Concept in Definition ABC

A cronopio is an imaginary being that was born from the fantasy of its creator, the Argentine writer Julio Cortázar (1914-1984). According to the writer himself in some interviews, the cronopios were born in his mind one day in 1952 while he was witnessing a representation musical of the teacher Igor Stravinsky.

During the break from the performance, Cortázar found himself alone in the theater, while the rest of the audience had left their seats. Suddenly and unexpectedly a picture strange: indefinable globe-shaped characters, wet looking and green in color, wandering amicably among the empty seats. The image of these beings immediately suggested a name for them, cronopios. Later, the cronopios were described with a partially human aspect and were part of one of his most famous books published in 1962, "Historias de cronopios y famas".

Cortázar does not describe them in a precise way

However, he himself affirmed that they are asocial "individuals"; like poets, marginal people and all those who live in margin of everyday life.

In the story Brief titled "Eugenesia" Cortázar provides some information about these characters: they belong to the lowly classes and when they are adults they resort to fame with the purpose to impregnate their women. In that same tale, it is suggested that the chronopians believe themselves morally superior to the fame.

Famas are the characters opposite to chronopios. Famas are like formal people and they resemble political leaders, managers of multinationals and influential people in society. In an intermediate plane between the chronopians and the famas, there are hopes, characters who have some chronopia and some fame depending on their circumstances.

There are many interpretations that have been given about these curious fictional beings. They are usually considered a metaphor of the popular classes of Argentine society in the 50s and 60s. Some literary critics have understood that the stories of chronopios, fame and hopes carried an attack implicit to Argentine Peronism.

Other beings product of the imagination

In mythological tales and in literature we find other fantastic beings as fascinating as the chronopians. Thus, the harpies are women with wings of great beauty who stole food and the elves are immortal creatures that belonged to a race inferior to that of the gods. The list of fantastic beings is endless: fairies, mermaids, mutants, nymphs, dryads, gargoyles ...

Photos: Fotolia - Irmun / Seamartini