Twenty-Four Conversations with Borges: Including a Selection of Poems : Interviews, 1981-1983

by Roberto Alifano Jorge Luis Borges, Roberto Alifano (Other Contributor)

English, Spanish (translation)

Genres: Nonfiction, Literature

157 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1984

Reviews

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have an insatiable appetite for every word that Borges has ever written, be it in the form of one of his short stories, essays, poems, or even interviews. For over forty years, I have been in thrall to him: He has been my guide and mentor to the world's great literature, and still continues to be so.

Although this set of interviews has its problems, they are mostly in the form of shoddy proofreading, particularly in the brief but excellent of thirty-four poems that follow the interviews. Among them is this little gem, translated by Willis Brownstone:

THAT NOTHING IS KNOWN

The moon can't know it is serene and clear,
Nor can it even know it is the moon;
Nor sand that it is sand. No thing may soon
Or ever know it has a strange form here.
The pieces made of ivory are as far
From abstract chess as is the hand, the key,
That guides them. Perhaps the human destiny
Of brief joy and lingering despair
Is the instrument of the Other. We can't know.
Giving it the name of god does no good.
And fear, doubt, and the midday prayer we could
Not finish—all that is futile. What bow
Could have released the arrow that I am?
What peak can be the target of that hand?

"The human destiny/Of brief joy and lingering despair"—that says it all, doesn't it?

Roberto Alifano is a congenial and exceptionally well-informed interviewer, with the result that Borges opens up to him with an erudition that surprises even me. Discussed are such authors little known to North America and the English-speaking world as Arturo Capdevilla, Ricardo Guiraldes, Evaristo Carriego, Francisco de Quevedo, Pedro Bonifacio Palacios (who called himself Almafuerte), and Leopoldo Lugones.He also continues to add interesting observations on such world literary figures as Virgil, Hawthorne, Cervantes, Dante, Kipling, and Oscar Wilde.

Now I have to return the library book of this edition and go looking for a good copy to add to my own collection of Borges, which continues to grow.

[Marne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one, together with Norman Thomas di Giovanni's superb editing of The Selected Poems of Jorge Luis Borges, first taught me to consider seriously the art of translation, especially of poetry, and enabled me to continue and pursue my parallel art of translating for non-Filipino speakers contemporary Filipino (Tagalog) poetry.

[Kristin McPhillips · Rating 3 out of 5]

This I found in a rental house and I couldn't put it down. It's Borges thoughts on various topics--poetry , various authors, north American literature-- having been a student of Spanish and Latin American literature and a fan of Borges, I found it interesting...not sure how someone who didn't share those interests would feel