If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

Content Warning: This section of the guide refers to death by suicide and describes sexual situations, sometimes explicitly.

The novel begins with the narrator directly addressing the Reader: “You are about to begin reading Italo Calvino’s new novel, If on a winter’s night a traveler” (3). Thus, the narrator suggests, the Reader—whom the narrator typically addresses as “you” throughout the novel—should get comfortable and put aside preconceptions and expectations. Next, the narrator describes way the Reader likely purchased the novel: The Reader went into a bookstore and found the novel in a small section in the back of the store, “New Books Whose Author Or Subject Appeals To You” (6). The narrator imagines that the Reader may be perusing the book “at your desk” (7) at a boring workplace where nothing is achieved; if the Reader had a more practical job, such as a surgeon or a construction worker, then reading at work would be ill-advised and dangerous.

The narrator suggests that as the Reader reads, the novel will reveal itself as short, fragmented scraps of text. This is deliberate, as the modern mind is only tuned to think in short, sharp bursts. In addition, the narrator hopes the Reader will recognize Calvino’s “unmistakable tone” even though Calvino is known to change his

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