Seven Nights, Jorge Luis Borges

I recently read the series of lectures Borges gave in 1977. "Modestly" blind, Borges committed his lectures to memory, and lectured "by heart." In them, he explores Dante's Inferno, the Thousand and One Nights, nightmares, poetry, Buddhism, the Kabbalah, and blindness. That last lecture is, in my opinion, the most thrilling, poetic, and enchanting of the seven. Here is a shining quote:

I, too...have always known that my destiny was, above all, a literary destiny-- that bad things and some good things would happen to me, but that, in the long run, all of it would be converted into words. Particularly the bad things, since happiness does not need to be transformed: happiness is its own end.

If you haven't checked it out, do. I only wish there were more nights in the volume.