Ma-Tsu
Zen Buddhist monk in fable
Zen Buddhist monk in fable
collection of Welsh tales, compiled in the 14th and 15th centuries
pseud. of Pierre Dumarchey, French writer, 1882-1970, author of Masques sur mesure
Portuguese colony in China
Fishburn and Hughes: "A Portuguese colony on the South China Sea, the earliest European port in the Far East, dating from the sixteenth century. It was later identified with smuggling and gambling." (122)
Mexican bandit in popular verses
English essayist and historian, 1800-59, author of Lays of Ancient Rome, a History of England and numerous Essays
Thomas Babington Macaulay's father, 1760-1838, a philanthropist and abolitionist
Scottish king, d. 1057, subject of Shakespeare play
Shakespeare tragedy, c. 1606
Fishburn and Hughes: "In the context of the assassination of Fergus Kilpatrick, the allusion to Macbeth, as well as to Julius Caesar, emphasises the literary quality of the 'scheme conceived' by the character Nolan and its predetermined nature. Warnings of death dominate the plots of both plays, unheeded by Caesar and misunderstood by Macbeth. See Julius Caesar." (122)
Thane of Fife, character in Shakespeare's Macbeth, drawn from Holinshed's Chronicle
region in northern Greece and southern former Yugoslavia
Fishburn and Hughes: "An ancient nation in the Balkan peninsula on the Aegean corresponding nowadays to parts of Bulgaria, Greece and Yugoslavia." (122)
Macedonius, bishop of Constantinople from 342 to 360, heterodox theologian associated with the Homoiousians and Pneumatomachi
Fernández Latour book, 1980
Austrian physicist and philosopher, 1838-1916
Spanish poet, 1875-1939, author of Campos de Castilla, Juan de Mairena and other works
Spanish poet and playwright, 1874-1947, author of Caprichos, Cante hondo and other works
Argentine colonel, 1823-1909, important in the Argentine army's campaigns against the Indians in the province of Buenos Aires
Fishburn and Hughes: "An Argentine military commander who in 1863 directed a campaign against the Indians in the southern pampas. The suggestion that Martín Fierro was conscripted to his forces is not mentioned in the poem." (122)
woman for whom Borges wrote one or perhaps two love poems
British author, 1863-1947, author of The London Adventure
Máquina de leer los pensamientos, Maurois, 1937
bazaar in Calcutta
Uruguayan woman, first person to be buried in Recoleta cemetery in Buenos Aires
US poet and critic, 1892-1982
character in Priestley's The Doomsday Men, said to have been based on Rosalind Russell
lieutenant general in British army, 1869-1952, author of numerous works on India and military history
British official in India, publisher of an edition of the Arabian Nights, Calcutta, 1839-42
town in Georgia
Scottish poet, 1736-1796, author of Ossianic poems
Roman writer who lived during the early fifth century. Author of the Saturnalia.
scholar of US literature, 1877-1932, author of The Spirit of American Literature
character in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
island off east Africa
Argentine film version of the Flaubert novel, directed by Carlos Schlieper, 1947
Flaubert novel, 1857
Spanish literary scholar and biographer, 1886-1978
town in the Campania, Italy
character in Borges story La muerte y la brujula
Portuguese island off Africa in the Atlantic
capital city of Wisconsin
city in southern India, now called Chennai
Fishburn and Hughes: "A seaport in south-east India." (122)
Grendel's mother, monster in Beowulf
Parodi: “La madre María no hace milagros.”: María Salomé Loredo Otaola de Zubiza (1854-1929), nacida en España, se radicó en la Argentina desde 1869. En 1881, gravemente enferma, visitó a Pancho Sierra (1831-1891), el ‘Gaucho Santo Argentino’, miembro de la Sociedad Espiritista de Alan Kardec (cf. “Doce” i §5) y reputado por sus dotes sobrenaturales, por sus poderes telepáticos y por las curaciones que realizaba por imposición de manos. María Loredo, pronto conocida como ‘la Madre María’, se convirtió en su discípula y continuadora. En 1891 inició su labor de curandera y de prédica del Evangelio en su Misión de Turdera (cf. “Signo” §11). El Culto a la Madre María, se rinde especialmente el Día de la Madre y el Día de Los Muertos.
Matka, Capek anti-fascist play, 1938
capital of Spain
Tulio Herrera book of poems, 1961
poem by Wilhelm Klemm, translated by Borges
statue in Brussels
Belgian author, 1862-1949, author of Pelléas et Mélisande and other works, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1911
ancient kingdom in India, part of Bihar south of the Ganges
Brazilian poet, author of Versos, 1933
Magariños Cervantes (1825–1893) was an Uruguayan writer and lawyer.
city in Saxony, Germany
Argentine actress
Rabbi Dov Baer, the Maggid of Mesritch or Mezeritz, second leader of Hasidim, d. 1772
Chesterton, play, 1913.
Argentine musician and tango songwriter (1880-1934)
French classical scholar, 1879-1952, translator of Homer
Benito Larrea's quinta in Bustos Domecq story
Viking warrior, died in Dublin
Magnus the Good, son of Olaf, Norwegian king, subject of a saga by Sturla Thordarson
Sturla Thordarsson's saga about king Magnus of Norway
Icelandic scholar, librarian at the University of Cambridge, 1833-1913, translator with William Morris of the Volsunga Saga
Icelandic historian and antiquarian, scholar of the sagas, 1781-1847
enemy of the people of Israel, perhaps a region from which Gog comes
French writer, 1877-1941, theosophist and author of a travel book on India
Arabic name for the west, usually referring to northwest Africa
Egyptian traveler to Persia
Mainz, German city
Hindu epic poem, c.500 B.C.
character in Cervantes
Vardhamana or Jina, Jain god, perhaps based on a historical figure who organized the Jain religion
Fishburn and Hughes: "The title given to Vardhamäna, the last of the twenty-four legendary patriarchs and founders of Jainism, a religion widespread in west India. Jainism conceives the universe as infinite and formed as a slender human figure with legs apart and arms akimbo surrounded by three layers of atmosphere. Mahavira preached severe asceticism, which involved renunciation of violence and all physical pleasures and respect for all living and non-living things." (122-23)
Muhammad Ahmad, Muslim religion leader in the Sudan, 1844-85
Fishburn and Hughes: "Arabic al-Mahdi, meaning 'the guided one': the name given in Islam to the future restorer of the Islamic faith to the world. Reference is to the Mahdi Mohammed Ahmed (1844-1885) who put an end to Egyptian domination in the Sudan. Claiming divine inspiration, the Mahdi overcame the 8,000 strong army of General Hicks. In 1885, after a long siege, he captured Khartoum and murdered General Gordon." (123)
Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Mahdi, Shia Imam, b. 869 and "occulted" 70 years later
Persian Sufi poet, author of the Gulshan i Raz or The Mystica Rose Garden, c.1320
Mahmud of Ghazni, Afghan conqueror, 971-1030, who ordered the compilation of The Surviving Monuments of Past Generations, The Canon dedicated to Mas'ud, and India
Mohammed or Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, 570?-632
Fishburn and Hughes: "Arabic for 'praised one': the name of the prophet and founder of Islam to whom, according to the tradition, the angel Gabriel revealed the infallible word of God. The saying before bowing to the inevitable, 'If the mountain will not come to Mohammed, Mohammed must go to the mountain', refers to the story of Mohammed who, when asked for a miraculous proof of his teaching, ordered Mount Safa to come to him and, as it did not move, said, 'God is merciful. Had it obeyed my words it would have fallen on us to our destruction. I will therefore go to the mountain, and thank God that He has had mercy on a stiff-necked generation.'" (131)
Irving biography, 1849- 1850
character in Eça's Os Maias
Russian poet and dramatist, 1893- 1930
Parodi: Vladimir Maiakovski (1893-1930) fue un poeta y dramaturgo revolucionario ruso y una de las figuras más relevantes de la poesía rusa de comienzos del siglo XX. Iniciador del futurismo ruso, publica en 1912 el manifiesto de ese movimiento en La bofetada al gusto del público.
Eça de Queiroz novel, 1888
town in Massachusetts
character in Borges story, alias of Emmanuel Zunz
Moses ben Maimon, Jewish rabbi, physician and philosopher, 1135-1204, author of the Guide for the Perplexed
Fishburn and Hughes: "A Jewish philosopher, jurist and physician, born at Cordoba and forced to flee from Spain in the persecutions of 1149. He settled first in Fez and then in Cairo, where he became head of the Jewish community and also physician to the Sultan. Maimonides was the leading Jewish thinker of the Middle Ages. His Commentary on the Talmud contains a codification of Jewish religious doctrine, its interpretation by existing authorities and his own comments on their moral and philosophical implications. His major philosophical work, written in Arabic, is the Guide for the Perplexed. Basing his interpretation of Judaism upon the systems of Aristotle, Maimonides seeks to achieve a harmony between reason and faith. The Guide was translated into Latin as early as the thirteenth century and exerted a profound influence upon Christian as well as Jewish and Moslem thought. Regarding dreams, in book 2 chs 36-8 of the Guide Maimonides discusses the relationship between prophecy, or divine emanations, and dreams. Breaking with traditional interpretations of the dream as a means of protection from anticipated danger, he develops his idea of the dream as a vision in which the action of the imaginative faculty becomes so perfect that you can see a thing as if it were outside you, and the thing which is produced in the dream appears as if by external sensation. Ch. 36 includes quotations of famous sayings, such as 'Dream is one sixtieth of prophecy', The windfall of prophecy is one dream' and 'If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known to him in a dream' (Numbers 12:6). Although the discussion includes many ideas which seem closely relevant to Borges's story 'The Secret Miracle', the exact assertion attributed by the narrator to Maimonides has not been traced. The idea mentioned in the story that the final interpretation of dreams rests with God stems from Genesis 40:8." (123)
Collection of nouvelles by Guy de Maupassant (1889).
Lewis novel, 1920
state in United States
French nobleman who is said to have published a book at the age of seven, apparently Louis Auguste de Bourbon, 1670-1736
Philipp Batz, German philosopher, 1841-1876, author of Die Philosophie der Erlösung
plain near Santiago, Chile, site of a battle between San Martin and the Spanish forces in 1818, often spelled Maipu
Fishburn and Hughes: "A battle fought on 5 April 1818, some ten miles south of Santiago, Chile, in which General San Martín finally defeated the royalist forces, thus securing the independence of Chile. This victory enabled San Martín to reorganise his army and embark on the last lap of his campaign for the emancipation of southern South America, notably the liberation of Peru." (123)
street in Buenos Aires where Borges lived in the last decades of his life
Parodi: en los años cuarenta, Borges vivió con su madre en la calle Maipú 994, a una cuadra de la Plaza San Martín, en el barrio de Retiro.
character in James Curtis's The Gilt Kid
Collection of nouvelles by Guy de Maupassant (1881).
French novelist, 1763-1852, author of Voyage autour de ma chambre
next Buddha
the second of four Nikayas in the Buddhist scriptures
Shaw play, 1907
Scholem, 1941
character in Grettirs Saga
street in Buenos Aires
city in southern Spain
street in Geneva
Prominent dictionarist from Puerto Rico (1878-1967). Author of Diccionario de americanismos
nickname of Guelf leader, the lord of Verucchio, d. 1312
street in Olivos, suburb of Buenos Aires
Work by W. W. Skeat, 1900.
country, now Malaysia
Malcolm III , Scottish king, 1057-93, character in Shakespeare's Macbeth
character in Priestley's The Doomsday Men, said to be based on Leslie Howard
place in Essex, England where battle of Maldon was fought in 991
Old English poem about a battle between the Northmen and the English in 991
Arroyo Maldonado, stream that crosses the city of Buenos Aires, now covered over
Fishburn and Hughes: "A small stream which marked the northern boundary of the city of Buenos Aires. The surrounding area, Palermo, was reputedly rough, as recalled by Borges in his 'Autobiographical Essay'. Today Maldonado forms part of the city's sewers and flows in pipes beneath the Avenida Juan B. Justo. The 'brook' referred to here is the Maldonado." (123-24)
Parodi: “me salvó la vida hace un rato, cuando la última creciente del Maldonado”: hasta 1929, el arroyo Maldonado era uno de los límites naturales de la ciudad de Buenos Aires; se extendía a cielo abierto aproximadamente desde el barrio de Liniers, en el extremo oeste, hasta Palermo, sobre el Río de la Plata. Con el tiempo, el Maldonado se convirtió en un depósito de basuras y desperdicios que, cuando llovía, se transformaba en una enorme laguna; era muy temido por sus desbordes y por las frecuentes inundaciones que provocaba (de ahí la ironía que encierra el “hace un rato” en el enunciado citado en esta entrada: “hace un rato, cuando la última creciente del Maldonado”). Las excavaciones para entubarlo comenzaron en 1929 y en 1936, ya entubado, se construyó una calle sobre el recorrido del arroyo, la actual Avenida Juan B. Justo. En “Palermo de Buenos Aires” (Evaristo Carriego 109), Borges evoca: “Hacia el poniente quedaba la miseria gringa del barrio, su desnudez. […] había callejones de polvo […] Después: el Maldonado, reseco y amarillo zanjón, estirándose sin destino desde la Chacarita y que por un milagro espantoso pasaba de la muerte de sed a las disparatadas extensiones de agua violenta, que arreaban con el rancherío moribundo de las orillas. Hará unos cincuenta años, después de ese irregular zanjón o muerte, empezaba el cielo […] Lo están encarcelando ahora: ese casi infinito flanco de soledad que se acavernaba hace poco, a la vuelta de la truquera confitería La Paloma, será reemplazado por una calle tilinga, de tejas anglizantes. […] Pensándolo, no creo que el Maldonado fuera distinto de otras localidades muy pobres, pero la idea de su chusma, desaforándose en rotos burdeles, a la sombra de la inundación y del fin, mandaba en la imaginación popular.”
tango
French philosopher, 1638-1715, author of La Recherche de la verité
French artist, 1890-1952, leader of the Lyon Dadaist group, editor of the magazine Manomètre and translator of the Borges poem Atardecer that was published there in French in 1923
Lugones poem in Romances del Rio Seco
Argentine playwright, co-author with Nicolás de las Llanderas of Así es la vida and Los tres berretines, 1932, associated with the acting career of Eva Duarte
Aquilino Ribeiro novel, 1958
French poet and critic, 1555-1628
Francis Iles, novel, 1931.
Argentine Philologist (1910-1962), know as a Hispanist Medievalist, member of the Real Academia Española and the Academia Argentina de Letras.
French poet, 1842-1898, author of Hérodiade and other works
Fishburn and Hughes: "A French poet who, together with Paul Verlaine, is regarded as the founder of the Symbolist movement, which had a marked influence in France throughout the twentieth century. Mallarmé also wrote a number of critical essays: his views on writing derive mainly from the principle that the world exists in order to be written about: 'Le monde est fait pour aboutir à un beau livre' ('The world was made to end in a beautiful book', misquoted by Borges as 'Tout aboutit à un livre' (Disc. 121)). This idea is examined by Borges in 'On the Cult of Books' (TL 358). In his escape from reality, Mallarmé was influenced at first by Baudelaire, both poets having lost a parent in early childhood, but Mallarmé turned increasingly to the intellect, rather than the emotions, in his search for an ideal world. He saw the poet's task as feeling and describing the essences beyond reality. To convey this sense of distilled reality, Mallarmé sought to pare down and condense his language: his later poems were often obscure, relying for their structure on the sound and association of the words employed." (124)
Parodi: Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898) poeta simbolista y crítico. Para Borges, Mallarmé es del tipo de escritor que “laboriosamente elabora una obra secreta” (“Francisco de Quevedo” 111). Traductor de los poemas de Poe, Mallarmé procuró alcanzar una poesía pura que presupone la participación activa del lector.
Argentine novelist, 1903-82, author of La ciudad junto a rio inmovil, Historia de una pasion argentina and numerous other works
Sarmiento's uncle, whose story is told in Recuerdos de provincia
one of the Balearic isles to the east of the Spanish coast
city in southern Sweden
Fishburn and Hughes: "The third-largest city of Sweden, founded in the twelfth century, an important port on the Öresund Canal." (124)
Spanish Augustinian ascetic writer and preacher, 1530?- 1589
Gomensoro poem
monthly bulletin, organ of the Asociación Aborigenista Argentina, edited by Marcelo Frogman
Parodi: supuesta publicación mensual editada, dirigida y distribuida a domicilio por Marcelo Frogman. El nombre del boletín responde al programa de la Asociación Aborigenista Argentina de defensa de la causa nativista y recuperación del lenguaje autóctono. ‘Malón’ es el término con que se designaban las inesperadas incursiones de los indígenas en el territorio habitado por españoles y criollos. Entre los colaboradores de la publicación se cuenta el hispanista Mario Bonfanti (cf. “Sangiácomo” i §5).
French writer, 1901-76
Hammett novel, 1930
Italian historian and military officer, 1595-1653, author of Tarquin and court historian to Philip IV of Spain
Malvinas islands, in dispute between Britain and Argentina
town in New York
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: sobrina de la dueña de la mercería; mantenía una relación íntima con Simón Fainberg (cf. supra §7).
Carriego poem in La canción del barrio
giant in Don Quijote de la Mancha
US film director, 1897-1987
Menninger, 1938
El hombre y su universo, Langdon-Davies book, 1930
Shaw play, 1903
Wilkie Collins, 1870.
Charles Gordon/Ralph Connor novel, 1901
Hombre ha creado la muerte, Yeats line from the poem Death
Shand poem in Ferment
David Garnett, 1924
Robert Flaherty film, 1934
Willard Huntington Wright naturalist novel, 1916
Poe story, 1840
Twain novel, 1900
Spencer essay on political philosophy, 1884
Edwin Arlington Robinson narrative poem, 1924
Chesterton stories, 1922
Belloc, 1931
Heinlein science fiction novel, 1950
Chesterton novel, 1908
Hombre que fue rey, story by Kipling, 1888
one act play by Francis Sladen-Smith
Cowen novel, 1934
Chesterton story in The Secret of Father Brown
Graham Greene, novel, 1929.
Chesterton, 1912
battlefield in Uruguay
Fishburn and Hughes: "A battle fought in the department of Colonia, Uruguay, on 17 July 1871, when the revolutionary forces led by Timoteo Aparicio were defeated by the army of the president, Lorenzo Batlle." (124)
ranch in Bustos Domecq story
Döblin, 1926
Argentine writer from Gualeguay, b. 1919
region in south central Spain
city in the Midlands in England
Fishburn and Hughes: "The leading commercial city in the north of England during the nineteenth century. The choice of Manchester as the place of publication of Nahum Cordovero's apocryphal work reflects its strong links with Jewish culture and its association with some of the oldest Sephardi families in England." (124)
Eça de Queiroz novel, 1880
putative author of the Voiage of Sir John Maundeville
devil, here mentioned in connection with gaucho folklore
baker, character in Bustos Domecq story
French painter, 1832-1883
Lenormand play, 1922
central part of New York City
Korzybski, 1921
English writer, 1904-1991
Scandinavian moon god
Unamuno poem
Marcus Manilius, Roman poet, fl. 20 A.D., author of a didactic poem on astrology
Cuban rumba about the street cry or pregón of a peanut seller, composed by Moisés Simons, 1889-1945, first recorded in 1926 or 1927 by Rita Montaner
German novelist, 1875-1955
Parodi: nombre que equivale a ‘niño que orina’, un mote que también alude a la hediondez. El ‘Manneken Piss’ es una pequeña estatua de bronce ubicada en la ciudad antigua de Bruselas que representa a un niño orinando en una fuente; data de 1619.
Manequí de mimbre, Anatole France novel, 1896
Kipling poem
English cardinal, 1833-1892, subject of a biography in Strachey's Eminent Victorians
Germanic god
O'Neill characters
character in Borges-Levinson story
reverend, character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: supuesto creador en 1941 de un edificio múltiple, el santuario de las Muchas Musas, en “Postdam” [sic]. Potsdam (y no Postdam) es la capital del Estado de Brandeburgo, ubicada a 24 km al sur de Berlín. La mención de Potsdam permite suponer que ‘Manntoifel’ es una versión fonética de un apellido mundialmente famoso durante la segunda Guerra Mundial, el del General Hasso-Eccard barón de Manteuffel (1897-1978), nacido en Potsdam, el alto militar alemán que dirigió los avances de las tropas blindadas del Tercer Reich tanto en el frente ruso como en el norafricano. Fue el comandante de la División Manteuffel durante la ‘Operación Barbarroja’ (1941), nombre de con que Hitler designó el plan de invasión a la Unión Soviética durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial.
Parodi: alusión a un episodio real de la vida de Enrico Caruso, cuando la “La Mano Negra”, la más antigua asociación mafiosa italiana de América, liderada por el capo Giuseppe Battista Balsamo, le exigió una elevada suma de dinero como ‘protección’ por actuar en el Metropolitan Opera House de Nueva York; Caruso pagó y a esa extorsión siguieron otras; finalmente, la Mafia lo amenazó de muerte. Hasta el año en que murió, Caruso vivió bajo protección policial.
Portuguese king, 1469-1521
Spanish poet, 1440-1479, author of the Coplas a la muerte de su padre
Jorge Manrique's father, the Count of Paredes, 1406-1476
New Zealand-born writer of short fiction, 1888-1923
street in Buenos Aires
Parodi: “en Mansilla, esquina Ecuador”: una intersección cercana al término de la Avenida Alvear, en el barrio de Recoleta.
Argentine writer, colonel and diarist, 1831-1913, author of Excursion a los indios ranqueles, Mis memorias and other works
glacier and river near Bariloche
character in film The Petrified Forest
monster described by Pliny and Flaubert
Fishburn and Hughes: "The Persian form of Parliament of Birds." (124)
Pilar de Lusarreta, 1964.
city in Italy
Written by Federico Barbará
anthology by Borges and Margarita Guerrero, 1953, later revised as the Libro de los seres imaginarios, 1967
Book written by Ciro Bayo in 1931
Kern, 1896
Moulonguet cookbook, 1929
Poe story, 1833
Borges poem added to revised editions of Luna de enfrente
Kipling book of stories, 1893
Italian poet and novelist, 1785-1873, associated with the Risorgimento
Menén Desleal story
Lugones series of poems in El libro de los paisajes
Mexican poet and essayist, 1898-1981, associated with the movement of estridentismo
Machiavelli, Italian author and statesman, 1469-1527, author of the Principe, Discorsi, Arte della guerra and Mandragola
sea god
beach resort in the province of Buenos Aires
Waendelsae, medieval Germanic name for the Mediterranean
city on the Atlantic coast of the province of Buenos Aires
Black Sea
Nepalese god of love
character in Henry Miller's Tropic of Capricorn
French actor and director, 1913-1998
al-Qazwini's Atharu'l-Bilad, a treatise on geography
one of the "libros serios" Aquiles Molinari sees in Abenjaldún's house, series of illustrated books on world geography from about 1900, published by the Editorial Ibérica in Barcelona
Parodi: obra enciclopédica en cuatro gruesos volúmenes lujosamente encuadernados, con ilustraciones en color y fotografías, publicada en Barcelona por la editorial Ibérica, a principios de 1920. Uno de los volúmenes estaba dedicado al continente americano y los otros, a Asia, Europa y Oceanía−África.
Hawthorne romance, 1860
character in El curioso impertinente, the exemplary novel Cervantes inserted in the first part of the Quijote
Ford Madox Ford memoirs and reflections on British literature and culture, his final book, 1938; the title given here is Más fuerte que la espada, which is a pretty creative translation
Argentine painter, 1899-1978, known for his paintings of Buenos Aires and of Argentine landscapes
Uruguayan weekly edited by Carlos Quijano, published from 1939 until 1974
Parodi: célebre semanario uruguayo de temas políticos y culturales. Fundado en 1939 por el abogado, periodista y político Carlos Quijano (1900-1984) y clausurado en 1974. El escritor Juan Carlos Onetti (1909-1994) fue secretario de redacción de la revista entre 1939 y 1941; colaboraba además con una columna cultural, “La piedra en el charco”. Marcha contaba con la sección “Literarias” dedicada a la crítica, que estaba a cargo de Emir Rodríguez Monegal y de Ángel Rama. En 1955, Marcha publicó “La fiesta del monstruo”, que en 1977 fue incluido en Nuevos cuentos de Bustos Domecq. Según el testimonio de Bustos Domecq, supuestamente Marcha publicó críticas muy favorables a las obras de Nierenstein Souza, que fueron editadas por la editorial Probeta.
French explorer and general, 1863-1934
Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm's collection of fairy tales, compiled between 1812 and 1857
Gustav Jungbauer, 1923
town in France near Orleans
Fishburn and Hughes: "A forest near Blois, the scene of numerous battles in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870." (124-25)
part-owner of a meatpacking plant
Marcus Antonius, Roman politician and soldier, 83-30
Marcus Aelius Aurelius Antoninus, Roman emperor and writer, 121-180
Marcus Junius Brutus, assassin of Julius Caesar, c. 85-42
Quevedo historical work, 1631-1644
given the context this would seem to be an invented name, but there is a Teodoro Ernesto Marcó listed in Quien es quien en la Argentina, a politician in Entre Ríos, b. 1911
hotel in the Once neighborhood
Parodi: supuesto hotel; para el Once, cf. “Limardo” i §11.
Gospel of Mark in the New Testament
Character in El frac by Ulises Nobody, El frac, 1961
St. Mark the Evangelist
Fishburn and Hughes: "The author of the second synoptic gospel now considered the earliest of the three and the source of Matthew and Luke. With its sixteen chapters, it is the shortest of the gospels, its power lying in the simple narrative of events in the life of Jesus. Mark may have received his information direct from St Peter, which would account for his immediacy. The gospel was written in Hellenistic Greek, the popular dialect of the eastern Mediterranean. Its purpose is clearly evangelical. It emphasises the dramatic presentation of the passion and resurrection of Jesus as the means of achieving the Kingdom of God." (125)
in medieval dialogues between Solomon and Saturn, the name given to Saturn
Fishburn and Hughes: "A fictional Latin name with the connotation 'flame' and 'red' (Rufus), contrasted with Joseph Cartaphilus, an 'earthen man, with grey eyes and grey beard' (see Christ, The Narrow Act, NY 1969, 206)." (125)
Melville novel, 1849
French physician, 1868-1949, translator of the Arabian Nights
Peyrou, book of short stories, 1967.
Argentine poet, novelist, essayist and playwright, 1900-70, author of Adán Buenosayres and numerous other works
He was a French pediatrician(1858 – 1942).
French pediatrician (1858-1942).
character in Bustos Domecq story
Barrie, 1897, about the author's mother
character in Goethe's Faust
Margaret of Navarre, also called Margarita de Angulema, queen of Navarre, 1492-1549, author of Heptameron
Parodi: “el Heptamerón de la Reina Margarita”: se trata de una colección de relatos escritos por Marguerite d’Angoulême (1492-1549), más conocida como Marguerite de Navarre, que fue princesa de Orleans y reina consorte de Navarra. A semejanza del Decamerón de Boccaccio (cf. infra), en el Heptameron (1540-1549), diez viajeros sorprendidos por una tempestad se refugian en una abadía y durante siete días cuentan historias que comentan los oyentes; el resultado son setenta y dos relatos sobre el tema del amor, que describen y satirizan prácticas eróticas sobre todo de la corte renacentista de Navarra.
French literary critic, author of studies of Erasmus, Rabelais, Flaubert and others
French scholar of China, author of an Anthologie raisonnée de la litterature chinoise, Histoire de la litterature chinoise, Evolution de la prose artistique chinoise and other works
pharmacist, character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: supuesto farmacéutico de Burzaco.
Jorge Isaacs novel, 1867
Austrian-born queen of France, 1755-1793
tale from Francisco Espínola’s book Raza ciega
in New Testament, repentant courtesan
in New Testament, mother of Jesus Christ
Argentine theater promoter, 1913-1996, author of Historia del teatro independiente
Miguel Torga story
character in Borges story
Argentine writer, 1893-1946, part of Boedo group, author of Cuentos de la oficina
Argentine film directed by Luis José Bayón Herrera, 1947, based on the 1895 Oscar Wilde play The Ideal Husband
town in West Prussia, now Malbork in Poland
Fishburn and Hughes: "German for Polish Malbork, a town in the Polish province of Gdansk, formerly in East Prussia and closely associated since the thirteenth century with the Teutonic Order." (125)
Wernher's life of the Virgin Mary, 1172, entitled Drei Lieder von der Jungfrau
Marian poetry, a common element of medieval religious poetry in Germany and elsewhere
“no es escrúpulo de Marigargajo”. According to the DRAE (Dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy), it is a colloquial adjective which means ridiculous, unfounded, extravagant and non-sense. (Mentioned in Suárez Lynch novella.)
Parodi: “no es escrúpulo de Marigargajo”: “Marigargajo es un personaje proverbial, prototipo de escrúpulos infundados y cochinería, que alardeaba de limpia y escrupulosa, de la que se decía que para saber si el aceite de la sartén estaba caliente, escupía en él. Vive en el dicho Escrúpulo de Marigargajo, o del padre Gargajo, con el significado de escrúpulo infundado, ridículo y falto de razón. Lo mismo se dice de la aseada de Burguillos, otra dama que hacía lo mismo.” (Sánchez 525).
Italian futurist poet, novelist and critic, 1876-1944
Parodi: Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876−1944), que en 1909 publicó en París el documento fundador del movimiento futurista (Manifesto del futurismo), al que siguieron el Manifiesto de la literatura futurista (1910), el Manifiesto de los pintores futuristas y el Manifiesto técnico del futurismo (1912) y otros once más. Las doctrinas de Marinetti sobre la literatura y el arte están también expuestas en sus libros Mafarka il futurista (1910), La battaglia di Tripoli (1911) y Parole in libertá (1912). Los postulados del futurismo fueron también adoptados en pintura y escultura, en las artes aplicadas, el teatro, la danza, la moda, el diseño, la fotografía, los juegos onomatopéyicos y tipográficos. Marinetti visitó dos veces la Argentina; en 1926, ocasión en que fue homenajeado por la Revista Martín Fierro, y en 1936, como delegado de Roma al XIV Congreso del PEN Club, realizado en Buenos Aires. Durante esas visitas, organizó en Buenos Aires varias veladas (las “seratas futuristas”). Sus ideas políticas de exaltación belicista y sus simpatías por el fascismo de Mussolini dieron ocasión a enfrentamientos con intelectuales locales; expuso esas convicciones en Democrazia futurista (1919) y Futurismo e fascismo (1924). Sobre Marinetti, cf. también “Toros” i §§2 y 5; iii §8.
Italian poet, 1569-1625, author of Adone
town in Virginia
French philosopher, 1882-1973
prostitute mistaken for damsel in distress by Don Quijote
Saga of the Virgin Mary, c.1200
Walter Pater novel, 1885
DeVoto biography, 1932
Stevenson novella, 1887
Old Norse name for Newfoundland
12th century Icelandic poet, known as Markus the Lawman
first Duke of Marlborough, 1650-1772
character in Conrad
English dramatist and poet, 1564-1593, author of Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine, The Jew of Malta and other works
English waiter who wrote a 1937 memoir "Coming, Sir!
Argentine poet, novelist and politician, 1817-1871, author of Amalia, Cantos de peregrino and other works
Fernández Irala book of poems
title for royal architect, position held by John Gibbon, Edward Gibbon's father
river in France, site of major battle in the First World War
Arolas tango
US novelist, 1893-1960, author of The Late George Apley and other works
scholar of Norse poetry, author of Die Altenglischen Kenningar, 1938
islands in the south Pacific
city in Morocco
Fishburn and Hughes: "A town in Morocco, one of the residences of the Sultan. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries it was the North African capital of the Almohad dynasty, under whose rule it enjoyed a temporary flowering of culture. Averroes spent some years of exile in Marrakesh." (125)
Blake prose work, 1790
Morocco
Fishburn and Hughes: "Arabic for 'farthest west', Morocco was a sultanate in north-west Africa inhabited by Arabs, Berbers, Europeans and Jews. It was conquered by the Arabs in the seventh century and by the Almohads in the twelfth and thirteenth." (135)
English sea-captain and novelist, 1792-1848
Marseilles, port city in southern France
English translator of Hermann Keyserling
English painter, d. 1940, wife of David Garnett
British historian, 1602-1685, author of Canon chronicus aegyptiacus, ebraicus, graecus
the planet Mars
Mars, Roman god of war
Fishburn and Hughes: "The Roman god of war." (125)
Danish theologian, 1808-1884, author of works on Christian ethics and dogma, and of a life of Jakob Boehme
Fishburn and Hughes: "A Danish theologian, bishop and court preacher, author of several treatises on Christian ethics and dogma revealing a strong interest in theosophy. Martensen also wrote a sketch on the life of Jakob Boehme." (125-26)
Cuban poet, novelist, journalist and political figure, 1853-1895, author of Versos sencillos, Ismaelillo, Versos libres and other works
Parodi: alusión al político, periodista, ensayista, poeta y revolucionario cubano, celebrado como el padre de la independencia de su país.
Bradbury science fiction novel, 1950
French town
Dickens novel, 1843-44
French author, 1881-1958, author of Jean Barois and L'Été 1914
Jack London, novel, 1909.
Hernández gauchesque poem, published in two parts, El gaucho Martín Fierro, 1872, and La vuelta de Martín Fierro, 1879
Fishburn and Hughes: see Fierro, Martín
Argentine literary magazine founded by Evar Méndez, 1924-27
Literary study written by Vicente Rossi
Argentine writer, author of Una mujer fronteriza, 1924, and El tiempo, 1924
reference to Quinquela Martín
suburb in northern Buenos Aires
Argentine poet and essayist, 1895-1964, author of Radiografía de la pampa, Muerte y transfiguración de Martín Fierro and other works
Fishburn and Hughes: "A prolific Argentine writer whose work reflects a deep concern with his country's development. Radiografía de la Pampa (1933) describes the changes that took place in Argentina in the early 1930s under fascist rule. La cabeza de Goliath (1940) examines the relationship of Buenos Aires to the rest of the country. Muerte y transfiguración del Martín Fierro (2 vols, 1948) is regarded as an outstanding work of literary criticism." (126)
Argentine poet and journalist, 1910-1968
friend of the narrator of the story El soborno, the Spanish literary scholar, 1907-2011, a disciple of Américo Castro and professor at the University of Texas for many years until 1971
Spanish playwright, poet, novelist, actor and journalist, 1881-1947
Parodi: Gregorio Martínez Sierra (1881−1947) fue un exitoso escritor, dramaturgo y empresario teatral español que, entre 1939 y 1947, vivió exiliado en Buenos Aires. Publicó obras dramáticas, de ficción y ensayos, varias sobre la condición social de la mujer (La mujer moderna, Eva curiosa: libro para mujeres, Sólo para mujeres, Mujer, El ama de la casa, etc.) que, si bien aparecieron firmadas con su nombre, fueron en su mayor parte escritas por su esposa, María de la O Lejárraga (1874−1974), escritora feminista republicana muerta en Buenos Aires. No sería improbable que, en caso de ser genuina, la frase que cita Bonfanti perteneciera a Lejárraga que incluso llegó a firmar sus propias obras con el nombre de su marido.
Argentine poet, 1860-1899
in Borges story, Argentine newspaper with Fascist leanings, edited by Ernst Palast, probably based on the nationalist periodical Crisol, to which Ernesto Palacio contributed
Argentine dairy industry, founded in 1889.
Parodi: “lechería”: un establecimiento donde se sirven bebidas o postres hechos a base de productos lácteos. En Buenos Aires, en todos los barrios existían las lecherías “La Martona”, empresa de la familia de Bioy. ‘Lechería’ aparece también en “Signo” §5; “Amistad” §1.
Baronius, 1586
wind gods in the Vedas
Sackville-West study, 1929
English metaphysical poet, 1621-78
German social philosopher, 1818-83
Work by May Sinclair, 1919.
Barrie, 1920
state in United States
Pérez Zelaschi, short stories, 1949.
Mariana Grondona, 1971
Zorrilla, 1838.
Argentine critic and writer, 1878-1916, author of studies of Almafuerte, Ghiraldo, Herrera y Reissig, and of Spanish literature
character in Bustos Domecq, perhaps related to Horacio Alberto and Rau Mascarenhas, prominent Argentine businessmen
Vilaseco poem
Parodi: término que se aplica a quienes se disfrazan para Carnaval.
English poet, 1878-1967
Negulesco film, 1944
town in north central Uruguay where a battle took place in 1904, resulting in the defeat and death of Aparicio Saravia
Fishburn and Hughes: "A decisive battle on 1 September 1904 in northern Uruguay between the rebel forces of Aparicio Saravia and the National Army; Saravia was defeated and mortally wounded." (126)
English author and politician (1865-1948). Author of The Four Feathers, among other works.
detective, character in Gardner novels
Spanish author and political figure, 1872-1934
Parodi: Jaume Maspons y Camarasa (1872-1934) fue Secretario General del Departamento de Agricultura de la Comunidad de Barcelona de 1909 a 1934; director del periódico regionalista La Veu del Vallès; presidente de la Federación Agrícola Catalana-Balear; autor de Agremiació agrícola: notes històriques (1906); del capítulo dedicado a la agricultura en Geografía General de Catalunya, compilada por Albert Martin en 1913, y otros títulos de obras similares.
Swinburne poem
Poe story, 1842
Máscaras a medida, Pierre Mac Orlan, 1937
state in United States
French scholar of Islam, 1883-1962
French nationalist writer, 1888-1970
Scottish literary scholar, 1822-1907, editor of Milton and De Quincey
character from The Pilgrim’s Progress
Stevenson novel, 1889
character from Bunyan's Pilgrim’s Progress
US poet and biographer, 1868-1950, author of the Spoon River Anthology
Argentine poet, 1901-76, author of Luz de provincia, Tierra amanecida, Conocimiento de la noche and other works
Fishburn and Hughes: "A poet, essayist and journalist, a member of the group of writers identified with the avantgarde literary magazine Martín Fierro, which published some of Borges's early work." (126)
Arab historian, geographer and philosopher, d. 956, author of The Golden Meadows
Argentine scholar, c. 1810-1877, author of Curso de lengua universal, 1861
Echeverria short story, written in 1841, published in 1871
Buenos Aires neighborhood
town in province of Buenos Aires
small river in Buenos Aires, also known as the Riachuelo, that empties into the River Plate at the Boca del Riachuelo
early tango by Prudencio Aragon
Silva Valdés poem
avenue in Tucumán
Martínez Estrada poem
Gospel of Matthew in New Testament
And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth (King James Version), which serves as the title of a Borges poem in El otro, el mismo
St. Matthew the Evangelist
Fishburn and Hughes: "Three Versions of Judas, CF 165: Matthew 10:7-8 reads: 'And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.' CF 165: Matthew 12:31 reads: 'Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.' Matthew 6:7 reads: 'But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.' The Theologians, CF 203: Matthew 6:12 is part of the Lord's prayer. Matthew 11:12: the full verse reads: 'And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.'" (126)
wizard in Mabinogion
Wilkins treatise, 1648
Kasner and Newman, 1940
US Puritan clergyman and writer, 1663-1728, author of The Wonders of the Invisible World
US Puritan clergyman, 1639-1723
street in Buenos Aires
Parodi: “la calle Matheu”: así llamada en honor a Domingo Matheu (1765-1831), vocal de la Primera Junta de Gobierno en 1810. Esta calle se extiende desde el barrio de San Cristóbal hasta el de Parque Patricios.
Masnavi, work by Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi, the greatest of the Persian Sufi poets, 1207-1273
legends of ancient Celtic knights used in medieval romances
character in Borges poem
French newspaper
French painter, sculptor and lithographer, 1869-1954
Borges anthology, 1970
main square in Montevideo
mentioned in Suárez Lynch novella
Parodi: “Huya, Mattaldi: mis padrinos visitarán mañana su pesebre”: la mención de Mattaldi parece aludir a una localidad del sur de la provincia argentina de Córdoba, renombrada en la época de las acciones de Modelo por la cría de ganado vacuno.
Prize given by the University of Oxford.
US literary critic, 1902-1950, author of The Achievement of T. S. Eliot and of numerous other works on James, Emerson and others
name in the Bible, mentioned in Christopher Smart poem
street in Montevideo
Argentine playwright and writer, 1884- 1917
Methuselah, in Bible, man who lived 969 years
birthplace of Hermann Sudermann
Tennyson poem, 1855
British writer on military strategy, author of Notes on the Evolution of Infantry Tactics, War and the World's Life and other works
Fishburn and Hughes: "An English military historian, author of The Evolution of Strategy, technical essays, and studies of the great military campaigns of the past such as Leipzig, Jena and Ulm. Maude also translated Clausewitz." (126)
British novelist and playwright, 1874-1965
French short-story writer and novelist, 1850-1893
Fishburn and Hughes: "An ancient kingdom in north Africa corresponding now to north Morocco and central Algeria. The kings of Mauretania became Roman vassals as early as the second century BC. Two centuries later Mauretania was annexed to the Roman Empire by the Emperor Claudius and divided into two provinces. The Inmortal: in the fourth century, during the tetrarchy of Diocletian, Mauretania and other regions of north Africa were the scene of rebellions against the Roman army led by Maximian, the Emperor's colleague." (127)
French writer, 1885-1970
French writer, pseud. of Emile Salomon Wilhelm Herzog, 1885-1967
French writer, 1868-1952, monarchist leader of Action Française
Austrian philosopher and writer, 1849-1923, author of Wörterbuch der Philosophie and other works
Hapsburg emperor of Mexico, 1832-67
Name given in the Antología de la literatura fantástica to an excerpt from Joyce's Ulysses.
Nepalese queen, Buddha's mother
ship which brought Pilgrims to Massachusetts in 1620
US film director, 1891-1968, director of The Petrified Forest and many other films
street in Buenos Aires, running from the Casa Rosada and Plaza de Mayo to the Congreso
main square in Buenos Aires, surrounded by the Casa Rosada, the Cabildo, the Central Bank, the Cathedral and several ministry buildings
Parodi: nombre con que se designa la antigua Plaza Mayor del Buenos Aires colonial; está ubicada en el sitio en que fue fundada la ciudad. Rodeada por el Cabildo, la Catedral y la Casa de Gobierno, tradicionalmente ha sido y sigue siendo el escenario de los grandes acontecimientos de la historia nacional y de manifestaciones políticas.
province of Iran
Ukrainian military officer, subject of an 1819 Byron poem
friend of Macedonio Fernández
Argentine writer, author of La congestión del tráfico, 1931 and other works
Argentine modernist poet, author of Los vencidos, 1910
Fishburn and Hughes:"A political organisation formed in 1833 to advance Rosas's Federalist leadership. At first respectable, it soon became Rosas's secret police. Its name, 'ear of corn', was chosen to suggest the values of countrymen as opposed to townsmen. Rosas's enemies claimed that it was más horcas ('more gallows'), and it became a by-word for intimidation, vandalism and brutality. After Rosas's fall, it was abolished and its leaders executed. CF 380: The English translation gives 'Rosas's posses'." (127)
British literary critic and journalist, 1877-1952
British politician and man of letters, 1859-1936, translator of 466 quatrains by Omar Khayyam
Jamaican-American poet, 1889-1948, active in Harlem Renaissance
Norris novel, 1899
British Theosophist, 1834-1933, founder of the Quest Society
Shakespeare comedy, 1603-04
Mecca, holy city of Islam, in Saudi Arabia
“como Meccano desarmado”. A very popular children´s game using metal strips, plates, angle girders, wheels, axles and gears, with nuts and bolts to connect the pieces. It enables the building of working models and mechanical devices. (Mentioned in Bustos Domecq story.)
region in north central Germany
Mastronardi poem
Euripides tragedy
in Greek mythology, princess of Colchis, skilled in magic and sorcery
Cullen collection of poems, including translation of Euripides play, 1935
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: supuesta familia de Fray Bentos que alquiló a Souza una vieja casona, donde vive hasta su muerte.
city in Colombia
powerful family in Florence during the Renaissance
Ker, 1912
city in Saudi Arabia
Middle East
Carlos Páez Vilaró book on history of Afro-Argentines and Afro-Uruguayans, 1971
Descartes treatise on metaphysics, 1641
Mediterranean Sea
Vaihinger, 1852
character in Ariosto
knife-fighter in Buenos Aires
in Greek mythology, most famous of the three monstrous Gorgon sisters
Avenue in Buenos Aires
Mephistopheles, one of the many names for the devil
British historian, 1903-1958, author of Mussolini in the Making
German literary scholar, 1856-1915, author of Der Reim and works on German and French poetry
German art critic and novelist, 1867-1935
Austrian philosopher and psychologist, 1853-1920
Fishburn and Hughes: "An Austrian philosopher who, in his theory of objects, or Über Gegendstandstheorie (1904), distinguished between objects that have 'existence' as physical objects and those that 'subsist' in our mind as concepts or theoretical entities, maintaining that the latter also have a form of existence. Accordingly he defined 'object' (Gegenstand) as that to which a mental act should be directed. Meinong's 'subsistent world' is illustrated by his example of the golden mountain which, though not present in the physical world, has a substantive existence as the product of our imagination." (127)
Parodi: “la razón social Meinong y Cía”: la supuesta sociedad, ubicada sobre la Avenida Belgrano y dedicada a la importación de tabaco, lleva el nombre de su fundador, don Alejandro Meinong, que evoca el del filósofo y psicólogo austríaco Alexius Meinong (1853-1920), conocido por su teoría de los objetos, los existentes y los subsistentes, e.d. los que no existen pero que es dable concebir de algún modo. Las coincidencias no se agotan en el apellido compartido: se afirma que don Alejandro llegó a la Argentina desde Viena, ciudad en la que había estudiado Alexius; lleva barba, como su homónimo austríaco; como él, era ciego; en el sótano de la calle Belgrano se manifiesta un objeto imposible, otra de las categorías de los objetos de Meinong.
German scholar of Icelandic poetry, 1863-1948, author of Die Kenningar der Skalden, 1921
author of La policia por dentro, 1913
Emecé´s two volumes of detective and crime stories edited by Borges and Bioy Casares.
alleged author of the Vidas y obras de Molinero, though this article is included in the Nuevos cuentos de Bustos Domecq
Parodi: “A instancias reiteradas del autor, que se llama Mejuto”: el cuento es presentado como un “curioso informe” que Bustos Domecq se limita a publicar ya que el supuesto autor sería un tal “Mejuto”. En el Diccionario de Bioy, hay una mención del apellido Mejuto que parece aludir directamente al Mejuto de “Deslindando”, el poeta que emplea el lenguaje con absoluta independencia de toda norma: “Bucear: Me complazco en estampar aquí un dicho que siempre le oigo al señor Mejuto: “El que bucea se estropea”. (A último momento me aseguran que Mejuto quiere más bien significar: “El que boxea se estropea”).”
river in Laos and Vietnam
German scholar and humanist, 1497-1560, author of Loci communes rerum theologicarum
Darío poem in Cantos de vida y esperanza, 1905
Argentine ambassador in imaginary Estado Occidental, character in Borges story
criminal in Buenos Aires
Spanish poet and playwright, 1754-1817
Argentine poet, writer, and educator, 1889-1958, cousin of Borges
Uruguayan lawyer and historian, 1850-1939, author of Semblanzas de pasado, relative of Borges's father
African king in Camões's Os Lusíadas
Melissus, Greek philosopher and admiral of Samos, last important member of the Eleatic school, 5th century B.C.
"king of the city," Carthaginian name for Baal
British officer, magistrate of Mpika, author of various books on Africa
Ascasubi, see Santos Vega
Portuguese writer and political figure, 1608-1666
town in northeastern Uruguay
Fishburn and Hughes: "A town in north-eastern Uruguay." (127)
one of Greek muses, who presides over tragedy
Parodi: “Melpómene y Talía”: las musas de la tragedia y de la comedia, según la mitología griega.
town in Leicestershire, England
Fishburn and Hughes: "A town north east of Leicester, popular among the English upper classes as a centre of foxhunting." (127)
bay on western coast of Greenland
US novelist, poet and short-story writer, 1819-91, author of Moby Dick, Pierre, Bartleby the Scrivener, Billy Budd and many other works
early Middle High German poem, probably written in Hirsau around 1070, about death and the peril of damnation
Flemish painter, born in Germany, 1430-1494
Conan Doyle, collection of short stories, 1894.
Wilkie Collins, 1848.
Excerpt from Memorabilia (1923) by George Loring Frost.
Quevedo sonnet
Persian collection of lives of poets: see Templo del Fuego
Farid ud-din Attar
Mastronardi memoir, 1967
José Sixto Alvarez, under pen name Fabio Carrizo, 1897
Book by Felipe Amadeo Lastra publised in 1965 (Editorial Huemul, Buenos Aires).The actual title of this work is Recuerdos del 900
Ssa-Ma Ch'ien's Historical Record, a history of China from the earliest ages to about 100 B.C., including chapters on customs, the calendar, astrology and other subjects
Arthur Miller play, 1955
character in Hitchcock film The Thirty-Nine Steps
city in Tennessee
Fishburn and Hughes: "The largest city in Tennessee, on the Mississippi. In the 1820s it was undergoing rapid commercial and industrial growth." (127-28)
Wells novel, 1923
Hemingway collection of short stories, 1927
Spanish poet and prose writer, 1411-1456, author of the Laberinto de fortuna and other works
Milinda of Buddhist tradition, Bactrian king of the Indo-Greeks, ruled 155-130
French symbolist writer, character in Borges story, author of Les problèmes d'un problème, Don Quijote and numerous other works, associated with Dr. Pierre Menard, French expert on graphology
Fishburn and Hughes: "A fictional character, perhaps drawn from Louis Menard (1822-1901). In an article by the symbolist writer Rémy de Gourmont (which Borges probably read), Louis Menard is described as a master of parody. He attempted to rewrite some of the lost Greek tragedies, including Aeschylus' Prometheus bound, and, as a hoax, wrote a piece which he attributed to Diderot. Like the fictional Pierre Menard, he indulged in anachronistic readings, thinking of Shakespeare when reading Homer, linking Helen with Hamlet and imagining Desdemona at Achilles' feet (see Emir Rodríguez Monegal, Jorge Luis Borges: a Literary Biography 123 and Daniel Balderston, Out of Context, 149-50)." (128)
gaucho
Menzius, Chinese thinker, 372-289
US editor, author and critic, 1880-1956, author of The American Language and other works
a jeweler in Bustos Domecq story
German composer, 1809-47
Portuguese explorer and writer, c. 1509-83
Portuguese writer invented by the Cenáculo group, composed of Eça de Queiroz and others, to whom they attributed a book called Poemas do Macadame
Parodi: Carlos Fradique Mendes es un personaje literario creado por los escritores portugueses Eça de Queiroz (1846-1900) y Ramalho Ortigão (1836-1915), que apareció por primera vez en El misterio de la carretera de Sintra (1870). Sus creadores dotaron a Fradique de una biografía y una personalidad que ponen al descubierto su dandismo, el gusto por los viajes, lo novedoso, lo extravagante y exótico, el esteticismo poético, la tendencia a la aventura, al escándalo y la rebeldía; y lo dotaron también de una obra literaria que se inaugura en 1870 con Poemas del Macadame y se continúa en 1900 con la Correspondencia de Fradique Mendes y las Cartas inéditas de Fradique Mendez, publicadas tras la muerte de Eça, en 1929.
French Parnassian poet, critic and novelist, 1841-1909
Parodi: Catulle Mendès (1841-1909), poeta, crítico teatral y novelista, uno de los fundadores del Parnaso literario. Aunque cuenta con una amplia obra en prosa que incluye novelas, novelas cortas, cuentos, teatro, ensayos y libretos de ópera, es célebre sobre todo por sus poemarios ajustados a la estética parnasiana. En Borges 922, comentando un poema de Mendès, dice Borges: “Parece que esos cromos bobos de Catulle Mendès corresponden a una intención filosófica..., lo que los vuelve peores aún”.
Peruvian poet, 1903-73
pseud. of Evaristo González Méndez, 1888-1955, Argentine avant-garde poet, editor of the magazine Martín Fierro and author of Palacios de ensueño
Argentine poet and journalist, 1843-1897
Buenos Aires notary public, friend of José Hernández
Bloy collection of stories, 8 vols., 1898-1920
Excerpt from Le Cornet à dés by Max Jacob, 1916.
friend of Macedonio Fernández
Afro Argentine tango songwriter (1866-1913)
Argentinian tango composer, 1868 - 1913.
city and province in western Argentina
Groussac historical study, 1916
Spanish conquistador, founder of Buenos Aires, c. 1487-1536
Menelaus or Menelaos, brother of Agamemnon and husband of Helen in Homeric poems
Salvadoran writer, 1932-2000, author of Cuentos breves y maravillosos, book of stories with apocryphal Borges preface, though interestingly Bioy's diary reveals that Borges and Bioy read and liked the book after they heard about the fraudulent preface
Spanish philologist, specialist on medieva Spanish language and literature, 1869-1968
Spanish literary historian, 1856-1912
Parodi: (1856-1912) erudito español, filólogo, historiador y crítico de las ideas y de la literatura. Menéndez y Pelayo dedicó muchos años de su vida al rastreo y recopilación de romances viejos, caballerescos, fronterizos e históricos.
Mencius, Chinese philosopher, d. c. 314 BC
Parodi: referencia a Mencio (c. 371-c. 288 a.C.), fundador de la filosofía del confucianismo. Viajó por China durante años difundiendo esta doctrina y adoctrinando a los gobernantes sus obligaciones frente a los súbditos.
second member of Spanish trio of Fulano, Mengano and Sutano
Fishburn and Hughes: "German for 'set theory': a mathematical term designating the theory of G. Cantor (1829-1920) on the relationship between finite numbers and infinitude. Cantor examines the comparisons of infinite collections, starting from the observation of the equivalences in a series such as 1,2,3,4 which could equally express, or be expressed by, 2,4,6,8, so that 1 could be represented by 2, 2 by 4, 3 by 6 and so on. Thus any integer can represent all its multiples and all its multiples can be elevated to multiple power, so that 1 may be 6036 and also 6036 squared, and so on. Furthermore 1 can undergo equal fragmentation. The point ultimately arrived at is that any one cardinal number may be symbolic of any other, and of all others and, by extension, of infinitude; moreover there are a host of potentially infinite numbers. This theory led Cantor to the paradoxical conclusion that the universe is composed of an infinitude of points, as is a yard of the universe, or a fraction of that yard, making the most infinitesimal point on earth symbolic of the macrocosm. Borges discuses this theory in Etern. 77-9. In the Mengenlehre, the aleph denotes a higher power than that of finite numbers. It also talks of a plurality of alephs." (128)
neighborhood of Paris in the twentieth arrondissement
neighborhood in Paris
Bernardim de Ribeiro novel, 1554
Velázquez painting, 1656
US psychiatrist, 1893-1990, author of The Human Mind, 1930, and Man Against Himself, 1938
Icelandic name for some figure in Trojan story, perhaps Agamemnon
Antonio de Guevara work in praise of rural life, 1539
Pessoa poems about Portuguese history, 1934
the White Rabbit in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Leonhard Frank novella, 1917
personification of lying
Common Market or European Economic Community, forerunner to the European Union
fruit market in Buenos Aires
church in Buenos Aires
city in the province of Buenos Aires (and also the name of various other towns in Corrientes and in Uruguay)
Parodi: alusión a un supuesto saladero de carnes ubicado en Mercedes, ciudad de la provincia de Buenos Aires, situada a 100 km al oeste de Capital.
Shakespeare play, c.1596
one of the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England
French literary monthly published from 1890 to 1965
Parodi: una revista literaria publicada con interrupciones y bajo diversos nombres desde fines del siglo xvii. Apareció mensualmente desde 1890 hasta 1965; a partir de 1995 su publicación fue retomada por las ediciones Gallimard.
the planet Mercury
Roman name for Hermes, god of commerce and messenger of the gods
Wilkins treatise on cryptography, 1641
English novelist and poet, 1828-1909, author of The Ordeal of Richard Feverel, The Egoist and other works
in Arthurian legend, magician, seer and teacher
Fishburn and Hughes: "A legendary figure, originally a Welsh poet and prophet of the sixth century, but remembered chiefly as the enchanter in the twelfth-century Arthurian romance. In Geoffrey of Monmouth's narrative Merlin is identified with a boy from an earlier tale who has no father and whose magic helps Arthur's father to win his bride. Merlin is reputed to have instituted the Round Table, and to have helped Arthur defeat his foes by his counsel and magic. He was said to possess knowledge of the past and of the future. The Faerie Queene, III, 2, refers to the mirror made by Merlin for King Ryence, which gave him the power to see all. It was in the form of a glass orb, shaped like the world, and enabled the viewer to look into the hearts of men and foresee the intentions of his enemies and the treachery of his friends." (128-29)
Parodi: “Pero a los hechos me atengo, dijera el sabio Merlino”: [Isidro] Parodi cita una supuesta frase del poderoso mago Merlín, personaje del ciclo de relatos célticos vinculados con la figura del Rey Arturo.
Buenos Aires suburb in the province of Buenos Aires
Fishburn and Hughes: "A town on the outskirts of Buenos Aires, to the west of the capital." (129)
Parodi: 1) “Merlo […] Berazategui”: dos localidades del Gran Buenos Aires, situadas respectivamente al noroeste y al sureste de la capital, separadas entre sí por una distancia de unos 60 km. Berazategui aparece mencionada también en “Signo” §2; Modelo iii §4; “Fiesta” §1 y §8. Un pueblo agrícola y ganadero que a principios del siglo xx se transformó en ciudad industrial dedicada a la producción de vidrio, y también de fibras textiles artificiales y de cerámicos. Berazategui está ubicada a unos 20 km al sudeste de la ciudad de Buenos Aires, sobre el ramal ferroviario Constitución−La Plata. Cf. Modelo III §4.
2) “el Mirador, ustedes no me dejarán mentir, está en Merlo”: Merlo es una localidad del Gran Buenos Aires, situada oeste de la provincia, a unos 30 km de la capital.
ship in Borges story about the Tichborne Claimant, really called the Bella
Argentine poet, 1923-78
Merovech, founder of the first Germanic-Frankish dynasty, king of France from 448 to 457
French writer who specialized in maritime stories, 1905-1972
US author who wrote mostly in French, 1863-1915
Parodi: Stuart Merrill (1863-1915), uno de los primeros poetas simbolistas de origen estadounidense, vivió la mayor parte de su vida en París y escribió sus poemas más conocidos en francés. Su antología de poemas en prosa (Pastels in Prose, 1890) introdujo la nueva poesía francesa en el ambiente literario estadounidense.
two magic spells, among the earliest remains of Germanic literature, clearly revealing pre-Christian origins
Merseburg, town near Leipzig, Germany
mountain in Buddhist legend
oasis and ancient city in Central Asia, old capital of Khorasan, near Mary in Turkmenistan
Apollinaire poem
Argentine gaucho soldier
Fishburn and Hughes: "A military leader who fought in the Wars of Independence and later in the frontier wars against the Indians. In 1829, in Laguna Colorada, Mesa was successful in recruiting a small contingent to fight on the side of Rosas. It was so popular that their numbers grew daily, joined by local montoneros and friendly Indians. On 29 January they were surprised by a force under Lavalle and suffered heavy casualties. Mesa escaped with some of his men to join Rosas, but he was attacked on the way, near Pergamino, by Isidoro Suárez, who sent him to Buenos Aires where he was condemned to death and executed on 16 February 1829." (129)
ancient region, perhaps in the southern Balkans, mentioned in Jordanes's history of the Goths
Portuguese writer, 1848-1884, author of O Japão
Spanish costumbrista writer, 1803-1882
Parodi: Ramón de Mesonero Romanos (1803-1882), un escritor costumbrista español que entre 1835 y 1881 escribió varias obras sobre la vida y las costumbres matritenses. Bustos deforma intencionalmente el primer apellido del escritor y lo sustantiva como si se tratara de un apodo, ‘el Mesonero’, o de un oficio. Por otra parte, Bustos califica de “polonesa” a la novela Quo vadis? y la atribuye a Ramón Navarro.
Spanish poet, secretary and correspondent of Quevedo
Grunberg book of poems, 1940
Aristotle treatise on metaphysics
Borges essay, 1952, not to be confused with another of the same name published in 1926
Kafka, see Verwandlung
Ovid poem
river in Umbria, site of battle between Romans and Carthaginians in 207 B.C.
Russian biologist, zoologist and protozoologist (1845-1916).
Russian microbiologist (1845-1916). He won the 1908 Medicine Nobel prize.
Darío poem in El canto errante, 1907
Gaston Rageot novel, 1933
Metrodorus of Lampsacus, Epicurean philosopher, c.331-278, or Metrodorus of Scepsis, philosopher and writer, fl. c.70 B.C.
Fishburn and Hughes: "Metrodorus of Scepsis, in Mysia, was celebrated for his powers of memory and his hatred of Rome. Pliny (7.24.1) wrote that Metrodorus perfected Simonides' art of memory so that 'a man might learn to rehearse again the same words of any discourse whatsoever, after hearing them once'. He is also referred to by Cicero, who says that 'he wrote down things he wanted to remember in certain "localities" in his possession by means of images, just as if he were inscribing letters on wax' (De Oratore 2.360)." (129)
country, sometimes spelled Méjico by Borges
Mexico City
street in Buenos Aires where the Biblioteca Nacional was located when Borges was its director
Parodi: en la calle México, calle sobre la que también estuvo ubicado el edificio de la Biblioteca Nacional desde 1901 hasta 1992.
Gulf of Mexico
original author of German encyclopedia, Meyers enzyklopädisches Lexikon
scholar of old Irish poetry
German scholar of Germanic literatures in the early 20th century
Austrian writer, pseudonym of Gustav Meyer, 1868-1932, author of Der Golem
Fishburn and Hughes: "The pseudonym of G. Meyer, an Austrian novelist who lived for many years in Prague and converted from Protestantism to Buddhism. Meyrink's interest in occultism led him to study the Cabbala, freemasonry, yoga and alchemy and to experiment with hashish. His best-known novel is Der Golem (1916), 'golem' being the Hebrew for embryo, or-anything incomplete; it is based on the medieval Jewish belief that it was possible to infuse life into a clay or wooden figure by means of a combination of letters of any one of God's names. The most famous version of this legend became that of the sixteenth-century rabbi from Prague Judah Loew, who is said to have created a golem to serve in the synagogue. Every evening the rabbi removed a vital letter of the combination, but on one occasion he forgot and the golem took over in a frenzy. This masterpiece of fantasy (of which two films were made by Paul Wegener) combines this strange legend with experiences of Meyrink's own life in Prague. It contains metaphysical themes from which Borges drew inspiration for many of his stories. Borges also wrote a long poem 'El Golem', which he considered among his best (Sel. Poems 123). In Meyrink's novel the golem can be seen to symbolise the individual who has become the automaton of modern society, instilled with a soul that is alien to himself. There are certain autobiographical links between the narrator of 'Guayaquil' and Borges. In his 'Autobiographical Essay' Borges relates that when he first learnt German he read Meyrink's book in the original and later, in 1960, discussed the legend with the Jewish scholar Gershom Scholem in Jerusalem (Aleph 134 (216)). On the same theme he has written: 'Gustav Meyrink uses this legend in a dream-like setting on the other side of the mirror and he has invested it with a horror so palpable that it has remained in my memory all these years!'" (129)
Polish town important in history of Hasidism
Lugones political work, 1917
Anglada essay
Paul Emile Victor book, probably Boréal, 1938
city in southern Florida
Conan Doyle, novel, 1888.
character in Dickens's David Copperfield
Mycenae, ancient city in the Peloponnesus in Greece
Belgian poet, 1899-1984
French romantic historian, 1798-1874, author of Introduction a l'histoire universelle and many other works
Parodi: Jules Michelet (1798-1874), historiador romántico francés, autor, entre otras muchas obras, de Introduction à l'histoire universelle.
Italian literary scholar, author of Da Boiardo all' Ariosto, 1898, and other works
state in United States
one of the Great Lakes
name of a cat in Lope de Vega's Gatomaquia, 1634
Parodi: nombre de gato, célebre desde la Gatomaquia (1634) de Lope de Vega (1562-1635); es también el título de un tango que Carlos Gardel (cf. “Enfoque” §2) grabó en 1927. En lunfardo, el nombre ‘Micifuz’ designa a los agentes de policía.
cartoon character created by Walt Disney in 1928
Voltaire tale, 1752
Phrygian king in Greek mythology whose touch turned things to gold
region of north central United States
county in southern England
Icelandic monster
Shand poem in Ferment
Fishburn and Hughes: "The plural of the Hebrew word midrash, 'study'. The term refers to texts of scriptural exegesis which seek to discover the deeper meaning of the bible by enlarging upon the literal meaning of each detail of the scriptures." (129-30)
Shakespeare comedy, c.1596
personification of fear in Bustos Domecq story
Carriego poem, published posthumously
Raúl González Tuñón
Manuel Gálvez, 1938
French priest and publisher of theological works, 1800-1875, compiler of Patrologiae cursus completus, a work in some 300 vols.
Fishburn and Hughes: "A French priest, theologian and publisher of theological literature. His most important publication is Patrology (1844-66), a collection of 'the teachings of the Fathers of the Church' consisting of 217 volumes of ecclesiastical writings in Latin up to the time of Pope Innocent III (1198-1216) and of 162 volumes of ecclesiastical writings in Greek up to 1439. The chief value of this work is that it contains texts that are not available in other editions. The introduction into Patrology of the writings of the character Aurelian is clearly apocryphal." (130)
Portuguese novelist, 1901-1980
Michelangelo Buonarroti, Italian artist, architect and poet, 1475-1564
the archangel Michael
friend of José Hernández, who wrote him an important letter about the Martín Fierro
pseud. of Georges-Ephraim Michel, French Symbolist writer, 1866-1890, author of L'Automne and Briseis
Parodi: Éphraïm Mikhaël fue el pseudónimo del poeta simbolista francés Éphraïm-Georges Michel (1866-1890). Publicó poesías y varias obras de teatro.
old Norse names for Constantinople. See Constantinopla
Austrian philologist, 1813-1891, author of important works on the Slavic languages as wel as on Romanian, Albanian, Greek and the gypsy language
Fishburn and Hughes: "An Austrian philosopher whose work focused on the nature of language and who in 1849 occupied the newly created chair of philology at the University of Vienna. Though 'the page much too famous' is apocryphal, Miklosich's linguistic studies included the origins of non-European languages such as Romany, the language of the gypsies." (130)
Kitab alf layla wa-layla, the Arabian Nights, collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories compiled in Arabic between the ninth and the fourteenth centuries, first translated into French in 1706
Morand story
Excerpt from A Writer’s Nootebook (1949) by W. Somerset Maugham.
Milan, Italy
Tibetan poet and sage
Miletus, Ionian city in Turkey, south of Izmir
The Questions of King Milinda, about the Greco-Bactrian king Menandro
book about Marco Polo's travels
Shakespeare line from Macbeth
British philosopher and economist, 1806-1873, author of System of Logic, Principles of Political Economy, Autobiography and other works
US poet, 1892-1950
Mil y una noches, Galland translation, 1704-17
US playwright, 1915-2005, author of Death of a Salesman, View from the Bridge, The Fall and other works
US writer, 1891-1980, author of Black Spring, The Tropic of Cancer, The Rosy Crucifixion and other works
British soldier in South America, later a diplomat and writer, 1795-1861, author of a volume of Memoirs
South African writer, 1889-1968
Parodi: “los Millonarios versus Chacarita Juniors”: referencia a dos clubes de fútbol de Buenos Aires; ‘los Millonarios’ alude a River Plate, del barrio de Núñez; Chacarita Juniors, del de Villa Crespo.
Polish scholar of Romance literatures, author of a study of Góngora and Mallarmé, Polish translator of Cervantes and French translator of Gracián
Fishburn and Hughes: "A popular tune, song or dance in Argentina. Borges wrote milongas, most of which are published in the collection 'Para las sets cuerdas' (O.P. 297) and some appear in English in Sel. Poems, 245-9." (130)
Poem by Borges
Jorge Luis Borges's Milonga—music by Astor Piazzola.
Poem by Jorge Luis Borges
Study written by Ventura R. Lynch.
tango composed by Samuel Linnig
Eliot essay, 1900
English poet, 1608-74, author of Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, Samson Agonistes and other works
Tillyard, 1947
city in Wisconsin on Lake Michigan
character in Murger's Scènes de la vie de Bohème and Puccini's La Bohème
town in the Sierras de Córdoba, Argentina
C. L. Dodgson work on logic, 4 vols., 1894-95
Spiller, 1902
Roman goddess of the arts, identified with Athena
Chinese dynasty, 1368-1644
Chinese emperor, ruled 58-76, during whose reign Buddhism was introduced to China
Antonio Correia D'Oliveira, 1915-17
Jack London, short story, published in Moon-Face and Other Stories, 1906.
Eden Phillpotts novel, 1934
Graham Greene, novel, 1943.
Russian-born German philosopher and mathematician, 1864-1909
German medieval knights, poets and singers
state in United States
in Greek mythology, king of Crete, creator of labyrinth at Knossos
monster, half-bull, half-man, imprisoned in the labyrinth at Knossos, also called Asterion
Fishburn and Hughes: "In Greek mythology the monster with the head of a bull and the body of man born from the union of Pasiphaë, wife of King Minos, with a bull. The House of Asterion: the Minotaur was placed by Minos in a labyrinth built by Daedalus, where he devoured a yearly tribute of seven youths and seven maidens from Athens. Ibn-Hakam al-Bokhari, Murdered in His Labyrinth: Dante presents the Minotaur as the guardian of the first circle of the 'violent', together with the centaurs (Inferno, 12.1-30). The assertion that Dante imagined the Minotaur as having the body of a bull and the head of a man is probably based upon a line from Ovid (Ars Amatoria 2.24) describing him as 'semibovemque virum, semivirumque bovem' ('a man half-bull, a bull half-man'). See Ariadne, Theseus." (130)
name of star in Anglo-Saxon dialogue
French writer and translator, 1880-1959
Lama Yongden novel of Tibet, 1938
Fishburn and Hughes: "A fictitious name composed of Mir, a title of respect used for the descendants of celebrated Mohammedan saints, Bahadur, a word common in all Altaic languages whose literal meaning is 'brave', often used as a surname or honorific title signifying hero, and Ali, one of the ninetynine special names for God in Islam, meaning 'The Exalted One'." (130-31)
character in Bustos Domecq story, author of Acopio de pullas y de gracejos, 1934
Spanish Jesuit writer, 1840-1917, author of Prontuario de hispanismos y barbarismos, Rebusco de frases castizas and other works
Spanish Jesuit and literary scholar, 1857-1912, author of works on Cervantes and on the history of the Jesuits, here called Padre Mir
Spanish novelist and short-story writer, 1879-1930
medieval dramas based on sacred history or the legends of the saints
Buzzati, 1971
Argentine poet, (1790 - 1825). Translator of Thomas Gray's Elegy (1823).
beach resort near Mar del Plata
character in Shakespeare's Tempest
Susana Vieyra book of stories, 1973
Capote story
character in Hawthorne's Marble Faun
monster, half-lion, half-ant
Spanish writer, 1879-1930
Castle situated in Tourville-sur-Arques, France.
planet identified with Neptune
collection of tragic stories in verse, planned by George Ferrers and William Baldwin, 1559
Chesterton story in The Secret of Father Brown
Fishburn and Hughes: "The alleged original version of this aphorism, 'Mirrors and fatherhood are abominable', is itself a quotation from the story 'The Masked Dyer, Hakim of Merv' (CF 43)." (131)
city on the Ganges between Varanasi or Benares and Allahabad
Sureda poem
Stevenson story, 1887
Lugones
Carriego book of poems, 1908
Section in Borges's study Evaristo Carriego (1930)
Wang Tai-hai work, 1791
Carlyle posthumous collection, c.1900
Work by English writer and antiquary John Aubrey (1626-1697) published in 1696.
Wilkie Collins, 1863.
Hugo novel, 1862
pseudonym of Kimitake Hiraoka, Japanese writer, 1925-1970
collection of Jewish law
Fishburn and Hughes: "Hebrew for 'repetition', 'instruction': the codification of the oral law in Judaism. As a collection of rabbinical discussions on the law of Moses intended to apply to the circumstances of everyday life, it forms the basis of the Talmud and is thought to have been compiled towards the end of the second century by Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi. The assertion in CF 242 stems from the Sabbath Tractate of the Babylonian Talmud, vol.1, pp. 41-3, which deals with the prohibition against carrying objects on the Sabbath. It reads as follows: 'A tailor must not go out with his needle near nightfall, lest he forget and go out (in the evening of the Sabbath), nor a scribe with his quill.'" (130)
Menén Desleal story
Almafuerte poem
northern province of Argentina, on border with Paraguay and Brazil
Parodi: en la Argentina, la principal provincia productora de yerba es Misiones.
title of Timothy Richards 1940 translation of Wu Ch'eng-en's Journey to the West, also known as Monkey
river
state in United States
town in Greece where Byron died in 1824
state in United States
Hawthorne short story in Twice-Told Tales, 1837
apparent reference to Heliodorus's Aethiopica
Castelo Branco novel, 1854
English bookseller in Buenos Aires in the middle of the 20th century
Fishburn and Hughes: "A famous English bookshop in Buenos Aires." (131)
Algernon Freeman-Mitford, Lord Redesdale, British diplomat in Japan, 1837-1916, author of Tales of Old Japan
Lun study, 1945
street in Buenos Aires
Parodi: “llegamos a la Avenida Mitre”: la calle principal de Avellaneda (cf. “Goliadkin” i §20); se extiende desde Quilmes hasta el Puente Pueyrredón, el límite con la Capital.
Argentine military man, statesman and writer, 1821-1906, author of Historia de San Martín
Parodi: Bartolomé Mitre (1821-1906) político, historiador, hombre de letras, militar, estadista, periodista, fundador del diario La Nación y Presidente del país entre 1862 y 1868.
Emerson poem
Mithridates VI , Eupator Dionysus, king of Pontus and enemy of Rome, 120-63
Fishburn and Hughes: "Literally 'given by Mithras, the Sun god': 'Mithridates' was a name bestowed on a number of oriental kings, soldiers and statesmen. Mithridates Eupator was the last of the six kings of Pontus. He overran the Roman province of Asia and was Rome's most powerful enemy until deposed by Pompey. His memory has been turned into a legend of outstanding bravery and outsize strength and appetite. He spent much of his time practising magic and was thought to be invincible. According to Pliny (7.24.1), 'Mithridates the king reigned over twenty-two nations of different languages and in as many tongues gave laws and ministered justice to them, without interpreters'." (131)
the world of men, in the Muspilli
imaginary primitive tribe in Borges story, see Yahoos
imaginary planet in the fantastic literature of Uqbar
mythical character in Dunsany
an ancient kingdom of Palestine
Fishburn and Hughes: "An area east of the Dead Sea outside the Promised Land, part of present-day Jordan. Most of our knowledge of the Moabites is derived from the Old Testament. See Moses." (132)
white whale in Melville novel
Melville novel, 1851
City located in northern Venezuela. (Mentioned in Bustos Domecq story.)
Moctezuma II , Aztec emperor, 1466-1520
Fishburn and Hughes: "Aztec for 'The Lord annoyed': a metaphor describing the sight of the sun behind clouds, a title held by several personages in Mexican history. The most ancient of these was one of the leaders of the Tenoch tribes who invaded the lagoon where the city of Tenochtitlán was founded. The second was one of Tenochtitlán's rulers. The third Montezuma reigned over the Aztecs from 1502 to 1520 and is probably the one referred to in the story. Though a despotic king, he attended to the education of his people and made his country powerful. His superstition led him to welcome the Spanish invaders led by Cortés, whom he believed to be the personification of the god Quetzacoatl. Montezuma was fatally wounded by a stone thrown during a public meeting, an act that may have been arranged by Cortés himself. He died four days after the injury, having refused food and medicaments." (132)
Suárez Lynch, 1946.
Chesterton story in Four Faultless Felons
magazine published in New York, 1909-1914
George Meredith, 1862
Ruskin essays, 1843-1860
Willard Huntington Wright, 1915
magazine published by the Stelton Colony in Stelton, New Jersey, starting in 1917
Stapledon, 1929
Whitehead treatise, 1938
Swift political satire on the Irish situation, 1729
German astronomer and mathematician, 1790-1868
Parodi: se trata de la librería y editorial de los hermanos Arnoldo y Balder Moën, originarios de Dinamarca, que en 1885 instalaron una librería en Buenos Aires, en la calle Florida al 300. Se dedicaban especialmente a la venta de libros franceses y algunos de edición argentina. A diferencia de otros editores, los hermanos Moën no financiaban los costos de las ediciones, que eran asumidos por los propios autores o sus mecenas. Que un libro fuera exhibido en las vidrieras de Moën era un honor para su autor; recuerda Giusti: “Hacer una vidriera [en Moën] significaba llenarla durante una semana con los libros que llevaban al pie el nombre de los supuestos editores, coronada la artística pila por el retrato del feliz autor flanqueado por los recortes de algún suelto periodístico elogioso” (91). Moën se convirtió en una librería de moda y un lugar de reunión de jóvenes poetas. Publicó algunas obras de Lugones y editó la revista Nosotros.
Italian-American opera singer, 1932-2006
Parodi: “la Moffo en Traviata”: Anna Moffo (1932-2006), célebre soprano estadounidense; debutó en 1955, cantó en los escenarios líricos más famosos. En 1960 actuó en el Teatro Colón de Buenos Aires, donde desempeñó el papel de Violetta en La Traviata de Verdi, ópera que volvió a representar en su segunda visita, en 1965.
Cunninghame Grahame travel book, 1898
Fishburn and Hughes: "From al-Mu'allaqat, Arabic for 'the suspended ones': a term denoting a collection of seven poems by seven authors preserved by oral tradition from pre-Islamic times. Because of their outstanding quality, they were hung on the walls of Islam's most sacred shrine, the Ka'ba in Mecca. See Zuhair." (132)
novel by Klabund about the prophet, 1917
dictionary of ibn Sida Resalat Al-Ghofran
Fishburn and Hughes: "The most authoritative Arab dictionary of the Middle Ages, compiled by Abensida and comprising many volumes." (132)
Moses, Hebrew lawgiver in Bible who led Jews out of Egypt in 13th century B.C.
Fishburn and Hughes: "A major biblical figure, who led the Jewish people out of slavery in Egypt to the Promised Land. According to the biblical account, Moses received from God the Jewish law, also known as the Torah, Pentateuch or Five Books of Moses. This moral and legal code is considered the Covenant binding the Jewish people as a nation.
Three Versions of Judas: Moses 'did not see God's face' either at Mount Sinai, when he received the Commandments and a cloud covered the mountain (Exodus 24:15), or when he entered the Tabernacle and God descended as a pillar of smoke. On this occasion he beseeched God to show him his glory but received the answer: 'Thou canst not see my face: for shall no man see me and live.' He was told to stand in a cleft in the rock and God covered him with his hand as he passed, saying: 'And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen' (Exodus 33:18 and 23).
The Theme of the Traitor and the Hero: after leading his people through the wilderness Moses was prevented from entering the Promised Land, which he could only glimpse from the land of Moab. This was as punishment for his disobedience at Meribah when, commanded by God to speak to the rock so that it should produce water, he struck it twice in a moment of anger, thus compromising what was intended to be seen as a miracle by an unbelieving people (Numbers 20:7-12)." (135)
Moses ben Shemtob de Leon, Spanish Kabbalist, d. 1305, author of Zohar
Zen master in fable
river in Austria
Fishburn and Hughes: "The German name of the Vltava, a principal river in Czechoslovakia, which runs through Prague." (132)
Jean Baptiste Poquelin, French playwright, 1622-1673
Argentine nationalist short-story writer and critic, 1880-1964
Argentine artist, known as Mandie
Fishburn and Hughes: "A friend of Borges, who invented the name Triste-le-Roy, which she placed on the map of an imaginary island painted by her on the wall of her bedroom. Borges used the name in 'Death and the Compass', which he dedicated to her." (132-33)
Argentine anarchist writer, 1874-1973, author of Hacia la vida intensa
character in Borges story
Fishburn and Hughes: "A fictional name, its obvious Italian association pointing to immigrant origin, used to suggest a feeling of animosity. It may also have a veiled reference to the poet Ricardo Molinari, a friend of Borges from his youth." (133)
character in Bustos Domecq stories
Parodi: 1) “el periodista de lápiz afilado”: alusión a Aquiles Molinari, personaje de “Las doce figuras del mundo”; cf. “Doce” i §1.
2) protagonista y principal narrador de “Las doce figuras del mundo”, Molinari es periodista del vespertino Noticias, donde escribe “sueltitos” sobre deportes y fútbol, la principal fuente escrita de información con que cuenta Parodi en su celda para la investigación de los casos. Molinari combina su labor periodística con un empleo público en las oficinas de Obras Sanitarias de la Nación. Individuo “fácilmente nacionalista”, profundamente deslumbrado por la celebración del Congreso Eucarístico en la Argentina, Molinari es uno de los ‘inmortales’ fabricados por el doctor Narbondo (cf. Crónicas “Los inmortales”), el único personaje de Bustos que perdura como “testigo para in aeterno”. En opinión de Borges y Bioy, Molinari es insuperable para “relatar historias largas” (cf. Borges 699). El modelo para la creación de este personaje lo proporcionaron Ricardo Molinari (1898−1996) y Sigfrido Radaelli (1909−1982), dos escritores muy poco apreciados por Borges y Bioy. En Borges, Ricardo Molinari es tema de más de medio centenar de conversaciones. Autor de una obra poética múltiple, distinguido con el Primer Premio Municipal (1933) y el Primer Premio Nacional de Poesía en 1958; miembro de la Academia Argentina de Letras; colaboró en la revista Martín Fierro y en el diario La Nación; alternó su actividad literaria con un empleo público en el Congreso Nacional. A lo largo de los años, en sus encuentros con Bioy es Borges quien con mayor frecuencia embiste contra Molinari como poeta y como individuo (cf. Borges 276, 586, 642, 720, 1089, entre otros pasajes). El segundo de los modelos que contribuyeron a la creación del protagonista de “Doce” fue Sigfrido Augusto Radaelli, abogado, historiador, poeta, director del Instituto Histórico; fue uno de los autores de la Historia de la Nación Argentina, editada por la Academia Nacional de la Historia en 1935 y de varias obras sobre historia, derecho y literatura. Fue distinguido con el Primer Premio Municipal por su labor poética. Fue miembro de múltiples asociaciones, incluido el PEN Club y la Sociedad Argentina de Escritores; colaboró y dirigió varias revistas. En 1935 editó en la colección Megáfono de la Editorial Tor la Historia universal de la infamia de Borges. En Borges tampoco escasean de parte de Borges y de Bioy las invectivas contra Radaelli, cf. 40, 158−159, 1262. Es mencionado también en “Sangiácomo” i §15.
Argentine poet, 1898-1996, author of El pez y la montaña and other works
Parodi: la primera monografía escrita por Walter Eisengardt, supuestamente centrada en la figura de Miguel de Molinos Zuxia (1628-1696), un místico y teólogo jesuita español, creador del quietismo. Autor de Guía espiritual. Que desembaraza al alma y la conduce por el interior camino para alcanzar la perfecta contemplación y el rico tesoro de la interior paz, 1675, propone como camino para acceder a Dios el vacío espiritual, la total quietud de alma, la ‘muerte mística’, que implica la suspensión de la palabra y del entendimiento. Denunciada esta obra por jesuitas ante la Inquisición en 1678, Molinos escribe su Defensa de la contemplación (1679-1680), obra que no lo salvó de las acusaciones de promover una ociosidad espiritual que anulaba toda responsabilidad moral. Molinos abjuró de su doctrina en 1685, pero fue condenado a reclusión perpetua por inmoralidad y heterodoxia.
Defoe novel, 1722
Canaanite god of fire
Parodi: el apellido del empresario evoca el nombre del dios cananeo Moloch, vinculado con sacrificios humanos por el fuego, principalmente de niños.
Mombasa, coastal city in Kenya
Baroja, 1919
Italian scholar, 1883-1952, author of Dante, Manzoni, Verga
German historian of Rome, 1817-1903
Momus, in Greek mythology, spirit of censure and mockery
line in the 18th century French folk song Au clair de la lune
Parodi: una canción infantil francesa, cuyo probable autor podría haber sido Jean−Baptiste Lully (1633−1687). Las intenciones de Montenegro de satisfacer los “envites afrodisíacos” de esta dama se ven interrumpidas por la aparición del coronel Harrap, que encierra a Montenegro en el baño del vagón. Esta escena es evocada por Isidro Parodi en Modelo v §56.
Fishburn and Hughes: "'My siege is done': the reply attributed to René Aubert (1655-1735), abbé of Vertot, when he rejected fresh documentation on the siege of Rhodes brought to him after he had completed his account of the event (d'Alembert, Reflexions sur l'Histoire)." (133)
principality in the Riviera between France and Italy
Fishburn and Hughes: "A small independent state on the French Riviera, a haunt of the rich famous for its casino, yachting clubs, fashion industry and festivals." (133)
Leibniz paper of 1714, published posthumously
Bernardo de Brito work, part of his História de Portugal, 1597-1609
Pineda, 1576
Argentine artist, 1921-2009, illustrator of book of Borges poems
country house belonging to Muñagorri in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: “la cabaña La Moncha”: se da el nombre de ‘cabaña’ a una hacienda rural en que se cría ganado y se mejoran las razas. La cabaña ha sido bautizada “Moncha’ en honor a Mariana, la esposa de Muñagorri, que lleva ese apodo propio de las Ramonas.
British nobeleman, 1898-1949, who wrote some poems about the First World War but was later known as a politician and financier
French newspaper where Henri Barbusse worked after the First World War (not the current newspaper El monde, founded in 1944)
Italian-born Argentine philosopher, 1877-1976
friend of Borges
place in Italy
country
Fishburn and Hughes: "A general term for an important Asiatic ethnic group. It probably derives from mong, meaning 'brave': bravery, accompanied by ruthlessnesss, was one of the chief qualities of the Mongols. Riding from the deserts of north and central Asia, the Mongols spread through Asia into eastern Europe. By 1227, on the death of their ruler Genghis Khan, their dominion extended from the banks of the Dnieper to the China Sea. The empire was then ruled by the great Kubla Khan and his successors, men of culture and taste who ruled China and fostered the growth of the arts and literature. The emperor Buyantu, for example, is renowned for rescuing inscriptions of the Chow dynasty and placing them at the gate of the temple of Confucius in Peking. Unable to consolidate its command over its conquered peoples, the Mongol empire disintegrated. By the seventeenth century the Chinese emperor invaded Mongolia and the power of some tribes decayed; others became subject to Russia." (133)
character in Hudson's The Purple Land
magazine, founded in 1910, where Banchs published articles
W. W. Jacobs's story
Arthur Waley's 1942 translation of Wu Ch'eng-en's Journey to the West
Phillpotts, novel, 1939.
Argentine scholar and educator, 1896-1987, author of Julián del Casal y el modernismo and other works
Spanish-born Argentine philologist, 1853-1927
Parodi: la frase parodia los títulos de dos libros del filólogo, gramático, docente, ensayista y poeta español Ricardo Monner Sans (1853-1927), Disparates usuales en la conversación diaria, publicado en 1923, y Barbaridades que se nos escapan al hablar, de 1933. Monner Sans, nacido en Barcelona y residente en la Argentina desde 1889 fue un tenaz defensor del purismo idiomático de tinte hispanófilo. Borges se refería a Monner como “un virrey clandestino” de la filología, por subordinar los estudios filológicos “al aspaviento español o a la indignación académica” (cf. “Vicente Rossi” 373; cf. también Carriego 132-133). Autor de más de un centenar de títulos, Monner publicó obras didácticas sobre gramática y literatura (Gramática castellana, 1916, Apuntes de Literatura Argentina, 1904), libros de poesía (Fe y Amor, 1879, El jardín de los encantos, 1914), refraneros (Gatología, 1927; Perrología: El perro a través del diccionario y del refranero, 1923) y en 1896, un breve tratado de lexicografía gauchesca y popular (Minucias lexicográficas. Tata, tambo, poncho, chiripá, etc. etc.).
character in a Chinese Buddhist novel, Journey to the West or Monkey
a cat in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: nombre del gato de Meinong.
fabulous black monkey that drinks ink, mentioned by Wang Ta-Hai
character in Suárez Lynch novella and Borges-Bioy filmscript
Parodi: el nombre de Mono Pancho quedó arraigado en el lenguaje popular a partir de una pieza de teatro cómico breve, un “juguete en un acto”, El Mono Pancho, escrita por el dramaturgo y periodista uruguayo Félix Sáenz y estrenada en 1892 por la compañía circense de la familia Podestá, fundadora del teatro nacional. En Descanso 12, “Del catálogo de un museo de juguetes”, Bioy cita el anuncio de venta de un “mono en bicicleta”, a cuerda, un juguete habitual en la primera mitad del siglo XX.
one-eyed creatures like the cyclops
Short Story written by José S. Álvarez
street in Buenos Aires
US poet and editor, 1860-1936, editor of Poetry
U. S. president, 1758-1831
US film actress, born Norma Jean Baker, 1926-62
Argentine artist, 1913-1963, known for his murals and for his eccentric life in the Paraná delta
editor and translator of the Heimskringla
neighborhood in Buenos Aires
Parodi: “Cuando sonaron las campanas de Monserrat”: por la localización de los personajes, ‘Monserrat’ podría aludir a la iglesia Nuestra Señora de Monserrat, situada en la avenida Belgrano 1151, en el barrio porteño de Monserrat, a pocas cuadras de la Plaza de Mayo.
Gaboriau detective novel, 1869
Collection of nouvelles by Guy de Maupassant (1885).
Paul Morand story
Cocteau, play, 1940.
here an obvious reference to Perón
Julien Green novel, 1926
French writer, author of Pieds nus, 1936
Swiss village near Lugano where Hermann Hesse died
Verona family in Romeo and Juliet
French essayist, 1533-1592
Emerson essay in Representative Men
chivalric hero mentioned in Don Quixote
Ecuadorean essayist, 1832-1889, author of the Siete tratados
State in United States
mountain in queen Maya's dream, in Buddhist legend
magnetic mountain in the Arabian Nights
Argentine socialist publication founded by José Ingenieros and Leopoldo Lugones in 1899
Lugones book of poems, 1897
Fishburn and Hughes: "Barcelona publishers of the Hispano-American Encyclopaedia in 16 volumes, a reliable, accessible and informative work intended for family use. Borges often quotes from it, usually half-mockingly, refuting its over-simple assertions with more complex ideas (Disc. 61, 98,113)." (133)
town in northern France near the front lines in the Battle of the Somme
Fishburn and Hughes: "An area in France, east of the city called ‘Albert'." (134)
supposed town in Minnesota where the Squonk lives
Argentine town on the Uruguay river, at the common frontier of Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil
Argentine political figure, 1785-1825
Argentine journalist and writer who wrote in Crítica, 1876-1914
character in Bustos Domecq story, an allusion to the Brazilian writer Jose Benito Monteiro Lobato, 1883-1948
Parodi: este supuesto autor lleva un nombre que juega con el del escritor brasileño José Bento Monteiro Lobato (1888-1948), novelista, cuentista, periodista, autor de obras de literatura infantil y juvenil. Fue director de la Revista do Brasil, desde la que postulaba la unidad latinoamericana de libros y lectores e instaba al intercambio literario entre escritores del continente. Vivió en la Argentina entre 1946 y 1947.
Portuguese poet and essayist, 1908-72
character in Bustos Domecq and Suárez Lynch stories, member of the Academia Argentina de Letras, author of Historia panorámica del periodismo nacional and several odes to José Martí.
Parodi: a diferencia de otros personajes escritores que pueblan las páginas de Bustos y de Suárez Lynch, Montenegro no es provinciano pobre sino porteño, de una acaudalada familia argentina de alcurnia, arraigada en el país desde “la primera hora”, o sea, antes del siglo xix, marcado por la llegada de los inmigrantes. Además de escribir el prólogo a Seis problemas, aparece como personaje en cinco de los cuentos; agrega asimismo una nota a una de las Fantasías memorables −“Signo”−; es también personaje en Modelo; escribe el prólogo a las Crónicas, donde reaparece en “Loomis”, “Ojo”, “Vestuario I”, “Esse” e “Inmortales”; es mencionado también en dos de los Nuevos cuentos (“Hijo” y “Penumbra”). Unido a Bustos por una vieja relación, Montenegro ha logrado gran reconocimiento como intelectual y ocupa un sillón en la Academia Argentina de Letras (“Palabra” §17). Nostálgico de la Argentina anterior a la inmigración, el acicalado y mundano académico “Mickey” Montenegro manifiesta su repudio por la cultura anglosajona y su fervor por la latina, en un discurso nacionalista −y a menudo antisemita− exornado frecuentemente con términos en francés. De su obra se mencionan pocos títulos y apenas se conservan los dos prólogos escritos para Bustos y algunas notas al pie, en las que rectifica o amplía afirmaciones del autor. Los datos informan que Montenegro ha cultivado tanto la poesía como la prosa. De su obra poética se mencionan un par de poemas menores y once odas a José Martí; en prosa, además de algunos cuentos baturros, tres proyectos: una Historia Panorámica del Periodismo Nacional, una vasta novela histórica a escribir en los ratos de ocio y un vago anteproyecto de saga familiar, Los Montenegro. Atraído por la vida social, anima “torneos verbales” con el poeta Anglada y participa de las veladas literarias de Loomis. Personaje versátil, se involucra en las más dispares y múltiples actividades: deportista, apasionado del juego y las apuestas, actor teatral, propietario de un burdel con ramificaciones internacionales, enamoradizo cortejador de todos los personajes femeninos de la obra, casado con una princesa, acusado de robo y asesinato, detective. Una conversación de Borges con Bioy revela que “Arturo Giménez Pastor, de jopo y bigote lacio, […] fue, cruzado acaso con Larreta, nuestro primer modelo para Gervasio Montenegro.” (Borges 1409). Ninguno de los dos escritores que mencionan como inspirador del personaje de Montenegro gozaba del aprecio de Borges y Bioy. A Giménez Pastor (1872−1949), Borges lo compara con un “bailarín del Abasto” y agrega que: “parece que como profesor, Giménez Pastor era pésimo” (414). Fue abogado, escritor y profesor universitario; autor de cuentos y novelas, crítico literario, colaborador en varios diarios; publicó una Historia de la literatura española y una Historia de la literatura argentina. Era asiduo concurrente a los cafés en que se reunían escritores y artistas porteños. Fue profesor de literatura argentina en la Facultad de Filosofía y Letras e integró la primera comisión directiva de la Sociedad Argentina de Escritores (sade); miembro de la Real Academia Española y de la Academia Argentina de la Historia. Aunque más matizada, no es mejor la opinión de Borges sobre Enrique Rodríguez Larreta (1875−1961), una de sus bêtes noires, un autor recordado principalmente por las novelas La gloria de don Ramiro (1908) y Zogoibi (1926). De Larreta, Borges y Bioy tienen opiniones menos negativas como escritor que como individuo que ha creado una cuestionable imagen de sí mismo. Para ellos, Larreta era “Gran señor, hidalgo español: en su oportunidad no desdeñó la zalamería a Perón; gran escritor, maestro del estilo: para parecer moderno escribió oraciones sin verbo, y no desdeñó frangollar argumentos para la televisión” (738); Borges lo ve como “un gran escritor español, un tanto fraudulento, porque no es español; los españoles deben de verlo como un simulador poco convincente. Y es un gran escritor argentino, que no logra ser tan argentino como Carriego y José S. Álvarez” (669−670). En cuanto al individuo, Larreta les da ocasión para comentar “la extraña fonética de quienes, por afectación vanidosa, imitan a los españoles en la manera de hablar, disfrazando la voz y la dicción: Larreta (con ocasionales yerros, como aller por ayer, que se le escapa) y sus seguidores en el intento de parecer hidalgos españoles.” (176); en opinión de Borges, si bien los poemas de Larreta “no son tan malos” (173), “fue siempre un personaje deleznable” (730) que “inauguró la época comercial” de los escritores argentinos: “Se convirtió en su propio agente de propaganda, se hizo fotografiar, consiguió que hablaran de su casa. ¿Por qué se va a hablar de la casa de los escritores?” (775) y en la misma conversación agrega: “Podría hacerse un paralelo entre Larreta y Perón, porque en sus diferentes esferas son parecidos, cada uno estaba ocupado por su propia vanidad y egolatría”. En esa combinación de modelos literarios y personales parece haber tenido su punto de partida la figura de Gervasio Montenegro.
character in Suárez Lynch novella, cousin of Gervasio Montenegro, nicknamed Pampa
Parodi: personaje de Modelo; conocida como ‘Pampa’, exnovia del Baulito Pérez y luego, prometida de Tonio Le Fanu. ‘Pampa’ es también el sobrenombre de un personaje de “Toros”, cf. iii §5.
city in northern Mexico
street in Buenos Aires
Parodi: “no bien la embocamos en Montes de Oca”: el viaje del narrador comienza en Adrogué y avanza hacia el norte en dirección a Plaza Constitución. La avenida Montes de Oca atraviesa de norte a sur el barrio de Barracas, ubicado al sur de la ciudad de Buenos Aires.
Spanish writer, 1897-1982, author of El viajero y su sombra, also wrote in Galician
in the second part of Don Quijote, character in the Cave of Montesinos episode
Parodi: “más profunda que la propia cueva de Montesinos, de felice recordación”: la cueva de Montesinos, mencionada en el capítulo XXII de la Segunda Parte del Quijote, “Donde se da cuenta de la grande aventura de la cueva de Montesinos, que está en el corazón de la Mancha, a quien dio felice cima el valeroso don Quijote de la Mancha”. La locución “de felice recordación” es recurrente en el Quijote.
French political philosopher, 1689-1755, author of Esprit des Lois and other works
capital of Uruguay
Fishburn and Hughes: "The capital of Uruguay, a port on the River Plate. In colonial times Montevideo suffered from increasing reliance on Buenos Aires, which in Uruguay's struggle for independence proved her chief local rival. In the middle of the nineteenth century it was twice seized by the Argentine dictator Juan Manuel Rosas. Borges's nostalgic memory of Montevideo recalls the city as quieter and more rooted in tradition than his native Buenos Aires." (134)
street in Buenos Aires
Montiel Ballesteros stories, 1924
name of several towns in France
French inventors of the hot air balloon, brothers, 1740-1810 and 1745-1799 respectively
Boswell's wife and cousin, 1738-1789
French writer, 1895-1972
region of La Mancha, Spain
section of northern Paris
Spanish critic, 1877-1961, author of El lenguaje como fenomeno estético and Manual d'història crítica de la literatura catalana moderna
Fishburn and Hughes: "CF 386: Gaucho guerrilla fighters who, in the civil wars which followed Argentina's independence, supported their local caudillo against the centralising policy of the porteño (Buenos Aires) army. The montoneros fought mainly in the interior provinces; their allegiance to their leader was personal and direct, and they were largely indifferent to his political leanings. During the 1970s the term was adopted by young left-wing urban guerrillas." (134)
city in southern France
character in Bustos Domecq story, contemporary of Zúñiga el Molinero
Parodi: “marqués de Montúfar”: el viejo apellido Montúfar, está ampliamente extendido en toda la península y también en América; no parece referirse aquí a un personaje concreto.
anthology of essays published by Sheed and Ward, 1930
French scholar and politician, 1876-1947, editor of the Encyclopédie française starting in 1935
Nigel Morland mystery, 1935
O'Neill play, 1918
O'Neill’s play, 1923.
Irish revolutionary and traitor, character in Borges story
Jack London, 1906.
Collins detective novel, 1868
Anglo-Irish author, 1852-1933, author of Hail and Farewell, Memoirs of My Dead Life, Untilled Field and other works
Fishburn and Hughes: "An Anglo-Irish writer, author of novels, plays and short stories. Moore was educated in France and 'found his English style in French'. Borges remembers jokingly that Moore 'pledged to find fourteen errors in any of the sonnets of Baudelaire' (Borges mem. 124). CF 195: the reference to Moore's 'artifices' is to his contorted syntax and startling juxtapositions. To create an unbroken narrative, Moore introduced such stylistic devices as the substitution of the present participle for the verb in finite form, so as to achieve a more flowing sentence; the repetition of certain words within the same paragraph, to cement together the various sentences; and the change from narrative to conversation without indentation or inverted commas. He also introduced striking anachronisms, as in The Brook Kerith (1916), where Jesus is presented as the son of a carpenter who does not die on the cross and with whose living presence St Paul is confronted when preaching about the crucifixion; or as in Heloïse and Abelard (1921), where a twelfth-century French context provides the background for characters who behave as they would in modern times." (134)
Parodi: (1852-1933) novelista irlandés, estudió arte en París. Trabajó durante varios años en la Académie Julian y frecuentó los estudios de Manet, Degas, Pissarro y Monet; tras esta experiencia, inició una vida literaria, frecuentando los círculos de Villiers de l’Isle Adam (cf. “Sangiácomo” ii §41), de Mallarmé (cf. infra §9) y de Emile Zola. Tras un período bohemio del que provienen sus Confessions of a Young Man (1888), regresó a Inglaterra donde escribió varias novelas. En sus conversaciones con Sorrentino (Siete 54), Bioy afirma el parentesco de su familia materna −los Lynch, de origen irlandés− con George Moore. (cf. Modelo “A manera de prólogo” §1).
English sculptor, 1898-1986
Parodi: el escultor inglés Henry Spencer Moore (1898-1986), se interesó particularmente en el problema del vacío, creando volúmenes sinuosos, de formas abstractas y líneas curvas, atravesados por cavidades. Mediante la incorporación de huecos esculpidos, Moore enfatiza el contraste entre los elementos sólidos de sus esculturas en bronce y piedra y el espacio vacío que las rodea y atraviesa.
Argentine ambassador to Brazil in the 1930s
Argentina sculptor
Parodi: “mi ditirambo analítico de la fuente de Lola Mora”: la ‘Fuente de las Nereidas’, conocida popularmente por ‘la fuente de Lola Mora’, el nombre de su autora, la escultora argentina Dolores Candelaria Mora Vega (1866-1936). Cuando se inauguró, en 1903, se la ubicó en el Paseo de Julio, a pocas cuadras de la Plaza de Mayo, pero el escándalo producido por los desnudos de nereidas y tritones decidió su traslado a los depósitos municipales hasta que, en 1918 fue ubicada en su emplazamiento en la Costanera Sur de la ciudad.
Portuguese writer, c. 1500-1572, author of the chivalric novel Palmeirim de Inglaterra
Portuguese writer, author of Cartas do Japão, 1904
Spanish poet from the Canary Islands, 1884-1921
Argentine author of books on piracy and literature, active in the 1940s
character in Borges-Bioy filmscript
Spanish painter, c. 1509-1586
Plutarch’s work.
medieval dramatic pieces in verse, in which characters are personified abstractions, the best known being Everyman
New York gangster, nickname of George Clarence Morgan, 1891-1957
French diplomat, novelist and travel writer, 1888-1976, author of Tendres Stocks, Ouvert la nuit, Ferme la nuit, France la doulce and other works
department in Brittany, France
Gide, 1921
character in Njalssaga
Ozep film based on Brothers Karamazov, 1931
Work by English writer and caricaturist Max Beerbohm (1872-1956) first published in 1899.
Fishburn and Hughes: "Latin for 'according to the methods of geometry'. Spinoza's work in two parts on Descartes's Principia is subtitled More Geometrico Demonstrata, his Ethica is subtitled Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata." (134)
English philosopher of the Cambridge Platonist school, 1614-1687, author of Opera theologica, Opera philosophica, Philosophica Poems and Divine Dialogues
US critic, educator and philosopher, 1864-1937
English statesman, writer and saint, author of Utopia, 1478-1535
Greek-born French symbolist poet, born Ioannis A. Papadiamantopoulos, 1856-1910, author of Les Syrtes, Les Cantilènes and Le Pèlerin passionné
vivisectionist, character in Wells's novel The Island of Dr. Moreau
Argentine gaucho, 1819-74, subject of a novel by Eduardo Gutiérrez and subsequent adaptations for the stage and screen.
Fishburn and Hughes: "One of the last famous gauchos, who became a legendary figure during his lifetime. Moreira was born of a Spanish Galician father and criollo mother and brought up in the province of Buenos Aires, where he lived peacefully until, victimised by the police, he was forced to become an outlaw. A high price was put on his head and he was eventually shot by the police. Soon after his death his story was fictionalised by Eduardo Gutiérrez and published in serial form (1879-80). Mingling fact and fiction, Gutiérrez sought to expose the injustices suffered by the gauchos at the hands of the authorities. Moreira is shown to have lived a peaceful life until the age of thirty in Matanza, when he was hounded by a corrupt and abusive social system. The wit and manly courage with which he fought back turned him into a popular romantic hero and symbol of rebellion. The novel was dramatised by José de Podestá." (134)
Parodi: el caso del legendario gaucho Juan Moreira (1819?-1874), de quien algunos afirman que nació en Navarro, mientras que otros se muestran partidarios de Lobos o de Morón y de La Matanza (cuatro localidades de la provincia de Buenos Aires).
Argentine political boss
French translator with Stuart Gilbert of Joyce's Ulysses, 1929
James Murrell, a thief of fugitive slaves and murderer, mentioned in Twain's Life on the Mississippi and the subject of a Borges story
character in the Martin Fierro, a singer or payador and the brother of black killed by Fierro, sometimes El Negro
Suburban neighborhood of Buenos Aires, in the western part of the city. (Mentioned in song in Borges-Bioy filmscript.)
street in Buenos Aires
Fishburn and Hughes: "A street in Buenos Aires that runs from the district of Almagro almost down to the port." (135)
Argentine jurist, political writer, editor and statesman, 1778-1811
French translator with Francis de Miomandre of Frieda Lawrence's memoir Not I But the Wind
French Egyptologist (1868-1938), author of Rois et Dieux d'Egipte
Spanish dramatist, 1618-1669, author of El desdén con el desdén
character in Borges-Bioy filmscript
English dramatic critic and novelist, 1894-1958, author of Portrait in a Mirror, The Fountain, A Voyage and other works
newspaper headline about Morgan, character in Borges-Bioy filmscript
sea captain, character in Hemingway's To Have and Have Not
Welsh buccaneer, c. 1635-88
US scholar of Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism who taught at Colgate University, 1908-?, author of numerous works on eastern religions
English writer and diplomat, 1726-1802, author of an "Essay on the Dramatic Character of Sir John Falstaff," 1777
“Tiene razón la Pumita: nadie se salva de su destino. Morganti era una fiera para el polo, hasta que se compró el tobiano que le trajo yeta". (Mentioned in Bustos Domecq story.)
He was a film actor who worked with Niní Marshall in the movie “Candida, la mujer del año”, 1919. (Character in Bustos Domecq story.)
Parodi: apócrifo ‘capo’ de una mafia rosarina. El nombre del mafioso coincide con el de un actor de cine, cantor y actor teatral, amigo de Carlos Gardel, popular en los años treinta y cuarenta (cf. “Enfoque” §2). En la obra de Bustos, en “Sangiácomo” ii §1, se menciona otro Morganti.
Viaje de Oriente, Hermann Hesse travel book, 1932
German periodical specialized in Asian studies
Paris street in famous Poe story
English essayist and historian, 1832-88, scholar of Gibbon
character in Borges story
three one-act plays by Sudermann, 1896
"Rotten Skin," synoptic history of kings of Norway, preserved only in part, with many digressions resembling short stories or incidents in the family sagas
British mystery writer, 1905-1986
US writer and journalist, 1890-1957
English man of letters, 1822-94, author of an eleven volume history of English literature, English Writers
British political figure, writer and newspaper editor, 1838-1923
characters in Wells's The Time Machine, 1895
Romanized version of the name of George Moore
Sternberg film, 1930
Enrique Saborido and Angel Villoldo tango, 1905
Buenos Aires suburb in province of Buenos Aires
Fishburn and Hughes: "A district to the west of Greater Buenos Aires, the scene of the battle of Caseros (1852) in which Rosas was finally defeated." (135)
mentioned in letter to Abramowicz
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: Manolo M. Morpurgo, uno de los manifestantes; para el apellido Morpurgo en Bustos Domecq, cf. “Arte” §1. El narrador emplea el término ‘fogarata’, una epéntesis popular de ‘fogata’.
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: “Mauro Morpurgo, alias el Gólgota”: el apellido Morpurgo lo llevan también otros personajes de Bustos Domecq, no relacionados entre sí: Manolo M. Morpurgo, en “Fiesta” §8, y Ubaldo Morpurgo, en “Arte” §1. El apodo de Mauro Morpurgo, posiblemente un individuo que acarrea adversidades, podría deberse a su identificación con el Calvario, el lugar de la crucifixión de Cristo.
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: supuesto creador del primer tenebrarium porteño. En los Nuevos cuentos de Bustos Domecq se mencionan personajes de apellido Morpurgo (cf. “Amistad” §23; “Fiesta” §8) que no parecen estar relacionados entre sí.
English poet, artist, critic, craftsman, designer, social reformer and printer, 1834-96, author of Defence of Guenevere, Life and Death of Jason, The Earthly Paradise, The Well at the World's End and numerous other works, and translator with Magnusson of the Volsunga Saga
Daumal poems, part of Le Contre-Ciel, 1936
La muerte joven, Jean Merrien novel, 1938
Tennyson poem, 1842
Guerra Junqueiro poem, 1874
John Cowper Powys novel, 1937
Meuse river in Belgium and France
nickname for Postemilla in Borges-Bioy filmscript
character in a posthumous work by Nierenstein Souza
Parodi: “las vicisitudes de Moscarda”: obra supuestamente editada por Probeta. Vitangelo Moscarda es el protagonista y narrador de Uno, nessuno e centomila (1926), la última novela escrita por Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936), definida por el autor como la “más amarga de todas, profundamente humorística, de descomposición de una vida” en las ‘cien mil’ identidades distintas que le imponen las miradas de los otros. Pirandello recibió en 1934 el Premio Nobel de literatura.
character in Jewish fable
German satirist and moralist, 1601-1669
Moscow, Russian capital
Coastal desert city located in southwestern Angola, Africa.
French scholar of old Germanic poetry, d. 1959, author of Manuel de l'anglais du moyen âge, Histoire de la forme périphrastique and editor of the Laxdoela Saga
Hawthorne, collection of short stories, 1846.
Rodó, José Enrique, 1909.
French avant-garde writer on cooking, character in Bustos Domecq story, author of various manifestoes and the Manue Raisonne
Parodi: el “sumo sacerdote de la cocina pura”, supuesto autor de un manifiesto, en 1915, y de un Manuel Raisonné, de 1919.
O'Neill trilogy of plays, 1931
novel by Rafael Cansinos Assens, 1921
British historian, 1883-1941
character in Kipling's Jungle Books
Argentine scholar of Argentine theater and of folklore, 1899-1981
country in southern Africa
Austrian composer, 1756-1791
Ethnic group from east-central Africa.
T. F. Powys novel, 1925
T. F. Powys, 1927
Phillpotts, novel, 1934.
Hawthorne, short story from Twice-Told Tales, 1837.
Walpole novel, 1911
Woolf novel, 1925
Bromfield novel, 1942
Romero film, 1937
eclectic modern building in Potsdam, by the architect Otto Julius Manntoifel, in Bustos Domecq story
Müggelsee, lake near Berlin
Borges story, 1942
Dabove story and book (1961, posthumous).
Martínez Estrada study of Hernández poem, 1948
personification of Death
poems in Luna de enfrente about the Recoleta and Chacarita cemeteries
Borges story, 1946
Dead Sea
conceptual art
Work by Ramón Gómez de la Serna, 1918.
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: personaje de “Toros”, médico de la familia Montenegro.
Afghan prophet
man whose story is recounted in Philip Meadows Taylor's Confessions of a Thug
Fishburn and Hughes: "The first month of the Islamic calendar. The tenth of Muharram commemorates the Battle of Karbala fought in Persia in 680 between the Shi'ites and the Sunnites on the issue of legitimate leadership of the Islamic community. It ends the ten-day mourning period in memory of the martyrdom of the Holy Family of the Shi'ite leader Imam Hussein, grandson of the prophet Mohammed through his daughter Fatima, and is a day of holy celebration." (136)
character in Borges story
Scottish poet and translator, 1887-1959, here mentioned for the translations of Kafka he did with his wife Willa
Willa Anderson Muir, 1890-1970, here mentioned for the translations of Kafka she did with her husband Edwin Muir
king of Dublin, d. 1119, also known as Murtagh
Jules Supervielle poetic narrative in L'Arche de Noé, 1938
Argentine novelist, 1910-1984, author of Misteriosa Buenos Aires, Bomarzo and numerous other works
Luis María Jordán
Irish journalist in 19th century Argentina, subject of 1970 book by Alicia Noailles
town in Alsace in France
Parodi: ciudad de Francia, situada al este, en la región de Alsacia.
German philologist and Orientalist, 1823-1900, editor of Sacred Books of the East and author of Comparative Mythology, India, What Can It Teach Us? and numerous other works
US literary critic and social philosopher, 1895-1990
character in Bustos Domecq stories
Parodi: Manuel Muñagorri, propietario de “La Moncha”, una cabaña donde cría toros; casado con Mariana Ruiz Villalba.
Norwegian painter, 1863-1944
wild animal park near Buenos Aires
Bentley
Austrian-born US stage and film actor, 1895-1967
München, city in southern Germany
city in Franconia, Germany, here misspelled Rünnerstadt
Spanish playwright, 1879-1936
Uruguayan poet, 1905-1964, author of Lejos, 1926
Buenos Aires suburb
Parodi: un barrio del municipio de Vicente López (cf. “Toros” i §2), al norte de la capital. En esa localidad está ubicado el Museo del Cine Lumiton, en un edificio adquirido en 1931 por los Estudios Lumiton, la productora cinematográfica de las primeras películas sonoras del país y la más importante de los años treinta y cuarenta; cesó sus actividades en 1952.
province in southern Ireland
Fishburn and Hughes: "The largest province in Ireland, which includes Clare, Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Tipperary. It was once an ancient kingdom whose name appears in the sagas of Celtic mythology. Munster was active during the Irish Civil War. In 1921 a Council of Action and twelve 'Soviets' were established there by members of the Communist party of Ireland." (136)
Hadrian's Wall in northern England
knife-fighter in Buenos Aires, alias "Cuervito"
thug in turn-of-the-century Buenos Aires, subject of numerous Borges texts
Fishburn and Hughes: "An old-time guapo, described by Borges as an obedient fighting machine, whose only distinguishing features were his lethal accuracy as a shot and a total lack of fear (Ev. Carr. 69). According to Borges, Muraña had no initiative and was utterly servile to his current paymaster. While he killed many men, he himself was so insignificant that Fate could be said to be acting through him. (For another version of Juan Muraña, see Ev. Carr. 150)." (136)
town in Italy near Venice
Parodi: “vaso de Murano”: referencia a la isla de Murano, en la laguna de Venecia, célebre por la artesanía del vidrio y del cristal.
Murasaki Shikibu, Japanese novelist, c. 973-c. 1014, author of The Tale of Genji
Anglo-Argentine who was for a time Borges's secretary
province of southeastern Spain
Bolitho, 1926
Eliot verse drama on Thomas à Becket, 1935
Agatha Christie, novel, 1939.
Dennis Wheatley novel, 1936
Poe detective story, 1841
character in Borges story
Argentine writer (1923-1975), author of Primer testamento (1946), La fatalidad de los cuerpos (1955) and El centro del infierno (1957) among other works. He also worked for the journal Sur.
mermaid sanctified in 6th century Wales
French writer, 1822-1861, author of Scènes de la vie de Boheme, basis for Puccini and Leoncavallo operas
Spanish painter, 1618-1682
British classical scholar, born in Australia, 1866-1957
Carriego poem in Las misas herejes
English critic and editor, 1889- 1957
Lussich poem
in Greek mythology, one of nine patronesses of the arts
Argentine soccer player, 1944-2009
Parodi: “congratulélo sobre la tramitación del último goal que, a despecho de la intervención oportuna de Zarlenga y Parodi, convirtiera el centro-half Renovales, tras aquel pase histórico de Musante”: los apellidos de los supuestos jugadores de Abasto Juniors corresponden a los propietarios del Hotel El Nuevo Imparcial (cf. “Limardo” i §3), según lo narrado en “La víctima de Tadeo Limardo”. Para Zarlenga, Renovales y Musante, cf. “Limardo” i §§3 y 8. La investigación de la muerte de Tadeo Limardo (cf. §10) estuvo a cargo del detective Parodi (cf. “Palabra” §9), otro de los apellidos mencionados.
character in Bustos Domecq story
Parodi: 1) esposa de Claudio Zarlenga, uno de los propietarios de El Nuevo Imparcial; anteriormente, casada con Limardo. Vuelve a ser mencionada en Crónicas y “Ojo”; el apellido reaparece en “Esse”.
2) para Juana Musante, personaje de “Limardo”, cf. “Limardo” i §8. La locución “hacer unos pases” se aplica a los movimientos con las manos que hace un hipnotizador, ya sea a distancia o tocando el cuerpo de la persona sometida a la sugestión hipnótica. En el enunciado de Bustos Domecq se sobrentiende que los pases no son a distancia.
nine collections of Quevedo's poetry, published posthumously in 1648 and 1670
Carriego poem
Argentine anarchist, co-founder of anarchist colony in Paraguay with Julio Molina y Vedia and Macedonio Fernández in 1897
wax museum in Paris
Parodi: “en el abigarrado Musée Grevin de las bellas letras”: alusión al célebre museo de cera de París, creado en 1882, que reúne las figuras de grandes personajes y escenas de la historia de Francia.
Parodi: “me infiltré en el museo”: alusión al Museo de Ciencias Naturales de la ciudad de La Plata, que fue inaugurado en 1888 y forma parte de la Universidad Nacional de esa ciudad. Posee un cuantioso fondo de objetos provenientes sobre todo de la arqueología y etnografía americanas, además de una sala dedicada a Egipto. La celebridad del museo se debe a la colección de grandes mamíferos prehistóricos y fósiles pampeanos. En el museo funciona además la Biblioteca Florentino Ameghino.
natural history museum in city of La Plata
historical museum in Luján
historical museum in Buenos Aires, in Parque Lezama.
art museum in Buenos Aires, near the Recoleta
Parodi: tras diferentes ubicaciones y traslados, el Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes ocupa desde 1933 un predio en el barrio de Recoleta, sobre la Avenida del Libertador. Por su colección permanente, que cuenta con obras de artistas de fama internacional, es uno de los más importantes museos de Latinoamérica; alberga además la mayor colección local de arte argentino.
museum founded in 1911, now a university
Capote, 1956
from Shakespeare's sonnet 8
reference to San Juan de la Cruz's Cántico
Ildefonso Pereda Valdés book, 1934
Georges Lacombe film based on René Lefèvre novel, 1940
giant in Elder Edda
9th century fragment of an eschatological poem in German alliterative verse
French romantic poet, dramatist and fiction writer, 1810-1857
Megaro biography, 1938
Italian dictator, leader of the Fascist movement, 1883-1945
Russian composer, 1839-1881
Betina Edelberg poetry collection, 1964
Fishburn and Hughes: "The Indian Mutiny, also known as the Sepoy Rebellion ('sepoy' being a Persian and Urdu term meaning soldier, used in most vernacular languages of India). It was one of the most traumatic events in British colonial history. Begun in 1857 by Indian troops serving in the army of the British East India Company, it ended in 1859 after the relief of Delhi. The episode has been subsequently popularised for patriotic purposes by supporters of the Indian National Movement. During the rebellion the Sikhs remained loyal to the British and helped overcome the rebels." (136)
Book of poems by Rubén Darío. 1914.
character in the Arabian Nights
Argentine writer and journalist, d. 1958, director of the newspaper El mundo starting in 1928
Nicolai Gubsky autobiography, 1939
Saroyan, 1939
Browning poem in Dramatic Lyrics, 1843
Lines in Macbeth (V.3)
Stephen Hudson novel, 1925
state of southern India
Fishburn and Hughes: "A state of southern India with a capital city of the same name." (136)
Leroux detective novel published serially in 1907 and in book form in 1908
Agatha Christie, 1920.
Grey, 1921
Dickens unfinished detective novel, 1870
Poe detective story
Agatha Christie, novel, 1928.
Swedenborg
David-Neel, 1929. Sometimes Parmi les Mystiques et magicines du Tibet