The Gold of the Tigers: Selected Later Poems

by Jorge Luis Borges

Selections, with English translations, from the author's "El oro de los tigres" and "La rosa profunda".

Genres: Poetry, Latin American, Classics

95 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Jorge 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."

Reviews

[Deborah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Argentine Jorge Luis Borges wrote in his prefaces in 1972 of this bilingual edition, “For a true poet, every moment of existence, every act, ought to be poetic since, in essence, it is so.” His eyesight began deteriorating in his 20s and became completely blind by age 55. He found blindness though confining, liberating to create. For Borges in writing, “I begin with the glimpse of a form, a kind of remote island, which will eventually be a story or a poem.” “A language is a tradition, a way of grasping reality, not an arbitrary assemblage of symbols.” “All verse should have two obligations: to communicate a precise instance and to touch us physically, as the presence of the sea does.” He posited be true to your “imagination”, not a “supposed ‘reality’”.

I admire Borges’ talent and his vast knowledge ranging from myths, poetry, literature, theology, and the bible. Starting when he was nine years old, he translated into Spanish Oscar Wilde’s “Happy Prince” and subsequently translated works from English, French, German into Spanish. Per wikipedia, Borges believed “that a translation may improve upon the original, may even be unfaithful to it, and that alternative and potentially contradictory renderings of the same work can be equally valid.” Despite his blindness, Borges was an influential figure in Spanish-language literature writing “poetry, essays, screenplays, literary criticism and edited anthologies.” His blindness did not stop him but freed him.

His poetry is deep with many layers and has you searching the internet as to those people and places he mentions. Yet with a word or two, you are in the moment or feeling he has created. This is not a light read. My favorites were “Tu” or “You” and the below:

For a taste of his poetry, here are a couple of excerpts:
“A Un Gato” or “To a Cat” (chose because after all I love cats):

“Tu lomo condesciende a la morosa
caricia de mi mano. Has admitido,
desde esa eternidad que ya es olvido,
el amor de la mano recelosa.
En otro tiempo estás. Eres el dueño
de un ámbito cerrado como un sueño.”

“Your back allows the tentative caress
my hand extends. And you have condescended,
since that forever, now oblivion,
to take love from a flattering hand.
You live in other time, lord of your realm –
a world as closed and separate as dream.”

“El Ciego” or “The Blind Man”:

“Lo han despojado del diverso mundo,
de los rostros, que son lo que eran antes,
de las cercanas calles, hoy distantes,
y del cóncavo azul, ayer profundo.
De los libros le queda lo que deja
la memoria, esa forma del olvido
que reteine el formato, no el sentido,
y que los meros títutos refleja.
El desnivel acecha. Cada paso
puede ser la caída. Soy el lento
prisonero de un tiempo soñoliento
que no marca su aurora ni su ocaso.
Es de noche. No hay otros. Con el verso
debo labrar mi insípido universo.”

He is divested of the diverse world,
of faces, which stay as once they were,
of the adjoining streets, now far away,
and of the concave sky, once infinite.
Of books, he keeps no more than what is left him
by memory, that brother of forgetting,
which keeps the formula but not the feeling
and which reflects no more than tag and name.
Traps lie in wait for me. I am a prisoner
shuffling through a time which feels like a dream,
taking no note of mornings or of sunsets.
It is night. I am alone. In verse like this,
I must create my insipid universe.”

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful poetry. I read the bilingual edition, with Borges' original words on one side of the page and the English translation on the other. I understand Spanish well enough to understand the direct translation, but the English version was nice for understanding nuances.

[Zack]

do you like labyrinths, mist, and mystery? maybe you should read borges' poetry. it's odd; i hear people talk a lot about borges' fiction but i never hear people talk about his poetry. i like his poetry a lot! there are like 5 poems in the book that are absolutely aMAZing...exciting...inspiring. most of the others are really solid...good shit. where this book is at it's worst is where borges just starts listing things. i am REALLY tired of the list poem. you know...when someone just lists a bunch of interesting shit and that's it. it seems to be happening more and more...argh. in my opinion...poems need verbs! shit needs to happen. not just lists.

[Bookluvr7 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Needed to read this for a project however it was really nice. I didn’t hate the poetry and I saw a lot of different parts of history in it and I would like to look more upon some of the instances to learn more. A short bilingual edition. I liked it.

4/5⭐️

[Swandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

What can I say in praise when every sound that comes out of my throat is like a croak or a wet thud in comparison to the lyrical lines by JLB??

The goal is oblivion. I have arrived early. MIC DROP HELLO????

My favourites: The Threatened One, You, Poem of Quantity, I, My Books

[Lucas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Borges so much I would read his hand.

[Rebeca · Rating 1 out of 5]

Por haber sido influenciado por Ruben Dario,no le vi ninguna semejanza, belleza,rima, en sus palabras.

[Leonard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything by Borges is great and this is no exception.

[Scott Cinsavich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sublime poetry. Loved it!

[Lena · Rating 3 out of 5]

The high points:
“Susana Bombal”
“The Blind Man”

[Wyatt Reu · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Borges is entering a world that is unfamiliar yet deeply familiar, intimate and small as a desk object yet truly vast.

[Benjamin Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

I haven't read a single word of Borges that I haven't fallen in love with. His poetry, his prose, his storytelling: the master at work.