Ventanas a lo insólito: references to photography in the short stories and essays by Julio Cortázar

Abstract

Regarding Cortázar’s poetics about the short stories, it is possible to identify metaphors and similes created in order to define the literary genre and to address the narrative act. Such metaphors assume several intonations throughout the author’s work, configuring not only the recurrence of themes which is present in essays and narratives, but also the traces of contamination of fictional writings and critiques. The references to photography as parameter for the literary construction are the object of analysis in essays that assume some fictional traces and constitute narrative motifs in short stories which span the dimension of criticism. This article puts into dialogue two essays, “Algunos aspectos del cuento” and “Ventanas a lo insólito”, and two short stories, “Las babas del diablo” and “Apocalipsis de Solentiname”, to analyze how reference to photography makes possible the opening to an extraordinary reality.