Which Argentine writer made the Minotaur the narrator of “The House of Asterion”?

Jorge Luis Borges made the Minotaur the narrator of “The House of Asterion.”

First published in 1947, Borges’s short story retells the Minotaur myth from the creature’s own perspective. Its narrator describes his strange home, his solitude, and his expectation of a liberating visitor. The story delays the full identification of the narrator, inviting readers to reinterpret familiar elements of the myth.

Borges’s version is much shorter and more psychological than a conventional adventure retelling. The Labyrinth becomes both a physical setting and a symbol of isolation, while the Minotaur is presented with ambiguity rather than as a simple monster.

The title uses Asterion, a name associated with the Minotaur in ancient mythographic tradition. Borges’s story is therefore a modern literary adaptation, not an ancient source for the original Greek myth.