câirculos de Borges

This thesis analyzes the interaction of three primordial circular concepts in the formation of the literary identity of Jorge Luis Borges: the English language, intertextuality, and translation. The allegory of concentric circles facilitates the explanation of the complexity of these processes that intertwine and interact expanding to the infinite. This is not only a metaphor but also a metaphysical dilemma which Borges has utilized to explain time not as an absolute progression where a before and after are feasible but rather as a cyclical idea in which the return and the repetition are eternal. The three key concepts will be analyzed, using as an example, a short story by one of the English writers who Borges has cited and translated, Gilbert Keith Chesterton, "The Three Horsemen of Apocalypse." Borges translated Chestertons tale prior to writing "The Garden of Forking Paths," and this thesis demonstrates how we may discern Chesterton's influence on the Argentine's fiction, particularly within the genre of the detective story.