The world of Calvino is a world of fable, but he uses its mechanisms to focus with unerring precision on human reality. Nature in these stories has a magical quality in the flight of a crow, the iridescent track of a snail, the sideways leap of a stray cat - but the magic can encompass both enchantment and terror.
'Italo Calvino's Adam, One Afternoon confirms the part he has played in revitalising the art of fiction in our time. In these beautifully translated stories, the quality of the writing emerges as clearly as do the ease and rage of his inventiveness. Calvino's special gift is to link the physical and immediate with an allegorical timelessness.. All the characters and creatures in these stories conspire to convey a feeling of the wonder, mystery and terror of life.' - Guardian
'Calvino's strength is his economy and subtlety. The best of his allegorical fantasies have the power of the Brothers Grimm, rollicking stories on the surface, with an underlying savagery' - Listener
