Books : Ficciones (BIBLIOTECA BORGES) (Spanish Edition)
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9788420633121
ISBN: 8420633127
Label: Alianza
Manufacturer: Alianza
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 218
Publication Date: January 01, 1997
Publisher: Alianza
Sales Rank: 298917
Studio: Alianza
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Product Description:
Ficciones es una obra imprescindible en la literatura contemporánea que merece su lugar destacado en cualquier canon de la literatura universal. Aquí se reúnen dos libros de Borges: El jardín de senderos que se bifurcan (1941) que incluye ocho relatos y Artificios (1944) con nueve cuentos.
En esta colección, Borges nos lleva de viaje por un reino extraño, irresistible y profundamente resonante. Entramos en la temerosa esfera del abismo de Pascal, el laberinto de libros surrealista y a su vez literal y la iconografía del eterno regreso. Al adentrarse en los mundos de Ficciones podrá llegar a la mente de Jorge Luis Borges, donde encontrará el Cielo, el Infierno y el poder infinito de su inteligencia e imaginación.
Amazon.com Review:
Reading Jorge Luis Borges is an experience akin to having the top of one's head removed for repairs. First comes the unfamiliar breeze tickling your cerebral cortex; then disorientation, even mild discomfort; and finally, the sense that the world has been irrevocably altered--and in this case, rendered infinitely more complex. First published in 1945, his Ficciones compressed several centuries' worth of philosophy and poetry into 17 tiny, unclassifiable pieces of prose. He offered up diabolical tigers, imaginary encyclopedias, ontological detective stories, and scholarly commentaries on nonexistent books, and in the process exploded all previous notions of genre. Would any of David Foster Wallace's famous footnotes be possible without Borges? Or, for that matter, the syntactical games of Perec, the metafictional pastiche of Calvino? For good or for ill, the blind Argentinian paved the way for a generation's worth of postmodern monkey business--and fiction will never be simply "fiction" again.
Its enormous influence on writers aside, Ficciones has also--perhaps more importantly--changed the way that we read. Borges's Pierre Menard, for instance, undertakes the most audacious project imaginable: to create not a contemporary version of Cervantes's most famous work but the Quixote itself, word for word. This second text is "verbally identical" to the original, yet, because of its new associations, "infinitely richer"; every time we read, he suggests, we are in effect creating an entirely new text, simply by viewing it through the distorting lens of history. "A book is not an isolated being: it is a relationship, an axis of innumerable relationships," Borges once wrote in an essay about George Bernard Shaw. "All men who repeat one line of Shakespeare are William Shakespeare," he tells us in "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius." In this spirit, Borges is not above impersonating, even quoting, himself.
It is hard, exactly, to say what all of this means, at least in any of the usual ways. Borges wrote not with an ideological agenda, but with a kind of radical philosophical playfulness. Labyrinths, libraries, lotteries, doubles, dreams, mirrors, heresiarchs: these are the tokens with which he plays his ontological games. In the end, ideas themselves are less important to him than their aesthetic and imaginative possibilities. Like the idealist philosophers of Tlön, Borges does not "seek for the truth or even for verisimilitude, but rather for the astounding"; for him as for them, "metaphysics is a branch of fantastic literature." --Mary Park
Average Rating: 
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Jorge Luis Borges was one of those rare writers who can take even a bizarre, utterly unbelievable idea, and spin it into an exquisite little gem of prose.
And this classic writer was at the peak of his powers when he collected together "Ficciones," whose plain name belies the subtle power and exquisite beauty of Jorges' short stories. Even among Borges' many short stories, few of them can rival this little labyrinth of strange ancient cities, fictional histories, and the eerie depths of the human mind.
"I owe the discovery of Uqbar to the conjunction of a mirror and an encyclopedia." An odd old saying from the Middle-East leads the narrator to seek out the long-lost heretical histories of a fictional world known as Tlon. Its beliefs, language, and metaphysical eccentricities increasingly fascinate the narrator, until it's almost a surprise to realize that Borges invented all of this.
The stories that follow are no less engrossing -- the recounting of a strange, haunting novel, a man who attempts to LIVE as Don Quixote, a man who tries to dream a new being into existence, a lottery that determines the way the people of Babylon are to live, an examination of a brilliant and underrated author, an exploration of the eternal Library of the universe, and a labyrinthine spy story.
The second round of short stories is a bit less enthralling, merely because it focuses more on "typical" Borges short stories. But they are still pretty ... Read More
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Transport the Wachowski brothers to the 1930's and ask them to express their philosophy by way of short stories. You might get something in the same ballpark as Ficciones. The diversity and genius of Borges' work is so unique that if you were to know all the languages in the world and had no word limit, it would still be hard to do a review that does justice. Ironically, this is exactly the kind of challenge that Borges would stand up to. I will attempt to review this work by enlisting adjectives that come to mind.
Surreal, mystic, recursive, sophistic, heretical, philosophical, religious, profound, imaginative, ingenious, circular, open-ended, unorthodox, personal, hallucinational, original, universal, self-referential, concise, contextual, complex, ironic.
Here are a few examples of the complexity of Borges' mind at work.
Borges attributes certain imaginary books and volumes of books to some of the authors that he is most influenced by. In reality, these books are projections of Borges' fertile mind and no more. In the process of critiquing imaginary works of art (let's call this meta-art), he creates an instance of the meta-art in the mind of the reader. It's like me talking to you about the eating habits of a third person you haven't met, and actually does not exist! Borges never fails to leave you with a lasting impression of a meta-art that resonates with your senses. On second thoughts, this is obvious because the meta-art is as much ... Read More
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Borges never fails to please, to challenge, to entertain, and more importantly make one's brain shift into high gear!
If you are looking for an easy read, don't expect to find it in Ficciones.
However, if you are looking for a little cerebral cortex arousal; grab this book and find a cozy spot...you won't be disappointed!
Reading with his head instead of his heart, Borges looks to fill his mind with all the minutia and information he can possibly hold and release it back in his works with finely crafted and fascinatingly playful philosophical stories.
The sparse, objective writing of Ficciones is a far cry from his earlier lyrical style, of which he says: "In those days, I sought dusk, the outskirts, and unhappiness; now, mornings, the center, and serenity."
Thankfully in the newer center, we are treated to 17 extraordinary stories that are teasingly succinct, yet brimming with imaginative and aesthetic prose!
The scarcity of words requires that the reader pay attention to them all or miss much of the wisdom and subtleness that define the delicate and ingenious style that is this fine master of fiction...Jorge Luis Borges!
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My knowledge of Borges is small; before purchasing Ficciones I had only read two or three of his short stories. Enough, however, to know that it would be well worth the short time it takes to read each of these stories.
Borges had an unusual and amazing way of compressing the most stimulating, fascinating material into a small number of pages. You may read one of his stories in ten-fifteen minutes and contemplate it for a week (or more) and remember it for life. And still, you may well want to reread it many times; it has happened more than once that upon finishing a Borges short I immediately wanted to go back and start from the beginning.
The strange thoughts on infinity and the nature of existence are presented in a way that stimulates thought in a humble yet intruiging way. Ideas that may be well recognized and used in other fiction (in some cases overused) have some other element, some different approach, so that even if the premise is not "new" the experience certainly is. How this can be done, and in so few words no less, is beyond me.
This was certainly one of my very best buys and I know that this book will be well worn by my reading alone, not to mention that of the many people I will lend it to with my best recommendations. These short stories will bring beauty and excitement of the mind to many an otherwise boring, mundane day.
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Borges is an ideas man. And he can write as well. I love his concepts even more than his writing. Some of his prose reminds me of Somerset Maughn and I wonder if that is the translator or himself. Some of the stories are ones that were common in his era and he's added a twist of lemon (Both Maughn and Borges have done the 'scar on the face' story.
A firm favourite, always. I like stories that twist your brain slightly to the left.
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