Jorge Luis Borges’ “Philosophy” of Language
- Issue:
- Received: 15 Aug. 2025
- Approved after reviewing: 25 Sept. 2025
- Date of publication: 25 Dec. 2025
- УДК / UDK: 821.111(73).0
- Publication Type: Research Article
- DOI:
- EDN:
- Abstract:
The article analyzes Jorge Luis Borges’ views on language. In his essays and poems, he often uses both philosophy and language as material. In this regard, the question arises: has Borges developed, to some extent or another, systematic and consistent views on language as such? The analysis is carried out on three aspects: Borges’s attitude to poetic language, to allegory and to translation. The material is Borges’s essays, prefaces, lectures and interviews. The evolution of Borges’ views is traced. At the early stage (1920–1940s), Borges is mostly interested in specific issues: the formulation of a normative ultraist poetics, the defense of the Argentine version of the Spanish language, as well as the problems of understanding grammar and applied stylistics. In other words, at this stage, two trends dominate: stylistic and sociolinguistic. At the second stage (1950–1980s), Borges changes his position regarding the use of Argentinisms and turns to more general problems, primarily the problem of poetic language. The origin of language is irrational. First, the language of poetry appears, then prose, each tradition has its own pace of development. Poetic language is associated with tradition, with a magical beginning and is an inconvenient tool due to its variability. The poet strives to return to ancient magic, selecting suitable means of language, acting as a “constructor”, adjusting the proportion of the concrete and the abstract. Borges interprets the concept of “translation” broadly: the translator is not required to know the source language, the concept of a finished text is untenable, we have before us a series of drafts that can and should be rewritten in the language of the translator, for whom it is most important to convey conceptual information, to reassemble the text by means of his language. However, the translator can also correct the text. Every writer is also a translator. Within the literary process, there is a movement from allegories to novels: from the abstract, associated with medieval realism, to the concrete (nominalism). However, in novels there remains an allegorical element when it comes to generalizations, identifying “types” of heroes.
- Keywords: Jorge Luis Borges, philosophy of language, poetic language, Borges’s poetry, Borges’s essays, Argentine Spanish, translation problems, translation as a phenomenon, ultraism, Latin American literature.
- For citation:
Kovalev, Boris. “On Jorge Luis Borges’ ‘Philosophy’ of Language.” Literature of the Americas, no. 19 (2025): 136–165. https://doi.org/10.22455/2541-7894-2025-19-136-165
- References:
Aguilar 2020 — Aguilar, Gonzalo. “La disolución del arte (Sobre ‘Crónicas de Bustos Domecq’)”. Variaciones Borges, no. 49 (2020): 33–48.
Almeida 1998 — Almeida, Ivan. “‘Seis problemas para don Isidro Parodi’ y la teología literaria de Borges”. Variaciones Borges, no. 6 (1998): 33–51.
Bagno 2014 — Bagno, Vsevolod E. Mif — obraz — motiv (Russkaia literatura v kontekste mirovoi) [Myth — image — motive (Russian literature in the context of the world literature)]. St. Petersburg: Vita Nova Publ., 2014. (In Russ.)
Betti 2021 — Betti, Miguel. “La perla o la rosa. Góngora según Borges”. Arte Nuevo: Revista de Estudios Áureos, no. 8 (2021): 230–258.
Bowra 1952 — Bowra, Cecil M. Heroic Poetry. London: Macmillan, 1952. Chistiukhina 2000 — Chistiukhina, Olga P. “Tvorchestvo J.L. Borgesa v kontekste filosofii kul’tury” [“The Works of J.L. Borges in the Context of the Philosophy of Culture”]. PhD diss., Rostov-on-Don, 2000. (In Russ.)
García 2020 — García, Mariano. “Herejías Estéticas. Bustos Domecq y Suárez Lynch como Catarsis”. Variaciones Borges, no. 49 (2020): 183–202.
Hoover 2019 — Hoover, David L. “The Invisible Translator Revisited.” In DH- 2019 Proceedings: https://dev.clariah.nl/files/dh2019/boa/0126.html.
Kleiner 2020 — Kleiner, Yuri A. “The Formula: Morphology and Syntax”. In John Miles Foley’s World of Oralities. Text, Tradition, and Contemporary Oral Theories, 107–122. Leeds: ARC Humanities Press, 2020.
Kovalev 2023 — Kovalev, Boris V. “Stihi o severe na ‘iuzhnom’ iazyke: opyt perevod stihotvorenii Jorge Luisa Borgesa ob Islandii i Norvegii” [“Poems about the North in a ‘Southern’ Language: an Experience of Translating Jorge Luis Borges’ Poems about Iceland and Norway”]. In II Nauchnye chtenija pamjati professora V.P. Berkova: sbornik materialov [Proceedings of And Scientific Readings in Memory of Professor V.P. Berkov], 110–117. St. Petersburg: SPbU Publ., 2023. (In Russ.)
Mezhikovskaia 2004 —Mezhikovskaia, Tatiana. I. “Literatura Argentiny” [“The Literature of Argentina”]. In Istoriia literatur Latinskoi Ameriki: v 5 t. [History of Latin American Literatures: in 5 vol.], vol. 4, 370–451. Moscow: IWL RAS Publ., 2004. (In Russ.)
Millán 2009 — Millán, Hermán M. “El Platón de Borges”. Variaciones Borges, no. 28 (2009): 163–186.
Mualem 2006 — Mualem, Shlomy. “Borges and Schopenhauer: aesthetical observation and the enigma of ‘El Zahir’”. Variaciones Borges, no. 21 (2006): 107–137.
Mualem 2002a — Mualem, Shlomy. “Borges and Wittgenstein on the Borders of Language: The Role of Silence on ‘The God’s Script’ and The ‘Tractatus Logico- Philosophicus’”. Variaciones Borges, no. 14 (2002): 61–78.
Mualem 2004 — Mualem, Shlomy. “The Imminence of Revelation Aesthetics & Poetic Expression in Early Wittgenstein & Borges”. Variaciones Borges, no. 18 (2004): 197–217.
Mualem 2002b — Mualem, Shlomy. “What Can Be Shown Cannot Be Said: Wittgenstein’s Doctrine of Showing and Borges’ ‘The Aleph’”. Variaciones Borges, no. 13 (2002): 41–56.
Nazarova 2023 — Nazarova, Julia V. “Eticheskie osnovaniia filosofii smerti J.L. Borgesa” [“Ethical Grouds of J.L. Borges Philosophy of Death”]. Gumanitarnye vedomosti TGPU im. L.N. Tolstogo, no. 4 (2023): 5–13. (In Russ.)
Orekhov 2020 — Orekhov, Boris, V. “‘Iliada’ E.I. Kostrova i ‘Iliada’ A.I. Liubzhina: stilemetricheskii aspect” [“‘The Iliad’ by E.I. Kostrov and ‘The Iliad’ by A.I. Lyubzhin: Stylometric Aspect”]. Aristei, no. 21 (2020): 282–296. (In Russ.)
Orekhov 2021 — Orekhov, Boris, V. “Tekst i perevod Vladimira Nabokova cherez prizmu stilemetrii” [“Text and Translation by Vladimir Nabokov Through the Prism of Stylometry”]. Novyi filologicheskii vestnik, no. 3 (2021): 200–213. (In Russ.)
Ortiz 2014 — Ortiz, Rodolfo. “Las deslecturas de Borges: Eliot, El traductor argentino y la tradición”. Variaciones Borges, no. 37 (2014): 37–52.
Ponzio 2002 — Ponzio, Augusto. “Reading and Translation in Borges’s ‘Autobiographical Essay’”. Semiotica, no. 140–1/4 (2002): 169–179.
Rest 1976 — Rest, Jaime. El laberinto del universo: Borges y el pensamiento nominalista. Buenos Aires: Ediciones librerías Fausto, 1976.
Salinas 2020 — Salinas, Alejandra M. “Los arquetipos en Borges: clasificación y análisis”. Variaciones Borges, no. 50 (2020): 127–148.
Viñas Piquer 1999 — Viñas Piquer, David. “Recorrido fugaz por la poesía de Borges”. Signos, no. 32 (1999): 57–70.
Zernova, Kovalev 2025 — Zernova, Elena S., and Boris V. Kovalev, “Formuliruia tradiciiu: obraz Islandii v poetike J.L. Borgesa” [“Formulating a Tradition: The Image of Iceland in the Poetics of J.L. Borges”]. In LI Mezhdunarodnaia nauchnaia filologicheskaia konferenciia imeni Liudmily Alekseevny Verbickoi: Izbrannye doklady [St. Petersburg University Studies in Social Sciences & Humanities. Vol. 7. Proceedings of 51st Ludmila Verbitskaya International Philological Conference], edited by V.V. Mokienko, K.V. Manerova, 72–86. St. Petersburg: SPbU Publ., 2025. (In Russ.)
