For those already signed up for Borges - Crevices of Unreason, and for those considering the course, which begins in two weeks, I wanted to give you some guidance on where to find the readings. If you find a copy of Collected Fictions (published by Penguin in 1999, translated by Andrew Hurley), you'll have everything you need for the class. That said, Hurley's not my favorite translator of Borges.

Many of you probably own the collection Labyrinths: Selected Stories and Other Writings (multiple translators; edited by Donald Yates and James Irby and published by New Directions in 1988). I prefer these translations to those in Collected Fictions, but the collection's not comprehensive. To fill in the gaps, you'll have to secure the Hurley/Penguin collection or gather the smaller volumes in which the stories originally appeared (The Aleph, Shakespeare's Memory, The Book of Sands).

The best translations were done through a 20-year collaboration between Borges and Harvard poetry professor Norman Thomas di Giovanni. Borges was so pleased with di Giovanni's translations that he agreed to split the royalties with him, but that apparently didn't sit well with Borges' widow Maria Kodama, who after Borges' death commissioned the Hurley translations and let di Giovanni's go out of print. Unfortunately, it's difficult to get your hands on the di Giovanni translations, but if you can, by all means.

In summary...

Work	Week	Suggested Source
Avatars of the Tortoise	1	Labyrinths
The Garden of Forking Paths	1	Labyrinths
The Lottery in Babylon	1	Labyrinths
The Library of Babel	2	Labyrinths
The Book of Sand	2	Collected Fictions, The Book of Sand
The Aleph	3	Collected Fictions, The Aleph
Funes, the Memorious	3	Labyrinths
Shakespeare’s Memory	3	Collected Fictions
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius	4	Labyrinths
The Other Death	4	Collected Fictions, The Aleph
The Circular Ruins	5	Labyrinths
Ibn-Hakkan al-Bokhari, Dead in His Labyrinth	5	Collected Fictions, The Aleph
Borges and Myself	6	Labyrinths
The Other	6	Collected Fictions, The Book of Sand
August 25, 1983	6	Collected Fictions

Several years ago, British artist Michelle Lord created and photographed cardboard models of the City of Immortals from Borges' story "The Immortal." More information and photos here.

Borges Center (University of Pittsburgh)
'Avatars of the Tortoise'
'Jorge Luis Borges, The Art of Fiction No. 39' (Paris Review)

Week 1 – Choice and Chance

“Avatars of the Tortoise,” “The Garden of Forking Paths,” and “The Lottery in Babylon”

Week 2 – Bibliographic Labyrinths

“The Library of Babel” and “The Book of Sand”

Week 3 – Unlimited Sense and Memory

“The Aleph,” “Funes, the Memorious,” and “Shakespeare’s Memory”

Week 4 – False History and Biography

“Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius” and “The Other Death”

Week 5 – Recursive Ruins

“The Circular Ruins” and “Ibn-Hakkan al-Bokhari, Dead in His Labyrinth”

Week 6 – Author Meets Writer

“Borges and Myself,” “The Other,” and “August 25, 1983”