The brilliant Italian writer Italo Calvino (1923-1985) compiled Fantastic Tales: Visionary and Everyday, a historical overview of great fantastic literature of the 19th century. Many of his 26 selections are from well-known authors (Sir Walter Scott, Honoré de Balzac, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Dickens, Ivan Turgenev, Guy de Maupassant, Robert Louis Stevenson, Henry James, Rudyard Kipling, and H.G. Wells), but Calvino largely avoided their best-known stories; the only inclusions likely to be familiar to many Americans are Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown," Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart," and H.G. Wells's "The Country of the Blind." The remaining contributors range from moderately well-known to obscure. So the reader who purchases Fantastic Tales gains not only an intelligently annotated anthology of superb fiction, but, in one pleasant sense, a collection of mostly new stories. Interestingly, some of the finest stories are by authors least known in America. Théophile Gautier's beautifully written, wrenchingly ironic "The Beautiful Vampire" establishes the traditions for romantic vampire fiction. Mérimée's "The Venus of Ille," a tale of culture clashes (Parisian and rural, ancient classical, and contemporary Christian), is sharp, well-written, and uncommonly horrific. With the gorgeous "A Lasting Love," the sole woman contributor, Vernon Lee, paints the most vivid portrait of obsessive, transcendent, destructive love.
Caveat: Calvino's introductions sometimes reveal more of the plot than readers will like. --Cynthia Ward
From Kirkus Reviews
An attractive compendium of 26 American and European 19th- century tales that was originally published in Italy in 1983, shortly before Calvino's death. Altogether, it's a curious mix, prefaced by a charmingly learned Introduction that elucidates the distinction the subtitle proclaims, and enhanced by disarmingly personal headnotes to each story. English-language readers will note overfamiliar contributions from several masters, including Scott, Hawthorne, Gogol, Stevenson, and Poe, among others. But there are also several fortuitous, little-known choices, including Philacrte Chasles's strange blend of folklore and surrealism, ``The Eye with No Lid''; Henry James's underrated ``The Friends of the Friends'' (a partial precursor of his masterly ``The Turn of the Screw''); and the pseudonymous Vernon Lee's magnificent tale (``A Lasting Love'') about a dead beauty who reaches from beyond the grave to destroy men seduced by her painted image. Several flourishing literary traditions are un- or under-represented: For example, the sole Scandinavian choice is Hans Christian Andersen's wispy ``The Shadow'' (one wonders if Calvino knew the infinitely superior storytelling of Selma Lagerlf and Jonas Lie). Other omissions are equally puzzling, making this an entertaining selection, though hardly a comprehensive or authoritative one. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"Calvino possesses the power of seeing into the deepest recesses of human minds and then bringing their dreams back to life."--Salman Rushdie
"Provides a grand entrance to the stange logic of the tale-like form, its obsession with the coexistence of multiple realities."--Bookforum
From the Inside Flap
With this posthumously published anthology--a successor to his bestselling Italian Folktales--Italo Calvino, a contemporary surveyor of the otherwordly, pays homage to twenty-six of his nineteenth-century precursors. The resulting volume is both an education in the history of fantastic literature and a rollercoaster ride of wonder and terror, vampires, ghosts, and the rebellious creatures of our own psyches. Selections include:
E.T.A. Hoffmann--"The Sandman"
Gérard de Nerval--"the Enchanted Hand"
Nikolai Gogol--"The Nose"
Edgar Allan Poe--"The Tell-Tale Heart"
Hans Christian Andersen--"The Shadow"
Ambrose Bierce--"Chickamauga"
Robert Louis Stevenson--"The Bottle Imp"
Henry James--"The Friends of the Friends"
H.G. Wells--"The Country of the Blind"
Comprising stories of the supernatural and narratives of the everyday uncanny, Fantastic Tales is a gallery of enchantments, deliciously entertaining yet more disturbing than our most persistent nightmares.
From the Back Cover
“The true theme of the nineteenth-century fantastic tale is the reality of what we see: to believe or not to believe in phantasmagoric apparitions, to glimpse another world, enchanted or infernal, behind everyday appearances.” — from Calvino’s introduction to Fantastic Tales
Vampires, ghosts, and other horrors abound in this collection of nineteenth-century fantastic literature, selected and edited by Italo Calvino, a twentieth-century master of the speculative. This posthumously published anthology of enchanting, uncanny, terrifying, and immortally entertaining short stories includes E.T.A. Hoffmann’s “The Sandman,” Nikolai Gogol’s “The Nose,” Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Bottle Imp,” and many more, each with an introduction by Calvino. Fantastic Tales is a delight for the mind and a feast for the senses.
“Impressive and utterly pleasing . . . Each story [Calvino] picks is absorbing, unique, and continually surprising.” — Los Angeles Times
ITALO CALVINO (1923–1985) attained worldwide renown as one of the twentieth century’s greatest storytellers. Born in Cuba, he was raised in San Remo, Italy, and later lived in Turin, Paris, Rome, and elsewhere. Among his many works are Invisible Cities, If on a winter’s night a traveler, The Baron in the Trees, and other novels, as well as numerous collections of fiction, folktales, criticism, and essays. His works have been translated into dozens of languages.
About the Author
ITALO CALVINO (1923–1985) attained worldwide renown as one of the twentieth century’s greatest storytellers. Born in Cuba, he was raised in San Remo, Italy, and later lived in Turin, Paris, Rome, and elsewhere. Among his many works are Invisible Cities, If on a winter’s night a traveler, The Baron in the Trees, and other novels, as well as numerous collections of fiction, folktales, criticism, and essays. His works have been translated into dozens of languages.
