Quotes from Italo Calvino

Though I leave the house as little as possible, I have the impression that someone is disturbing my papers. More than once I have discovered that some pages were missing from my manuscripts. A few days afterward I would find the pages in their place again. But often I no longer recognize my manuscripts, as if I had forgotten what I had written, or as if overnight I were so changed that no longer recognized myself in the self of yesterday.

Everything in the garden was like that: lovely but impossible to enjoy properly, with that worrying feeling inside that they were only there through an odd stroke of luck, and the fear that they'd soon have to give an account of themselves.

I knew that signs also allow others to judge the one who makes them, and that in the course of a galactic year tastes and ideas have time to change, and the way of regarding the earlier ones depends on what comes afterwards; in short, I was afraid a sign that now might seem perfect to me, in two hundred or six hundred million years would make me look absurd.

The Sultan's wife must never remain without books that please her: a clause in the marriage contract is involved, a condition the bride imposed on her august suitor before agreeing to the wedding....

La fantasia è una specie di macchina elettronica che tiene conto di tutte le combinazioni possibili e sceglie quelle che rispondono ad un fine, o che semplicemente sono le più interessanti, piacevoli, divertenti.

Orlando, sevda orman? sana göre yer de?ildir! Alçakça tuzaklar?ndan seni hiçbir kalkan?n koruyamayaca?? bir dü?man?n pe?inden ko?uyorsun.

You reach a moment in life when, among the people you have known, the dead outnumber the living. And the mind refuses to accept more

There is little I can tell you about Aglaura beyond the things its own inhabitants have always repeated: an array of proverbial virtues, of equally proverbial faults, a few eccentricities, some punctilious regard for rules.

When I got here my first thought was: Maybe I achieved such an effort with my thoughts that time has made a complete revolution; here I am at the station from which I left on my first journey, it has remained as it was then, without any change. All the lives that I could have led begin here; there is the girl who could have been my girl and wasn't, with the same eyes, the same hair...

Most of the books I have written and those I intend to write originate from the thought that it will be impossible for me to write a book of that kind: when I have convinced myself that such a book is completely beyond my capacities of temperament or skill, I sit down and start writing it.

In the infinite universe of literature there are always other avenues to explore, some brand-new and some exceedingly ancient, styles and forms that can change our image of the world. And when literature fails to assure me that I'm not merely chasing dreams, I look to science to sustain my visions in which all heaviness dissolves . . .

Tutto l'immaginabile può essere sognato ma anche il sogno più inatteso è un rebus che nasconde un desiderio, oppure il suo rovescio, una paura. Le città come i sogni sono costruite di desideri e di paure, anche se il filo del loro discorso è segreto, le loro regole assurde, le prospettive ingannevoli, e ogni cosa ne nasconde un'altra.

Sözlerim, senin etraf?nda hangi ülkeyi kurarsa kursun, bu saray?n yerinde kaz?klar üzerine kurulmu? bir köy de olsa, meltem sana çamur dolu bir nehir a?z?n?n kokusunu da getirse sen, hep kendi durdu?un yere benzer bir yerden göreceksin onu.

Cosimo stretched out his arms. 'I came up here before you, my lords, and here I will stay afterwards too!' -'You want to withdraw!' cried El Conde. -'No, to resist,' replied the Baron.

Only in a superficial sense can lies be said to exclude the truth; you will be aware that in many cases lies- the patient's lies to the psychoanalyst- are just as revealing as the truth, if not more so...

This is already true now, when you are still occupied, each with the other's presence, in an exclusive fashion. Imagine how it will be in a little while, when ghosts that do not meet will frequent your minds, accompanying the encounters of your bodies tested by habit.

Tutte belle cose, però io avevo l'impressione che in quel tempo mio fratello non solo fosse del tutto ammattito, ma andasse anche un poco imbeliccendosi, cosa questa più grave e dolorosa, perché la pazzia è una forza della natura nel male o nel bene, mentre la minchioneria è una debolezza della natura, senza contropartita.

So you begin to wonder if Leonia's true passion is really, as they say, the enjoyment of new and different things, and not, instead, the joy of expelling, discarding, cleansing itself of a recurrent impurity.

Traveling, you realize that differences are lost: each city takes to resembling all cities, places exchange their form, order, distances, a shapeless dust cloud invades the continent.

Hep ba??n arkaya dönük mü ilerlersin sen- ya da: -Gördü?ün ?ey hep geride kalan m?d?r?- ya da daha do?rusu: -Yaln?z geçmi?e mi senin yolculu?un?

if your cart is empty and the others are full, you can only hold out so long: then you're overwhelmed by envy, heartbreak, and you can't stand it.

Now she is inviting you to a seminar at the university, where books are analyzed according to all Codes, Conscious and Unconscious, and in which all Taboos are eliminated, the ones imposed by the dominant Sex, Class, and Culture.

M'accorgo che correndo verso Y ciò che più desidero non è trovare Y al termine della mia corsa: voglio che sia Y a correre verso di me, è questa la risposta di cui ho bisogno, cioè ho bisogno che lei sappia che io sto correndo verso di lei ma nello stesso tempo ho bisogno di sapere che lei sta correndo verso di me.

Ba?ka yer, negatif bir aynad?r. Yolcu sahip oldu?u tenhay? tan?r, sahip olmad??? ve olmayaca?? kalabal??? ke?federek.