With Borges

Little known in the West and in the former USSR, the name of Weinberg, the third great Russian composer of the 20th century, after Prokofiev and Shostakovich, seems to be slowly emerging from the shadow of the latter, his protector and friend. Far from being an epigone, he is rather, by his temperament as a symphonist and the importance of his chamber music, the spiritual heir. This part of his vast catalogue, not written to put food on the table, includes 17 quartets, the most experimental body of his work along with his sonatas, those for cello, written with Rostropovich in mind, being henceforth consecrated.

This book seeks to fill a double lacuna in Borges scholarship. For one, this scholarship has been largely developed through the lens of literary and cultural studies, and not by political theorists who bring a distinct disciplinary perspective into the reading of literary works. Secondly, mainstream interpreters have overlooked or have not analyzed enough Borges’s political sympathies.