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/lit/ - Literature

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22599046 No.22599046 [Reply] [Original]

Thread on Italo Calvino's work: what's your favorite? Why? What's overrated/underrated?

If on a winter's night a traveler, Invisible Cities, and the Cosmicomics stories are the greats for me. The sheer breadth of imagination, the playfulness with form without ever getting too arch and always retaining emotional impact... I think Cosmicomics might win for me though.

>> No.22599053

Tldr
Read Borges instead

>> No.22599067

>>22599053
/thread

>> No.22599070

>>22599053
>>22599067
Do you not have the time to do both? Maybe read less Brandon Sanderson?

>> No.22599083

>>22599070
Calvino short fiction "Flash" is really fucking kino. Sometimes I feel like that but then I lose that feeling.

What to make of it? Calvino just took a great photo of that feel.

>> No.22599084

Ok I'll read him now
Thank you for the thread
Where do I start?

>> No.22599089

>>22599053
>Read Borges instead
read both

>> No.22599093

https://youtu.be/w2UUhi3vs7g

>> No.22599108

>>22599084
Invisible Cities probably a good place to start. Really short but really good. Not so much a narrative as a collection of cities expressing architecture, emotion, memory, dreams, etc. Alternatively, the Cosmicomics stories (they've been collected in a few places) are wonderful short stories combining some kernel of scientific fact with fantasy and humor.

>>22599093
Thanks - this is cool, I hadn't seen it before

>> No.22599128

>>22599046
Invisible Cities. Beautifully strange and inventive. Don't know about underrated, but nothing's underratdd.

>> No.22599132

>>22599108
>Calvino creeping on him and Weaver in the train station.
Gave me a good chuckle. Here is another that is Vidal talking about Calvino, but I have not watched this one yet, an anon posted a pile of interviews awhile ago and I am still working through them.

Been reading The Written World and the Unwritten World off and on for the past month or so, one of about a half dozen nonfiction works I have been hopping between. Pretty good but often goes on about Italian literature that I have no clue about. I think I prefer his fiction.

>> No.22599134

>>22599132
forgot the link.
https://youtu.be/Nd3hGhv861Q

>> No.22599139

>>22599046
Funny that you post this because I just started reading If On A Winter’s Night A Traveler this afternoon

>> No.22599141

>>22599108
I think Invisible Cities will just make you feel filtered if you don't understand Calvino's literary vision.
If on a winter's night shows it the best and might coincidentally also be his best.
The Baron in the trees might also showcase Calvino's love of playing with fable and concepts.

>> No.22599162

>>22599132
>>22599134
Thanks anon, will watch this one too.

I've been reading a few reviews of his work (including by Gore Vidal) which people might find interesting. Maybe after having read some actual Calvino first though.

Gore Vidal: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1974/05/30/fabulous-calvino/
Gore Vidal's obituary: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1985/11/21/on-italo-calvino/
Salman Rushdie: https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v03/n17/salman-rushdie/calvino
Jonathan Galassi: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2013/06/20/dreams-italo-calvino/
James Butler (review of The Written World and the Unwritten World): https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v45/n12/james-butler/infinite-artichoke

>> No.22599167

>>22599139
Quite possibly my favorite! I remember reading it on a train at around 17 and just blew my mind on what "fiction" could be

>>22599141
True, but IC is short enough that it's very easy for new readers to get into. The whole Our Ancestors trilogy is very fun and less formally weird. I don't think it's his best but does have that fable element. I still need to read his edited Italian Folktales

>> No.22599179

>>22599046
Those are the only three of his works I've read so far and I loved all of them. Invisible Cities is still my favorite, maybe because it was the first one I read, but I recently read Cosmicomics and it really surprised me with how creative it was. For any Baldur's Gate 2 fans here it's like an entire book narrated by Jan Jansen if he was a timeless cosmic entity.

>> No.22599196

>>22599167
I feel as if some of his work suffers in translation so I don't blame you if you had it that way.
It's easier to read mayhaps so he could read that, see if he enjoys it, read if on a winters night, go back to invisible cities.

>> No.22599204
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22599204

>>22599162
Nice, the obit is the only one of those I have read, will dig into those tonight. Have had picrel in my cart for awhile, probably will wait for routledge to do a sale since they tend to be on the pricey side and I have about a dozen books in my cart there so the savings will be substantial.

>> No.22599221

>>22599179
The Cosmicomics and Time and the Hunter were the first works of his I read. I didn't know till then you could write stories like that

>> No.22599232

Here's one Cosmicomic I really like btw, for some reason on a Chinese website: https://www.ruanyifeng.com/calvino/2008/12/the_other_eurydice_en.html

>>22599204
That looks interesting, I wonder what it says. I don't read a lot of nonfiction (especially about writing) except for reviews. A lot of his stories do feel very cinematic though, like the use of second person

>> No.22599234

>>22599093
Crazy to think he died shortly after that was filmed.

>> No.22599462

if on a winter's night = based

>> No.22600121

>>22599046
Stupendously boring.

>> No.22601640

>>22599046
Cosmicomics were the worst for me - honestly almost torture to read these scientific premises stretched out into fables. A handful were good. Lots of them felt tedious, and almost the same story of chasing after some romantic interest dressed up in different science.

Invisible Cities and If on a winter's night a traveler were both really good in different ways and are hard to choose between.

>> No.22602253

>>22599046
I've read Invisible Cities and understood it to be Continental propaganda. Each city is an exploration of some concept in semiotics or some postmodern idea.
I agree that Borges does this better (with more substance and more literary content). The book also made me very happy that I'm not European.

>> No.22602263

>>22599046
I read "Le Baron Perché" yesterday and it was great, reminded me of Siddhartha in some way, idk what should i read next of him tho

>> No.22602277

>>22602253
>rent free
goddamn
>>22602263
If on a winters night ofcourse. If you liked the baron however you might also like italian fables. See what's available though.

>> No.22602306

>>22602253
lol. I think you may have pushed the q-tip in a bit too far.