Painting with words, writing with pictures : word and image in the work of Italo Calvino / Franco Ricci.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Ricci's book ranges widely over Calvino's oeuvre to illustrate the accuracy of the idea articulated by Calvino himself that a visual image lies at the origin of all his narrative.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

Starting from the boldly formulated premise that for Calvino "thinking began at the eye," Ricci (Univ. of Ottawa) goes on to make an important and original contribution to the burgeoning field of Calvino studies. In six densely written and theoretically savvy chapters ("From Word to Image," "From Image to Word," "Variations on a Theme," "Verbal Order to Visual Chaos," "The World's Seamless Web," "Painted Stories and Novel Spaces"), Ricci traces a subtle and convincing argument for the centrality of the visual in the writing and thought of the late Italian novelist and critic. The author ranges widely through Calvino's novels, stories, essays, and editorial work, and he discusses key issues such as ekphrasis, imagery, the importance of maps in Calvino's fiction, his writings on artists (Adami, Gnoli, De Chirico) and the visual arts in general, and the relationship of verbal and visual in his overall imaginistic system. Ricci's sharp intelligence, extensive reading, and interdisciplinary flair enable him to deliver a salutary challenge to the received wisdom about Calvino (he argues, for example, that Calvino was never a neorealist writer). This book is indispensable for graduate and research collections in modern Italian studies, criticism of contemporary fiction, and applied literary theory. S. Botterill University of California, Berkeley