Julio Cortázar was born in Brussels in 1914, three weeks after Germany invaded neutral Belgium in World War I. He was the son of an Argentinian diplomat who moved his family first to Switzerland, then to Spain, and finally back to Argentina before abandoning his family when Julio was six years old. In 1951, opposing the government of Juan Perón, he moved to Paris, where he lived for the rest of his life. He died in 1984.
Cortázar is best known for his translations from several languages and for his highly experimental and original prose fiction, including the novel,
Rayuela (Hopscotch) in which the following excerpt, often reprinted separately as a prose poem, appears as Chapter 7. This novel shows his surrealistic, postmodern, interactive narrative technique, which encourages the reader to choose the order in which the chapters are to be read. Cortázar was a contemporary, though not a close friend, of Jorge Luis Borges. He was one of the founders of the so-called Latin American Boom and of the movement that came to be known as magical realism, which influenced many writers including Gabriel García Marquez, Isabel Allende, Salman Rushdie, Tim O’Brien, and Toni Morrison.
Hopscotch, Chapter 7, “I Touch Your Mouth”
I touch your mouth, with one finger I touch the edge of your mouth, I go on drawing it as if it came out from my hand, as if for the first time your mouth partly opened, and it is enough for me to close my eyes in order to undo it all and start again, I give birth each time to the mouth that I desire, the mouth that my hand chooses and draws on your face, a mouth chosen from among all, chosen with supreme freedom for me to draw with my hand for your face, and which, by a chance that I do not seek to understand, coincides exactly with your mouth that smiles under the one that my hand draws for you.
You look at me, closely you look at me, each time more closely, and then we play Cyclops, we look at each other more closely and our eyes grow large, coming closer to each other, superimposing themselves and then we Cyclopes look at each other, breathing, confused, our mouths meet and fight warmly, biting each other on the lips, barely resting the tongue on the teeth, playing in their enclosure where the heavy air comes and goes with an old perfume and a silence. Then my hands seek to plunge into your hair, to slowly fondle the depth of your hair while we kiss as if we had mouths full of flowers or fish, of lively movements, of dark fragrance. And if we bite each other, the pain is sweet, and if we suffocate in a brief and terrible simultaneous sucking in of breath, that instantaneous death is beautiful. And there is one single saliva and one single flavor of ripe fruit, and I feel you tremble against me like a moon in the water.
Original Spanish Text
https://libreriodelaplata.com/rayuel...ca-capitulo-7/
Rayuela,, Capitulo 7
Toco tu boca, con un dedo toco el borde de tu boca, voy dibujándola como si saliera de mi mano, como si por primera vez tu boca se entreabriera, y me basta cerrar los ojos para deshacerlo todo y recomenzar, hago nacer cada vez la boca que deseo, la boca que mi mano elige y te dibuja en la cara, una boca elegida entre todas con soberana libertad elegida por mí para dibujarla con mi mano por tu cara, y que por un azar que no busco comprender coincide exactamente con tu boca que sonríe por debajo de la que mi mano te dibuja.
Me miras, de cerca me miras, cada vez más de cerca y entonces jugamos al cíclope, nos miramos cada vez más de cerca y los ojos se agrandan, se acercan entre sí, se superponen y los cíclopes se miran, respirando, confundidos, las bocas se encuentran y luchan tibiamente mordiéndose con los labios, apoyando apenas la lengua en los dientes, jugando en sus recintos donde un aire pesado va y viene con un perfume viejo y un silencio. Entonces mis manos buscan hundirse en tu pelo, acariciar lentamente la profundidad de tu pelo mientras nos besamos como si tuvieramos la boca llena de flores o de peces, de movimientos vivos, de fragancia oscura. Y si nos mordemos el dolor es dulce, y si nos ahogamos en un breve y terrible absorber simultáneo del aliento, esa instantánea muerte es bella. Y hay una sola saliva y un solo sabor a fruta madura, y yo te siento temblar contra mí como una luna en el agua.
Crib:
I touch your mouth, with one finger I touch the border of your mouth, I am drawing as if it left from my hand, as if for the first time your mouth half-opened, and it is enough for me to close my eyes in order to undo it all and start again, I give birth each time to the mouth that I desire, the mouth that my hand chooses and draws on your face, a mouth chosen from among all, chosen with sovereign freedom for me to draw with my hand for your face, and which, by a chance that I do not seek to understand, matches exactly with your mouth that smiles under the one that my hand draws for you.
You look at me, closely you look at me, each time closer, and then we play Cyclops, we look at each other more closely and our eyes expand, coming closer to each other, one putting itself on top of the other, and the Cyclopes look at each other, breathing, confused, our mouths encounter each other and struggle tepidly, biting each other on the lips, hardly supporting the tongue on the teeth, playing in their enclosures where the heavy air goes and comes with an old perfume and a silence. Then my hands seek to sink into your hair, to slowly caress the profundity/deep esse of your hair while we kiss as if we had a mouth full of flowers or fish, of lively movements, of dark fragrance. And if we bite each other, the pain is sweet, and if we drown in a brief and terrible lapping up of breath, that instantaneous death is beautiful. And there is one single saliva and one single taste of ripe fruit, and I feel you tremble against me like a moon in the water.
Cortázar, “I Touch Your Mouth”
Linear Mode
