Cortázar: fragmented stories and the importance of the reader in the narrative

Abstract

In the following article, we have sought to highlight Cortázar’s concept of the author-work-reader relationship. From his earliest novels, Cortázar revealed his intent to break with the established canon, with his most important work, Hopscotch, demonstrating this very rupture with respect to the traditional concept of the novel. Such an idea of fragmented stories that alternate with other types of discourse did, however, respond to what we believe is a more active type of participation from the reader who is beseiged by a variety of motives. This approach even leads the author to articulate different forms of discourse in which he can include “stories”k through frames, as is the case in Último round.