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cantordustbunnies's review against another edition
4.0
Very cool and very much a product of the 1960's. While I enjoy psychedelia, I'm not as big a fan of postmodernism. The stories within are certainly enjoyable, written with style, and are an interesting combination of metaphor, myth, and science. Fundamental forces are personified and natural events are the often accidental result of the aspirations, dreams, or interactions of godlike beings in this collection of shorts. There were beautiful and profound moments but overall it felt like the sweet daydreams of a psilocybin enthusiast which maybe is exactly what you're looking for. These stories could get a little on the overly fanciful, airy-fairy side of things. I think they would make a great animated cartoon in the vein of René Laloux.
sonj's review against another edition
A collection of short stories is hard for me to read in one sitting.
spookytrashlover's review against another edition
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
anaforgia's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
davisroberts's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
5.0
aschoonover's review against another edition
challenging
informative
lighthearted
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
elianachow's review against another edition
2.0
Basically a whole lot of shlup shlup shlup nonsense that I did not enjoy reading. The first series of stories was engaging, and Calvino’s prose is lyrical enough, but the collections as a whole were something along the lines of pseudo-philosophical sci-fi modernism and I wasn’t a fan.
gph's review against another edition
4.0
If you ever wanted to read about making tagliatelle at the time of the big bang, or have wondered what if the moon was like, soft and gross, or like scaly and oozing, do not hesitate.
This is a big collection of collections. Qfwfq is an egoist, jealous, stuck-up, probably a cosmic-scale liar, and I loved him. Some of the stories, especially where Qfwfq is no longer driving, get a little mathematical and then you really feel like you are kind of plodding along and if covid lockdown hadn't forced my hand I might have left this unfinished during the Time and the Hunter collection. I was so relieved when Qfwfq returned for the end!!
This is a big collection of collections. Qfwfq is an egoist, jealous, stuck-up, probably a cosmic-scale liar, and I loved him. Some of the stories, especially where Qfwfq is no longer driving, get a little mathematical and then you really feel like you are kind of plodding along and if covid lockdown hadn't forced my hand I might have left this unfinished during the Time and the Hunter collection. I was so relieved when Qfwfq returned for the end!!
elenajohansen's review against another edition
3.0
I am boggled, though mostly in a good way.
I found this a quite difficult and cerebral read, not at first, but increasingly as the stories began to seem less like "stories" and more like esoteric philosophical tracts and eventually complex mathematical proofs. The anthology starts innocently enough with a tale full of absurd humor about going to the moon for its milk, so I did not suspect that by the end I would be thoroughly confused.
That's not entirely the book's fault, though, because had I known just how experimental this fiction would be, I might not have chosen to read it during a worldwide pandemic that's stressing me out and destroying my concentration. I know I'm not the only one having difficulty focusing on reading--I just read an article about it yesterday--but this book certainly requires that focus, that curiosity and questioning and interest. I just couldn't summon it as much as I needed to--by the end I was sitting down and telling myself "Just get through one story, then go do something else." Not my preferred way of reading.
So it's a challenging book. For all that, when I "got" it, I enjoyed it. The early stories often relied on absurdist humor coupled with a sort of deliberate cognitive dissonance--the narrator could be a human, or they could be a single cell, or they could be a fish just crawled from the water to live on dry land for the first time in evolutionary history, but the tone and expressions and idioms were still human, so sometimes you had to remember it wasn't necessary a "person" speaking, or that space and time didn't behave the way we perceive them or the way you would expect them to. Things got weirder from there, with a story about falling infinitely through curved space, in pondering the eventual intersection of parallel lines via non-Euclidean geometry, becoming a metaphor for a threesome; with a single afternoon car ride being overwhelmed by passion in the form of extensive blood/salt/seawater metaphors; with a story about the mitosis of a single-celled narrator being likened to falling in love, but not with another, but also not with yourself, but also not a vague sort of cosmic, universal love. (That one in particular bent my brain a little too far out of whack.)
I love the idea of it, or rather the ideas, the weird bent on philosophy via biology and other sciences. But my poor beleaguered brain wasn't up to some of the more difficult concepts and twists and pages-long paragraphs of endless pontificating.
Ideally, I'd like to come back to this in a year or so and give it another try, to see if it makes more sense (or at least is more enjoyable in whatever level of nonsensicalness it still holds for me) when I can give it the attention it deserves.
I found this a quite difficult and cerebral read, not at first, but increasingly as the stories began to seem less like "stories" and more like esoteric philosophical tracts and eventually complex mathematical proofs. The anthology starts innocently enough with a tale full of absurd humor about going to the moon for its milk, so I did not suspect that by the end I would be thoroughly confused.
That's not entirely the book's fault, though, because had I known just how experimental this fiction would be, I might not have chosen to read it during a worldwide pandemic that's stressing me out and destroying my concentration. I know I'm not the only one having difficulty focusing on reading--I just read an article about it yesterday--but this book certainly requires that focus, that curiosity and questioning and interest. I just couldn't summon it as much as I needed to--by the end I was sitting down and telling myself "Just get through one story, then go do something else." Not my preferred way of reading.
So it's a challenging book. For all that, when I "got" it, I enjoyed it. The early stories often relied on absurdist humor coupled with a sort of deliberate cognitive dissonance--the narrator could be a human, or they could be a single cell, or they could be a fish just crawled from the water to live on dry land for the first time in evolutionary history, but the tone and expressions and idioms were still human, so sometimes you had to remember it wasn't necessary a "person" speaking, or that space and time didn't behave the way we perceive them or the way you would expect them to. Things got weirder from there, with a story about falling infinitely through curved space, in pondering the eventual intersection of parallel lines via non-Euclidean geometry, becoming a metaphor for a threesome; with a single afternoon car ride being overwhelmed by passion in the form of extensive blood/salt/seawater metaphors; with a story about the mitosis of a single-celled narrator being likened to falling in love, but not with another, but also not with yourself, but also not a vague sort of cosmic, universal love. (That one in particular bent my brain a little too far out of whack.)
I love the idea of it, or rather the ideas, the weird bent on philosophy via biology and other sciences. But my poor beleaguered brain wasn't up to some of the more difficult concepts and twists and pages-long paragraphs of endless pontificating.
Ideally, I'd like to come back to this in a year or so and give it another try, to see if it makes more sense (or at least is more enjoyable in whatever level of nonsensicalness it still holds for me) when I can give it the attention it deserves.
bellaroobookworm's review against another edition
5.0
I don't think I have ever been so intrigued by a collection of short stories before. Calvino's work is startling, alluring, provoking, soothing...an enjoyable read.