Calvino's powers of invention were formally ingenious at the same time he was an extremely lucid writer. Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore ( 1979 trans William Weaver as If on a Winter's Night a Traveler 1981) stunningly transfigures the conventions and momentums of narrative into a Bunuelesque labyrinth. Le cittá invisibili ( 1972 trans William Weaver as Invisible Cities 1974) frames fragmented versions of Marco Polo's narrative of his extraordinary voyages (see Fantastic Voyages) with a remarkable set of meditations ostensibly triggered by distant, surrealistic Cities he has not in fact visited.
#Cosmicomics italo calvino full#
One of the stories in The Watcher and Other Stories (1952-1963 coll trans William Weaver 1971), "La nuvola di smog" (in I Racconti, coll 1958 trans William Weaver as "Smog"), a remarkable Pollution tale, is sf, one of the last tales published before Calvino gained his full international reputation, began the remarkable sequence of experimental fictions that have cemented that fame, and incurred the ire of the not-unprovincial Italian critical establishment. Speculations and fables about the nature of life, Mathematics, Evolution and the distinction between reality and appearance (see Perception) dominate in the end, Calvino's cosmicomics seem radiantly witty, moving and, after their strange fashion, effectively didactic.
#Cosmicomics italo calvino plus#
Most of these cosmicomics appear in two linked volumes – Le Cosmicomiche (coll of linked stories 1965 trans William Weaver as Cosmicomics 1968) and Ti con zero (coll of linked stories 1967 trans William Weaver as t zero 1969 vt Time and the Hunter 1970) but The Complete Cosmicomics (coll/omni trans Tim Parks, Martin McLaughlin and William Weaver 2009) also adds seven stories from La Memoria del Mondo (coll 1968), four from Prima che tu dica "Pronto" (coll 1993 trans Tim Parks as Numbers in the Dark and Other Stories 1995), plus other stories. Beneath the Fabulation-drenched protocols of these volumes – the nonexistent knight, for instance, is an empty suit of armour with a "passion" for the formalities and ceremonies that keeps it "alive" – lies a concern for fundamental conundrums of being.Ĭalvino comes closest to sf in the various stories which he called "cosmicomics": short tales – usually told in an abstract but recognizable Club Story frame by the presence called Qfwfq, who is the same age as the Universe – which posit fantasticated scientific postulates whose implications are unpacked with a sometimes Absurdist, cartoonish clarity, as though they were Memes with tales to tell. A more recent venture in the same idiom was Il Castello dei Destini incrociati (coll of linked stories 1969 trans William Weaver as The Castle of Crossed Destinies 1977), though here the gamelike estrangement is not simply an underlying premise but an active transformative agency – a group of men and women are stranded together speechless, and must communicate their stories by dealing a pack of tarot cards, which tells them who they are rather like a Club Story with St Vitus' Dance. (1923-1985) Italian author, born in Cuba, active from the middle of World War Two, at first with realist works but soon with Gothic, surrealist romances of great vigour and impact, such as Il Visconte dimezzato ( 1951) and Il Cavaliere inesistente ( 1959) – translated together by Archibald Colquhoun as The Non-Existent Knight and The Cloven Viscount (omni 1962) – and Il Barone rampante ( 1957 trans Archibald Colquhoun as Baron in the Trees 1959), three thematically linked fables later assembled as I nostri antenati (omni 1960 in the Colquhoun trans as Our Ancestors 1980).