If you’re in the mood for an unusual story, look no further: If on a winter’s night a traveler is an experimental “meta fiction” novel that plays with genre, storytelling conventions, POV, and pretty much everything else. There’s a little something for everyone here… and even some things you might never think to ask for.
The story begins by addressing You, the Reader, as you/he sit(s) down to read Italo Calvino’s latest novel, If on a winter’s night a travel. The narrator instructs You to find just the right reading position (this is very important): try standing, try sitting and reclining, prop your feet up, make sure you have plenty of light, etc. Then, once you’re all settled, the book gives you the “first chapter” of If on a winter’s night at traveler… which starts to repeat itself. Realizing something is wrong with the copy, You, the Reader, go back to the bookshop to exchange it, only to find that all the copies are misprinted. This starts of the unending quest for the rest of the book… which leads to more and more unfinished chapters as the Reader delves into absurd literary and government conspiracies.
There’s so much to say about this book – where to begin, really? I suppose, at the beginning? I love that first chapter especially, as it not only portrays the mentality of a reader (lowercase “R”) so well but also because of what Calvino is doing in those first few pages. By using second-person narrative and telling You how to find the right reading environment and position, he draws your attention to your own body, increasing your awareness of yourself rather than letting you forget yourself in the book. As I read his directions, I feel the physical urge to try all he suggests: to curl up, to stretch out, to wiggle my toes. Right from the start, Calvino is confusing you, the “real” reader, with You, the fictional Reader, so that you are hyper-aware of the experience of reading. The way he does this reminds me in many ways of the experience of viewing abstract art, which often works to make you physically aware of yourself in relation to the art piece.
Then, of course, there are things Calvino is doing structurally. We have one continuing narrative, as the Reader begins book after book, always to be stopped in some way, and searches in vain for the continuation of whatever story he’s just begun, and then there are the many broken storylines of the books within the book. Each “book” in the novel is playing with a different technique or convention – thrillers, westerns, romance, noir, and so forth – and one slowly realizes that each story is chasing the ever-shifting ideal of the Second Reader (who is the Reader’s latest bookish acquaintance and love interest). It’s a fun way for Calvino to explore genres and character types, without having to commit to one full novel of each – while also reflecting on the nature of writers and readers, the publishing industry, the rise of technology, and – because why not add one more thing? – fascism and governmental control. So the book is not only meta fiction, playing with its own form and your awareness of it, but also a multi-level satire.
If on a winter’s night a traveler
Outside the town of Malbork
Leaning from the steep slope
Without fear of wind or vertigo
Looks down in the gathering shadow
In a network of lines that enlace
In a network of lines that intersect
On the carpet of leaves illuminated by the moon
Around an empty grave
What story down there awaits its end?
–If on a winter’s night a traveler
There is much much more that I’ve left out because there’s just so much going on, in terms of both story and literary technique. I remember when I first finished If on a winter’s night a traveler, I was confused, entertained, delighted – all the things. So of course, I made my book club read it (power does go to my head sometimes) because I needed to be able to talk to people about it, and it turned out to be one of our best discussions to date – one can never get bored reading or talking about this wild ride of a book. If you want something different, please do check this one out and let me know what you think!
–b
Book It With Becca 