"The End" (original

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

title: "El fin") is a

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, s ...

writer

Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, as well as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known bo ...

, first published in ''La Nación'' in 1953. It was included in the 1956 edition of ''

Ficciones ' (in English: "Fictions") is a collection of short stories by Argentine writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges, originally written and published in Spanish between 1941 and 1956. Thirteen stories from ''Ficciones'' were first published by New Direc ...

'', part two (''Artifices'').

Plot summary

"The End" is a response to the Argentine epic ''

Martín Fierro ''Martín Fierro'', also known as ''El Gaucho Martín Fierro'', is a 2,316-line epic poem by the Argentine writer José Hernández. The poem was originally published in two parts, ''El Gaucho Martín Fierro'' (1872) and ''La Vuelta de Martín F ...

'', which Borges had discussed in a long essay published earlier that year.Jorges Luis Borges. ''El Martín Fierro.'' Columba, Buenos Aires, 1953. In the story, a man who presumably has had a crippling

stroke A stroke is a medical condition in which poor blood flow to the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and hemorrhagic, due to bleeding. Both cause parts of the brain to stop functionin ...

winds up half seeing and half hearing a definitive fight between a "

negro In the English language, ''negro'' is a term historically used to denote persons considered to be of Black African heritage. The word ''negro'' means the color black in both Spanish and in Portuguese, where English took it from. The term can be ...

" guitarist who has been dwelling in the man's store and a mysterious stranger who turns out to be Martin Fierro whom the negro has been waiting for. The story ends with Fierro's death at the hands of the negro. Literary scholars have debated the question whether Fierro is a Christ-like figure.

References

Short stories by Jorge Luis Borges 1953 short stories {{1950s-story-stub