Calvino, by Calvino
In an article I'm reading (Sergio Blazina, "Italo Calvino: Un Linguaggio fra Scienzo e Mito"), quoting Calvino on the language of science and what it can bring to the language of literature (my quick translation):
"...the model of mathematical language, of formal logic, can keep the writer from the repetition into which words and images fall through their false use. ...The writer must not believe he has found something absolute, however; here too the example of science can help: in the patient modesty with which it considers each result as part of a perhaps infinite series of approximations."
(This is the/a key to Calvino's story, "L'avventura di un fotografo." )
And also:
"In Palomar...a continuous need of real knowledge has led me to limit the field, descend ever further into the details. In the end this type of research shows itself inexhaustible."
The game of language, in Calvino, a serious game, with serious objectives, despite the skepticism, despite the irony, is a grate of light (see his story, "The Count of Montecristo,") in the wee hours feeling of "what's the point"? I want to see it as a way out of Beckett.
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