In “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote”, Borges plays with ideas of authorship and originality by inventing a French Symbolist poet who embarks on the impossible task of composing Don Quixote.
What would a world with no objective reality look like? How about a language with no nouns? Jorge Luis Borges explores these ideas in a fascinating thought experiment.
The theme of honour runs through many of the fictions of Jorge Luis Borges. But why bother retelling such a well-known story if all you’re going to do is reinforce the standard narrative?
I had a short story published recently in Storgy magazine. It’s available to read free online, so do check it out if you’re interested. It’s about two women caught on opposite sides of a militarised border wall: one in Europe,…
Before I read Borges, I used to think there was a sharp dividing line between fiction and nonfiction. In my own writing, there’s a huge gap between the serious, diligently factual articles I write for The Wall Street Journal and…
Belated news that I had a short story published earlier this year by a small Australian publisher, In Short Publishing. The story is called Boy, Dog, Accordion, and it's published as a pocket-size book.
One evening in Crete, a couple of years ago, I saw something that made a lasting impression on me. A small boy, maybe eight or nine years old, sitting in front of a large green rubbish bin, with an accordion in…