Reading Circle - Ficciones, March 2008

Lucid Lounge
1

THE READING CIRCLE - March 2008

[center]Ficciones
Jorge Luis Borges[/center]
Book & Author

Just last week, in the middle of a casual talk, a friend of mine confessed to never having been able to finish this book. “I’m afraid of that book,” she said. “I think I have some sort of borges-phobia.” The geniality of Borges’ fictions is truly mindblowing: but while many other authors could be described as “brilliant” or “mindblowing” for their fiction, there is something about Borges which is truly unique.

Fiction, no matter how brilliant, usually occurs only punctually, that is, within its own plot, at a comfortable, safe distance from the reader and their life. The fictions of Jorge Luis Borges, on the other hand, seem to spread all over the place, taking over and dragging you into its fictional reality. My friend, the one who’s afraid of Borges, once said: “when I read Borges, I have a feeling that the world around me is being sucked into the story.” Indeed, the acid ink of his quill seems to have the power to dissolve the pillars of reality, and for a moment you cannot tell real from fiction anymore. And that is why you must read his books.

This Month’s Reading

Ficciones is a fairly easy read, most of its 17 stories being no larger than 10 pages. Our reading begins the 1st of March — a Saturday two weeks from now. Until then you should have enough time to get your hands in a copy of the book. (If anyone has trouble finding a translation to their language, PM me). You could start reading the moment you get it: as your host this month, I have decided not to set a schedule or reading order. You can read as many stories as you want, beginning at whatever point you like in the book, there will always be someone to discuss with you. So that’s it! Go get your copy of Ficciones, and see you all in two weeks!

Oh, and meanwhile, don’t forget to advertise our reading to forum members & friends! :hyper: Here’s a button you can add to your sig, for that matter:
Join the Reading Circle!

[size=11][b][url=https://community.ld4all.com/t/reading-circle-ficciones-march-2008/27643/1][color=#990000]Join the Reading Circle! [img]https://letraselinhas.com.br/bruno/imagens/smileys/coffee.gif[/img][/color][/url][/b][/size] [center]* * *[/center]
A note to the English reader: there is a better translation to some of Ficciones’ stories in an English-language anthology called Labyrinths, which I’d highly recommend, if it wasn’t for the fact that it doesn’t contain all the stories from Ficciones.

2

Hmm, interesting pick Bruno. I like the idea that you said this book will suck you in, I like that feeling actually. I’ll get the book from my public library in a week. :happy:

And by the way, it took me like five tries to find out what was wrong with the code, and it finally works. :content:

3

This seems quite interresting , ill see i get a copy … :plotting: The internet is your friend , …most of the times

4

Luckily enough, the SFU library has a copy of this, so I will be joining you all in the read of a lifetime :wink:

5

And we’re off… woo hoo!
:read:

6

Sweet! I’d love to get into this! I’ll see what I can do to get my hands on a copy, maybe turning to Amazon as a last resort. Plus, I need something to add to my signature. :wink:

…That’s weird, the image in the sig isn’t working for me. Either I can take the cup out or…

No signature for me! :tongue:

7

That’s because LD4all has this new filter (which, I must admit, annoys me to uæ, as it absolutely cannot be bypassed), whose function basically is to get big urls and put spaces in the middle of them. So both links in that code have a space where they shouldn’t: the first in viewtopic.ph_p and the second in /smiley_s. Remove the spaces, and it should work. :wink:

8

hmf. And I had to figure it out myself. It took like half an hour. I don’t know much about BBCodes.

9

Hmm, might be joining this :grin: If the book is in norwegian and some library has it…

10

Petter, look for Labyrinter. Any good library should have it. :wink:

11

Hehe, I actually found ficciones, but I’m kind of worried that it might be in english now… Hmm, I wonder if Labyrinter is labyrinths translated or ficciones translated… Such as their PC-system is working it seems like that.

Anyways Ficciones is already ordered to be sent from another library in the county (without me even thinking about the possibility that it is in English…), they have “labyrinter” in our library (Me ish LOF library BTW). So if it is as it most likely is that ficciones is in english I’ll quite simply just return it and rent labyrinter (or keep it to read the stories not in labyrinter in english, if i manage to). Argh, I’m not making sense am I ? :wink:

Argh! It seems like it is even in Spanish.

12

I ordered Ficciones from my local library today. I’ll get it Monday or Tuesday, somewhere around there.

13

Wait—

I bought Collected Fictions by mistake! :ack: :tongue:

After all, I was a bit tired when I went to Barnes & Noble today. I just didn’t know how tired. :anx: Oh well, there’s no harm done, really. I was planning on going back again tomorrow for something else anyway.

14

:lol: Sonia, first you should check with wikipedia if you don’t actually have all the stories you’ll need in that book :tongue:

15

I came back when I realized I was in the clear but you got here first! :lmao: I have what I needed and much more, so I’m more than good. :cool: I’m glad I took a closer look because I would have felt like such a dolt if I went back to buy Ficciones only to come back and realize that I have the entire book already. :tongue:

16

If it is Labyrinths, you shouldn’t worry :smile: I have read El Aleph and Ficciones, and I’m inviting a (real life) friend who also read El Aleph. Labyrinths is a Yank anthology of Borges fictions, it’s basically made of stories from those two books. So if what you get is the translation to Labyrinths, you’ll have at least two people to discuss the “extra” stories with, and I can find you the ones you’re missing, in English, if you want me to. :smile:

Oh, that wouldn’t be a problem, I’d probably try to buy the Collected Fictions from you if that was the case. :razz: At any rate, I don’t know how the Collected Fictions treat Ficciones, which is actually a collection of (two) books. So if you don’t find “ficciones” in the index, the books you’re looking for are “the garden of forking paths” and “artifices” :wink:

17

Our library only seems to have the book in spanish :sad:
I would be able to read an english or dutch version and I even would have tried to read a german version. But spanish will not work for me.

18

Ansie, isn’t there an inter-library borrowing system?

19

There is, but in all dutch libraries they only have the spanish version. There are other books of him. Maybe one of them is the dutch translation or one of them contains some of the stories. But I don’t no which it could be.

20

Depends on the country. In France, there are 3 books, Fictions, Labyrinthes et L’Aleph, which have different short stories in them. Fictions contains (amongst other short stories):

  • The Garden of Forking Paths
  • Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius :crazy:
  • Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote :happy:
  • The Circular Ruins :nuu:
  • The Babylon Lottery :happy:
  • The Library of Babel (very famous :grin: )
  • Death and the Compass
  • The Secret Miracle
  • Three Versions of Judas
    and in some editions:
  • The Approach to Al-Mu’tasim :good: