Signs of Borges

158 Pages·1993·8.792 MB·English

by  Sylvia Molloy, Oscar Montero

Signs of Borges
A Book in the Series
Latin America in Translation/En Traducci6nl Em Tradufao
Sponsored by the Duke-University of North Carolina
Joint Program in Latin American Studies
Post -Contemporary Interventions
Series Editors:
Stanley Fish
and
Fredric Jameson
Sylvia Molloy
Signs
of
Borges
Translated and Adapted
by Oscar Montero
in Collaboration with
the Author
Duke University Press Durham and London
1994
Translation of the books in the series Latin America in
Translation/En Traducci6n/Em Tradufao, a collaboration
between the Duke-University of North Carolina Joint Pro
gram in Latin American Studies and the university presses of
Duke and the University ofN orth Carolina, is supported by a
grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
© 1994 Duke University Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States
of America on acid-free paper 00
Designed by Cherie Holma Westmoreland
Typeset in Meridien with Trajanus display
by Keystone Typesetting, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in
Publication Data
Molloy, Sylvia. [Letras de Borges. English) Signs of
Borges / Sylvia Molloy ; translated and adapted by Oscar
Montero in collaboration with the Author. p. cm. -
(Post-contemporary interventions) (Latin America in trans
lation/en traduccion/em tradU(;ao) Includes index.
ISBN 0-8223-1406-1. -ISBN 0-8223-1420-7 (pbk)
I. Borges, Jorge Luis, 1899- -Criticism and interpreta
tion. I. Montero, Oscar, 1947- . II. Title. III. Series.
IV. Series: Latin America in translation/en traduccion/em
traduc;ao. PQ7797.B635z78413 1994 868-dc20
93-11260 CIP
For Maria Luisa Bastos
who, years ago, told me to
read Borges

Contents
Preface ix
Introduction I
1 Shadow Plays 5
A Double Mistrust "A Detailed Web of Theories to Validate the Task"
"The Coveter of Souls": A First Step Toward Fiction
Greedy Sequels: Evaristo Carrieg o and the "Infamous Biographies"
"A Surface of Images" Games with Masks Mask and Displacement
The Mask Revealed
2 Textual Rubrications 26
The Signs in a Book Deflected Signs Deflected Deaths
3 Fragments and Greeds 40
The Dissolving of Character: Doubles Beyond the Double Lack of
Symmetry: Contamination and the Illusion of Desire Disequilibrium:
The Ineffective Character Fragments and Shadows
4 Postulating a Reality, Selecting a Reality 58
Reality and Residue Three Postulations of Reality The Charm of
the Circumstantial Stevenson as Precursor The Emphatic Gesture
The Waste of the Circumstantial
Contents viii
5 Converting the Simulacrum 77
Organization and Emphasis: The Uncanny Distortion
Desire and Fear of Names: Ineffective Simulacra
To Name, to Falsify Diversion, Conversion, Metaphor
6 Pleasure and Perplexity 95
The Repertory: Selection, Disarticulation, Rescue
The Pleasure of Interpolation Selective Erudition
7 The Buried Foundation 112
Heterogeneous Enumeration and Overcrowded Series
Heterogeneous Enumeration: Signaling the Interstice
Concatenation and Betrayal Beyond the Nightmare of Causality
Our Invisible Skeleton: The Shape of a Face
Abbreviations 131
Notes 133
Index 139
Preface
Any attempt to reconstruct the steps that led me, more than fifteen
years ago, to write this particular book on Borges and not another
would be illusory. I would like to think that my reflections on
reading Borges may have been of use to others then, as they were to
me. Borges taught me to think about literature, even to write it. Las
letras de Borges wanted to acknowledge that debt.
I speak casl,lally of this book as ifit had not changed, even when
I realize that, by now, it is no longer the same. The book I wrote in
Spanish, as an explication and an homage, is now, in its English
version, another book, unfamiliar, a little disquieting. I have con
tributed to its translation willingly yet not without trepidation,
reading it with other eyes, conversing with it at every turn. It is, to
quote the title of one of Borges's books of poems, elotro, el mismo. It
is a book in which I recognize myself fully; it is also a book that I
might not have written today.
New York, 1993