Borges and Me An Encounter
- 4 Aug 2022
- 9781838850234
- £10.99
- 320 pp
- 129×198mm
- 5 Aug 2021
- 9781838850241
- £8.79
- 320 pp
In a few words
This is the true story of the unlikely friendship between a young Jay Parini and Jorge Luis Borges — and their road trip across the Highlands; now a film directed by Marc Turtletaub featuring Alan Cumming and Fionn Whitehead
In a few words
This is the true story of the unlikely friendship between a young Jay Parini and Jorge Luis Borges — and their road trip across the Highlands; now a film directed by Marc Turtletaub featuring Alan Cumming and Fionn Whitehead
This is a jewel of a book. Very funny, clever, moving, luminous with love of literature and landscape. Parini’s portrait of both Borges and Scotland is exquisite, deeply affectionate, sometimes comically irritable . . . The young Parini's painful writing ambitions are beautifully wrought . . . It’s hard to conceive of how an old and frail blind man could have had such psychological force, such unworldly innocence, such redeeming sway over others, but Jay Parini persuades us fabulously in a high-style Borgesian marriage of fiction and history
Ian Mcewan
For readers who already admire Borges, this memoir will be a delicious treat. For those who have yet to read him, Parini provides the perfect entry point to a writer who altered the way many think of literature
This is a jewel of a book. Very funny, clever, moving, luminous with love of literature and landscape. Parini’s portrait of both Borges and Scotland is exquisite, deeply affectionate, sometimes comically irritable . . . The young Parini's painful writing ambitions are beautifully wrought . . . It’s hard to conceive of how an old and frail blind man could have had such psychological force, such unworldly innocence, such redeeming sway over others, but Jay Parini persuades us fabulously in a high-style Borgesian marriage of fiction and history
Ian Mcewan
For readers who already admire Borges, this memoir will be a delicious treat. For those who have yet to read him, Parini provides the perfect entry point to a writer who altered the way many think of literature
More about
the book
‘A jewel of a book’ IAN MCEWAN
ADAPTED INTO THE 2026 FILM BY MARC TURTLELAUB FEATURING ALAN CUMMING AND FIONN WHITEHEAD
In frantic flight from the Vietnam War, Jay Parini leaves the United States for Scotland. There, through unlikely circumstances, he meets famed Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges. The pair embark on a trip to the Scottish Highlands, and on the way the charmingly garrulous Borges takes Parini on a grand tour of western literature and ideas while promising to teach him about love and poetry.
Borges and Me is a classic road novel, based on true events. It’s also a magical tour of an era – like our own – in which uncertainties abound, and when – as ever – it’s the young and the old who hear voices and dream dreams.
More about
the book
‘A jewel of a book’ IAN MCEWAN
ADAPTED INTO THE 2026 FILM BY MARC TURTLELAUB FEATURING ALAN CUMMING AND FIONN WHITEHEAD
In frantic flight from the Vietnam War, Jay Parini leaves the United States for Scotland. There, through unlikely circumstances, he meets famed Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges. The pair embark on a trip to the Scottish Highlands, and on the way the charmingly garrulous Borges takes Parini on a grand tour of western literature and ideas while promising to teach him about love and poetry.
Borges and Me is a classic road novel, based on true events. It’s also a magical tour of an era – like our own – in which uncertainties abound, and when – as ever – it’s the young and the old who hear voices and dream dreams.
Often caper-ish and laugh-out-loud funny . . . this little jewel also brims with affection and gratitude . . . with romantic reveries, stolen lines of poetry, philosophical meanderings and charismatic/egotistical performances showcasing his vast expanse of literary and historic knowledge
A classic comic-philosophical road story, playfully conscious of its own traditions . . . The pressure to capture Scotland in words for the great Jorge Luis Borges forces Jay to think about language in a new way, to “up his game” as a poet, and this artistic journey, occurring alongside their physical journey, becomes the book’s emotional backbone . . . A fun, tightly crafted, tender-hearted literary adventure [and] an improbable tale that, like many improbable tales, happens to be true
I don't think I've read any book recently with such outright and unalloyed enjoyment. Jay Parini's wry, ridiculously funny and beautifully written memoir is a literary road trip par excellence. It will open your eyes wide and blow your mind. Devastatingly honest, darkly crazy and deeply touching, this is that rare sort of book: finish it, and you just want to start it all over again
Philip Hoare
Ironic, funny, adorable . . . What a wonderful book! It gave me so much pleasure to read it
Erica Jong
Often caper-ish and laugh-out-loud funny . . . this little jewel also brims with affection and gratitude . . . with romantic reveries, stolen lines of poetry, philosophical meanderings and charismatic/egotistical performances showcasing his vast expanse of literary and historic knowledge
A classic comic-philosophical road story, playfully conscious of its own traditions . . . The pressure to capture Scotland in words for the great Jorge Luis Borges forces Jay to think about language in a new way, to “up his game” as a poet, and this artistic journey, occurring alongside their physical journey, becomes the book’s emotional backbone . . . A fun, tightly crafted, tender-hearted literary adventure [and] an improbable tale that, like many improbable tales, happens to be true
I don't think I've read any book recently with such outright and unalloyed enjoyment. Jay Parini's wry, ridiculously funny and beautifully written memoir is a literary road trip par excellence. It will open your eyes wide and blow your mind. Devastatingly honest, darkly crazy and deeply touching, this is that rare sort of book: finish it, and you just want to start it all over again
Philip Hoare
Ironic, funny, adorable . . . What a wonderful book! It gave me so much pleasure to read it
Erica Jong
