Jorge Luis Borges- The Other Duel

Shawn Bartee

The Other Duel
Jorge Luis Borges


Their lack of imagination freed them from fear and pity alike, though fear did touch them sometimes, just as the cavalry charged them. (Borges 141)

After reading The Other Duel, I found that this phrase most interesting to me. As we know the two characters in the story lived without fear, without concern of dying, and without concern of other people. When reading the story I noticed that the two, Silveira and Cardosa lived like warriors. They weren’t afraid of anyone or anything. Just thinking about how they treated the female in the story, they had no imagination no love, no imagination to dream, or feel for someone else. They knew of nothing else but battle, they fought to the death. In other words they lived to die. The characters didn’t fear dying, they just wanted to win the battle, they didn’t have any imagination to feel and understand pain, they couldn’t hurt or pity, or even cry. I believe that this phrase was just so powerful, the lack of fear is the reason why they live the way they did, the lack of certainty, lack of fear and panic. The use of this phrase in the story is brilliant. As we discussed in class, the characters lived in a Nihilistic world, and everything meant nothing to them, the only thing that they were certain of is death, so why would they have to fear anything.