Jorge Luis Borges - The Last Interview

you’ve been given prizes for insignificant work …
    BORGES: Yes, that’s true …
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: But really you’re more …
    BORGES: I’d like to be a saint, why not? [
Laughs
.] Why reject sainthood? I’ve tried to be an analytical man, which is enough isn’t it? No, I’m not a saint.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: But really …
    BORGES: But actually, why not? If you see me as a saint right now, I have no problem with being a saint.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: For everything you’ve done for Argentine literature?
    BORGES: Well, no, because that’s been minimal. I haven’t influenced anyone, and yet in contrast I owe so much to so many writers from the past.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: But how is it that you think you haven’t had any influence?
    BORGES: No, I owe much to Groussac, 10 I owe much to Lugones, I owe much to Capdevila, 11 I owe much to Fernández Moreno, 12 without a doubt. Almafuerte, 13 I don’t know if I’m worthy of him. The only man of genius Argentina has produced is Almafuerte, the author of “El misionero,” Carriego could recite “El misionero” from memory. My first contact with pure literature was one Sunday night with Carriego, who was an unremarkable-looking man, at home, standing and reciting “El misionero” in quite a booming voice. I didn’t understand a word, but I felt that I had discovered something new, and that new thing was poetry.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: The power …
    BORGES: Yes, it came to me from Almafuerte, but through Carriego who recited him very well. I remember: “
Yo deliré de hambre muchos días y no dormí de frío muchas noches, / para salvar a Dios de los reproches de su hambruna humana y sus noches frías
.” 14 That’s from the end of “El misionero.”
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: If we were in your library right now, what poem would you ask me to read to you?
    BORGES: The poem “Acquainted with the Night” by Robert Frost, or we could open the book
La fiesta del mundo
by Arturo Capdevila. I’d tell you to open it anywhere and just start reading to surprise me. Especially the poem “Aulo Gelio” which has some admirable verses that no one remembers any more: “
(Si los Lacedemonios al combate, iban a son de lira o son de flauta, ¿en cuántas drachmas cotizó Corinto? La noche de la
Laís la cortesana)
,” 15 that’s by Capdevila, it’s admirable. And yet it seems that he’s been forgotten because people tend to forget easily, or they remember stupid things like a football match, for example, or the founding fathers. I’m a descendent of the founding fathers, but I don’t know if they’re worth much thought. We have a history, but I don’t know if it’s filled with men of ideas, equestrian social strata, rather.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: Why shouldn’t you be described as a genius?
    BORGES: There’s no reason why I should be. What have I written? Transcriptions of writing by other people.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: But it’s not just what you’ve written, it’s how you’ve exposed the Argentine being, describing what’s happening …
    BORGES: No, not at all, I haven’t done anything …
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: How you got involved with political events, how you spoke out about the military dictatorship.
    BORGES: Well, because I was getting such sad news, and also I knew that I was in a fairly untouchable position. I could speak out against the military, against the war, without being in any danger.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: And you did.
    BORGES: And I did.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: Another person might not have.
    BORGES: But it was my duty, I did it for ethical reasons. I haven’t read a newspaper in my life; news reaches me indirectly but surely. For example the Mothers and Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo 16 came to my house, maybe their children were terrorists, maybe they got what they deserved, but the tears of those women were sincere, they weren’t acting, they weren’t hysterical, and I saw this, and so I spoke out. It was my duty, many others did too … yes.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: Do you lie, Borges?
    BORGES: Not voluntarily. But I can lie, language is so limited compared to what we think and feel that we are obliged to lie, words themselves are lies. Stevenson said that in five minutes of any man’s life things happen that all of Shakespeare’s vocabulary and talents would be unable to describe adequately. Language is a clumsy tool and that can oblige one to lie. Lie deliberately? No. I try not to lie.
    LÓPEZ LECUBE: When do you lie? You don’t lie to journalists.
    BORGES: No, I am very naive with