Borges's Poe: The Influence and Reinvention of Edgar Allan Poe in Spanish America (The New Southern Studies Ser.)

Edgar Allan Poe's image and import shifted during the twentieth century, and this shift is clearly connected to the work of three writers from the R�o de la Plata region of South America--Uruguayan Horacio Quiroga and Argentines Jorge Luis Borges and Julio Cort�zar. In Borges's Poe , Emron Esplin focuses on the second author in this trio and argues that Borges, through a sustained and complex literary relationship with Poe's works, served as the primary catalyst that changed Poe's image throughout Spanish America from a poet-prophet to a timeless fiction writer. Most scholarship that couples Poe and Borges focuses primarily on each writer's detective stories, refers only occasionally to their critical writings and the remainder of their fiction, and deemphasizes the cultural context in which Borges interprets Poe. In this book, Esplin explores Borges's and Poe's published works and several previously untapped archival resources to reveal an even more complex literary relationship between the two writers. Emphasizing the spatial and temporal context in which Borges interprets Poe--the R�o de la Plata region from the 1920s through the 1980s-- Borges's Poe underlines Poe's continual presence in Borges's literary corpus. More important, it demonstrates how Borges's literary criticism, his Poe translations, and his own fiction create a disparate Poe who serves as a precursor to Borges's own detective and fantastic stories and as an inspiration to the so-called Latin American Boom. Seen through this more expansive context, Borges's Poe shows that literary influence runs both ways since Poe's writings visibly affect Borges the poet, story writer, essayist, and thinker while Borges's analyses and translations of Poe's work and his responses to Poe's texts in his own fiction forever change how readers of Poe return to his literary corpus. Edgar Allan Poe's image and import shifted during the twentieth century, and this shift is clearly connected to the work of three writers from the Río de la Plata region of South America—Uruguayan Horacio Quiroga and Argentines Jorge Luis Borges and Julio Cortázar. In Borges's Poe, Emron Esplin focuses on the second author in this trio and argues that Borges, through a sustained and complex literary relationship with Poe's works, served as the primary catalyst that changed Poe's image throughout Spanish America from a poet-prophet to a timeless fiction writer.Most scholarship that couples Poe and Borges focuses primarily on each writer's detective stories, refers only occasionally to their critical writings and the remainder of their fiction, and deemphasizes the cultural context in which Borges interprets Poe. In this book, Esplin explores Borges's and Poe's published works and several previously untapped archival resources to reveal an even more complex literary relationship between the two writers. Emphasizing the spatial and temporal context in which Borges interprets Poe—the Río de la Plata region from the 1920s through the 1980s—Borges's Poe underlines Poe's continual presence in Borges's literary corpus. More important, it demonstrates how Borges's literary criticism, his Poe translations, and his own fiction create a disparate Poe who serves as a precursor to Borges's own detective and fantastic stories and as an inspiration to the so-called Latin American Boom.Seen through this more expansive context, Borges's Poe shows that literary influence runs both ways since Poe's writings visibly affect Borges the poet, story writer, essayist, and thinker while Borges's analyses and translations of Poe's work and his responses to Poe's texts in his own fiction forever change how readers of Poe return to his literary corpus. Most scholarship that couples Poe and Borges focuses primarily on each writer's detective stories, refers only occasionally to their critical writings and the remainder of their fiction, and deemphasizes the cultural context in which Borges interprets Poe. In this book, Esplin explores Borges's and Poe's published works and several previously untapped archival resources to reveal an even more complex literary relationship between the two writers. Emphasizing the spatial and temporal context in which Borges interprets Poe--the Río de la Plata region from the 1920s through the 1980s--Borges's Poe underlines Poe's continual presence in Borges's literary corpus. More important, it demonstrates how Borges's literary criticism, his Poe translations, and his own fiction create a disparate Poe who serves as a precursor to Borges's own detective and fantastic stories and as an inspiration to the so-called Latin American Boom. --Publisher description Cover 1 Half Title 2 Title 4 Copyright 5 Contents 6 Acknowledgments 8 A Note on Translation 12 INTRODUCTION. Reciprocal Influence 16 Part 1. Renaming Poe: Jorge Luis Borges’s Literary Criticism on Edgar Allan Poe 36 CHAPTER 1. Borges’s Philosophy of Poe’s Composition 38 CHAPTER 2. Reading and Rereading 62 Part 2. Translating Poe: Jorge Luis Borges’s Edgar Allan Poe Translations 80 CHAPTER 3. Theory, Practice, and Pym 82 CHAPTER 4. Facts and an Envelope 96 Part 3. Rewriting Poe: Jorge Luis Borges’s Poe- Influenced and Poe- Influencing Short Fiction 116 CHAPTER 5. Buried Connections 118 CHAPTER 6. Supernatural Revenge 135 EPILOGUE. Commemorative Reframing 167 Notes 182 Works Cited 220 Index 240 A 240 B 240 C 242 D 243 E 243 F 244 G 244 H 245 I 245 J 245 K 246 L 246 M 246 N 247 O 248 P 248 Q 250 R 250 S 250 T 251 U 252 V 252 W 252 Y 253 Z 253