"Old, Old Words, Worn Thin": On the Manuscript of Borges's "El inmortal"

This essay examines a probable second draft of the Borges story "El inmortal", originally published as "Los inmortales" in Los Anales de Buenos Aires in February 1947, and subsequently included as the lead story in the short story collection El Aleph in 1949. The manuscript, which is now in Special Collections at Michigan State University Libraries, includes late revisions, though it seems to have been the copy sent to the compositors for Los Anales. There are several printer's marks that indicate where to place the illustrations, two by Amanda Molina y Vedia and one by the writer's sister, Norah Borges. This manuscript does not contain bibliographical references in the left margin, a feature of some other Borges manuscripts from this time, although the story itself includes acknowledged and unacknowledged quotations from a variety of sources.