Source: See Buenos Aires Index.
Image: Calle Maipú (Maipú Street), Buenos Aires.
Comments: This is the street in an upper middle class neighborhood in downtown Buenos Aires where Borges lived. You can just make out the entrance to his building on the right. Borges was born in this city in 1899. His family was well educated and belonged to the upper middle class. In fact, his maternal grandfather was a hero who fought in the Buenos Aires Army against the dictator Juan Manuel Rojas. Borges' father was a lawyer and teacher and his mother was British, which means Borges grew up in a partially English-speaking and Anglocentric home. Borges and his parents moved to Geneva, Switzerland, in 1914, where the teenager learned French and German. After several years the family lived in various cities in Spain, but they returned to Buenos Aires in 1921. From 1967 to just before the end of his life (he died in Geneva in 1986), he lived here on Calle Maipú. His personal assistant, María Kodama, lived nearby, and she accompanied him on his many international trips after he went blind in the early 1950s.
For a pair of photos of María Kodama, click on the following image: