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Italo Calvino

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Italo Calvino


Born
in Santiago de Las Vegas, Cuba
October 15, 1923

Died
September 19, 1985

Genre

Influences


Italo 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 simpl
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Average rating: 3.99 · 381,897 ratings · 27,814 reviews · 449 distinct worksSimilar authors
If on a Winter's Night a Tr...

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4.04 avg rating — 89,815 ratings — published 1979 — 193 editions
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Invisible Cities

4.13 avg rating — 75,967 ratings — published 1972 — 5 editions
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The Baron in the Trees

by
4.03 avg rating — 39,905 ratings — published 1957 — 192 editions
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Il visconte dimezzato

3.82 avg rating — 22,615 ratings — published 1952 — 122 editions
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Cosmicomics

4.17 avg rating — 17,534 ratings — published 1965 — 127 editions
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Il cavaliere inesistente

3.84 avg rating — 18,765 ratings — published 1959 — 114 editions
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Il sentiero dei nidi di ragno

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3.77 avg rating — 17,446 ratings — published 1947 — 89 editions
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Marcovaldo

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3.85 avg rating — 12,436 ratings — published 1963 — 151 editions
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Difficult Loves

3.92 avg rating — 9,376 ratings — published 1958 — 84 editions
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Six Memos For The Next Mill...

4.21 avg rating — 8,424 ratings — published 1988 — 93 editions
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More books by Italo Calvino…
Il visconte dimezzato The Baron in the Trees Il cavaliere inesistente
(3 books)
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3.94 avg rating — 84,499 ratings

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Quotes by Italo Calvino  (?)
Quotes are added by the Goodreads community and are not verified by Goodreads. (Learn more)

“A classic is a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.”
Italo Calvino, The Uses of Literature

“Sections in the bookstore

- Books You Haven't Read
- Books You Needn't Read
- Books Made for Purposes Other Than Reading
- Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong to the Category of Books Read Before Being Written
- Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered
- Books You Mean to Read But There Are Others You Must Read First
- Books Too Expensive Now and You'll Wait 'Til They're Remaindered
- Books ditto When They Come Out in Paperback
- Books You Can Borrow from Somebody
- Books That Everybody's Read So It's As If You Had Read Them, Too
- Books You've Been Planning to Read for Ages
- Books You've Been Hunting for Years Without Success
- Books Dealing with Something You're Working on at the Moment
- Books You Want to Own So They'll Be Handy Just in Case
- Books You Could Put Aside Maybe to Read This Summer
- Books You Need to Go with Other Books on Your Shelves
- Books That Fill You with Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified
- Books Read Long Ago Which It's Now Time to Re-read
- Books You've Always Pretended to Have Read and Now It's Time to Sit Down and Really Read Them”
Italo Calvino, If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

“Melancholy is sadness that has taken on lightness.”
Italo Calvino

Polls

October 2015 New School Classics Group Read

1934, Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers, 209 pages
 
  26 votes, 19.3%

1982, Schindler's List by Thomas Keneally, 429 pages
 
  24 votes, 17.8%

1981, Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie, 647 pages
 
  16 votes, 11.9%

1931, The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, 418 pages
 
  9 votes, 6.7%

 
  9 votes, 6.7%

 
  9 votes, 6.7%

1958, Our Man in Havana by Graham Greene, 220 pages
 
  8 votes, 5.9%

1997, American Pastoral by Philip Roth, 432 pages
 
  7 votes, 5.2%

1971, Maurice by E.M. Forster, 256 pages
 
  6 votes, 4.4%

1939, Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo, 243 pages
 
  5 votes, 3.7%

1997, Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier, 449 pages
 
  3 votes, 2.2%

 
  3 votes, 2.2%

1972, Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino, 165 pages
 
  3 votes, 2.2%

 
  3 votes, 2.2%

 
  2 votes, 1.5%

1963, Hopscotch by Julio Cortázar, 564 pages
 
  1 vote, 0.7%

1905, The Petty Demon by Fyodor Sologub, 352 pages
 
  1 vote, 0.7%

1997, Out by Natsuo Kirino, 400 pages
 
  0 votes, 0.0%

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