Reflections on Autoexoticism by Way of Cortazarian Literature

The oeuvre of Julio CortÁzar contains many facets of autoexoticism. In this essay, I engage with a few of his works to examine the notion of autoexoticism in two main aspects: first, the transformation of the self into the other self as a form; second, autoexoticists as those whose notion of the self inhabits their own desirous gaze. Textual examples in Cortázar's literature that illustrate the first aspect are ubiquitous. For instance, in his short story “Lejana” we observe the alteration of Alina Reyes into a beggar in Budapest as she envisages with increasing clarity in her diary, while living in Buenos Aires, another self in Budapest. Her obsession with and fervent desire for this other self culminates in a final metamorphosis into it. The metamorphosis is based on the narcissistic reduplication of her self. In other words, through the externalization and exoticization of her self, she assumes an autoexoticist one.