Fantastic Short Stories

Donald Bartheleme's "sixty Stories"?

Daniil Kharms. Good luck finding translations.

There's a collection of Kharms translations here: http://www.sevaj.dk/kharms/kharmseng.htm
I had a wee Kharms kick last year, when I somehow stumbled into a collection of Norwegian translations of his work. Great stuff. I don't understand it at all, but that's nothing new.

There's also a new book of that era Soviet writings, translated by Eugene Ostashevsky and the dude who runs Ugly Duckling Presse [Mitvai something?]. I don't have it but I flipped through it, it seemed interesting.

Matvei Yankelevich.

Kelly Link

http://www.lcrw.net/fictionplus/link-handbag.htm

http://www.kellylink.net/

Aimee Bender

George Saunders

I second the Saunders and the Barthelme, for what it's worth. And there's a book called 'The Suicide Kit' from a few years back, whose author I have forgotten, which also fits the bill.

Also, maybe the short stories of Gene Wolfe?

Wholeheartedly second the short stories of Kelly Link. Fantastical, dreamlike, sensual, cruel and oddly matter-of-fact. Cool stuff. I enjoyed her first collection, "Stranger Things Happen" a lot more than the more recent "Magic For Beginners", but they're both worth reading.

Steven Millhauser's "The Knife Thrower" is another great collection of strange, ethereal, vaguely fantastical short stories that steadfastly resist any kind of genre classification. They're somewhat like Link's stories in that they come at you out of the fog and dissipate before you can really grab hold of them, but they're much drier and less humane. Millhauser trades in icy intellectual detachment, where Link is curious and playful.

And, of course, you've GOTTA read Angela Carter's amazing collection of reimagined fairy tales, "The Bloody Chamber". A short book of even shorter stories, this is one of my favorite books of ever, ever. With lots of exclamation points. Wild, subversive, sexy, smart and gorgeous.

Also:
Jorge Luis Borges - everything, but especially "Labyrinths" (= best book ever)
Stanislaw Lem - "The Cyberiad"
Anne Carson - "The Autobiography of Red" (a novel in verse, but hey, it's pretty short)
Italo Calvino - "Invisible Cities"
Robert Coover - "Stepmother" (another super short novel, bear with me)

The Autobiography of Red is awesome!