ili otkrića izgubljenog dokumenta se ovdje prebacuje na usmeno svjedočenje, što pripovijetkama dodaje još jedan nivo nepouzdanosti, pošto se oslanja na sjećanje okrnjeno vremenom. Ipak, ljudi se pretvaraju u noževe, razgovori od prije nekoliko vijekova se ponavljaju u novom dobu, a čitalac jevanđelja postaje raspeti mesija. I na kraju opet imamo otkriveni dokument sa opisom fantastičnog vavrvarskog naroda. Iako su me mnoge priče oduševile, ponaka mi je djelovala tek kao nacrt za priču, zbog čega izostaje peta zvjezdica.
April 19, 2019
من این کتاب رو با ترجمه مانی صالحی علامه از نشر کتاب پارسه خوندم. ترجمه خوب و روان بود،اما دو سه مورد رو در کتاب نامفهوم دیدم، شاید اگر بخوام دوباره کتاب رو بازخوانی کنم، ترجمه دیگه ای انتخاب کنم.
کتاب از یازده داستان تشکیل شده. خرمگس معرکه، بی ارزش، داستان از زبان روسندو خوارز، رویارویی، خوان مورانیا، بانوی سالخورده، دوئل، دوئلی دیگر، گوایاکوئیل، انجیل به روایت مرقیون، و گزارش برودی.
در دیباچه کتاب بورخس مینویسه :
"گهگاه به ذهنم رسیده است که مرد جوان نابغه ای که استعداد آن را داشته باشد که چیزی را تصور کند و به بار بنشاند، مردی که با گذر زمان، شروع به پیشرفت کرده و کارش را هم خوب بلد است، خودش هم بدون خودنمایی، می تواند از عهده انجام آن کار برآید. حاصل آن تفکر در این کتاب آمده است؛خوانندگان خود میتوانند داوری کنند."
بورخس در نظر من همین جوان نابغه و با استعداده.
اما بهترین توصیف رو خودش از داستانهاش داره :
"من سعی کرده ام که حکایتهای روشن و فصیح بنویسم. جرئت نمیکنم بگویم آنها ساده اند، حتی یک صفحه ساده یا یک واژه ساده بر روی زمین وجود ندارد، چرا که همه صفحه ها و همه واژه ها از جهان خبر می دهند که برجسته ترین صفتش پیچیدگی است. حکایت های من مثل حکایتهای هزار و یک شب به قصد برانگیختن و متقاعد ساختن خواننده نوشته نشده، بلکه غرض، سرگرم کردن و تحت تاثیر قرار دادن خواننده است.
داستانهای من با کاربرد اصطلاحی که این روزها رواج دارد، واقع گرا است. گمان میکنم که همه اصول قراردادی این گونه ادبی در آن ها رعایت شده (گونه ای که کمتر از همه سبک ها و گونه های دیگر <قرادادزده> نیست و خیلی زود دل زده مان میکند، البته اگر تا حالا دل زده نشده باشیم. )"
این دومین کتابی هست که از بورخس میخونم. اولین کتاب کتابخانه بابل بود، اونجا پیشنهاد کردم همه کسانی که از کارهای نولان یا آرنوفسکی لذت میبرن کتاب کتابخانه بابل رو بخونن، الان پیشنهاد میکنم همه طرفداران اسکورسیزی کتاب گزارش برودی رو بخونن. در کتاب کتابخانه بابل، چیزی که در مورد بورخس تصور میکردم، یه پیرمرد نابینا داخل یه کتابخونه هس که بخاطر مطالعه زیاد، میتونه از هر جای دنیا داستانی رو با قوه تخیل خودش پیوند بزنه و نقل کنه، اما بورخسی که توی کتاب گزارش برودی دیدم، یه آدم با رگه های سرخ پوستی، سبیل مشکی نازک و مرتب، موهای کم پشت و چاق هست که چاقو دست میگیره، توی محله های حاشیه شهر رفت و آمد میکنه، فحش میده، دعوا راه میندازه و آدم میکشه و در انتهای همه دعواها، قابیل گونه از کارش پشیمون میشه.
تصمیم گیری در مورد اینکه کدوم بورخس رو بیشتر دوست دارم سخته. بورخس آروم و محترم، یا بورخس رها و خشن و به قول خودش "مرد عمل" :دی
کتاب با یک داستان عالی شروع میشه(خرمگس معرکه). داستانی که تا لحظه های آخر، با استفاده از سمبل ها، هابیل و قابیل رو برامون تداعی میکنه اما در نهایت نشون میده نسل ادم از گذشته عبرت گرفته و به جای برادر کشی، عامل ایجاد دعوا رو از بین برده.
داستان بعدی(بی ارزش) یک داستان در مورد کتابفروشی هست که در جوانی جزو یک باند مافیایی شرور بوده که با لو دادن اون باند، خودش رو خلاص میکنه. [جدا تعجب نمیکنم اگه روزی متوجه شم بورخس در جوانی یه لات یک لا قبا بوده که سر کوچه می ایستاده و زنجیر می چرخونده :)))]
این خط داستانی فرد شرور که متحول یا پشیمون میشه در داستان سوم و پنجم، هفتم و هشتم هم دیده میشه.
داستان چهارم (برخورد) یک جور پند و نصیحت برای افراد شرور هس که آلت دست چاقوها نشن.
داستان ششم(بانوی سالخورده) چندان مورد پسند من نبود. احساس میکنم این داستان، با بقیه داستانهای کتاب هماهنگ نبود.
داستان نهم(گوایاکوئیل) هم به نوعی نشون دهنده یک دوئل هست، اما دوئلی که ابزار دست افراد، حرفها و واژه ها هستن.
اما داستان مورد علاقه من از این کتاب_و حتی داستان منتخب بورخس_ داستان انجیل به روایت مرقیون هست. فکر کنم برای نقد این داستان نیاز به یک ریویوی جدا باشه، اما سمبل ها، خط سیر، همه چی فوق العاده بود. و در نهایت انتهای داستان، ادم رو شوکه میکرد. (بخوام روراست باشم، سمبل های داستان ذهن منو به سمت داستان حضرت نوح میبرد در حالی که داستان به صلیب کشیده شدن عیسی رو روایت میکنه، نمیدونم اصلا هدف گمراه کردن خواننده بود یا نه، اما اگر هدف بورخس این بوده، حداقل در مورد من موفق شد)
داستان آخر داستان گزارش برودی هست که داستانی سمبلیک هس که باز هم فکر میکنم تعلقش به این مجموعه جای بحث داره.
حقیقت اینه که انقدر این کتاب رو دوست داشتم که میتونم ساعتها در موردش صحبت کنم، اگر کسی بخواد نقد درستی بنویسه و در مورد تک تک سمبل ها و برداشت ها صحبت کنه، شاید خودش یک کتاب بشه، اما به قول بورخس "ای خواننده، خداوند تو را از دیباچه [نقد] های طولانی حفظ کند."
کتاب از یازده داستان تشکیل شده. خرمگس معرکه، بی ارزش، داستان از زبان روسندو خوارز، رویارویی، خوان مورانیا، بانوی سالخورده، دوئل، دوئلی دیگر، گوایاکوئیل، انجیل به روایت مرقیون، و گزارش برودی.
در دیباچه کتاب بورخس مینویسه :
"گهگاه به ذهنم رسیده است که مرد جوان نابغه ای که استعداد آن را داشته باشد که چیزی را تصور کند و به بار بنشاند، مردی که با گذر زمان، شروع به پیشرفت کرده و کارش را هم خوب بلد است، خودش هم بدون خودنمایی، می تواند از عهده انجام آن کار برآید. حاصل آن تفکر در این کتاب آمده است؛خوانندگان خود میتوانند داوری کنند."
بورخس در نظر من همین جوان نابغه و با استعداده.
اما بهترین توصیف رو خودش از داستانهاش داره :
"من سعی کرده ام که حکایتهای روشن و فصیح بنویسم. جرئت نمیکنم بگویم آنها ساده اند، حتی یک صفحه ساده یا یک واژه ساده بر روی زمین وجود ندارد، چرا که همه صفحه ها و همه واژه ها از جهان خبر می دهند که برجسته ترین صفتش پیچیدگی است. حکایت های من مثل حکایتهای هزار و یک شب به قصد برانگیختن و متقاعد ساختن خواننده نوشته نشده، بلکه غرض، سرگرم کردن و تحت تاثیر قرار دادن خواننده است.
داستانهای من با کاربرد اصطلاحی که این روزها رواج دارد، واقع گرا است. گمان میکنم که همه اصول قراردادی این گونه ادبی در آن ها رعایت شده (گونه ای که کمتر از همه سبک ها و گونه های دیگر <قرادادزده> نیست و خیلی زود دل زده مان میکند، البته اگر تا حالا دل زده نشده باشیم. )"
این دومین کتابی هست که از بورخس میخونم. اولین کتاب کتابخانه بابل بود، اونجا پیشنهاد کردم همه کسانی که از کارهای نولان یا آرنوفسکی لذت میبرن کتاب کتابخانه بابل رو بخونن، الان پیشنهاد میکنم همه طرفداران اسکورسیزی کتاب گزارش برودی رو بخونن. در کتاب کتابخانه بابل، چیزی که در مورد بورخس تصور میکردم، یه پیرمرد نابینا داخل یه کتابخونه هس که بخاطر مطالعه زیاد، میتونه از هر جای دنیا داستانی رو با قوه تخیل خودش پیوند بزنه و نقل کنه، اما بورخسی که توی کتاب گزارش برودی دیدم، یه آدم با رگه های سرخ پوستی، سبیل مشکی نازک و مرتب، موهای کم پشت و چاق هست که چاقو دست میگیره، توی محله های حاشیه شهر رفت و آمد میکنه، فحش میده، دعوا راه میندازه و آدم میکشه و در انتهای همه دعواها، قابیل گونه از کارش پشیمون میشه.
تصمیم گیری در مورد اینکه کدوم بورخس رو بیشتر دوست دارم سخته. بورخس آروم و محترم، یا بورخس رها و خشن و به قول خودش "مرد عمل" :دی
کتاب با یک داستان عالی شروع میشه(خرمگس معرکه). داستانی که تا لحظه های آخر، با استفاده از سمبل ها، هابیل و قابیل رو برامون تداعی میکنه اما در نهایت نشون میده نسل ادم از گذشته عبرت گرفته و به جای برادر کشی، عامل ایجاد دعوا رو از بین برده.
داستان بعدی(بی ارزش) یک داستان در مورد کتابفروشی هست که در جوانی جزو یک باند مافیایی شرور بوده که با لو دادن اون باند، خودش رو خلاص میکنه. [جدا تعجب نمیکنم اگه روزی متوجه شم بورخس در جوانی یه لات یک لا قبا بوده که سر کوچه می ایستاده و زنجیر می چرخونده :)))]
این خط داستانی فرد شرور که متحول یا پشیمون میشه در داستان سوم و پنجم، هفتم و هشتم هم دیده میشه.
داستان چهارم (برخورد) یک جور پند و نصیحت برای افراد شرور هس که آلت دست چاقوها نشن.
داستان ششم(بانوی سالخورده) چندان مورد پسند من نبود. احساس میکنم این داستان، با بقیه داستانهای کتاب هماهنگ نبود.
داستان نهم(گوایاکوئیل) هم به نوعی نشون دهنده یک دوئل هست، اما دوئلی که ابزار دست افراد، حرفها و واژه ها هستن.
اما داستان مورد علاقه من از این کتاب_و حتی داستان منتخب بورخس_ داستان انجیل به روایت مرقیون هست. فکر کنم برای نقد این داستان نیاز به یک ریویوی جدا باشه، اما سمبل ها، خط سیر، همه چی فوق العاده بود. و در نهایت انتهای داستان، ادم رو شوکه میکرد. (بخوام روراست باشم، سمبل های داستان ذهن منو به سمت داستان حضرت نوح میبرد در حالی که داستان به صلیب کشیده شدن عیسی رو روایت میکنه، نمیدونم اصلا هدف گمراه کردن خواننده بود یا نه، اما اگر هدف بورخس این بوده، حداقل در مورد من موفق شد)
داستان آخر داستان گزارش برودی هست که داستانی سمبلیک هس که باز هم فکر میکنم تعلقش به این مجموعه جای بحث داره.
حقیقت اینه که انقدر این کتاب رو دوست داشتم که میتونم ساعتها در موردش صحبت کنم، اگر کسی بخواد نقد درستی بنویسه و در مورد تک تک سمبل ها و برداشت ها صحبت کنه، شاید خودش یک کتاب بشه، اما به قول بورخس "ای خواننده، خداوند تو را از دیباچه [نقد] های طولانی حفظ کند."
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 8, 2024
In the forward JLB says he set out to write minimalist stories like Robert Louis Stevenson. I can’t say if he is Stevensian or not, but I can tell you that these stories are minimalist masterpieces. How can he possibly pack so much in four-to-six pages? And he isn’t cramming in a thousand modifiers into every paragraph either; instead there is a languid, almost doggedly mundane quality to a lot of the sentences, and yet still by the end it as if we have read an entire novel. There are plenty of novels numbering in the hundreds of pages where much less happens. Borges, in his old age, seemed to tire of writing fabulist tales and wanted some good old fashioned realism. Well, if realism can be like this then I say fuck fantasy!
Can we take a moment too and ask what is his bloody obsession with gingers?! He has this image in his mind – of the redheaded Latino cowboy, all dressed in black, knife in hand – that is indelible in this volume. Where did that image come from? We suspect a real life situation, but he never tells us. In any event the ginger gauchos of Brodie’s Report engage in duels and have their souls trapped in their street instruments, and it’s all still realism. How many writers can do that? The sad part is Borges’ relation to all this—he watches the fights and the Red Men in Black all from a distance he can never cross; we feel the sorrowful resignation of JLB that he will always be a lonesome reader, and never a lunfardo-speaking badass. Luckily for us, JLB’s disappointment is our enduring gain.
Can we take a moment too and ask what is his bloody obsession with gingers?! He has this image in his mind – of the redheaded Latino cowboy, all dressed in black, knife in hand – that is indelible in this volume. Where did that image come from? We suspect a real life situation, but he never tells us. In any event the ginger gauchos of Brodie’s Report engage in duels and have their souls trapped in their street instruments, and it’s all still realism. How many writers can do that? The sad part is Borges’ relation to all this—he watches the fights and the Red Men in Black all from a distance he can never cross; we feel the sorrowful resignation of JLB that he will always be a lonesome reader, and never a lunfardo-speaking badass. Luckily for us, JLB’s disappointment is our enduring gain.
March 8, 2022
BRODIJEV IZVEŠTAJ-HORHE LUIS BORHES
✒"Ovde je zapisujem zato što nam,ubeđen sam (ali može biti da grešim),nudi kratak i tragičan pogled na one pojedince koji su se kroz život probijali kroz borbe noževima u opasnim predgrađima Buenos Ajresa."
🌃Ova zbirka je nastala dosta kasno u piščevom životu,tačnije 1970.godine.
🌃Sadrži 12 priča,"realističnih" po Borhesovoj tvrdnji.
🌃Opisuje Buenos Ajres i njegove opasne kutke,ali i provinciju,borbe,bandite i gaučose,izdaje,neprijateljstva,hrabrost i kukavičluk.
🌃Naravno da je to ipak Borhes,mada malo drugačiji,trilerskiji.
🌃Uvođenje unutrašnjeg naratora(pričao mi je drug,svedok,učesnik...) samo produbljuje misterioznost.
🌃Osim priča o dvobojima i ubistvima,tu je i par pripovedaka koje donekle imaju drugačiju atmosferu.
🌃U priči Suparništvo govori se o borbi i vezanosti dve slikarke koje u nadmetanju nalaze smisao svojih života. To prerasta u neku čudnu vrstu ljubavi i međusobnog uvažavanja.
🌃Priča Jevanđelje po Marku je totalno mistični magični realizam na kakav sam od Borhesa navikla.
🌃Naslovna priča,Brodijev izveštaj je (autor sam to tvrdi) inspirisana Sviftovim Guliverovim putovanjima. Ipak,Borhesovi Jahui su jedan potpuno originalan izmišljen narod.
🌃Malo je reći da sam uživala u čitanju
#7sensesofabook #knjige #bookstagram #classicliterature #literature #readingaddict
✒"Ovde je zapisujem zato što nam,ubeđen sam (ali može biti da grešim),nudi kratak i tragičan pogled na one pojedince koji su se kroz život probijali kroz borbe noževima u opasnim predgrađima Buenos Ajresa."
🌃Ova zbirka je nastala dosta kasno u piščevom životu,tačnije 1970.godine.
🌃Sadrži 12 priča,"realističnih" po Borhesovoj tvrdnji.
🌃Opisuje Buenos Ajres i njegove opasne kutke,ali i provinciju,borbe,bandite i gaučose,izdaje,neprijateljstva,hrabrost i kukavičluk.
🌃Naravno da je to ipak Borhes,mada malo drugačiji,trilerskiji.
🌃Uvođenje unutrašnjeg naratora(pričao mi je drug,svedok,učesnik...) samo produbljuje misterioznost.
🌃Osim priča o dvobojima i ubistvima,tu je i par pripovedaka koje donekle imaju drugačiju atmosferu.
🌃U priči Suparništvo govori se o borbi i vezanosti dve slikarke koje u nadmetanju nalaze smisao svojih života. To prerasta u neku čudnu vrstu ljubavi i međusobnog uvažavanja.
🌃Priča Jevanđelje po Marku je totalno mistični magični realizam na kakav sam od Borhesa navikla.
🌃Naslovna priča,Brodijev izveštaj je (autor sam to tvrdi) inspirisana Sviftovim Guliverovim putovanjima. Ipak,Borhesovi Jahui su jedan potpuno originalan izmišljen narod.
🌃Malo je reći da sam uživala u čitanju
#7sensesofabook #knjige #bookstagram #classicliterature #literature #readingaddict
February 7, 2017
“He intentado, no sé con qué fortuna, la redacción de cuentos directos. No me atrevo a afirmar que son sencillos; no hay en la tierra una sola página, una sola palabra que lo sea, ya que todas postulan el universo, cuyo más notorio atributo es la complejidad." - Prólogo
En estos cuentos argentinos Borges resucita el imaginario gauchesco de fines del siglo XIX y describe un mundo de malevos, cuchilleros, duelos y venganzas.
Algunos de sus temas de predilección - la verdad y el tiempo, la memoria y el olvido- afloran en forma de breves reflexiones que no afectan el carácter directo de las narraciones.
Sin embargo es el tema de la degeneración, que se manifiesta de forma indirecta e insistente, que parece regir esta recopilación.
Los Yahoos descriptos por el informe de Brodie no son una tribu primitiva sino degenerada. En "el Evangelio según Marcos", la familia del capataz Gutre, bruscos e analfabetos, son descendientes de una familia inglesa letrada de apellido Guthrie. El historiador elegido para estudiar la carta de San Martín en “Guayaquil”, es un extranjero con un español incorrecto y un rigor científico dudoso. En “la Señora mayor”, la hija del guerrero de la Independencia es simplona y vana.
La violencia extrema que se ejerce en la mayoría de los cuentos se da como consecuencia de este pasaje de la civilización a la barbarie. El recuerdo de las no tan lejanas épocas civilizadas refuerza el horror .
En estos cuentos argentinos Borges resucita el imaginario gauchesco de fines del siglo XIX y describe un mundo de malevos, cuchilleros, duelos y venganzas.
Algunos de sus temas de predilección - la verdad y el tiempo, la memoria y el olvido- afloran en forma de breves reflexiones que no afectan el carácter directo de las narraciones.
Sin embargo es el tema de la degeneración, que se manifiesta de forma indirecta e insistente, que parece regir esta recopilación.
Los Yahoos descriptos por el informe de Brodie no son una tribu primitiva sino degenerada. En "el Evangelio según Marcos", la familia del capataz Gutre, bruscos e analfabetos, son descendientes de una familia inglesa letrada de apellido Guthrie. El historiador elegido para estudiar la carta de San Martín en “Guayaquil”, es un extranjero con un español incorrecto y un rigor científico dudoso. En “la Señora mayor”, la hija del guerrero de la Independencia es simplona y vana.
La violencia extrema que se ejerce en la mayoría de los cuentos se da como consecuencia de este pasaje de la civilización a la barbarie. El recuerdo de las no tan lejanas épocas civilizadas refuerza el horror .
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