Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0880013680, Paperback)
Borges On Writing
In 1971, Jorge Luis Borges was invited to preside over a series of seminars on his writing at Columbia University. This book is a record of those seminars, which took the form of informal discussions between Borges, Norman Thomas di Giovanni--his editor and translator, Frank MacShane--then head of the writing program at Columbia, and the students. Borges's prose, poetry, and translations are handled separately and the book is divided accordingly.
The prose seminar is based on a line-by-line discussion of one of Borges's most distinctive stories, "The End of the Duel." Borges explains how he wrote the story, his use of local knowledge, and his characteristic method of relating violent events in a precise and ironic way. This close analysis of his methods produces some illuminating observations on the role of the writer and the function of literature.
The poetry section begins with some general remarks by Borges on the need for form and structure and moves into a revealing analysis of four of his poems. The final section, on translation, is an exciting discussion of how the art and culture of one country can be "translated" into the language of another.
This book is a tribute to the brilliant craftsmanship of one of South America's--indeed, the world's--most distinguished writers and provides valuable insight into his inspiration and his method.
(retrieved from Amazon Mon, 14 Jan 2013 05:31:28 -0500)
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Wikipedia in English
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With that, know that his is not a book written by Borges to instruct aspiring writers but is a collection of 38 short pieces, assembled after his death, pertaining to literature as a realm or endeavor and the part the writer plays within that realm. 10 of the pieces are published in English translation here for the first time. The tile could be “On Criticism” or “On Literature” without giving up any accuracy.
Here's the kind of stuff you'll encounter (From “The Detective Story”):
“The detective novel has created a special type of reader. This tends to be forgotten when Poe's work is evaluated, for if Poe created the detective story, he subsequently created the reader of detective fiction.”
And (from “Narrative Art and Magic”):
“From the foregoing it can be inferred that the main problem of the novel is causality. One kind of novel, the ponderous psychological variety, attempts to frame an intricate chain of motives similar to real life....In the adventure novel, such cumbersome motivation is inappropriate; the same may be said for the short story and for those endless spectacles composed by Hollywood with silvery images of Joan Crawford, and read and reread in cities everywhere. They are governed by a different order, both lucid and primitive: the primeval clarity of magic.”
The pieces were written over a nearly 80 year span. Some were included to demonstrate Borges' development as a writer, some because they have had enormous influence, and some because they're just plain good – I include the very short snippets from the chapter “The Critic At Work” and also the two pieces quoted above as well as “Kafka and His Precursors” and “Stories from Turkestan”.
This is not a good introduction to Borges' work – try Labyrinths or thumb through Collected Fictions for that – but could be very valuable if you're trying to get a handle on what exactly he was up to. (