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The Uses Of Literature
In these widely praised essays, Calvino reflects on literature as process, the great narrative game in the course of which writer and reader are challenged to understand the world. Calvino himself made the selection of pieces to be included in this volume. Translated by Patrick Creagh. A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book
249 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1980
About the author
Italo Calvino
514 books8,204 followersItalo Calvino was born in Cuba and grew up in Italy. He was a journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy (1952-1959), the Cosmicomics collection of short stories (1965), and the novels Invisible Cities (1972) and If On a Winter's Night a Traveler (1979).
His style is not easy to classify; much of his writing has an air reminiscent to that of fantastical fairy tales (Our Ancestors, Cosmicomics), although sometimes his writing is more "realistic" and in the scenic mode of observation (Difficult Loves, for example). Some of his writing has been called postmodern, reflecting on literature and the act of reading, while some has been labeled magical realist, others fables, others simply "modern". He wrote: "My working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, sometimes from people, sometimes from heavenly bodies, sometimes from cities; above all I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language."
His style is not easy to classify; much of his writing has an air reminiscent to that of fantastical fairy tales (Our Ancestors, Cosmicomics), although sometimes his writing is more "realistic" and in the scenic mode of observation (Difficult Loves, for example). Some of his writing has been called postmodern, reflecting on literature and the act of reading, while some has been labeled magical realist, others fables, others simply "modern". He wrote: "My working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, sometimes from people, sometimes from heavenly bodies, sometimes from cities; above all I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
December 1, 2016
Italo Calvino was a watershed for me in reading fiction in my 20s. I had always read a lot and even critically, but somehow Calvino's fiction which was more mathematical and structured in some ways than the more fluid literature I had read before changed my perspective. This collection of essays about literature does indeed make you want to reread his entire catalog to understand even more deeply the ideas he was trying to pass along. He reflects on who the author is writing for, why the classics are classic and still relevant - many timeless topics that continue to drive literary analysis and inspire readers and writers alike. To be read before or after Invisible Cities :)
May 25, 2015
الحديث عن الكتابة شيء لا أمله. كنت في رأس كاليفنو.. حرفيًا!
July 29, 2020
“Yeni Bir Sayfa” Italo Calvino’nun büyük çoğunluğu edebiyata dair eleştirileri, yazarlar hakkında değerlendirmeleri, edebi eserlerdeki dil, üslup ve yazı teknikleri üzerine düşüncelerini içeren denemelerden oluşuyor. 1955 ile 1978 yılları arasında kaleme aldığı bu denemelerinin bazıları akademik çalışma diyebileceğimiz kadar spesifik, bir kısmı ise çok özel bir konuda yazılmış, ilgi çekici olmayan bireysel konudaki metinlerden oluşuyor.
Belirgin bir akışta gitmiyor kitap, bir bakıyorsunuz başucunuza asacak kadar etkileyici bir metin, bir bakıyorsunuz, bunu neden yazmış diyeceğiniz bir metin karşınıza çıkıyor. Beğendiğim denemeleri şöyle sıralayabilirim. “Günümüz İtalyan Romanında Üç Akım”, “Felsefe ile Edebiyat”, “”Bilim ve Edebiyat Üzerine İki Söyleşi”, “Edebiyatın Doğru ve Yanlış Siyasal Kullanımları”, “Edebiyatta Gerçeklik Düzeyleri”. Bu son deneme gerçekten çok etkileyici.
Kitabı okuduktan sonra hoşuma giden bir husus da metinlerde adı geçen İtalyan romanlarının çoğunu okumuş olmamı görmem oldu, örneğin; Sicilya Konuşmaları, Leopard, İsa Bu Köye Uğramadı, Malavoglialar ve Calvino’nun neredeyse tüm romanları gibi.
Kitabın daha seçici ve daha az hacimli olması okunurluluğunu arttırırdı mutlaka ama Calvino usta böyle istemiş kitabı, bunu sunuş yazısında belirtiyor. Edebiyatla profesyonel olarak ilgilenen ve Calvino’nun kültür dünyasını merak edenler için öneririm.
Belirgin bir akışta gitmiyor kitap, bir bakıyorsunuz başucunuza asacak kadar etkileyici bir metin, bir bakıyorsunuz, bunu neden yazmış diyeceğiniz bir metin karşınıza çıkıyor. Beğendiğim denemeleri şöyle sıralayabilirim. “Günümüz İtalyan Romanında Üç Akım”, “Felsefe ile Edebiyat”, “”Bilim ve Edebiyat Üzerine İki Söyleşi”, “Edebiyatın Doğru ve Yanlış Siyasal Kullanımları”, “Edebiyatta Gerçeklik Düzeyleri”. Bu son deneme gerçekten çok etkileyici.
Kitabı okuduktan sonra hoşuma giden bir husus da metinlerde adı geçen İtalyan romanlarının çoğunu okumuş olmamı görmem oldu, örneğin; Sicilya Konuşmaları, Leopard, İsa Bu Köye Uğramadı, Malavoglialar ve Calvino’nun neredeyse tüm romanları gibi.
Kitabın daha seçici ve daha az hacimli olması okunurluluğunu arttırırdı mutlaka ama Calvino usta böyle istemiş kitabı, bunu sunuş yazısında belirtiyor. Edebiyatla profesyonel olarak ilgilenen ve Calvino’nun kültür dünyasını merak edenler için öneririm.
January 22, 2013
Recently I ordered a copy of Moby Dick and I am anticipating reading it for the 1st time very soon and I thought: let's read Calvino again on "why to read the classics". I read the rest of the book afterwards. Very few people can write with such intelligence, style, originality, humour and an eye for the absurd as Calvino could and while I don't have much interest for many of the 19th century French novelist Calvino writes about the man never bores. The general essays are best. The opening essay on cybernetics and literature is an all-time favourite. Calvino is a classic himself and why do we read the classics? Because it is better to have read them than it is to haven't read them. YES!
May 29, 2018
After hammering with the literary criticism textbooks for a while, reading about literature from another perspective is like getting some new fresh air, especially from Calvino whom I always resonate with intelligence and witty. The book gives me a tingling hope, with the reassurence, that literature still matters and has a potential standpoint. Each chapter illustrates the certain points with the latest issues in 20th century; literary criticism from a writer's POV, genre, the question about whom the writer should write for, the importance of reading classics, politics in writing literature, realities in literature, the crossing fields among literature, science and philosophy and most intense part is the elaboration of the classic works in part II and the part Calvino psychoanalysed himself. So grateful for having a chance to read a piece of writing from someone who is dedicated and passionate, and still very critical and poignant.
April 29, 2024
for a few years now, this book has been an occasional companion. I own more calvino than any other author, and this one is a delight—a break from paper-thin words that float, to a more serious prose—as heavy as needed but no more. among other things, it's an elaboration of his influences—Invisible Cities transmutates Pliny; Cosmicomics recaptulates Cyrano—and what he finds meaningful in them.
The opening essay—Cybernetics and Ghosts—is alone worth the price of admission.
> The power of modern literature lies in its willingness to give a voice to what has remained unexpressed in the social or individual unconscious: this is the gauntlet it throws down time and again. The more enlightened our houses are, the more their walls ooze ghosts. Dreams of progress and reason are haunted by nightmares.
The opening essay—Cybernetics and Ghosts—is alone worth the price of admission.
> The power of modern literature lies in its willingness to give a voice to what has remained unexpressed in the social or individual unconscious: this is the gauntlet it throws down time and again. The more enlightened our houses are, the more their walls ooze ghosts. Dreams of progress and reason are haunted by nightmares.
Want to read
February 8, 20194* If on a Winter's Night a Traveler
4* Il visconte dimezzato
4* Il cavaliere inesistente
4* Difficult Loves
3* The Castle of Crossed Destinies
4* Why Read the Classics?
TR Invisible Cities
TR The Baron in the Trees
TR The Path to the Spiders' Nests
TR The Uses of Literature
4* Il visconte dimezzato
4* Il cavaliere inesistente
4* Difficult Loves
3* The Castle of Crossed Destinies
4* Why Read the Classics?
TR Invisible Cities
TR The Baron in the Trees
TR The Path to the Spiders' Nests
TR The Uses of Literature
January 9, 2022
Heel interessant, zet je aan het denken, maar tegelijk ook heel lastig. Literatuurtheorie, interviews, essays… Noem maar op. Heel nederig geschreven voor een hrote meneer. Hoofdstukje per dag is meer dan genoeg. Anyway, thanks Paul-Valery!
March 14, 2022
It's often a treat to gaze into the mind of a genius. Italo Calvino does, without any shadow of a doubt, understand the written word. His work with the Oulipo making novels like "If On A Winter's Night a Traveler" and "Invisible Cities" and flipping the format of literature onto its head. Changing the medium in a way only a master of it really can. Here are essays of literary criticism that rival Northrop Frye and Harold Bloom. I'll admit I found the first half of the book stronger than the latter. This is however because the latter delves into essays, dissertations and talks at University about authors I admittedly am not as versed as Calvino. The way he describes them, their contributions to the craft and their impact on him are wonderful. I cannot in good faith take away a star because of a lack of culture on my part. His essay on Stendhal, an author I am familiar with was my favorite of this latter half. I would consider this book essential text to a writer, a reader, or anyone in between.
May 12, 2015
Starting school's-over-so-more-time-to-read reading with a guy that loves books so much is pretty great. Calvino has a lot of interesting things to say about books; The Hypothetical Bookshelf and Why Read the Classics? are two of my favourites in the collection, although there other really good moments. It's really nice to read stuff by a writer who knows the importance of the reader, and isn't pretentious and superior about his opinions.
I will admit that I tuned out a little in the second half, mostly because I haven't read Stendhal or Balzac or Fourrier, all of whom occupy a significant portion of it. Nevertheless it's readable even in most of the parts where I knew nothing about the texts he refers to. The first half though, which is about books more generally speaking, is generally easier to relate to. Probably 3.5 overall.
So, worth the read (but If On A Winter's Night a Traveler conveys literary love better in my opinion).
I will admit that I tuned out a little in the second half, mostly because I haven't read Stendhal or Balzac or Fourrier, all of whom occupy a significant portion of it. Nevertheless it's readable even in most of the parts where I knew nothing about the texts he refers to. The first half though, which is about books more generally speaking, is generally easier to relate to. Probably 3.5 overall.
So, worth the read (but If On A Winter's Night a Traveler conveys literary love better in my opinion).
February 6, 2015
Having read Invisible Cities, I had a high hope of his essays, and he didn't let me down. His insights about literature involves politics, but hasn't been carried away too much. One could praise how brilliant he is in Literature and Politics, or his discussion about Fourier, but never would say he only cares about politics and lack of poetic sensibility (probably I would say that to Günter Grass...sorry)
He tries to "psychoanalyze" himself in the form of autobiography, which makes a lot of sense.
Essay? Proses? He is born to be a writer.
He tries to "psychoanalyze" himself in the form of autobiography, which makes a lot of sense.
Essay? Proses? He is born to be a writer.
Read
December 29, 2015Waaaahhhhh... Calvino is/remains so amazing all the time. This is my first foray into his nonfiction, after reading the majority of his novels in high school and college. Everything about these essays is so lucid, so intelligent, and so obviously linked with his elegant, mathematical fiction style. These essays in the vein of Sontag, Barthes, and Benjamin further confirm my belief that he created the most consistently impressive prose of the 20th Century that I've encountered.
May 9, 2014
It's hard to appreciate essays about books which one has yet to read; thus, I enjoyed the pieces about literature and writing as a whole more than I did the selections about specific titles. But all of it was interesting. Calvino is my favorite author and his insights into literature are as wide-ranging and devoted as his fiction. Plus, I came across a number of words I'd never heard: mastodonic, gnosiology, and eudaemonism.
July 23, 2022
Italo Calvino uses many narrative examples (Odyssey, Don Quixote, Madame Bovary, Divine Comedy, In Search of Lost Time) to penetrate the impenetrability of the sheaths of reality in Literature.
He lucidly explains why there is no such thing as one Reality in Literature. Instead, there are various levels of reality acting as vacuums that interact with each other, a constellation of threads that form the poetic portrait of life, both the wonder and unknowability of its true nature, which is often opaque and cryptic to us.
A reader can simply unravel at will or observe from a distance the borders of the inexpressible nature of stories, arriving each time on a blank page which is but the beginning of a burgeoning infinity that shows how the literature of Self recognizes the meandering tensions between these layers of reality in a story’s narrative.
A narrative’s inner life is perhaps the only kind of awakening that Literature allows, the only one that exists, unrecognizable by the reality of our lives. If we take a closer look at Literature, we can learn “to become without ceasing to be and to be without ceasing to become.”
A quote from the book:
“Did we say that literature is entirely involved with language, is merely the permutation of a restricted number of elements and functions? But is the tension in literature not continually striving to escape from this finite number? Does it not continually attempt to say something it cannot say, something that it does not know, and that no one could ever know?
[..]
The struggle of literature is in fact a struggle to escape from the confines of language; it stretches out from the utmost limits of what can be said; what stirs literature is the call and attraction of what is not in the dictionary.”
Perhaps we can connect this with what Rilke demands from us; a layer of solitudinous contemplation in relation to writing, living, and being:
“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart;
[…]
Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”
He lucidly explains why there is no such thing as one Reality in Literature. Instead, there are various levels of reality acting as vacuums that interact with each other, a constellation of threads that form the poetic portrait of life, both the wonder and unknowability of its true nature, which is often opaque and cryptic to us.
A reader can simply unravel at will or observe from a distance the borders of the inexpressible nature of stories, arriving each time on a blank page which is but the beginning of a burgeoning infinity that shows how the literature of Self recognizes the meandering tensions between these layers of reality in a story’s narrative.
A narrative’s inner life is perhaps the only kind of awakening that Literature allows, the only one that exists, unrecognizable by the reality of our lives. If we take a closer look at Literature, we can learn “to become without ceasing to be and to be without ceasing to become.”
A quote from the book:
“Did we say that literature is entirely involved with language, is merely the permutation of a restricted number of elements and functions? But is the tension in literature not continually striving to escape from this finite number? Does it not continually attempt to say something it cannot say, something that it does not know, and that no one could ever know?
[..]
The struggle of literature is in fact a struggle to escape from the confines of language; it stretches out from the utmost limits of what can be said; what stirs literature is the call and attraction of what is not in the dictionary.”
Perhaps we can connect this with what Rilke demands from us; a layer of solitudinous contemplation in relation to writing, living, and being:
“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart;
[…]
Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”
April 21, 2024
3.5
কালভিনোর এই লেখাগুলোর আত্মায় জড়ানো সাহিত্য, কিন্তু স্বাদের দিক দিয়ে এরা - ফুকোর ভাষায় - যেটা সায়েন্টিফিক রাইটিং, মোটাদাগে সেই গোছের। অন্যভাবে বলতে গেলে লেখাগুলো একটু কঠোর জাতের।
ওডিসি নিয়ে আলাপটা চমৎকার। কাঁদিদ, আর বালজাকের উপন্যাসে প্যারিস নিয়ে আলাপ দুটাও সুন্দর। কয়েকটা বিজ্ঞান-বই নিয়ে ভালো আলোচনা আছে, মূল বইগুলো পড়া না থাকায় সেগুলোর স্বাদ যথাযথ ভাবে নেওয়া হলো না।
"Why read the Classics?" সম্ভবত বইটার সবচেয়ে বিখ্যাত রচনা। সেটা আগেই পড়া ছিলো। ওটা বাদে বিশেষ করে আমার ভালো লেগেছে "The Hypothetical Bookshelf"।
আরেকটা দুর্দান্ত আলাপ ছিলো "Levels of reality in Literature"। সেটা পড়ে ভাবি, লেখার ভেতরে ওই 'আমি' নিয়ে আমার আগে পড়া সবচেয়ে বিস্তারিত আলাপটা ছিলো উমবার্তো ইকোর, যিনি আরেকজন ইতালিয়ান। এটা কি শুধুই কাকতাল? না সাহিত্যের বাস্তবতার একাধিক তলকে ইতালিয়ানরা সত্যিই খুঁটিয়ে দেখেছে?
কালভিনোর এই লেখাগুলোর আত্মায় জড়ানো সাহিত্য, কিন্তু স্বাদের দিক দিয়ে এরা - ফুকোর ভাষায় - যেটা সায়েন্টিফিক রাইটিং, মোটাদাগে সেই গোছের। অন্যভাবে বলতে গেলে লেখাগুলো একটু কঠোর জাতের।
ওডিসি নিয়ে আলাপটা চমৎকার। কাঁদিদ, আর বালজাকের উপন্যাসে প্যারিস নিয়ে আলাপ দুটাও সুন্দর। কয়েকটা বিজ্ঞান-বই নিয়ে ভালো আলোচনা আছে, মূল বইগুলো পড়া না থাকায় সেগুলোর স্বাদ যথাযথ ভাবে নেওয়া হলো না।
"Why read the Classics?" সম্ভবত বইটার সবচেয়ে বিখ্যাত রচনা। সেটা আগেই পড়া ছিলো। ওটা বাদে বিশেষ করে আমার ভালো লেগেছে "The Hypothetical Bookshelf"।
আরেকটা দুর্দান্ত আলাপ ছিলো "Levels of reality in Literature"। সেটা পড়ে ভাবি, লেখার ভেতরে ওই 'আমি' নিয়ে আমার আগে পড়া সবচেয়ে বিস্তারিত আলাপটা ছিলো উমবার্তো ইকোর, যিনি আরেকজন ইতালিয়ান। এটা কি শুধুই কাকতাল? না সাহিত্যের বাস্তবতার একাধিক তলকে ইতালিয়ানরা সত্যিই খুঁটিয়ে দেখেছে?
May 21, 2024
I love this book. It gave me a desire to seek out a wider range of writing.
There are two ideas that I think I got from these essays that I really like. The first is the idea of combinatory play from "Cybernetics and Ghosts". Here, Calvino provocatively insists that writing will be "entrusted to machines" and the human author will "vanish". This doesn't sound like the sort of thing I'd like, but he continues: "Once we have dismantled and reassembled the process of literary composition, the decisive moment of literary life will be that of reading." The job of the machine-author is to generate novel combinations of words, but this would be a pointless activity without fully human readers.
"At a certain moment things click into place, and one of the combinations obtained—through the combinatorial mechanism itself, independently of any search for meaning or effect on any other level—becomes charged with an unexpected meaning or unforeseen effect which the conscious mind would not have arrived at deliberately: an unconscious meaning, in fact, or at least the premonition of an unconscious meaning."
"The literature machine can perform all the permutations possible on a given material, but the poetic result will be the particular effect of one of these permutations on a man endowed with a consciousness and an unconscious, that is, an empirical and historical man. It will be the shock that occurs only if the writing machine is surrounded by the hidden ghosts of the individual and of his society."
This is a hopeful message because it says there's nothing in principle to fear from computers when it comes to the future of literature. This is not to be confused with the issues facing the *present* of literature, pertaining to AI-generated content and making sure human authors can make a living. You can always use a computer to produce crap. But computers, and more generally algorithms or even *rules*, have helped produce significant literature since forever. "Writers, as they have always been up to now, are already writing machines." I think the way Calvino frames these ideas is a helpful way of thinking about where humanity fits into that process. Writing, even if produced purely by combinatorial play, can say what was previously only a subconscious dream.
"The power of modern literature lies in its willingness to give a voice to what has remained unexpressed in the social or individual unconscious; this is the gauntlet it throws down time and again. The more enlightened our houses are, the more their walls ooze ghosts."
"Literature is necessary to politics above all when it gives a voice to whatever is without a voice, when it gives a name to what as yet has no name, especially to what the language of politics excludes or attempts to exclude."
Presumably it is then the job of the literary critic to read and notice what resonates, and bring it to everyone else's attention. I am reminded of Richard Rorty's suggestion in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature that "in England and America philosophy has already been displaced by literary criticism in its principal cultural function—as a source for youth’s self-description of its own difference from the past."
The other idea that I really like is the thought of reading technical writing (science, philosophy, literary criticism) as one would read literature. Calvino says that "the greatest Italian writer is Galileo" (how can this not make you want to read Galileo?). I find Calvino's book recommendations convincing:
"But, to get back to what I was saying a moment ago, Galileo uses language not as a neutral utensil, but with literary awareness, with a continuous commitment that is expressive, imaginative, and even lyrical. When I read Galileo I like to seek out the passages in which he speaks of the moon. It is the first time that the moon becomes a real object for mankind, and is minutely described as a tangible thing, yet as soon as the moon appears one feels a kind of rarefaction, almost of levitation, in Galileo’s language. One rises with it into an enchanted state of suspension."
"I remember an American book I read some years ago (Stanley E. Hyman, The Tangled Bank: Darwin, Marx, Frazer and Freud as Imaginative Writers [New York: Atheneum, 1962]). The author examined the writings of four innovators of nineteenth-century thought as if they were imaginative works, mythical cosmogonies, epic poems, tragedies, cycles of novels. He pointed out the characters, situations, images, conflicts, and feeling for nature, but without ever departing from the methods of literary criticism. Was this simply a sophisticated frolic? I must say that Hyman’s book has always been a most useful reading lesson for me."
I think this commitment to reading "every kind of human discourse" as literature follows naturally downstream of thinking of literature as the fortuitous result of combinatory play. The ideas can come from anywhere- the only demand is that it strike a chord with human readers.
Literary criticism, in turn, can be subjected to the same treatment.
"...to establish relationships between types of experience that I would otherwise be quite unable to link together.
If I continue to read books of criticism, it is because I always hope they will give me surprises of this kind."
"Every true book of criticism may be read like one of the texts it deals with, as a web of poetic metaphors."
Gilles Deleuze insists that "a book of philosophy should be in part a very particular species of detective novel, in part a kind of science fiction." I used to think that this was just a kind of abdication of the role of a philosopher. But now I think it may be the appropriate response to some of these natural facts about language. You can only accomplish so much of what technical writing purports to accomplish:
"Barthes gets to the point of maintaining that literature is more scientific than science, because literature knows that language is never naive, and knows that in writing one cannot say anything extraneous to writing, or express any truth that is not a truth having to do with the art of writing."
Furthermore, science itself is catching on to these ideas: "But can the science of today really be defined by such trust in an absolute code of references, or is it not in itself by this time a continual questioning of its own linguistic conventions? In his polemic against science Barthes appears to envisage a kind of science far more compact and sure of itself than it really is. And—as far as mathematics is concerned—rather than claiming to base an argument on a truth beyond itself, we find a science not guiltless of tinkering with its own formulative processes." I think this is a very true thing to say about mathematics, and something you really have to be exposed to mathematics in order to get.
We stand only to gain by breaking down the mental barrier between the Two Cultures. This is a very 1960s thought to have and I'm here for it.
"Here we are in a totally different climate from the austere and rarefied atmosphere of the analyses of Barthes and the writings of the Tel Quel group of authors. The dominant feature here is play, and the acrobatics of the intellect and the imagination." We're having fun here, folks.
One more thing I love about Calvino is that his genuine love of reading, writing, and everything about books shines through with his constant thinking about bookshelves, libraries, rereading, intertextuality, and all the things that give books context that change the way we think of them.
"From the point of view of literary criticism, the objection might be raised against him that the Bible is not a book, but a library. That is, it is a selection of books placed one after another, which are given particular significance as a whole, and around which we place all other possible books.
The notion of a “library” is not part of Frye’s terminology, but it might well be added to it. Literature is not composed simply of books but of libraries, systems in which the various epochs and traditions arrange their “canonical” texts and their “apocryphal” ones. Within these systems each work is different from what it would be in isolation or in another library. A library can have a restricted catalogue, or it can tend to become a universal library, though always expanding around a core of “canonical” books."
This next quote resonates with several of the things I've mentioned above, so it's probably good to get a summary idea of why I think this book is cool.
"A writer’s work is important to the extent that the ideal bookshelf on which he would like to be placed is still an improbable shelf, containing books that we do not usually put side by side, the juxtaposition of which can produce electric shocks, short circuits. And so my initial answer already needs correction. A literary situation begins to get interesting when one writes novels for people who are not readers of novels alone, and when one writes literature while thinking of a shelf of books that are not all literary."
I'm not sure if these are the right words to express this, but these essays give me a kind of hope that reading will never be boring.
"And if anyone objects that it is not worth taking so much trouble, then I will quote Cioran (who is not yet a classic but will become one): “While they were preparing the hemlock, Socrates was learning a tune on the flute. ‘What good will it do you,’ they asked, ‘to know this tune before you die?’”"
There are two ideas that I think I got from these essays that I really like. The first is the idea of combinatory play from "Cybernetics and Ghosts". Here, Calvino provocatively insists that writing will be "entrusted to machines" and the human author will "vanish". This doesn't sound like the sort of thing I'd like, but he continues: "Once we have dismantled and reassembled the process of literary composition, the decisive moment of literary life will be that of reading." The job of the machine-author is to generate novel combinations of words, but this would be a pointless activity without fully human readers.
"At a certain moment things click into place, and one of the combinations obtained—through the combinatorial mechanism itself, independently of any search for meaning or effect on any other level—becomes charged with an unexpected meaning or unforeseen effect which the conscious mind would not have arrived at deliberately: an unconscious meaning, in fact, or at least the premonition of an unconscious meaning."
"The literature machine can perform all the permutations possible on a given material, but the poetic result will be the particular effect of one of these permutations on a man endowed with a consciousness and an unconscious, that is, an empirical and historical man. It will be the shock that occurs only if the writing machine is surrounded by the hidden ghosts of the individual and of his society."
This is a hopeful message because it says there's nothing in principle to fear from computers when it comes to the future of literature. This is not to be confused with the issues facing the *present* of literature, pertaining to AI-generated content and making sure human authors can make a living. You can always use a computer to produce crap. But computers, and more generally algorithms or even *rules*, have helped produce significant literature since forever. "Writers, as they have always been up to now, are already writing machines." I think the way Calvino frames these ideas is a helpful way of thinking about where humanity fits into that process. Writing, even if produced purely by combinatorial play, can say what was previously only a subconscious dream.
"The power of modern literature lies in its willingness to give a voice to what has remained unexpressed in the social or individual unconscious; this is the gauntlet it throws down time and again. The more enlightened our houses are, the more their walls ooze ghosts."
"Literature is necessary to politics above all when it gives a voice to whatever is without a voice, when it gives a name to what as yet has no name, especially to what the language of politics excludes or attempts to exclude."
Presumably it is then the job of the literary critic to read and notice what resonates, and bring it to everyone else's attention. I am reminded of Richard Rorty's suggestion in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature that "in England and America philosophy has already been displaced by literary criticism in its principal cultural function—as a source for youth’s self-description of its own difference from the past."
The other idea that I really like is the thought of reading technical writing (science, philosophy, literary criticism) as one would read literature. Calvino says that "the greatest Italian writer is Galileo" (how can this not make you want to read Galileo?). I find Calvino's book recommendations convincing:
"But, to get back to what I was saying a moment ago, Galileo uses language not as a neutral utensil, but with literary awareness, with a continuous commitment that is expressive, imaginative, and even lyrical. When I read Galileo I like to seek out the passages in which he speaks of the moon. It is the first time that the moon becomes a real object for mankind, and is minutely described as a tangible thing, yet as soon as the moon appears one feels a kind of rarefaction, almost of levitation, in Galileo’s language. One rises with it into an enchanted state of suspension."
"I remember an American book I read some years ago (Stanley E. Hyman, The Tangled Bank: Darwin, Marx, Frazer and Freud as Imaginative Writers [New York: Atheneum, 1962]). The author examined the writings of four innovators of nineteenth-century thought as if they were imaginative works, mythical cosmogonies, epic poems, tragedies, cycles of novels. He pointed out the characters, situations, images, conflicts, and feeling for nature, but without ever departing from the methods of literary criticism. Was this simply a sophisticated frolic? I must say that Hyman’s book has always been a most useful reading lesson for me."
I think this commitment to reading "every kind of human discourse" as literature follows naturally downstream of thinking of literature as the fortuitous result of combinatory play. The ideas can come from anywhere- the only demand is that it strike a chord with human readers.
Literary criticism, in turn, can be subjected to the same treatment.
"...to establish relationships between types of experience that I would otherwise be quite unable to link together.
If I continue to read books of criticism, it is because I always hope they will give me surprises of this kind."
"Every true book of criticism may be read like one of the texts it deals with, as a web of poetic metaphors."
Gilles Deleuze insists that "a book of philosophy should be in part a very particular species of detective novel, in part a kind of science fiction." I used to think that this was just a kind of abdication of the role of a philosopher. But now I think it may be the appropriate response to some of these natural facts about language. You can only accomplish so much of what technical writing purports to accomplish:
"Barthes gets to the point of maintaining that literature is more scientific than science, because literature knows that language is never naive, and knows that in writing one cannot say anything extraneous to writing, or express any truth that is not a truth having to do with the art of writing."
Furthermore, science itself is catching on to these ideas: "But can the science of today really be defined by such trust in an absolute code of references, or is it not in itself by this time a continual questioning of its own linguistic conventions? In his polemic against science Barthes appears to envisage a kind of science far more compact and sure of itself than it really is. And—as far as mathematics is concerned—rather than claiming to base an argument on a truth beyond itself, we find a science not guiltless of tinkering with its own formulative processes." I think this is a very true thing to say about mathematics, and something you really have to be exposed to mathematics in order to get.
We stand only to gain by breaking down the mental barrier between the Two Cultures. This is a very 1960s thought to have and I'm here for it.
"Here we are in a totally different climate from the austere and rarefied atmosphere of the analyses of Barthes and the writings of the Tel Quel group of authors. The dominant feature here is play, and the acrobatics of the intellect and the imagination." We're having fun here, folks.
One more thing I love about Calvino is that his genuine love of reading, writing, and everything about books shines through with his constant thinking about bookshelves, libraries, rereading, intertextuality, and all the things that give books context that change the way we think of them.
"From the point of view of literary criticism, the objection might be raised against him that the Bible is not a book, but a library. That is, it is a selection of books placed one after another, which are given particular significance as a whole, and around which we place all other possible books.
The notion of a “library” is not part of Frye’s terminology, but it might well be added to it. Literature is not composed simply of books but of libraries, systems in which the various epochs and traditions arrange their “canonical” texts and their “apocryphal” ones. Within these systems each work is different from what it would be in isolation or in another library. A library can have a restricted catalogue, or it can tend to become a universal library, though always expanding around a core of “canonical” books."
This next quote resonates with several of the things I've mentioned above, so it's probably good to get a summary idea of why I think this book is cool.
"A writer’s work is important to the extent that the ideal bookshelf on which he would like to be placed is still an improbable shelf, containing books that we do not usually put side by side, the juxtaposition of which can produce electric shocks, short circuits. And so my initial answer already needs correction. A literary situation begins to get interesting when one writes novels for people who are not readers of novels alone, and when one writes literature while thinking of a shelf of books that are not all literary."
I'm not sure if these are the right words to express this, but these essays give me a kind of hope that reading will never be boring.
"And if anyone objects that it is not worth taking so much trouble, then I will quote Cioran (who is not yet a classic but will become one): “While they were preparing the hemlock, Socrates was learning a tune on the flute. ‘What good will it do you,’ they asked, ‘to know this tune before you die?’”"
July 7, 2015
In these essays - selected from various papers & symposiums over the course of the 1960s/70s - Calvino examines the intersections of literature with philosophy, science, psychology, and politics. He’s blazingly insightful, incredibly well-read, and has an intensely logical, mathematical way of dissecting literature.
My favorites:
Why Read the Classics? - various definitions of what makes a piece of literature a “classic”, and the role of such classics in a reader's life. "A classic,” goes one such definition, "is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say."
Cybernetics and Ghosts - thoughts about linguistics, storytelling, artificial intelligence, and the potential to mechanize the production of literature.
Levels of Reality in Literature
Definitions of Territories: Eroticism - about the treatment of sexual themes in the modern novel
Definitions of Territories: Fantasy
Right and Wrong Political Uses of Literature
The Odysseys Within the Odyssey - a short essay on folktale patterns, memory, identity, and restorative journeying in Homer’s epic
I didn't necessarily agree with everything he said (e.g. when thinking about mechanizing literature, what's with his apparent desire to erase the figure of the author and reduce humanity's role to one of passive consumption? why would this be beneficial?)... but I certainly found him very thought-provoking.
(I admit to only having skimmed most essays in the latter half of the book, as they’re all in-depth studies of books I haven’t read (yet?), and I didn’t feel I'd get as much out of them.)
My favorites:
Why Read the Classics? - various definitions of what makes a piece of literature a “classic”, and the role of such classics in a reader's life. "A classic,” goes one such definition, "is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say."
Cybernetics and Ghosts - thoughts about linguistics, storytelling, artificial intelligence, and the potential to mechanize the production of literature.
Levels of Reality in Literature
Definitions of Territories: Eroticism - about the treatment of sexual themes in the modern novel
Definitions of Territories: Fantasy
Right and Wrong Political Uses of Literature
The Odysseys Within the Odyssey - a short essay on folktale patterns, memory, identity, and restorative journeying in Homer’s epic
I didn't necessarily agree with everything he said (e.g. when thinking about mechanizing literature, what's with his apparent desire to erase the figure of the author and reduce humanity's role to one of passive consumption? why would this be beneficial?)... but I certainly found him very thought-provoking.
(I admit to only having skimmed most essays in the latter half of the book, as they’re all in-depth studies of books I haven’t read (yet?), and I didn’t feel I'd get as much out of them.)
April 1, 2018
“To read a great book for the first time in one’s maturity is an extraordinary pleasure, different from (though one cannot say greater or lesser than) the pleasure of having read it in one’s youth.”
I love the way Calvino describes the act of reading, calling literature a ”voyage of discovery” where books can “conceal themselves in the folds of memory, camouflaging themselves as the collective or individual unconscious.” Calvino believed in the importance of literature and the ability for it to influence masses. He believed in approaching books without preconceived notions or bias, as you never know when one can change your life. He challenges us to take a look at literature with eyes of wonder and with expectations that we will learn and grow from it. Though books withstand the test of time and remain the same, we are always growing and changing, so reading and rereading our favorite books at different times of our life can bring whole new meanings and perspectives for us.
I love the way Calvino describes the act of reading, calling literature a ”voyage of discovery” where books can “conceal themselves in the folds of memory, camouflaging themselves as the collective or individual unconscious.” Calvino believed in the importance of literature and the ability for it to influence masses. He believed in approaching books without preconceived notions or bias, as you never know when one can change your life. He challenges us to take a look at literature with eyes of wonder and with expectations that we will learn and grow from it. Though books withstand the test of time and remain the same, we are always growing and changing, so reading and rereading our favorite books at different times of our life can bring whole new meanings and perspectives for us.
Read
May 6, 2023A scattershot but satisfying collections of essays and book introductions, forwards, and commentaries. Italo Calvino is both a man of his times (the 1960s-1980s) which means he is often responding to the more technical analysis of literature through the introduction of structuralism, psychoanalysis, and eventually deconstruction. He is also a writer. While I still like to read good, clear and pragmatic literary criticism, I too find that a lot of more recent criticism (and I haven't read journal articles in quite some time) is more and more particular and even self-serving. But a writer telling you why they love to read and giving their thoughts as a writer is so good and engaging and inspires you to want to read more.
From this collection I plan to soon read Manzoni's The Betrothed (with some help from Umberto Eco too), and am jumping into reading and rereading some classics.
From this collection I plan to soon read Manzoni's The Betrothed (with some help from Umberto Eco too), and am jumping into reading and rereading some classics.
July 19, 2014
As usual, Calvino does not disappoint. The writing is intelligent, and always dynamic, and he has this playful sensability which really comes through in his non fiction work. "Why read the classics?" I found especially resonent and gratifying since I'm in grad school at St. John's. He just brings such a fresh, lively perspective to everything he writes about, heck, he almost made me want to read Dickens again in 'the novel as spectacle'
Note: a lot of the pieces from section II can also be found in his collection "Why read the classics?" which is also great
Note: a lot of the pieces from section II can also be found in his collection "Why read the classics?" which is also great
November 16, 2011
Essay on 'Cinema & the Novel: Problems of Narrative' is especially good, and can be found on Google Books. Important reading for cartoonists (Calvino is good for cartoonists to read in general I think). Discusses Robbe-Grillet, the nouveau-roman, Godard's 'essay films', inherent inferiority complexes, etc. Mentions comic strips at the end and the bearing they have had on his work, how 'a true study of the genre as an art in itself has still to see the light', which remains a fairly accurate assessment..
December 6, 2013
Although I feel like I've read some of these essays before, Calvino is always a welcome kick in the ass to remind me what I love about reading and writing. Some of my favorites were "Cybernetics and Ghosts," "Literature as Projection of Desire," and "Right and Wrong Political Uses of Literature." And the humble postscript essay "By Way of an Autobiography" is a lesson to all writers in how to talk about yourself and your work.
November 27, 2008
Italo Calvino is my Number One MySpace Friend. It's an illustrious position to hold and one that I do not take lightly. These essays make my brain mushy in the best possible way. I think I want to have his posthumous literary metaphorical babies. Never mind N'Sync, where can I get a poster of Calv?
Really, though, any one of these essays is worth the price of admission alone.
Really, though, any one of these essays is worth the price of admission alone.
January 27, 2019
140713: this is a very good selection of essays by Calvino, the reason it is a four is my unfamiliarity with certain works and authors he examines in final essays, so it is part one preferred. even there, a certain amount of reading is helpful, if only to decide whether his claims make sense, but overall there is great pleasure in his explorations...
January 17, 2016
The best essay in this collection is the title one. It is in the center of the book and it is the linchpin. Calvino had the perspicacity to remind why it matters to read the best of the best.
The rest of the essays I came in and out on and had different levels of engagement. But being a Calvino enthusiast, I highly recommend getting a copy of this for reading and for your library.
The rest of the essays I came in and out on and had different levels of engagement. But being a Calvino enthusiast, I highly recommend getting a copy of this for reading and for your library.
Want to read
December 19, 2008I've obviously been neglecting this book. It's a collection of essays so it's easy to stop and start. Why to Read the Classics was a great essay. I will give this more attention. It certainly deserves it...
September 1, 2010
Includes the marvelous essay 'Why Read the Classics.' A wonderful perspective, especially held up against, say, Harold Bloom's more fixed and heavy view of what used to be the canon.
Also includes a great essay on the good and bad uses of politics in literature.
Also includes a great essay on the good and bad uses of politics in literature.
June 12, 2008
Loved it. He is humorous and pretty easy to follow.
January 26, 2008
I re-read his essay "Why Read the Classics?" every three or four months. It helps remind me why I love reading and re-reading.
June 30, 2008
This collection of essays provides a major framework for how I view the act of reading/information networks.
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