A Little Detour into Borges and Criticism

I've been reading a ton of Jorge Luis Borges recently. The man has become my favorite author. As much as I love his short stories, I may love his essays even more. There is something that is just so appealing to me about Borges' non-fiction writing; each essay is like an opportunity to sit down and chat with this incredibly well-read and intelligent person, to hear him ruminate with resounding clarity and an enduring sense of wonder about endless topics in philosophy, religion, politics and history, and above all, literature. I love it!

If you've never read Borges before, he is sort of a super-brainy forefather to the Latin American Magical Realists. His short stories often involve the exploration of an idea or logical puzzle. There are a few central themes that he is particularly fond of and returns to again and again, among them, the unity of all humans and human experience and the unfathomability of the concept of infinity. I highly recommend Labyrinths as a starting point. If you find you have the pallet for him, go on to his Collected Fictions and Selected Non-Fictions;

All this literary material may seem at first blush a bit far off topic, but Borges is actually a big inspiration for this site. I've often struggled with the nagging fear that music writing and criticism is parasitic, that no matter what, it will always be inferior to the production of music itself. But reading Borges' lucid and insightful literary criticism, I see that criticism can act as an invaluable bridge between the reader/listener/consumer and the book/music/art itself, as well as between fellow art appreciators. Besides, I totally subscribe to the notion that the viewer/listener collaborates with the artist to create the meaning and value of his art. With that in mind, criticism can be just as creative as art itself, a secondary vehicle that nevertheless animates and articulates what the experience of art is for the recipient. Criticism can breathe life into thoughts and emotions that usually go unexpressed and unexplored, can bring them more clearly into focus, can put their aesthetic mechanisms "under the magnifying glass" (if you will permit the pun).

Now, with regards to actual music-related content, the purported focus of this site, I'm going to start doing some album reviews and posting them up here. I think it'll provide some good practice and put a give a little structure to what I'm trying to do here. My first review will be of the Jesus Lizard's 1992 album Liar, motivated and inspired by Audrey Gertz's very cool 1992 music review project (thanks, Audrey!). Look for it here soon~