Books: Quicker than the Eye?

ALL FIRES THE FIRE by JULIO CORTAZAR 152 pages. Pantheon. $5.95.

To deal in illusion but not be dismissed as an illusionist is the nearly unsolvable problem of a writer like Julio Cortazar. For him the short story is the perfect form — a fine dazzle, then a quick curtain and nothing left but spots on the retina. But an entire collection of Cortazar's glittering tricky fiction invites the reader's eye to outguess the magician's hand. The mood that results is a profitless mixture of admiration and something not unlike contempt.

The only cure is...

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