The Review of Contemporary Fiction

Jorge Luis Borges: Conversations by Richard Burgin
David William Foster

Richard Burgin, ed. Jorge Luis Borges: Conversations. Univ. of Mississippi Press, 1998. 254 pp. $17.00.

Perhaps no Latin American author was interviewed more than Jorge Luis Borges, at least in the English-language press. The fact that Borges was a speaker of English, having grown up speaking English in his home, meant that he could not only handle himself easily with English-language interviewers (something that a number of Latin American writers can do) but that he was able to handle the language with virtually the same degree of nuance and sophistication of style as his interviewers, many of whom were distinguished writers, journalists, and literary critics themselves.
Burgin has provided a lovely anthology of the best of these interviews, organized chronologically. They are prefaced with a detailed chronology of Borges’s life, in order to place each interview within the context of Borges’s personal life and literary career. They span the years 1966 (Richard Stern) to 1985 (Amelia Barili), which, since Borges died in 1986, must be the last interview he gave in English.
The only defect of the volume is that a longer introduction by Burgin, in which he analyzes the nature of these interviews, or the inclusion of Ted Lyon’s article on the Borges interview as a critical genre, would have been useful. However, there is a detailed analytical index that is invaluable for seeing the treatment in the interviews of particular themes.
Since Borges has virtually become a part of the English-language literary canon, there is much information here of use to those who may view Borges only as an “international” figure and who have little interest in or regard for his connections with Latin America and, particularly, with Argentina. Since there is a balance between interviews that focus on the purely literary aspects of his work and those (especially by Latin Americanists) that wish to place Borges in a cultural and historical context, Burgin provides an excellent and informative balance of material. [David William Foster]


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The Review of Contemporary Fiction Jorge Luis Borges: Conversations by Richard Burgin David William Foster Richard Burgin, ed. Jorge Luis Borges: Conversations. Univ. of Mississippi Press, 1998. 254 pp. $17.00. Perhaps no Latin American author was interviewed more than Jorge Luis Borges, at least in the English-language press. The fact that Borges was a speaker of English, having grown up speaking English in his home, meant that he could not only handle himself easily with English-language interviewers (something that a number of Latin American writers can do) but that he was able to handle the language with virtually the same degree of nuance and sophistication of style as his interviewers, many of whom were distinguished writers, journalists, and literary critics themselves. Burgin has provided a lovely anthology of the best of these interviews, organized chronologically. They are prefaced with a detailed chronology of Borges’s life, in order to place each interview within the context of Borges’s personal life and literary career. They span the years 1966 (Richard Stern) to 1985 (Amelia Barili), which, since Borges died in 1986, must be the last interview he gave in English. The only defect of the volume is that a longer introduction by Burgin, in which he analyzes the nature of these interviews, or the inclusion of Ted Lyon’s article on the Borges interview as a critical genre, would have been useful. However, there is a detailed analytical index that is invaluable for seeing the treatment in the interviews of particular themes. Since Borges has virtually become a part of the English-language literary canon, there is much information here of use to those who may view Borges only as an “international” figure and who have little interest in or regard for his connections with Latin America and, particularly, with Argentina. Since there is a balance between interviews that focus on the purely literary aspects of his work and those (especially by Latin Americanists) that wish to place Borges in a cultural and historical context, Burgin provides an excellent and informative balance of material. [David William Foster]

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