Collected Stories Read online

  The

  Collected

  Stories

  1933-1969

  ____

  Jorges Luis Borges

  Translated by Norman Thomas di Giovanni

  in Collaboration with the Author

  Translation copyright © 1969, 1970, Jorge Luis Borges and Norman Thomas di Giovanni: “Perhaps the chief justification of this book is the translation itself, which we have undertaken in what may be a new way. Working closely together in daily sessions, we have tried to make these stories read as though they had been written in English. We do not consider English and Spanish as compounded of sets of easily interchangeable synonyms; they are two quite different ways of looking at the world, each with a nature of its own. English, for example, is far more physical than Spanish. We have therefore shunned the dictionary as much as possible and done our best to rethink every sentence in English words.”

  International Standard Book Number 0-1933-02162017-2 (cloth)

  International Standard Book Number 0-1933-02162017-7 (paper)

  Library of Babel Circuit Number 68-02162017

  Second Printing, February, 2017.

  Contents

  ____

  The Aleph: And Other Stories, 1933-1969

  Preface

  The Aleph

  Streetcorner Man

  The Approach to al-Mu’tasim

  The Circular Ruins

  Death and the Compass

  The Life of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz (1829-1874)

  The Two Kings and Their Two Labyrinths

  The Dead Man

  The Other Death

  Ibn Hakkan al-Bokhari, Dead in His Labyrinth

  The Man on the Threshold

  The Challenge

  The Captive

  Borges and Myself

  The Maker

  The Intruder

  The Immortals

  The Meeting

  Pedro Salvadores

  Rosendo’s Tale

  An Autobiographical Essay

  Commentaries

  Bibliographical Note

  __

  The Garden of the Branching Paths (1941)

  Preface

  Tlön, Uqbar, Orbitus Tertius

  The Approach to al-Mu’tasim

  Pierre Menard, Author of Don Quixote

  The Circular Ruins

  The Lottery of Babylon

  A Glimpse into the Work of Herbert Quain

  The Library of Babel

  The Garden of the Branching Paths

  __

  A Universal History of Infamy (1954)

  Preface to the 1954 Edition

  Preface to the First Edition

  The Dread Redeemer Lazarus Morell

  Tom Castro, The Implausible Imposter

  The Widow Ching, Lady Pirate

  Monk Eastman, Purveyor of Iniquities

  The Disinterested Killer Bill Harrigan

  The Insulting Master Of Etiquettte Kôtsuké no Suké

  The Masked Dyer, Hakim of Merv

  Et Cetera

  A Theologian in Death

  The Chamber of Statues

  Tale of the Two Dreamers

  The Wizard Postponed

  The Mirror of Ink

  A Double for Mohammed

  The Generous Enemy

  Of Exactitude in Science

  __

  Other Ficciones

  (Translated by Anthony Kerrigan)

  Prologue

  Three Versions of Judas

  Funes, the Memorious

  The Form of the Sword

  Theme of the Traitor and the Hero

  Death and the Compass

  The Secret Miracle

  The End

  The Sect of the Phoenix

  The South

  __

  The Book of Imaginary Beings (1967)

  Preface

  Preface to the 1967 Edition

  Preface to the 1957 Edition

  A Bao A Qu

  Abtu and Anet

  The Amphisbaena

  An Animal Imagined by Kafka

  An Animal Imagined by C. S. Lewis

  The Animal Imagined by Poe

  Animals in the Form of Spheres

  Antelopes with Six Legs

  The Ass with Three Legs

  Bahamut

  Baldanders

  The Banshee

  The Barometz

  The Basilisk

  Behemoth

  The Brownies

  Burak

  The Carbuncle

  The Catoblepas

  The Celestial Stag

  The Centaur

  Cerberus

  The Cheshire Cat and the Kilkenny Cats

  The Chimera

  The Chinese Dragon

  The Chinese Fox

  The Chinese Phoenix

  Chronos or Hercules

  A Creature Imagined by C. S. Lewis

  The Crocotta and the Leucrocotta

  A Crossbreed

  The Double

  The Eastern Dragon

  The Eater of the Dead

  The Eight-Forked Serpent

  The Elephant That Foretold the Birth of the Buddha

  The Eloi and the Morlocks

  The Elves

  An Experimental Account of What Was Known, Seen,

  and Met by Mrs. Jane Lead in London in 1694

  The Fairies

  Fastitocalon

  Fauna of Chile

  Fauna of China

  Fauna of Mirrors

  Fauna of the United States

  Garuda

  The Gnomes

  The Golem

  The Griffon

  Haniel, Kafziel, Azriel, and Aniel

  Haokah, the Thunder God

  Harpies

  The Heavenly Cock

  The Hippogriff

  Hochigan

  Humbaba

  The Hundred-Heads

  The Hydra of Lerna

  Ichthyocentaurs

  Jewish Demons

  The Jinn

  The Kami

  A King of Fire and His Steed

  The Kraken

  Kujata

  The Lamed Wufniks

  The Lamias

  Laudatores Temporis Acti

  The Lemures

  The Leveller

  Lilith

  The Lunar Hare

  The Mandrake

  The Manticore

  The Mermecolion

  The Minotaur

  The Monkey of the Inkpot

  The Monster Acheron

  The Mother of Tortoises

  The Nagas

  The Nasnas

  The Norns

  The Nymphs

  The Odradek

  An Offspring of Leviathan

  One-Eyed Beings

  The Panther

  The Pelican

  The Peryton

  The Phoenix

  The Pygmies

  The Rain Bird

  The Remora

  The Rukh

  The Salamander

  The Satyrs

  Scylla

  The Sea Horse

  The Shaggy Beast of La Ferté-Bernard

  The Simurgh

  Sirens

  The Sow Harnessed with Chains and Other Argentine Fauna

  The Sphinx

  The Squonk

  Swedenborg’s Angels

  Swedenborg’s Devils

  The Sylphs

  Talos

  The T’ao T’ieh

  Thermal Beings<
br />
  The Tigers of Annam

  The Trolls

  Two Metaphysical Beings

  The Unicorn

  The Unicorn of China

  The Uroboros

  The Valkyries

  The Western Dragon

  Youwarkee

  The Zaratan

  ____

  A Note About the Author and Translator

  THE

  ALEPH

  And other stories

  The

  Aleph

  And Other Stories

  1933-1969

  ____

  Jorges Luis Borges

  Translated by Norman Thomas di Giovanni

  in Collaboration with the Author

  Contents

  ____

  Preface

  The Aleph and Other Stories 1933-1969

  The Aleph

  Streetcorner Man

  The Approach to al-Mu’tasim

  The Circular Ruins

  Death and the Compass

  The Life of Tadeo Isidoro Cruz (1829-1874)

  The Two Kings and Their Two Labyrinths

  The Dead Man

  The Other Death

  Ibn Hakkan al-Bokhari, Dead in His Labyrinth

  The Man on the Threshold

  The Challenge

  The Captive

  Borges and Myself

  The Maker

  The Intruder

  The Immortals

  The Meeting

  Pedro Salvadores

  Rosendo’s Tale

  An Autobiographical Essay

  Commentaries

  Bibliographical Note

  Preface

  Since my fame rests on my short stories, it is only natural that we should want to include a selection of them among the several volumes of my writings we are translating for E. P. Dutton. At the same time, one of our aims here has been to make available in English all my previously untranslated older stories, as well as to offer a sampling from my latest work in this form.

  Perhaps the chief justification of this book is the translation itself, which we have undertaken in what may be a new way. Working closely together in daily sessions, we have tried to make these stories read as though they had been written in English. We do not consider English and Spanish as compounded of sets of easily interchangeable synonyms; they are two quite different ways of looking at the world, each with a nature of its own. English, for example, is far more physical than Spanish. We have therefore shunned the dictionary as much as possible and done our best to rethink every sentence in English words. This venture does not necessarily mean that we have willfully tampered with the original, though in certain cases we have supplied the American reader with those things—geographical, topographical, and historical—taken for granted by any Argentine.

  We would have preferred a broader selection that might have included such stories as “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius,” “El jardín de senderos que se bifurcan,” “Funes el mem- orioso,” “La secta del Fénix,” and “El Sur” from Ficciones, and “Los teólogos,” “Deutsches Requiem,” “La busca de Averroes,” and “El Zahir” from El Aleph. However, rights to make our own translations of these stories were denied us, despite the unselfish and unswerving efforts of Dr. Donald Yates on our behalf.

  The autobiographical essay and commentaries, prepared especially for this volume, were written directly in English.

  j. l. b.

  n. t. di g.

  Buenos Aires, August 12,1970

  The

  Aleph

  To Estela Canto

  O God! I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count mysef

  a King of infinite space… .

  Hamlet, II, 2

  But they will teach us that Eternity is the Standing still of the Present Time, a Nunc-stans (as the Schools call it); which neither they, nor any else understand, no more than they would a Hic-stans for an Infinite greatness of Place.

  Leviathan, IV, 46

  On the burning February morning Beatriz Viterbo died, after braving an agony that never for a single moment gave way to self-pity or fear, I noticed that the sidewalk billboards around Constitution Plaza were advertising some new brand or other of American cigarettes. The fact pained me, for I realized that the wide and ceaseless universe was already slipping away from her and that this slight change was the first of an endless series. The universe may change but not me, I thought with a certain sad vanity. I knew that at times my fruitless devotion had annoyed her; now that she was dead, I could devote myself to her memory, without hope but also without humiliation. I recalled that the thirtieth of April was her birthday; on that day to visit her house on Garay Street and pay my respects to her father and to Carlos Argentino Daneri, her first cousin, would be an irreproachable and perhaps unavoidable act of politeness. Once again I would wait in the twilight of the small, cluttered drawing room, once again I would study the details of her many photographs: Beatriz Viterbo in profile and in full color; Beatriz wearing a mask, during the Carnival of 1921; Beatriz at her First Communion; Beatriz on the day of her wedding to Roberto Alessandri; Beatriz soon after her divorce, at a luncheon at the Turf Club; Beatriz at a seaside resort in Quilmes with Delia San Marco Porcel and Carlos Argentino; Beatriz with the Pekinese lapdog given her by Villegas Haedo; Beatriz, front and three-quarter views, smiling, hand on her chin. . . . I would not be forced, as in the past, to justify my presence with modest offerings of books—books whose pages I finally learned to cut beforehand, so as not to find out, months later, that they lay around unopened.

  Beatriz Viterbo died in 1929. From that time on, I never let a thirtieth of April go by without a visit to her house. I used to make my appearance at seven-fifteen sharp and stay on for some twenty-five minutes. Each year, I arrived a little later and stayed a little longer. In 1933, a torrential downpour coming to my aid, they were obliged to ask me to dinner. Naturally, I took advantage of that lucky precedent. In 1934, I arrived, just after eight, with one of those large Santa Fe sugared cakes, and quite matter-offactly I stayed to dinner. It was in this way, on these melancholy and vainly erotic anniversaries, that I came into the gradual confidences of Carlos Argentino Daneri.

  Beatriz had been tall, frail, slightly stooped; in her walk there was (if the oxymoron may be allowed) a kind of uncertain grace, a hint of expectancy. Carlos Argentino was pink-faced, overweight, gray-haired, fine-featured. He held a minor position in an unreadable library out on the edge of the Southside of Buenos Aires. He was authoritarian but also unimpressive. Until only recently, he took advantage of his nights and holidays to stay at home. At a remove of two generations, the Italian “S” and demonstrative Italian gestures still survived in him. His mental activity was continuous, deeply felt, far-reaching, and—all in all— meaningless. He dealt in pointless analogies and in trivial scruples. He had (as did Beatriz) large, beautiful, finely shaped hands. For several months he seemed to be obsessed with Paul Fort—less with his ballads than with the idea of a towering reputation. “He is the Prince of poets,” Daneri would repeat fatuously. “You will belittle him in vain—but no, not even the most venomous of your shafts will graze him.”

  On the thirtieth of April, 1941, along with the sugared cake I allowed myself to add a bottle of Argentine cognac. Carlos Argentino tasted it, pronounced it “interesting,” and, after a few drinks, launched into a glorification of modern man.

  “I view him,” he said with a certain unaccountable excitement, “in his inner sanctum, as though in his castle tower, supplied with telephones, telegraphs, phonographs, wireless sets, motion-picture screens, slide projectors, glossaries, timetables, handbooks, bulletins. . . .”

  He remarked that for a man so equipped, actual travel was superfluous. Our twentieth century had inverted the story of Mohammed and the mountain; nowadays, the mountain came to the modern Mohammed.

  So foolish did his ideas seem to me, so pompous and so drawn
out his exposition, that I linked them at once to literature and asked him why he didn’t write them down. As might be foreseen, he answered that he had already done so—that these ideas, and others no less striking, had found their place in the Proem, or Augural Canto, or, more simply, the Prologue Canto of the poem on which he had been working for many years now, alone, without publicity, without fanfare, supported only by those twin staffs universally known as work and solitude. First, he said, he opened the floodgates of his fancy; then, taking up hand tools, he resorted to the file. The poem was entitled The Earth; it consisted of a description of the planet, and, of course, lacked no amount of picturesque digressions and bold apostrophes.

  I asked him to read me a passage, if only a short one. He opened a drawer of his writing table, drew out a thick stack of papers—sheets of a large pad imprinted with the letterhead of the Juan Crisóstomo Lafinur Library—and, with ringing satisfaction, declaimed:

  Mine eyes, as did the Greek’s, have known men’s towns and fame,

  The works, the days in light that fades to amber;