Jorge Luis Borges
Who was Jorge Luis Borges?
Argentine author renowned for his short stories and essays exploring themes of infinity, labyrinths, and metaphysical puzzles.
Biographical data adapted from Wikipedia’s article on Jorge Luis Borges (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Biography
Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) was an Argentine writer who changed modern literature with his unique take on philosophical ideas, endless possibilities, and complex structures. Born in Buenos Aires to a middle-class family with English roots, Borges developed an early love for reading that influenced his entire career. His father, Jorge Guillermo Borges, was a lawyer and psychology teacher with a large personal library, while his maternal grandfather was a military colonel who fought in Argentine independence wars.
Borges studied at Collège Calvin in Geneva, Switzerland, where his family moved during World War I. This European stay exposed him to different languages and literary styles, like French symbolism and German expressionism. After returning to Argentina in 1921, he became involved with the ultraist literary movement, which focused on innovative metaphors and cutting out unnecessary rhetoric. During this time, he published his first collection of poems and essays and contributed to various avant-garde literary magazines.
His career took a major turn in 1938 when he started working at the Miguel Cané Branch Library in Buenos Aires, a job that gave him plenty of time to read and write. This experience directly influenced his most famous work, "The Library of Babel," which imagines a universe as an infinite library containing every possible book. His role as a librarian became central to his identity as a writer, and he later worked as director of the National Public Library from 1955 to 1973.
Borges married Elsa Astete Millán in 1967, but the marriage ended in divorce in 1970. In 1986, shortly before his death, he married his longtime collaborator and companion María Kodama. Throughout his career, he received many international awards, including the Prix Formentor in 1961, which brought him global fame, and the Jerusalem Prize in 1971. His progressive blindness, starting in his thirties and becoming complete by the 1950s, meant he increasingly relied on dictation and collaboration with others, including Kodama, who became his literary executor and helped him keep writing until his last years.
Before Fame
Borges grew up in a bilingual home where English literature was as important as Spanish works. His grandmother, Fanny Haslam, was English and taught him to read English before Spanish, introducing him to authors like Robert Louis Stevenson and Edgar Allan Poe. When his family moved to Europe during his teenage years, it was a key time for him. He learned French and German in Switzerland and later lived in Spain, where he became familiar with the ultraist poetry movement.
After coming back to Buenos Aires in the 1920s, Borges first gained attention as a poet and essayist, contributing to literary magazines like "Sur," edited by Victoria Ocampo. He gradually shifted to fiction writing in the 1930s and 1940s, creating the unique short stories that gained him international fame. His job as a librarian gave him hands-on experience with cataloging and classification systems and inspired his explorations of infinite knowledge and fantastical architectures.
Key Achievements
- Revolutionized short fiction through works like 'Labyrinths' and 'Ficciones' that blend philosophy with literature
- Served as Director of the National Public Library of Argentina from 1955 to 1973
- Won the inaugural Prix Formentor in 1961, sharing it with Samuel Beckett and gaining international recognition
- Created the concept of the infinite library that influenced information science and digital humanities
- Translated major works from English, German, and Old Norse into Spanish throughout his career
Did You Know?
- 01.He memorized entire passages from the Encyclopedia Britannica and could recite them verbatim decades later
- 02.Despite his international fame, he never won the Nobel Prize in Literature, which he attributed to his political views and support for military governments
- 03.He learned Old English and Old Norse in his later years, translating works from these languages despite being completely blind
- 04.His short story 'The Lottery in Babylon' inspired the naming of a computer programming concept called 'Borgesian probability'
- 05.He worked as a poultry inspector before becoming a librarian, a job he obtained through political connections after Juan Perón's government removed him from the library
Family & Personal Life
Awards & Honors
| Award | Year | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Gran Premio de Honor de la SADE | 1944 | — |
| Prix Formentor | 1961 | — |
| Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres | 1962 | — |
| Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire | 1965 | — |
| Commander of the Order of the Sun of Peru | 1965 | — |
| Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic | 1967 | — |
| Jerusalem Prize | 1971 | — |
| Alfonso Reyes International Prize | 1973 | — |
| commander of the Order of Bernardo O'Higgins | 1976 | — |
| Edgar Awards | 1976 | — |
| doctor honoris causa from the Paris-Sorbonne University | 1978 | — |
| Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany | 1979 | — |
| World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement | 1979 | — |
| Miguel de Cervantes Prize | 1979 | — |
| Grand Officer of the Order of the Falcon | 1979 | — |
| Prix mondial Cino Del Duca | 1980 | — |
| Balzan Prize | 1980 | — |
| Knight of the Legion of Honour | 1983 | — |
| Grand Cross of the Civil Order of Alfonso X the Wise | 1983 | — |
| Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic | 1984 | — |
| Grand Officer of the Military Order of Saint James of the Sword | 1984 | — |
| diamond Konex award | 1984 | — |
| honorary doctorate of the University of Murcia | 1985 | — |
| honorary doctorate from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru | — | — |
| honorary doctorate of the National University of San Marcos | — | — |
| National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism | 1999 | — |