Difficult Loves

This was just breath-takingly heart-breakingly brilliant and, at points, exactly what I was looking for. Calvino has such an incredible knack for describing personal thought and emotion... add to this a flurry of expertly chosen adjectives, and you find yourself taken away and immersed into the mind and body of the character on the page. This is what I needed.As with any collection of shorter works, there are high points and low points. At times I felt like this was a mediocre read. One that I was going to be glad to have read but not one that stuck with me. At times I felt like, in only a dozen or so pages, I had completely lost myself in a world that I didn't want to leave. I don't know if it was the type of stories being written or the simple fact that Calvino became a better writer over the course of the five years represented in this collection, but by the end I felt like *I* had grown into something different and better along with the stories I was reading.The first section of the book, Riviera Stories, slowly pulls you into the fantastical and meandering worlds in Calvino's mind. Many of these stories seem almost non-sensical and lack any real overt point to be made, but it's within these beautifully rendered slice-of-life stories that one finds meaning if you're willing to look. The author need not browbeat the reader with any sort of agenda as it is simply too easy to lose oneself within the web of words. I adored the non-ending endings of these stories and found that I had to put the book down with the conclusion of each mini-drama to let the feelings that were building up wash over me and away before I could jump into the next fantasy.This style became such an expectation throughout Riviera Stories and into the first 2 installments of Wartime Stories that the full ending of "Going to Headquarters" caught me completely off-guard and unprepared. I felt it coming, but I never expected to see it happen. Calvino then lulled me back into my dream world over the next several episodes... "The Crow Comes Last" was an incredible thriller that had me turning pages faster than anything up to that point but somehow still retained a feeling of unreality. "Animal Woods" then slowed everything down such that my dream state was nearly complete before being awoken by the iron hand grasping the nape of my neck at the end of "Mine Field." Again I found myself unprepared and requiring a moment to gather my thoughts.The farcical experiment of "A Theft in a Pastry Shop" was nearly as unexpected and carried well into "Dollars and the Demimondaine" until that story also broke my heart. The whole of Postwar Stories really contained an unexpected element of humor that, at times, almost become too ridiculous. It was here that, while enjoyable, I felt like this book perhaps did not have as much to say to me as I had hoped to hear.But then the big guns came out and Stories of Love and Loneliness grabbed me by the heart and refused to let go. "The Adventure of a Soldier" was, perhaps, my favorite story in the collection. I think we've all been there, and my skin crawled as I felt the hope, the self-doubt, the assurance, and the hopelessness run up and down my spine just as poor Tomagra's hand stumbled its way closer and further to our nameless heroine. I wanted to be on that train car so badly. I wanted to be Tomagra, and I wanted those feelings I was feeling in abstenia to be real. "The Adventure of a Clerk" had nearly the same effect as my stomach churned as I watched (and felt!) the exaltation unable to be expressed, unable to be shared, and finally unable to be held onto. "The Adventure of a Traveler" simply left me in awe (again!) of Calvino's ability to throw me, fully, into the feelings of these characters. It was, however, "The Adventures of a Reader" that brought everything together for me. I was on that rock. I was watching the tan lady. I was reading that book. I was trying not to see her and see her at the same time. I had escaped into the story just as Amedeo found himself counting the stairs with Raskolnikov. (Again, with  Crime and Punishment (Everyman's Library (Cloth)) Crime and Punishment !) Between this and "The Adventure of a Soldier," I do find it difficult to pick a favorite. I loved the nearsighted man as well, and his story of loneliness nearly made me cry. Perhaps this will be the thrill of my life, and now it is over as well. Ugh. The final chapter brought everything together and left me with a somber, undetermined, yet hopeful feeling in the pit of my stomach and the lump in my throat.Really, this was just an incredible journey through the lives of others. Watching, waiting, and projecting myself into these short adventures was wholly rewarding, and I feel lucky to now have these as part of my "overall and unitary book that is the sum of all my readings."

I read Difficult Loves a month ago and found that the stories in this book have staying power. Italo Calvino conjures up vivid imagery to accompany magical and unsettling stories. His story telling abilities are such that he reminds readers of long forgotten sensations. We feel the marvel and anxiety of two children who happen upon a property that is both enchanting and disturbing. We experience the elation of a man who is new to glasses and his disappointment upon realizing he found only a temporary reprieve from his same old life. Another story that opens with a leathery old man warning a weary traveler against crossing a mountain pass is one of the most powerfully written tales in the book. Difficult Loves is worth rereading.

Signifying nothing... The stories, that is. They mean nothing. They tell nothing. They are nothing. They are simple the everyday adventures of your most common strangers.Calvino has the gift to describe those feelings and moments that no one else does... From the electric tension of flirting in a train and not knowing if it's leading anywhere to the rush of adrenaline in an imaginary pirate ship. These stories make sense to the young and the old... To anyone who has ever had an ordinary day and just loved it...

Not for everyone, but definitely an interesting read. Some of these short stories were better than others.

good quality & service

As always the mind of Italo Calvino is enthralling.

Calvino is one of my fav author; yet this interpreter betrayed him - it is almost unreadable in some chapters. I have read the chinese version and they are fantastic.

Book came in a timely fashion and as described.

Difficult, mundane, bewildering loves

I love the book, had read an ebook, and then proceeded to buy a hard copy. This is a must have book.