In the novel, the narrator is like a boxer who seeks to win on points. In the short story, the narrator is like a boxer who goes straight for the knockout. And in both cases, the reader who wants to take up the fight is a worthy opponent. If the short story is like a boxing ring, it is also like a closed room, and for the boxing-loving Argentine master storyteller Julio Cortázar (1914-1984), closed rooms became an obsession. The elevator, the flight cabin, the corridor and the tunnel are just as many challenges to the imagination. Well told, the short story becomes a passage to other worlds. With this selection, which contains samples from all of Cortázar's short story collections, Danish readers have the opportunity to take 11 rounds with one of the 20th century's great 'champs', plus a few essays on the 'sense of the fantastic'.
