so this guy, Calvino?

turns out, he's a pretty good writer. i probably should have read If On a Winter's Night a Traveler back in grad school, but i've only gotten around to it lately. it gets a little proud of its metanarrative moves in the middle chapters, but early on, where it's terrifically obvious and strangely subtle at the same time, it's very good. what do i love most about reading *this* particular (library) copy of If On a Winter's Night a Traveler? in chapter one, a former reader has left some notes; one reads "ambiguous." come on. that's sweetly funny (and tragic, as i surely wrote something like this in the margins of my grad school books).