The Book of Imaginary Beings

In a perfect pairing of talent, this volume blends twenty illustrations by Peter Sís with Jorge Luis Borges’s 1957 compilation of 116 ＂strange creatures conceived through time and space by the human imagination,＂ from dragons and centaurs to Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire Cat and the Morlocks of H. G. Wells’s The Time Machine. A lavish feast of exotica brought vividly to life with art commissioned specifically for this volume, The Book of Imaginary Beings will delight readers of classic fantasy as well as Borges’s many admirers.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Jorges Luis Borgeswas born in Buenos Aires in 1899 and educated in Europe. One of the most widely acclaimed writers of our time, he published many collections of poems, essays and short stories, before his death in Geneva in June 1986. In 1961 Borges shared the International Publishers’ Prize with Samuel Beckett. The Ingram Merrill Foundation granted him its Annual Literary Award in 1966 for his ＂outstanding contribution to literature.＂ In 1971 Columbia University awarded him the first of many degrees of Doctor of Letters, honoris causa that he was to receive from the English-speaking world. In 1971 he received the fifth biennial Jerusalem Prize and in 1973 was given the Alfonso Reyes Prize, one of Mexico’s most prestigious cultural awards. In 1980 he shared the Cervantes Prize (the Spanish world’s highest literary accolade) with Gerardo Diego. Borges was Director of the Argentine National Library from 1955 until 1973. In a tribute to Borges, Mario Vargas Llosa wrote: ＂His is a world of clear, pure, and at the same time unusual ideas...expressed in words of great directness and restraint. [He] was a superb storyteller. One reads most of Borges’ tales with the hypnotic interest usually reserved for reading detective fiction...＂

Andrew Hurley is a translator of numerous works of literature, criticism, history, and memoir. He is professor emeritus at the University of Puerto Rico.

Peter Sís has received five New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Book of the Year awards, a Society of Illustrators Gold Medal, and a Caldecott Honor. He was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2003.