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Jorge Luis Borges, After Going Blind, Draws a Self-Portrait
// Open Culture
Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), one of the great writers to come out of Argentina, went blind when he was only 55 years old. As unsettling as it must have been, it wasn't particularly a surprise. He once told The New York Times, "I knew I would go blind, because my father, my paternal grandmother, my great-grandfather, they had all gone blind."
In the years following that life-changing moment, Borges never learned braille and could no longer read. But he did continue to write; he served as the director of Argentina's National Library; he traveled and delivered an important series of lectures at Harvard on poetry (click to listen); and he even took a stab at drawing — something he did fairly well earlier in life. (See our previous post: Two Drawings by Jorge Luis Borges Illustrate the Author's Obsessions.)
Above, you can see a self portrait that Borges drew in the basement of the famous Strand Bookstore in New York City. According to the Times, he did this "using one finger to guide the pen he was holding with his other hand." After making the sketch, Borges entered the main part of the bookstore and started "listening to the room, the stacks, the books," and made the remarkable observation "You have as many books as we have in our national library."
If you've ever been to The Strand, you know how many books it holds. Indeed, the store boasts of being "New York City's legendary home of 18 Miles of new, used and rare books." My guess is that Argentina's national library might have a few more volumes than that. But who is really counting?
Related Content:
Jorge Luis Borges' 1967-8 Norton Lectures On Poetry (And Everything Else Literary)
Jorge Luis Borges Chats with William F. Buckley on Firing Line (1977)
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1944, "The Great Reception" cover for Incidentes Melodicos del Mundo Irracional (Melodic Incidents of the Irrational World) (I replaced my scan with the Guggenheim's scan) These images come from two books: Mexico Ilustrado 1920-1950 (in Spanish though a harder-to-find English edition exists) and Mexico and Modern Printmaking: A Revolution in the Graphic Arts, 1920-1950. They are both pretty incredible books with not too much overlap. From wikipedia:Leopoldo Méndez (June 30, 1902 – February 8, 1969) was one of Mexico's most important graphics artists and one of the country's most important artists from the 20th century. Méndez's work mostly focused on engraving for illustrations and other print work generally connected to his political and social activism. His most influential work was connected to organizations such as the Liga de Escritores y Artistas Revolucionarios and the Taller de Gráfica Popular creating propaganda related to the ideals of the Mexican Revolution and against the rise of Fascism in the 1930s. Despite his importance in 20th-century artistic and political circles, Méndez was a relatively obscure figure during his life, and remains so afterwards. The reasons for this generally relate to the fact that he believed in working collaboratively and anonymously for the good of society rather than for monetary gain and because the socialist and communist themes of his work fell out of favor with later generations. Despite this, he has received some posthumous recognition with Mexican scholarship considering him to be the successor to graphics artist José Guadalupe Posada. [cont. reading] 
1944, from Incidentes Melodicos del Mundo Irracional "Much as Posada used the calavera, Méndez was able to make political statements by substituting anthropomorphic animals for human subjects in his wood engravings for Juan de la Cabada's book Incidentes Melodicos del Mundo Irracional, published in 1944 by La Estampa Mexicana. In this retelling of a traditional Mayan story Méndez rendered the deceitful leader of the Yucatan animal community as a vulture wearing the white-collar uniform of the bourgeois businessman. When the other animals rise up against the vulture, the story becomes an unmistakable allegory for a Marxist revolution in which the proletariat replaces the bourgeoisie as the ruling class."—James M. Wechsler, "Propaganda Grafica" essay from Mexico and Modern Printmaking You can see the full book at Full Table. 
1944, from Incidentes Melodicos del Mundo Irracional 
1944, from Incidentes Melodicos del Mundo Irracional 
1932, "God and the Four Evangelists (Fool's Concert)," wood engraving Features caricatures of Dr. Atl, Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and education secretary Moises Saenz. 
1934, The Accident 
1942 
1947, cover for Anthropos 
1931 
1932 cover 
1935, cover for a novel, attributed to Mendez 
1931, cover for a novel, attributed to Mendez 
Futuro magazine cover, November 1940 
1928, A Fragment of the Revolution cover 
1928, A Fragment of the Revolution cover 
1927 cover 
1938, "Imperialism and War," lithograph flyer 
1945, "What May Happen (Self-Portrait)," wood engraving 
1942, "Corrido of Stalingrad," linocut 
1948 linocut, "I'm Thirsty" accompanied a film titled Rio Escondido (apparently prints like this were projected before the movie...would be interesting to see it blown up that large) 
1932, "Proletarian Hand," wood engraving This post first appeared on March 18, 2014 on 50 Watts 
