I’ve started reading the blog Planet of the Blind by author Stephen Kuusisto, who has been “legally blind” since birth.

In a post titled “Spoons in the Snow“, Kuusisto describes attending the keynote address by Jorge Luis Borges at a conference on Nabokov in the late 1970s. Amusingly, it turns out that in the Q&A following Borges’ talk that Borges gave the impression that he had never heard of Nabokov. (It’s likely that Borges was simply toying with the Nabokov scholars.)

Writing is not another form of journalism

But the gem of Kuusisto’s post is not that anecdote but the lesson learned from Borges, or “How would I be able to write about the world if I couldn’t see it?”

“I thought some more about Borges.

A friend told me how his mother used to walk everyday in Buenos Aires with the poet. She would describe the things she was seeing in the central market and in turn Borges would narrate his version of their walk.

This emancipation from the photographic image is what allowed me to become a writer.

What a relief it is to write about the things I do not see!”

Went up to San Isidro to visit the home of Villa Ocampo, one of the homes of Victoria Ocampo. The Web site for Villa Ocampo is actually quite good and contains a lot of information that the woman who was a great patron of the arts

It’s a gorgeous house, certainly worth a visit.

If you can make it out to San Isidro, then stop by Victoria Ocampo’s house in Palermo….it’s a very different style.

One of my readers here in Buenos Aires, Dolores, sent me the following photos of abandoned or taken houses for the City that Fades Away series.

Catamarca y Humberto Primo
That cupola can’t last much longer, can it?

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Cevallos y Humberto Primo

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Mexico 2900

That window is a beauty.

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Paysandu y Rivadavia
I’ve seen the exterior of this house myself and it’s wonderful. Notice that the windows and entrances are blocked over to keep people out otherwise empty houses become prime targets for squatters.