The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka's 1915 novella. One day a man wakes up to find that he has been transformed into an insect.

Labyrinths, Selected Stories and Other Writings, Jorge Luis Borges's 1962 collection. Recognized all over the world as one of the most original and significant figures in modern literature, Borges was also Cortazar's mentor.

Evelyn Picon Garfield's 1975 critical study, Julio Cortazar, begins and ends with personal interviews that she conducted with Cortazar at his home in Provence, France. An invaluable guide to Cortazar's philosophies, his preferences, and even his nightmares, which illuminate much of the symbolism found in his work.

Cortazar's 1966 novel Hopscotch is recognized as a modern literary classic. Its main character, Horacio Oliveira, has an ambition: to so fragment his personality that his life will become a series of present moments, which never cohere into a perceptible whole. He...