Cortázar finishes his first novel when he is nine years old. He also writes poems. His family suspects they are copied from someone else, this fact produces great distress on him.

In 1932 he obtains his Normal Teacher Diploma, which allows him to teach at schools. That same year he tries to travel to Europe in a cargo boat with a group of friends, but he does not achieve his purpose. We can find this failure in his short story Lugar llamado Kindberg.

He publishes his first poems in 1938 under the title of Presencia and using Julio Denis as a pseudonym. In 1944 moves to Cuyo, Mendoza where he teaches French Literature at the University. He publishes his first short story: Bruja in the review "Correo Literario". He takes parts in meetings against the movement that supports General Perón (peronismo) and in 1946 publishes the short story Casa tomada in the review "Los anales de Buenos Aires", whose director is Jorge Luis Borges. That same year he publishes an essay about the English poet John Keats The Greek urn in the poetry of John Keats in the "Revista de Estudios Clásicos de la Universidad de Cuyo".

In 1947 his short story Bestiario appears in the review "Los Anales de Buenos Aires" and in 1949 he publishes the dramatic poem The Kings, first work to be published under his own name. It was ignored by the critics. During the summer he writes his first novel Divertimento which in some way prefigures Rayuela. Divertimento will be published only in 1986 after his death.

Cortázar publishes in 1956 the volume of short stories Final del Juego. This volume includes the story Los Venenos which he considers "autobiographic". So is the story that bears the title of the book. He also publishes the translation of Poe's Work in prose at the University of Puerto Rico, and in 1959 Las armas secretas which includes the short story called El Perseguidor. This story implies a change in Cortázar's prose. "It was an illumination. I finished reading that article (one that announced the death of Charlie Parker) and then the next day, or maybe that same day, I don't recall, I started the story, because I immediately knew he was the character (.....) it was what I had been looking for". Cortázar says that here he is facing an existential question, a humane problem, which he would expand afterwards in Los Premios and most of all in Rayuela (Los Nuestros, Luis Harss).

In 1961 visits Cuba for the first time. This visit will show him "the great political void I had , my political uselessness. Since then I have tried to get informed, to understand, to read". That same year Fayard publishes Los Premios, first translation of a work of Cortázar,and a year later (1962), publishes Historias de Cronopios y Famas in Minoautorbusro, Buenos Aires, followed in 1963 by Rayuela (Sudamericana Publishers), 5000 copies were sold the first year. He said: "I wrote long passages of Rayuela without any idea of where they were going to be situated or what was their reason (....) In some way I was inventing at the same time I was writing, never going ahead of what I could see at that very moment". (In Omar Prego´s Julio Cortázar - La fascinación de las palabras ).

In 1966 publishes the volume of stories Final del juego in Sudamericana, Buenos Aires. The article "Para llegar a Lezama Lima" is published in the review "Union", Havana. He decides to assume his commitment to the struggle for liberation of Latin America.

1967. La vuelta al día en ochenta mundos, this book gathers short stories, chronicles, essays and poems. The composition, which is very original, was mostly conceived by Julio Silva. According to Cortázar the book was imagined as an homage to Jules Verne, "but in a very indirect way". In 1968 publishes the novel 62, Modelo para armar in Buenos Aires. This novel is received with some astonishment by the critics. That same year he publishes in Buenos Aires the book Buenos Aires with pictures of Sara Facio and Alicia D'Amico.

1969.  Ultimo round, and in 1970 Sudamericana publishes the volume Relatos were a selection of stories from Bestiario, Final del Juego, Las armas secretas and Todos los fuegos el fuego is included.

1971. Pameos y Meopas (Barcelona, Ocnos) includind poems written between 1944 and 1958.

1972. Prosa del observatorio in Lumen, Barcelona with pictures taken by Julio Cortázar and the aid of Antonio Galvez.

1973. Libro de Manuel (Buenos Aires, Sudamericana) and La casilla de los Morelli (Barcelona, Tusquets).

1974. Octaedro (Buenos Aires, Sudamericana).

1975. Fantomas contra los vampiros multinacionales (Mexico, Excelsior) and Silvalandia(Mexico, Cultural GDA), a series of texts inspired by some of Julio Silva's paintings.

1977. Alguien anda por ahí (Alfaguara, Madrid).

In 1979, He publishes Un tal Lucas in Alfaguara, Madrid. In October he visits Nicaragua and since then he devotes to back and serve the Sandinist Revolution. Some of his texts are used in the country's literacy campaign.

1980. He publishes the short story book Queremos tanto a Glenda, Mexico, Nueva Imagen. He gives a series of lectures at the University of Berkeley, California.

In 1981, the socialist government of Francois Mitterand concedes him the French nationality on June 24th. Due to health problems he is taken to the hospital, and he is diagnosed leukaemia. His project to visit Cuba, Nicaragua and Puerto Rico in December must be suspended.

1982. He publishes a new volume of poems Deshoras, Mexico, Nueva Imagen. His wife Carol Dunlop passes away in November. In 1983, he publishes Los autonautas de la cosmopista, written together with his wife Carol Dunlop in a thirty three day trip from Paris to Marseilles, stopping at two parking stations a day. He hands over the copyright to the Nicaraguan Sandinist government.

1983. Nicaragua, tan violentamente dulce is published in Managua by Nueva Nicaragua Publishers.

In february 1984, he dies of leukaemia and he is buried at the Cemetery of Montparnasse in the same tomb were Carol Dunlop rests. His volume of poems Salvo el Crepúsculo appears in Mexico.