"The books and the night", neurological perspective on Jorge Luis Borges' blindness
Gac. méd. Méx
;
155(5): 516-518, Sep.-Oct. 2019. graf
Article
in English
| LILACS
| ID: biblio-1286553
ABSTRACT
The works of Argentinian scholar Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) have captivated physicians. An assiduous reader, he was given, with magnificent irony, "books and the night". Borges suffered from chronic and irreversible blindness, which influenced much of his work and has been the subject of different literary and diagnostic analyses from the ophthalmological point of view. However, the characteristics of his visual impairment have escaped the neurological approach, which is why we reviewed his work looking for data suggesting a concomitant brain injury. On his autobiography, he recounts how, during an episode of septicemia, he suffered hallucinations and loss of speech; in addition, in some poems and essays he describes data that suggest "phantom chromatopsia", a lesion of cortical origin. After that accident, Borges survived with a radical change in literary style. Although a precise diagnosis is impossible, his literary work allows recognizing some elements in favor of concomitant brain involvement.
Full text:
Available
Index:
LILACS (Americas)
Main subject:
Poetry as Topic
/
Writing
/
Blindness
/
Famous Persons
/
Brain Injuries, Traumatic
Type of study:
Etiology study
Country/Region as subject:
South America
/
Argentina
Language:
English
Journal:
Gac. méd. Méx
Journal subject:
Medicine
Year:
2019
Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Mexico
Institution/Affiliation country:
Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León/MX
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