Recent Reading: Borges and Me

Yesterday I finished Jay Parini's excellent book Borges and Me.

The book is mostly a memoir of a single week, fifty years ago, that Parini, then 21, spent driving Jorge Luis Borges, then 70, around northern Scotland. Parini is an aspiring poet and literary scholar who does not, at least for the first half of the trip, realize that he is having intimate experiences with one of the literary legends of the twentieth century.

Borges is quite modest and never belittles his host and driver. He is also quite willing to share his wisdom about literature and the world with the young Parini. For example:

"But I attended no university. Not like yourself," Borges said.

"It doesn't seem to have held you back. You're very well informed."

"Ah, informed..." Borges said dismissively. "Nobody can teach you anything. This is the first truth. We teach ourselves. All my life I have lived in books, in libraries. I remember every library in my life as I remember my lovers, their smells, the texture of their skin, the taste, even the brightness in the air around them. Or the darkness. Yes, every library is for me like a woman, erotic, a creature of the dark, full of smells and textures, tastes.

Like Michael Greenberg in his review in the Times, I highly recommend this book. As Greenberg says:

This reminiscence by Parini, who is now a prolific novelist, biographer and poet, brings Borges more sharply to life than any account I’ve read or heard. (I met Borges in Buenos Aires a few years after the events of this book.) In this sense, the memoir is an important contribution to the biography of a major writer. The bond that Borges and Parini forge during their improbable journey is moving, with its unexpected moments of confession and shared fragility. Some scenes, remembered 50 years after the fact, may read like set pieces, some conversations may seem too neatly composed, but the spirit of Borges rings true. Fans may notice that his conversation is peppered with quotes from his essays and wonder if Parini has placed lifted passages in his subject’s mouth. But this was how Borges talked: There was little separation between what he had read, lived and written himself.

For readers who already admire Borges, this memoir will be a delicious treat. For those who have yet to read him, Parini provides the perfect entry point to a writer who altered the way many think of literature.