PREFACE Sometimes what is presented before our eyes, although real, is false, that is, the work of a faker. This collection of short stories, The Fake , is based precisely on characters, some taken from history, others pure literary fiction (if history is not), whose behaviour does not coincide with their external or internal reality. The fake and those who fake are on instinct repugnant to us. But we must bear in mind that not all those who present a false reality do so of their own free will, nor are they aware of their falsehood, nor do they do it for no reason, but for some motive which is superior, or which they consider superior, to the truth itself. Dealing with this subject, in this volume we Hind the traitor whose betrayal, from another point of view, is loyalty; the condemned who knows he is innocent but believes he is guilty, depending on the rational or emotional basis on which he judges himself; the writer who lives in the ...