# Adolfo Bioy Casares

Adolfo Bioy Casares (September 15, 1914 – March 8, 1999) was an Argentine fiction writer.

## Quotes

* "Toda máquina está en proceso de extinción."
** Machines are always on the verge of extinction.
*** Guirnaldas con amores, 1959.
* "El mismo lobo tiene momentos de debilidad, en que se pone del lado del cordero y piensa: Ojalá que huya."
** Even the wolf has its moments of weakness, in which it sides with the lamb and thinks: I hope it runs away.
*** Guirnaldas con amores, 1959.
* "¿No es lo mismo que suceda lo que deseamos, que desear lo que suceda? Lo que importa es que nuestra voluntad y los sucesos estén de acuerdo."
** Is there any difference between our desires becoming reality, and our desiring what is already real? What matters is that our will and reality agree with one another.
*** La otra aventura, 1968.
* "Creyó por primera vez entender porqué se decía que la vida es sueño: si uno vive bastante, los hechos de su vida, como los de un sueño, su vuelven incomunicables porque a nadie interesan."
** He thought he understood for the first time why some said life is a dream: If one lives long enough, facts about your life, just like your dreams, become impossible to communicate, because nobody cares about them.
*** Diario de la Guerra del Cerdo, 1969.
* "En la vejez todo es triste y ridículo: hasta el miedo a la muerte."
** Everything is sad and ridiculous in old age. Even the fear of death.
*** Diario de la Guerra del Cerdo, 1969.
* "Llega un momento en la vida en que, haga uno lo que haga, solamente aburre. Queda entonces una manera de recuperar el prestigio: morir."
** There comes a moment in your life when, no matter what you do, you bore everybody else. There is only one way to get back the lost prestige. Dying.
** Fuente: Diario de la Guerra del Cerdo, 1969.
* "El mundo atribuye sus infortunios a las conspiraciones y maquinaciones de grandes malvados. Entiendo que se subestima la estupidez."
** The world attributes its misfortunes to the schemes and plottings of the very evil and powerful. I think stupidity is underestimated.
*** Breve diccionario del argentino exquisito, 1978.
* "Las mujeres son el impuesto que pagamos por el placer."
** Women are the tax we pay on pleasure
*** Una muñeca rusa, 1991.
* "La vida es una partida de ajedrez y nunca sabe uno a ciencia cierta cuándo está ganando o perdiendo."
** Life is a game of chess and you never really know when you are winning or losing.
*** Una muñeca rusa, 1991.
* "Revolución: Movimiento político que ilusiona a muchos, desiluciona a más, incomoda a casi todos y enriquece extraordinariamente a unos pocos. Goza de firme prestigio."
** Revolution: Political movement which gets many people´s hopes up, let´s even more people down, makes almost everybody uncomfortable, and a few, extraordinarily rich. It is widely held in high regard.
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "Más exclusivamente que en la vigilia, en el sueño somos nosotros. Contribuimos con todo el reparto."
** Even more so than when we are awake, we are ourselves when we are asleep. We play all the parts.
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "Debió de recibir una buena noticia, porque ayer tenía el pelo blanco y hoy apareció completamente rubia."
** She must have received some great news, because yesterday her hair was white and today it is completely blond.
** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "La vida es difícil. Para estar en paz con uno mismo hay que decir la verdad. Para estar en paz con el prójimo hay que mentir."
** Life's hard. To be in peace with oneself, one must speak the truth. To be in peace with others, one must lie.
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "No he notado en las feministas mayor simpatía por las otras mujeres."
** I have not perceived any increased sympathy for other women in feminists."
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "Un médico es la conjunción de un guardapolvo, un estetoscópio y una jerga."
** A doctor is the conjunction of a white coat, a stethoscope, and a jargon.
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.
* "A veces pienso que La vida de los poetas de Johnson es todo lo que necesito para ser feliz."
** Sometimes I think Johnson´s Lives of the English Poets is all I need to be happy.
*** Descanso de caminantes, 2001.

## Quotes about

* it was not until 1937 that Argentine fantastic literature would experience its greatest achievements. The creative trio of Silvina Ocampo, Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares, good friends in Buenos Aires, met to publish their first anthology of fantastic literature [Anthology of Fantastic Literature (1939)]
** Marjorie Agosín Introduction to Secret Weavers: Stories of the Fantastic by Women Writers of Argentina and Chile (1992)
* For the majority of readers, Latin American fantastic literature operates under the tutelage of the great masters: Jorge Luis Borges, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Julio Cortázar and Gabriel García Márquez. However, although few are acquainted with their works, many women began experimenting with this genre well before their male counterparts and were the true precursors of the form, though their names remained on the shelves of oblivion, without the recognition that they deserved. María Luisa Bombal, for example, wrote the fantastic nouvelle, House of Mist (1937) before the famous Ficciones (1944) of Borges, and the Mexican, Elena Garro, wrote Remembrance of Things to Come (1962) before the publication of García Márquez' One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967).
** Marjorie Agosín "Reflections on the Fantastic" Translated from the Spanish by Celeste Kostopulos-Cooperman. In Secret Weavers: Stories of the Fantastic by Women Writers of Argentina and Chile (1992)

## External links

* Caricature and obituary at literatura.org (in Spanish)
* logosfreebooks.org biography of Bioy Casares (in Spanish)
* Spanish-language page on Bioy Casares, including links to some passages from his works
* Bioy reknown around the world. Published online in www.Argentina.ar (in English)

#### About The Invention of Morel

* Borges on Morel
* Review of 'The Invention of Morel' by Seamus Sweeney on nthposition.com
* Prologue to The Invention of Morel (in Spanish)
* Review of 'The Invention of Morel' on waggish.