Tango four lectures, authored by: Jorge Luis Borges

The book is about four talks on four evenings delivered about the art of tango in 1966. In this book, Borges dealt with the art of tango that originated in Buenos Aires. It intertwines melody with singing and dance with words. The reader will get to know a new face of Borges, who is very passionate about this art. Borges introduces by talking about the details of this art, including the circumstances of its emergence and its key figures, such as composers and musicians. He also discusses the means by which tango conquered the world and became a symbol of Argentina. Borges maintains the style that the reader is accustomed to, which provokes the imagination. Among what is mentioned in the book: In the lecture, or rather in the previous talk, I said that the word "Argentine," when announcing belonging to Argentina, evokes in any part of the world two words, which are two words referring to a man and to music: the word "gaucho" and the word "tango." It could be said that this combination of ideas is universal; at least, I have experienced it this way in various parts of America and Europe. At first glance, it might be said that these two words, "gaucho" and "tango," have nothing in common. However, I believe there is a relationship between them, even though the gaucho has never danced tango, nor has he known it. We have two negative proofs of this, which are two poetic excerpts: one is from Esquivel, who uses two voices, and if I am not mistaken, in his poetic work, the word "comadrito," and he knows it but never uses the word "tango," and it seems he ignored the word "stabilization." Number of pages: 143