# Borges, Jorge Luis.

containing the author's reading notes on Keats in preparation for an essay, chiefly consisting of quotations from his background reading with sources (Cambridge History of English Literature, Letters, Colvin, Dickens' Bleak House, Byron, Garrod etc) and page numbers listed near the inner margin, most passages quoted in English, others translated by him into Spanish, 2 pages, text on rectos only, graph paper, hole-punched at inner margin, 4to, [c. early 1950s]

Condition is described in the main body of the cataloguing, when appropriate.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Borges selects  passages from Keats' own letters and other writers' commentaries on the poet. These include, for instance, Colvin's remark that Keats "contrasts the transitoriness of human life, meaning the life of the individual, with the permanence of the song-bird's life, meaning the life of the type", Arnold's report of Keats' comment "I know nothing, I have read nothing; and I mean to follow Solomon's directions: 'Get learning, get understanding'..." and Colvin's discussion of the "fatal influence" on the poet of Leigh Hunt, and Dickens' portrayal of him as Harold Skimpole in Bleak House ("...a brilliant, vivacious, sentimental, but thoroughly selfish man").

Borges used these notes in his essay "El ruiseñor de Keats" ("Keats' Nightingale"), which first appeared in La Nación on 9 December 1951, and was reprinted the following year in his fine collection of essays, Otras inquisiciones. Many of the quotations in the present notes are used directly in the finished essay. He also described these notebook pages and the hand in which they were written in 'Pierre Menard, the Author of Don Quixote', one of his most famous stories. There he attributes them to his character and not to himself, of course, characterizing them as 'the personal system of symbols he used for marginal emendations, and his minute handwriting.'