Status
Available
Call number
Collections
Publication
Mariner Books (1979), Edition: First, 144 pages
Description
A group of travellers chance to meet, first in a castle, then a tavern. Their powers of speech are magically taken from them and instead they have only tarot cards with which to tell their stories. What follows is an exquisite interlinking of narratives, and a fantastic, surreal and chaotic history of all human consciousness.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Poquette
The Castle of Crossed Destinies opens with an evocation of Dante's Inferno — the narrator is lost in a dark wood — but then it shifts to an evocation of The Canterbury Tales — various travelers make their way to a castle in a forest. The kicker here is that their misadventures while being
The tarot trumps, when viewed in order, are understood to represent the Renaissance idea of a hero's progress as he pursues his quest, but when scattered randomly among the other 56 cards, they merely provide glimpses of character qualities or trials or boons, depending upon the juxtaposition of one card to another. A notion of the medieval court or Renaissance society is doubly invoked through both the setting of this collection of stories and the historic quality of the cards.
But Calvino being Calvino — playful and ironic — and the cards being what they are — ambiguous and subjective of interpretation — most of these stories go in unexpected directions, not necessarily of either the heroic or Chaucerian kind. Over and over again, the cards reveal multiple possibilities of interpretation and demonstrate that they reflect what is in the eye of the beholder at any given moment: ". . . each new card placed on the table explains or corrects the meaning of the preceding cards . . . for the cards conceal more things than they tell . . . each story runs into another story . . . the stories told from left to right or from bottom to top can also be read from right to left or top to bottom . . . the same cards presented in a different order often change their meaning." But this is the way of tarot cards.
The book consists of two parts, the first as described above, set in a castle and using the Italian Renaissance Visconti deck. The second part is set in a tavern and employs the 18th century French Marseille deck. The images are similar between the two decks although some of the cards carry different names. Also, the Renaissance cards were initially used in trick-taking games in which what are called today the "Major Arcana" were then the "greater trumps." No one knows for sure how the game was played. By the 18th century, the Marseille deck had been co-opted for fortune telling and other occult purposes, and this has been the lasting legacy until the later part of the 20th century when countless new decks began to appear which have taken tarot down a Jungian-Campbellian-meditative road. Occultism has taken a back seat to a new incarnation of the heroic quest.
In a postscript Calvino tells us that he wrote these stories so that he could move on from his obsession with the story-telling possibilities of tarot cards: "I realized that tarots were a machine for constructing stories; I thought of a book and I imagined its frame; the mute narrators, the forest, the inn; I was tempted by the diabolical idea of conjuring up all the stories that could be contained in a tarot deck." Of course, with 78 cards the number of iterations would compete with the number of stars in the sky. Before it drove him beyond the pale, he stopped with the two small collections we have here, which grant us a peek into the world of possibilities.
Some of these tales would give even Chaucer's pilgrims pause: "A Grave Robber's Tale," the "Tale of the Vampire's Kingdom." Some reflecting modern issues: "The Surviving Warrior's Tale," in which an army of Amazons defeats battling knights and only one is left to tell about it. Some reference great literature: "The Tale of Roland Crazed with Love" and "Three Tales of Madness and Destruction" which combine Hamlet, Macbeth and Lear all rolled into one.
Not everyone will be charmed by this book, which defies quite a few conventions, but once again Calvino sets himself apart as a master. Indeed, as in so much of his work, there is more here than meets the eye.
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lost in the woods have deprived them of their ability to speak. The host produces a deck of tarot cards which they then use to try to communicate their stories by picture and gesture. This deck of cards is the hand-painted Visconti deck from the mid 1400s, which was reproduced and marketed in the 1980s. The book is completely illustrated with each card image as it appears in a story.The tarot trumps, when viewed in order, are understood to represent the Renaissance idea of a hero's progress as he pursues his quest, but when scattered randomly among the other 56 cards, they merely provide glimpses of character qualities or trials or boons, depending upon the juxtaposition of one card to another. A notion of the medieval court or Renaissance society is doubly invoked through both the setting of this collection of stories and the historic quality of the cards.
But Calvino being Calvino — playful and ironic — and the cards being what they are — ambiguous and subjective of interpretation — most of these stories go in unexpected directions, not necessarily of either the heroic or Chaucerian kind. Over and over again, the cards reveal multiple possibilities of interpretation and demonstrate that they reflect what is in the eye of the beholder at any given moment: ". . . each new card placed on the table explains or corrects the meaning of the preceding cards . . . for the cards conceal more things than they tell . . . each story runs into another story . . . the stories told from left to right or from bottom to top can also be read from right to left or top to bottom . . . the same cards presented in a different order often change their meaning." But this is the way of tarot cards.
The book consists of two parts, the first as described above, set in a castle and using the Italian Renaissance Visconti deck. The second part is set in a tavern and employs the 18th century French Marseille deck. The images are similar between the two decks although some of the cards carry different names. Also, the Renaissance cards were initially used in trick-taking games in which what are called today the "Major Arcana" were then the "greater trumps." No one knows for sure how the game was played. By the 18th century, the Marseille deck had been co-opted for fortune telling and other occult purposes, and this has been the lasting legacy until the later part of the 20th century when countless new decks began to appear which have taken tarot down a Jungian-Campbellian-meditative road. Occultism has taken a back seat to a new incarnation of the heroic quest.
In a postscript Calvino tells us that he wrote these stories so that he could move on from his obsession with the story-telling possibilities of tarot cards: "I realized that tarots were a machine for constructing stories; I thought of a book and I imagined its frame; the mute narrators, the forest, the inn; I was tempted by the diabolical idea of conjuring up all the stories that could be contained in a tarot deck." Of course, with 78 cards the number of iterations would compete with the number of stars in the sky. Before it drove him beyond the pale, he stopped with the two small collections we have here, which grant us a peek into the world of possibilities.
Some of these tales would give even Chaucer's pilgrims pause: "A Grave Robber's Tale," the "Tale of the Vampire's Kingdom." Some reflecting modern issues: "The Surviving Warrior's Tale," in which an army of Amazons defeats battling knights and only one is left to tell about it. Some reference great literature: "The Tale of Roland Crazed with Love" and "Three Tales of Madness and Destruction" which combine Hamlet, Macbeth and Lear all rolled into one.
Not everyone will be charmed by this book, which defies quite a few conventions, but once again Calvino sets himself apart as a master. Indeed, as in so much of his work, there is more here than meets the eye.
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LibraryThing member Pummzie
I suspect that this was a lot more fun and frustrating and fulfilling (and any other F words that you can think of....) to write than it is to read. The beauty of his game of constructing tales from tarot cards is all in the creation. I didn't share in it in the telling other than the usual
In short, a man arrives at a castle in a forest. At dinner are a bunch of other travellers who are eating in silence. He quickly realises that they and he have suddenly become mute. A pack of tarot cards is laid out on the table and different members of the party use them to illustrate their stories which our narrator attempts to interpret into a narrative.
The second half of the book takes place in a tavern with similar circumstances but a less grand set of cards. This time the combination of cards illusrate well known stories, like that of Hamlet, Faust and Oedipus.
Clever but like watching someone else with a rubik's cube
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admiration I have for his quirky unique approach to story-telling.In short, a man arrives at a castle in a forest. At dinner are a bunch of other travellers who are eating in silence. He quickly realises that they and he have suddenly become mute. A pack of tarot cards is laid out on the table and different members of the party use them to illustrate their stories which our narrator attempts to interpret into a narrative.
The second half of the book takes place in a tavern with similar circumstances but a less grand set of cards. This time the combination of cards illusrate well known stories, like that of Hamlet, Faust and Oedipus.
Clever but like watching someone else with a rubik's cube
Show Less
LibraryThing member P_S_Patrick
Having read a few of Calvino's books, I can confidently say that this is not one of his best. The book relies a lot on its gimmick, for want of a better word, and while many of his other original ideas have worked brilliantly in other books, I think he labours this one past its worth. It's not a
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bad book, but I cannot find any particular virtue to recommend it for. Show Less
LibraryThing member Petroglyph
This one was a great deal of fun: I was absolutely delighted by this exuberantly postmodern game with literary tropes and retellings.
The castle of the title is located at the centre of a vast forest, where it serves as an inn for a host of inexplicably voiceless guests -- suddenly none of them are
The second half of the book is similar in setup, but serves as a basis for a retelling of Shakespeare plays, coupled with a few passages of musings on Art and Life that are decidedly Literary Criticism.
It is all a wonderful, tongue-in-cheek game: Calvino only took things seriously enough to adhere to his square of cards to be read in all possible directions. But other than that, it’s sheer indulgence: an erudite, playful writer enthusiastically exploring the worlds of literature and the mechanisms of story construction. More than once Calvino’s boundless enthusiasm reminded me of Borges and his extravagant literary funhouse.
The book must have been an absolute riot to write, and I found it infectious as anything: it made me giggle with delight, repeatedly.
The castle of the title is located at the centre of a vast forest, where it serves as an inn for a host of inexplicably voiceless guests -- suddenly none of them are
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able to use their voice. And so they resort to using a pack of tarot cards to tell each other their adventures and the events that led them to this place. This is, of course, a flimsy excuse for Calvino to indulge in a multi-levelled game of connect-the-dots: the stories that he spins off sequences of tarot cards are spurred on by associations, hints, creative liberty, literary allusions and an impish eagerness to take visual details on the card out of context (the symmetrical ten of swords, for instance, is called on to represent opposing armies in one story and a barrier of archangels in another; the ace of cups stands for a forest spring, the fountain of youth, and a magic-beanstalk-type tree). One story’s sequence of cards will, when read the other way, yield a completely different story. And so, as he first builds and then explores his square of cards, Calvino presents a lovely array of stories built around late-medieval, and renaissance-era tropes: retellings of Roland, Faust, Parsifal (among others), even Oedipus in the spirit of courtly romances, Boccaccio and Chaucer. The second half of the book is similar in setup, but serves as a basis for a retelling of Shakespeare plays, coupled with a few passages of musings on Art and Life that are decidedly Literary Criticism.
It is all a wonderful, tongue-in-cheek game: Calvino only took things seriously enough to adhere to his square of cards to be read in all possible directions. But other than that, it’s sheer indulgence: an erudite, playful writer enthusiastically exploring the worlds of literature and the mechanisms of story construction. More than once Calvino’s boundless enthusiasm reminded me of Borges and his extravagant literary funhouse.
The book must have been an absolute riot to write, and I found it infectious as anything: it made me giggle with delight, repeatedly.
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LibraryThing member isabelx
Travellers taking shelter at a castle in a forest find that they are unable to speak, and tell each other their stories using the cards from a tarot pack.
LibraryThing member lucybrown
"I publish this book to be free of it: it has obsessed me for years."
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
Show More
the most inventive writers of his generation. This book somehow wins as art, but fails with the heart. I might compare it to those paintings where the artist executes a human head with various vegetables. As an academic and artistic game it is full of fun, but lacks a real soul. However, I never got the feeling that that was the point of this particular book, any more than I got the feeling it was the point of those paintings. Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
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LibraryThing member Mikalina
If our (the reader´s) view on free will is that our personal variant of life story can be fitted into a short list of stock of stories that is told again and again (albeit in different disguises,) Calvino tells us we need no more than a pack of Tarot cards and mute grimacing to communicate.
The
The book is a brilliant mirror of the challenge of communication. The argument on the side of hope and of the human free will is given by the fact that the author himself is strictly following the Tarot card/mute-storyteller-rule writing the book, and by that shows us how a precise and original human mirror always will splinter the beastly destiny/no-true-communication frame we are born into.
The constricted frame and the tedious style is my story, your story, anyone´s and everybody´s story. It only becomes a great story when Calvino mirror us all in our feeble communication skills, and by that manages to tell quite another story, a story that can not be held back neither by tediousness of language or restricted vehicles of communication, nor leave the reader that let himself be mirrored as mute-deaf as he was...... A true Heisenberg maneuvre done by a true author.
The
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Castle of Crossed Destinies is a story of human communication. The deaf listener leaves the storyteller mute, an the non-emphatic reader fits any story he reads into a stereotype he masters. The book is a brilliant mirror of the challenge of communication. The argument on the side of hope and of the human free will is given by the fact that the author himself is strictly following the Tarot card/mute-storyteller-rule writing the book, and by that shows us how a precise and original human mirror always will splinter the beastly destiny/no-true-communication frame we are born into.
The constricted frame and the tedious style is my story, your story, anyone´s and everybody´s story. It only becomes a great story when Calvino mirror us all in our feeble communication skills, and by that manages to tell quite another story, a story that can not be held back neither by tediousness of language or restricted vehicles of communication, nor leave the reader that let himself be mirrored as mute-deaf as he was...... A true Heisenberg maneuvre done by a true author.
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LibraryThing member rdaneel
These are stories constructed from a deck of tarot cards. As Calvino says in an end note, the deck turned into a story generating machine for him, which is fascinating for a while, but then one wears of it. The point of the book, I guess, is that all stories (not just the ones in this book),
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consist of a set of common elements. However, I think he dealt with this concept better in Invisible Cities, and the tarot deck has been put to better use by Pavic in Last Love in Constantinople. Overall, this one is avoidable, unless you are a diehard Calvino fan. Show Less
LibraryThing member DRFP
This was a book I desperately wanted to like, but unfortunately I couldn't quite bring myself to do so.
It's certainly a very clever novel, telling stories through Tarot cards, but ultimately that method of narrative is quite restricting. It's all done very well, but as said, it all gets a little
It's certainly a very clever novel, telling stories through Tarot cards, but ultimately that method of narrative is quite restricting. It's all done very well, but as said, it all gets a little
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tedious and the style is a bit too constraining. Show Less
LibraryThing member iayork
Crossing "Castles": Italo Calvino was a master of surreal storytelling -- he was, for example, one of only two authors I've seen who could manage a second-person narrative. But his gimmick falls flat in "The Castle of Crossed Destinies," a book that is intriguingly laid out, but never manages to be
In the first section, a traveler comes to a castle full of other guests, but for some reason no one there is able to speak. To tell each other about their histories, they use a pack of tarot cards to communicate their stories -- tales about love affairs, ancient cities, and Faustian pacts.
The second is pretty much the same, except that it takes place in a tavern, where mute people are still using tarot cards to describe their pasts. The stories -- evil queens, fallen warriors, even an Arthurian tale -- get darker and stranger, especially when the narrator himself began to describe his own past to the people who are watching him and the cards.
As an idea, tarot cards being used to tell a story is brilliant. Especially since the stories that Calvino spins out are not necessarily the only interpretation -- each card used to tell the story can be interpreted differently. The problem is, in the first half of the book, Calvino tries to apply this to some very boring, straightforward little stories. They tend to stop suddenly, without much of a finale.
The second half of the book uses this gimmick more skilfully, with Calvino writing in greater detail, and using more ornate, atmospheric writing. It feels less like stories wrapped around some cards, and more like stories with cards as illustrations of what might have been. He also adds a more eerie, macabre tale to this half, making it even more engaging.
The first half sags in a big way; it's almost tiring to read. But the second half of "Castle of Crossed Destinies" is where Calvino's tarot gimmick starts to pay off. Interesting, but not all that it could have been.
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more than a curiosity. In the first section, a traveler comes to a castle full of other guests, but for some reason no one there is able to speak. To tell each other about their histories, they use a pack of tarot cards to communicate their stories -- tales about love affairs, ancient cities, and Faustian pacts.
The second is pretty much the same, except that it takes place in a tavern, where mute people are still using tarot cards to describe their pasts. The stories -- evil queens, fallen warriors, even an Arthurian tale -- get darker and stranger, especially when the narrator himself began to describe his own past to the people who are watching him and the cards.
As an idea, tarot cards being used to tell a story is brilliant. Especially since the stories that Calvino spins out are not necessarily the only interpretation -- each card used to tell the story can be interpreted differently. The problem is, in the first half of the book, Calvino tries to apply this to some very boring, straightforward little stories. They tend to stop suddenly, without much of a finale.
The second half of the book uses this gimmick more skilfully, with Calvino writing in greater detail, and using more ornate, atmospheric writing. It feels less like stories wrapped around some cards, and more like stories with cards as illustrations of what might have been. He also adds a more eerie, macabre tale to this half, making it even more engaging.
The first half sags in a big way; it's almost tiring to read. But the second half of "Castle of Crossed Destinies" is where Calvino's tarot gimmick starts to pay off. Interesting, but not all that it could have been.
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LibraryThing member shiunji
The concept of this book, as blurbed, made it sound like a mesmerising & wonderful concoction, especially to a keen Calvino reader. It is. However, practicality & execution of this particular piece was lack lustre.
For me, the gem of this little collection of stories inspired by the tarot was the
Do not pick it as your introduction to this marvellous author, but look instead to the tenets of If on a Winter's Night a Traveller, Invisible Cities & Mr Palomar.
For me, the gem of this little collection of stories inspired by the tarot was the
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pathos inducing author's afterword. Do not pick it as your introduction to this marvellous author, but look instead to the tenets of If on a Winter's Night a Traveller, Invisible Cities & Mr Palomar.
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LibraryThing member elissajanine
I love the idea of this and was really excited to read it. The first half almost made me put the book down for good; I couldn't feel the stories as anything more than an exercise in plot-building using tarot cards. The writing in the second part was much more evocative, haunting in places. I'm glad
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I finished, but I admit I was left wondering if I was missing something. Show Less
LibraryThing member fruiter
A most splendid case of meta-textual literature! Calvino defies all canonical approaches to story-telling and reinvents many pillars of our literature. From Perceval to King Lear, from Oedipus to Hamlet, but also drawing from no specific work and writing himself into the narration as well, this
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fantastic author transforms all of these different stories and uses them to create a story that is more than a story; it is, more significantly, the story of crossed destinies, made real from the metaphorical crossings of tarot cards, which represent any thing the reader wills them to be. It was definitely a book that I read with all the enthusiasm of a die-hard fanfic reader & sometimes writer; I loved how the quirky and witty style of a writer who was born decades before fanfiction as we know it today existed, often prosaic and humorous, but also surprisingly apt to profound considerations, adapted itself so well to the kind of narration requested of this marvelous book. Show Less
LibraryThing member weeksj10
A very cool and creative concept, but its not my favorite Calvino. It just seems a bit muddled and confused. The characters are very deep and the story line is a bit jumpy. If you like Calvino then give it a try, but definitely don't read it as your first experience, because it may turn you off
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from one of the greatest writers of recent times. Show Less
LibraryThing member lucybrown
"I publish this book to be free of it: it has obsessed me for years."
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
Show More
the most inventive writers of his generation. This book somehow wins as art, but fails with the heart. I might compare it to those paintings where the artist executes a human head with various vegetables. As an academic and artistic game it is full of fun, but lacks a real soul. However, I never got the feeling that that was the point of this particular book, any more than I got the feeling it was the point of those paintings. Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
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LibraryThing member roblong
A traveller stops at a castle in the forest for the night, only to find that he and his fellow guests have lost the power of speech. They then tell their life stories via tarot cards, the traveller deciphering a person's story from the cards they lay down. It's an interesting idea, about how
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stories are made and understood, how lives overlap, and how the same 'card' in life might affect different people in very different ways, but it was hard to get involved with the book. All too much of a tangle, in my view, there was no point I could just start to enjoy what he was doing. In the afterword he says that the idea had bugged him for years and I can imagine why, but it didn't come off for me. Show Less
LibraryThing member unapersson
This book is an experiment in turning an arrangement of tarot cards into a collection of linked stories. Told by travellers in an inn who have been struck dumb and can only tell their stories through tarot. In the second part of the book it is taken to a new level, the cards arranged in a grid with
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stories pulled from history and legend re-expressed through tarot (i.e. Hamlet and the story of Percival) where stories run horizontally or vertically through the grid. It works for the most part, and Calvino's afterword describes the difficulties he had in getting the literary experiment to work, but as you might expect the end result can be slightly variable though some of it is quite remarkable. Show Less
LibraryThing member amerynth
I think Italo Calvino has such interesting ideas for his books and "The Castle of Crossed Destinies" was no exception. He took decks of tarot cards, laid them out and wrote a series of stories from the resulting patterns... including takes on other works.
This book consists of two sections, each
I can really appreciate the work that went into this, and enjoyed Calvino's notes at the close of the book and his writing process.
This book consists of two sections, each
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with a similar premise-- travelers arrive at a destination and find none of them can speak. So, they start to tell their stories using decks of tarot cards. No all of the stories were successful.... I thought the second half of the book was a lot stronger than the first half, where some of the stories got a bit tedious as it felt like Calvino was just trying to get through all the cards.I can really appreciate the work that went into this, and enjoyed Calvino's notes at the close of the book and his writing process.
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LibraryThing member lucybrown
"I publish this book to be free of it: it has obsessed me for years."
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
Wisely, Calvino states this in the "Note" at the end of The Castle of Crossed Destinies". I imagine many readers who happen about the book may wish he hadn't. I am glad he did.
Calvino, along with Kundera and Saramago, was one of
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the most inventive writers of his generation. This book somehow wins as art, but fails with the heart. I might compare it to those paintings where the artist executes a human head with various vegetables. As an academic and artistic game it is full of fun, but lacks a real soul. However, I never got the feeling that that was the point of this particular book, any more than I got the feeling it was the point of those paintings. Here is the gist, a group of Chaucer-like pilgrims make their way through a forest, but their experiences in the forest have rendered them speechless. They all come to what might be a castle or a tavern depending on how you look at it. Each wants to tell his tale, but none can speak. Using a deck of tarot cards they begin to vie for the cards so that they might tell their stories of what happened to them in the forest. The cards are depicted alongside the text. As they each tell their tales, as in life, the cards from one's story interlaces with the cards of the others.
As an imaginative treatise of how and why we tell stories, and of the nature of stories and storytelling, this is wonderful fun and a great pleasure to read. As fiction, it is a bit soulless.
"I always feel the need to alternate one type of writing with another, completely different, to begin writing again as if I had never written anything before." Thus Calvino ends the book. And until his death from cancer, that was one thing his readers could be sure of. I wonder what dreams he would be spinning out for us now if he had lived to Saramago's age.
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LibraryThing member sometimeunderwater
Classic narratives (Orpheus, Shakespeare, etc.) retold by mute travelers through the means of tarot cards.
Unless one has a particularly strong interest in tarot, it's hard to get much from this book. The writing is occasionally interesting by virtue of its quick turns and misdirections, but it
The premise would be rendered redundant if any one of the characters knew sign language, or had thought to carry a pencil.
Unless one has a particularly strong interest in tarot, it's hard to get much from this book. The writing is occasionally interesting by virtue of its quick turns and misdirections, but it
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doesn't go anywhere especially exciting with it.The premise would be rendered redundant if any one of the characters knew sign language, or had thought to carry a pencil.
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LibraryThing member delta351
I thought the second half of the book was much better than the first. I am not familiar w tarot cards, and that made it more confusing. Plus there are some pretty heavy western European literary references to reconcile. I really enjoyed the last two stories, one of which concerned the major
I did not especially like it at first, but it grows on you. Definitely will get better w successive readings. Prob best to read a chapter a day
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tragedies of Shakespeare.I did not especially like it at first, but it grows on you. Definitely will get better w successive readings. Prob best to read a chapter a day
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LibraryThing member hippietrail
This one didn't work for me at all. I just didn't get it. But I'm giving Calvino another chance with If on a Winter's Night a Traveller and I'm glad I did.
LibraryThing member iffland
Didn´t finish it the first time I tried to read it and now gave it a second try - after page 22 I felt like quitting again. It´s just feels like that I see the attention of the author and like the idea of using a Tarock game as basic premise for creating stories but it just doesn´t really work.
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It´s tedious and not very entertaining - can´t really recommend it. Actually I would say that I only gave the third star because i love Tarock cards and really wanted this to work out. Show Less
Subjects
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1969 (original Italian; part 1)
1973 (original Italian; entire)
1979 (English translation)
Physical description
144 p.; 9.31 x 0.43 inches
ISBN
0156154552 / 9780156154550
Local notes
MJW
Other editions
The Castle of Crossed Destinies by Calvino Italo (Hardcover)