Professor Borges A course on English literature

Jorge Luis Borges, 1899-1986

Book - 2013

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Subjects
Published
New York : New Directions Books 2013.
Language
English
Spanish
Main Author
Jorge Luis Borges, 1899-1986 (-)
Other Authors
Katherine Silver (translator)
Item Description
A compilation of the twenty-five lectures Borges gave in 1966 at the University of Buenos Aires, where he taught English literature.
Physical Description
xiv, 306 pages ; 22 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN
9780811218757
  • About This Book
  • Class 1. The Anglo-Saxons. Genealogy of the Germanic kings. Poetry and kennings.
  • Class 2. Beowulf. Description of the Germans. Ancient funeral rites.
  • Class 3. Beowulf. Bravery and boastfulness: Beowulf as compared to the compadritos.
  • Class 4. The Finnsburh Fragment. The Vikings. Anecdotes from Borges's trip to York. "The Battle of Brunanburh." Tennyson's translation.
  • Class 5. "The Battle of Maldon." Christian poetry. "Caedmon's Hymn." The runic alphabet. Characteristics of Anglo-Saxon elegies.
  • Class 6. The origins of poetry in England. The Anglo-Saxon elegies. Christian poetry: "The Dream of the Rood."
  • Class 7. The two books written by God. The Anglo-Saxon bestiary. Riddles. "The Grave." The Battle of Hastings.
  • Class 8. A brief history until the eighteenth century. The life of Samuel Johnson.
  • Class 9. Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia, by Samuel Johnson. The legend of the Buddha. Optimism and pessimism. Leibniz and Voltaire.
  • Class 10. Samuel Johnson as seen by Boswell. The art of biography. Boswell and his critics.
  • Class 11. The romantic movement. The life of James Macpherson. The invention of Ossian. Opinions about Ossian. Polemic with Johnson. Reappraisal of Macpherson.
  • Class 12. Life of William Wordsworth. The Prelude and other poems.
  • Class 13. The life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. A story by Henry James. Coleridge and Macedonia Fernandez, compared. Coleridge and Shakespeare. In Cold Bloody by Truman Capote.
  • Class 14. Coleridge's final years. Coleridge compared to Dante Alighieri. Coleridge's poems. "Kubla Khan." Coleridge's dream.
  • Class 15. The life of William Blake. The poem "The Tyger." Blake and Swedenborg's philosophy, compared. A poem by Rupert Brooke. Blake's poems.
  • Class 16. Life of Thomas Carlyle. Sartor Resartus by Carlyle. Carlyle, precursor of Nazism. Bolívar's soldiers, according to Carlyle.
  • Class 17. The Victorian era. The life of Charles Dickens. The novels of Charles Dickens. William Wilkie Collins. The Mystery of Edwin Drood, by Dickens.
  • Class 18. The life of Robert Browning. The obscurity of his work. His poems.
  • Class 19. Robert Browning's poems. A chat with Alfonso Reyes. The Ring and the Book.
  • Class 20. The life of Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Evaluation of Rossetti as a poet and a painter. The theme of the double (fetch). A book of exhumed poems. Rossetti's poems. History cyclically repeated.
  • Class 21. Rossetti's poem. Rossetti as seen by Max Nordau. "The Blessed Damozel," "Eden Bower," and "Troy Town."
  • Class 22. The life of William Morris. The three subjects worthy of poetry. King Arthur and the myth of the return of the hero. Morris's interests. Morris and Chaucer. "The Defence of Guenevere."
  • Class 23. "The Tune of the Seven Towers," "The Sailing of the Sword," and The Earthly Paradise, by William Morris. The Icelandic sagas. The story of Gunnar.
  • Class 24. The Story of Sigurd the Volsung, by William Morris. The life of Robert Louis Stevenson.
  • Class 25. The works of Robert Louis Stevenson: New Arabian Nights, "Markheim," The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Jekyll and Hyde in the movies. The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde. "Requiem," by Stevenson.
  • Epilogue
  • Afterword, by Martín Arias
  • Borges in Class, by Martín Hadis
  • Endnotes
  • Index
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

This mesmerizing volume preserves the eclectic, erudite, and charismatic style of Argentine writer Borges (Labyrinths) and his insights on English literature, via his 1966 class at the University of Buenos Aires. Working from the transcriptions of tapes made by students, the editors have reconstructed the course, which traced English literature from its Saxon roots through the 19th century. The 25 lectures, on subjects including Beowulf, Anglo-Saxon elegies, and the novels of Charles Dickens, are bookended by informative essays and extensive, helpful endnotes. Borges moves effortless between subjects, almost overloading the senses with facts, digressions, and interpretations. While the lectures are not all equally compelling, there is enough here to keep the reader moving forward, and Borges's delight and passion for every author shines brightly. As the afterword explains: "What Borges tries to do as a professor, more than prepare his students for exams, is excite and entice them to read the works and discover the authors." Over 40 years later, he is still achieving that goal. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review

Edited and translated transcripts of recordings of a university class in English literature taught in the fall of 1966 by the celebrated Argentinian author. In 1966, Borges (18991986) had been teaching for 10 years at the University of Buenos Aires, and his lectures communicate a comfortable familiarity with the material; they also offer some piercing insights into specific works in the English canon. His 25 class sessions began with the Anglo-Saxons and ended with Robert Louis Stevenson and the notion of schizophrenia evident in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and other works. (Shakespeare is present only in allusions.) His approach is highly traditional--mostly lecture and explication--though in some later classes, he invited students to read aloud from the texts; he periodically interrupted to illuminate. Also astonishing were his expectations for his students. He routinely alluded to other texts outside the syllabus (The Picture of Dorian Gray, In Cold Blood) and stated and/or implied that his students surely knew these works. Among the texts and authors he dealt with directly were Beowulf, Johnson and Boswell, James MacPherson, Wordsworth and Coleridge (he calls the latter "lazy"), Blake, Carlyle, Dickens (who "suffers from an excess of sentimentalism"), Robert Browning and William Morris. Borges--who had lost his eyesight by 1966--occasionally confesses some personal frailties--e.g., "I have a poor memory for dates." He also clearly believed in the importance of an author's biography: He continually introduced works with some details about the writer's personal life. Evident, too, is a trait that many contemporary students would probably find off-putting: a lack of humor. The classes were unrelievedly earnest and academic and included very few references to popular culture or contemporary history. A sobering, even startling, view of an academic world that has fundamentally altered and softened in the last half-century.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.