Six Walks in the Fictional Woods
by Umberto Eco
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 158)
Read in July, 1998
Engaging theoretical book about reading and the place of narrative techniques including narrative time in works of fiction. Umberto Eco is a delightful writer whose semiotic approach demands the creation of a particular ideal or "model" reader, unlike Vladimir Nabokov, who demands a separation of the "perceptive" reader from the text. I believe both views have their legitimate place in reading theory. What is the use of literature if you can never find yourself within its pag...more
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Read in August, 2007
recommends it for:
Writers/Philosophers
An attempt to list lessons learned and thoughts provoked from this book might very well produce the manuscript.
After reading The Name of the Rose 5 times over the last 10 years this was a refreshing shot at Umberto in the under 1000 pages venue. As always, he challenges me personally not only from a writers perspective, but also philosophically, and especially metaphysically.
An elegant read with a bittersweet ending as close to life itself. It's also strewn with the delicate humor of a...more
After reading The Name of the Rose 5 times over the last 10 years this was a refreshing shot at Umberto in the under 1000 pages venue. As always, he challenges me personally not only from a writers perspective, but also philosophically, and especially metaphysically.
An elegant read with a bittersweet ending as close to life itself. It's also strewn with the delicate humor of a...more
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Read in May, 2008
recommends it for:
fiction writers
A six-part series of lectures by the brilliant Umberto Eco. The first lecture is on point of view and is fascinating. The second and third are on plot chronology, the fourth and fifth – believability, the sixth on the impact of the fictional on the actual (good and bad).
The last lecture brings to light some interesting examples of mistaken fiction's beastly results, including a tree of reference connecting the knights templar myths to Hitler's library.
If you have the inclination but li...more
The last lecture brings to light some interesting examples of mistaken fiction's beastly results, including a tree of reference connecting the knights templar myths to Hitler's library.
If you have the inclination but li...more
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Read in May, 2007
recommends it for:
writers, thoughtful readers
Nominally a book about reading, this collection of six lectures by Umberto Eco also yields insight into writing. Philosophical, thought-provoking, but often funny, the lectures use literary examples from Dumas, Nerval and Flaubert, but also from Fleming and Christie. It considers the way fiction manipulates us, the way we use fiction, and even the ways we expect or force our world to conform to narrative. Fascinating.
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Read in June, 2008
The lectures will be of most interest to students of literature, those who are interested in writing fiction themselves, and also general fans of Eco's amazing world.
While the lectures were of mixed interest to me, they were full of personal anecdotes from Eco's life and writing and also much useful advice for aspiring writers.
While the lectures were of mixed interest to me, they were full of personal anecdotes from Eco's life and writing and also much useful advice for aspiring writers.
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Read in January, 2000
Norton Lectures at Harvard: these are his notes for a public lecture on reading fiction; one of my favorite texts on the act of reading; also, he writes this in homage to Calvino--he's responding to Calvino's Six Memos for the Millennium, also a Norton lecture, but Calvino died before he delivered it.
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