The Watcher and Other Stories

by Italo Calvino

Overview

This collection of three long stories by the author of Cosmicomics “demonstrates clearly his talent for transforming the mundane into the marvelous” (The New York Times).

Italo Calvino is widely recognized as one of postwar Italy’s greatest fiction writers and one of the twentieth century’s greatest fabulists. This collection of three stories showcases his range and virtuosity.

In the title story, an Italian Communist poll watcher is stationed at a hospital in Turin, where nuns guide the hands of invalids to their preferred candidate in a special election. In “Smog,” a city’s cooperative laundry facility reveals a harbinger of social purification. And in “The Argentine Ant,” the citizens of a provincial seaside town struggle against a government-controlled infestation.

“Like Jorge Luis Borges and Gabriel García Márquez, Italo Calvino dreams perfect dreams for us.” —John Updike, New Yorker

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780544279575
Publisher:	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publication date:	03/19/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	141
Sales rank:	589,080
File size:	778 KB

About the Author

ITALO CALVINO (1923–1985) attained worldwide renown as one of the twentieth century’s greatest storytellers. Born in Cuba, he was raised in San Remo, Italy, and later lived in Turin, Paris, Rome, and elsewhere. Among his many works are Invisible Cities, If on a winter’s night a traveler, The Baron in the Trees, and other novels, as well as numerous collections of fiction, folktales, criticism, and essays. His works have been translated into dozens of languages.

Editorial Reviews

Like Borgas and Garcia Marquez, Calvino dreams perfect dreams for us....Of the three, Calvino is the funniest, the most variously and benignly curious about the human truth as it comes embedded in its animal, vegetable, historical, and cosmic contest. -- The New Yorker

John Updike