Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges KBE; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986), was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, and a key figure in Spanish-language literature. His best-known books, Ficcionesand El Aleph, published in the 1940s, are compilations of short stories interconnected by common themes, including dreams, labyrinths, libraries, mirrors, fictional writers, philosophy, and religion...
NationalityArgentinian
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth24 August 1899
memories museums mirrors
We are our memory, we are that chimerical museum of shifting shapes, that pile of broken mirrors.
mirrors two labyrinth
It only takes two facing mirrors to build a labyrinth.
mirrors discovery conjunctions
I owe the discovery of Uqbar to the conjunction of a mirror and an encyclopedia.
errors mirrors earth
The earth we inhabit is an error, an incompetent parody. Mirrors and paternity are abominable because they multiply and affirm it.
mirrors fatherhood illusion
The visible universe was an illusion or, more precisely, a sophism. Mirrors and fatherhood are abominable because they multiply it and extend it.
art mirrors objectivity
Two aesthetics exist: the passive aesthetic of mirrors and the active aesthetic of prisms. Guided by the former, art turns into a copy of the environment's objectivity or the individual's psychic history. Guided by the latter, art is redeemed, makes the world into its instrument, and forges, beyond spatial and temporal prisons, a personal vision.
mirrors saws earth
I saw all the mirrors on earth and none of them reflected me.
reflection mirrors self-improvement
I gazed at every mirror on the planet, not one gave back my reflection.
concept destroyer empire limited whose
There is a concept that is the corrupter and destroyer of all others. I speak not of Evil, whose limited empire is that of ethics; I speak of the infinite.
bound conception create fact future work writers
The fact is that all writers create their precursors. Their work modifies our conception of the past, just as it is bound to modify the future.
mistake writing thinking
I try to avoid purple patches, fine writing, all that kind of thing... because I think they're a mistake. And then sometimes it comes through and sometimes it doesn't, but that's not up to me. It's up to chance.
giving oblivion granted
I ask of any God, of any gods, that if they give immortality, I hope to be granted oblivion also.
memories mean identity
I suppose identity depends on memory. And if my memory is blotted out, then I wonder if I exist - I mean, if I am the same person. Of course, I don't have to solve that problem. It's up to God, if any.
dream thinking may
I wonder if I have woven through dreams the sexual strife. I don't think so. But after all, my business is to weave dreams. I suppose I may be allowed to choose the material.