Julio Cortazar - Argentina

Biography:
Julio Cortázar (sometimes called "Grandísimo Cronopio" in reference to a genus of fantastic creatures he created) was born in Brussels, Belgium, in 1914, to Argentine parents. When he was four years old, his family returned to Buenos Aires to a section of town called Banfield. After completing his studies at the University of Buenos Aires, he became a professor of French literature at the University of Cuyo, Mendoza, in the middle 1940s.

In 1951, in opposition to the Perón regime, Cortázar emigrated to France, where he lived until his death. From 1952 he worked for UNESCO as a translator. His translation projects included Spanish renderings of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe and the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, and it is commonly noted that Poe's influence is recognizable in his work.

In his later years he underwent a political transformation, becoming actively engaged with leftist causes in Latin America, and openly supporting the Cuban Revolution and the Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

He was married three times, to Aurora Bernárdez (in 1953), Ugné Karvelis and Carol Dunlop.

Julio Cortázar died of leukemia in Paris in 1984 and was interred there in the Cimetière du Montparnasse. It has recently been suggested that AIDS (contracted through a blood transfusion before this disease was identified and given a name) may have been the cause of his death, though the fact not only reminds uncomfirmed, but is sometimes considered a urban myth.

You can find the full biography here

Related Posts:
Hopscotch by Julio Cortázar
Diary of Andrés Fava by Julio Cortázar
Final Exam by Julio Cortázar

Works:
1938 - Presencía
1949 - Los Reyes
1951 - Bestiario
1956 - Final del juego
1959 - Las Armas Secretas
1960 - Los Premios - The Winners
1962 - Historias de Cronopios y de Famas - Cronopios and Famas
1963 - Rayuela - Hopscotch
1964 - Cuentos
1966 - Todos Los Fuegos El Fuego / All the Fires the Fire
1967 - El perseguidor y otros cuentos
1967 - Blow-Up And Other Stories
1967 - La vuelta al día en ochenta mundos - Around the Day in Eighty Worlds
1968 - Ceremonias
1968 - Buenos Aires
1968 - 62 / Modelo para armar - 62: A Model Kit
1969 - Último round
1970 - Literatura en la revolución y revolución en la literatura (with Oscar Collazos and Mario Vargas Llosa)
1970 - Viaje alrededor de una mesa
1971 - La isla a mediodía y otros relatos
1971 - Pameos y meopas
1972 - Prosa del observatorio
1973 - Libro de Manuel
1973 - La casilla de los Morelli
1974 - Octaedro
1976 - Humanario
1976 - Los relatos (3 vols.)
1977 - Alguien Que Anda Por Ahi
1979 - Un Tal Lucas
1980 - A Change of Light and Other Stories
1981 - París: ritmos de una ciudad
1981 - Queremos Tanto a Glenda
1983 - Deshoras
1983 - Los autonautas de la cosmopista
1983 - Nicaragua, tan violentamente dulce - Nicaraguan Sketches
1984 - Salvo El Crepusculo
1984 - Argentina: años de alambradas culturales
1984 - Nada a Pehuajó, y Adiós, Robinson
1985 - Cortázar
1986 - El Examen
1986 - Divertimento
1987 - Policrítica en la hora de los chacales
1987 - Diario de Andres Fava - Diary of Andres Fava
1989 - Fantomas contra los vampiros multinacionales
1990 - Cartas a una pelirroja
1994 - Cuentos completos (1945-1982)
1994 - Siete Cuentos
1994 - Obra crítica (3 vols.)

On film:
1966 - Blow-Up - Directed by Michelangelo Antonioni