Três Ficções (Three Fictions, in English) is an editorial design project for a paperback Portuguese edition of three short stories from Fictions by Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges. The stories featured in this selection are Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote, An Examination of the Work of Herbert Quain and Library of Babel.

This group of fantastic tales are rather original and complex, encompassing apparent facts mixed with surreal information. Moreover, everything is thoroughly described in such a way that one is led to believe that each Fiction is real. At the same time, a curious reading process takes place: at first, one is confused and not sure about what one is reading; in the end, one is completely immersed in the story and convinced of its truthfulness. This happens due to the genius creativity and engaging writing of the author.

The clash and confusion between reality and fiction is fundamental in every Fiction. So, this project is based on a simple layout in which models from Maths and Physics exercise books are mixed with fragments of sentences. These elements introduce the book, the three Fictions and other parts of the book. These images change with every page turn as the sentences’ fragments start gathering in a comprehensible order and the other graphic elements disappear.

These visual compositions represent the clash and reading process mentioned earlier as they present a playful group of elements that reference something that could be real mixed with aleatory features arranged in messy composition that becomes clearer. Furthermore, it is also possible to see the first letters of the book’s title (on the cover, letters “T” and “F”), the book’s Summary (letter “I” for Índice in Portuguese), the Fictions’ titles in Portuguese (letters “P”, “E” and “B”) and, finally, the Colophon (letter “C).