Italo Calvino was born in Cuba in 1923. He grew up in Italy. He was an essayist and journalist and a member of the editorial staff of Einaudi in Turin. In 1973 he won the prestigious Premio Feltrinelli. He died in 1985

"This brilliant collection of essays should be a feast for his admirers, as well as for those who approach his dazzling oeuvre for the first time...Calvino is not only constantly and supremely intelligent; he is constantly and supremely faithful to his narrative imagination" Guardian "Calvino juggles with ideas, spinning around the roles of reader, author, character, in ever-changing spheres, seeking the literary form that is yet to be, to fill the bookshelf as yet uncarved" Literary Review "It's one of the many joys of The Literature Machine that the reader, always a crucial player in Calvino's literary game, gets to watch the writer also as a reader, though at one further remove. That the game is serious is never in doubt, however playful, however feather-light its motions. In Calvino's fictions, the narrative gymnastics, the comic irony, the enchantments of fantasy and the charm of paradox all perform exquisitely precise manoeuvres in that area "between the lightness of ideas and heavy weight of the world" New Statesman