The Myopic Eye: Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSRAuthor(s): Catharine MeeReviewed work(s):Source: The Modern Language Review, Vol. 100, No. 4 (Oct., 2005), pp. 985-999Published by: Modern Humanities Research AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3737721 .Accessed: 08/05/2012 11:18

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THE MYOPIC EYE: CALVINO'S

TRAVELS IN THE USA AND THE USSR

II problema di fondo e sempre quello della possibilita o impossibilita di conoscere il mondo.

(Italo Calvino)1

Italo Calvino's life and work were a quest for knowledge about the world, a

lengthy exploration of paths which might lead to that elusive goal.2 One tried and tested method for knowing the world, in a literal sense, is by visiting it. Calvino made several prolonged sojourns abroad, travels which have left traces in much of his work. His love of cities, for example, finds expression in his fictional work, perhaps most obviously in Le citta invisibili (1972).3 In Palomar (1983)4 some of the protagonist's travels are fictional reworkings of Calvino's own.5 However, travel writing itself, the factual or autobiographical description of his own travels, is rare among Calvino's prolific literary output. The one travel book he did plan and write, to be titled Un ottimista in America, he rejected and had destroyed just before publication.6 Nevertheless, like other Italian writers who travelled, such as Emilio Cecchi and Alberto Moravia,7 Calvino did put some of his impressions into print, as articles for various

journals and newspapers. The American travels of 1959-60 which provided the impetus for Un ottimista were originally the subject of articles, published in several journals and now available in the collected Saggi.8 Also republished in Saggi are the articles Calvino wrote about the USSR for UUnita, the daily newspaper of the PCI (Partito Comunista Italiano), after a journey there at the beginning of the fifties, entitled Taccuino di viaggio nelVUnione Sovietica

I would like to thank Martin McLaughlin for his detailed readings and comments on this paper. 1 'Vittorini: progettazione e letteratura', 77 Menabd, 10 (1967), 73-95 (p. 75). 2 Calvino identified this search as the force behind Italian literature: *e una vocazione profonda

della letteratura italiana che passa da Dante a Galileo: l'opera letteraria come mappa del mondo e dello scibile, lo scrivere mosso da una spinta conoscitiva che e ora di filosofia naturale ora di osservazione trasfigurante e visionaria' ('Due interviste su scienza e letteratura', in Una pietra sopra (Turin: Einaudi, 1980), pp. 184-88 (p.187)).

3 Turin: Einaudi. 4 Turin: Einaudi, 1983; repr. Milan: Mondadori, 1994. 5 Clelia Martignoni, 'Viaggio nelle citta di Italo Calvino', Autografo, 36 (January-June 1998),

33-47 (p. 34). In the three chapters of the section 'I viaggi di Palomar' Palomar travels, as Calvino did, to Japan, Mexico, and the Middle East.

6 Italo Calvino, Eremita a Parigi: pagine aut ohio grafiche (Milan: Mondadori, 1994), p. 2. Calvino explained this decision in a letter to Luca Baranelli dated 24 January 1985: 'Avevo deciso di non pubblicare il libro perche rileggendolo in bozze l'avevo sentito troppo modesto come opera letteraria e non abbastanza originale come reportage giornalistico' (Italo Calvino, Lettere: IQ40- ig8$ (Milan: Mondadori, 2000), p. 1530).

7 LoredanaPolezzi, Translating Travel: Contemporary Italian Travel Writing in English Trans? lation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001), p. 14. 8 These were 'Cartoline dall'America', published in ABC from June to September 1960; 'Qua- derno Americano', in L'Europa letteraria on 8 April 1961; 'I classici al motel', in L'lllustrazione italiana in January 1961; 'Diario dell'ultimo venuto', in Tempo Presente in June 1961; 'Diario Americano 1960', in Nuovi argomenti from November 1961 to February 1962. See Italo Calvino, Saggi: ig45-ig8$, ed. by Mario Barenghi (Milan: Mondadori, 1995), pp. 2499-679.

986 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

(1952).9 More recently, Eremita a Parigi has also brought into print previously unpublished letters written by Calvino during his time in America, gathered under the title Diario americano ig^g-ig6o,10 which formed the basis for both the published articles and Un ottimista.

These two important journeys, to the USA and the USSR, both closely as? sociated with Calvino's political ideologies and development as a writer, are the

subject of this study. For this young ltalian, the opportunity to visit two coun? tries which cast long and opposing shadows over Europe and its intellectuals, to compare their cultural and political ideals in action, to be able to see and

judge for himself these visions of a future world in the working mechanisms of daily life, was fundamental to his own intellectual development. Calvino made reference to the importance both countries held for him on a number of occasions. Shortly after his American trip, in the article 'La generazione degli anni difficili', he places them high on his list of political interests: 'Unione Sovietica e Stati Uniti sono come prima al centro del mio interesse e delle mie

preoccupazioni, perche dall'una e dall'altra parte vengono le immagini che mi faccio del nostro futuro.'11 The letters and articles he wrote during his travels document his experiences and reveal the evolution of his impressions.

Although these texts record significant moments in Calvino's life, they remain

relatively unstudied. This is perhaps due to Calvino's own dissatisfaction with his American writings and because of the restrictions he travelled under in the USSR. On the subject of America, Paola Castellucci's Un modo di stare al mondo: Italo Calvino e l'America,12 examines Calvino's relationship with that

country, arguing that it had a strong influence on him throughout his career

(p. 12). She includes a chapter on Calvino's various renditions of his American travels of 1959-60. Martino Marazzi also examines the American articles in Little America: gli Stati Uniti e gli scrittori italiani nel novecento,12 setting Calvino's texts in the context of other ltalian writings on the United States in the twentieth century. On the Soviet side, Bruno Pischedda, in Due modernitd: le

pagine culturali dell"Unitd\ ig45-ig$6,14 examines the perpetuation in UUnitd ofthe myth ofthe USSR, giving due attention to Calvino's work for the paper, notably his Taccuino. Domenico Scarpa's article 'Come Calvino viaggio in Urss senza vedere Stalin',15 also examines the Taccuino from a political point of view. Thus previous criticism has concentrated on the literary connections and influences from the time Calvino spent in America and the political aspects and implications of his relationship with the USSR.

In this paper I use a comparative approach to Calvino's travel writing to examine the writer as a traveller. Although the texts are not particularly out-

9 Saggi, pp. 2407-96. 10 Eremita a Parigi, pp. 20?124. 11 Saggi, pp. 2748-59 (p. 2759). 'La generazione degli anni difBcili' was originally published in a volume of the same title by Laterza (Bari, 1962). Other references to the USSR and USA can be found in Calvino's interviews with Carlo Bo and FerdinandoCamon: Saggi, pp. 2724-32, 2774-96 respectively. 12 Bari: Adriatica Editrice, 1999. 13 Milan: Marcos y marcos, 1997. 14 Milan: Francoangeli, 1995. 15 Linea d'ombra, 8.52 (September 1990), 20-23.

CATHARINE MEE 987

standing in literary terms, they give important insights into the way Calvino

processed his own experiences of the world. They illustrate his responses to encounters with new cultures, which fed into his other writing, directly or in more abstract ways. A comparison of the texts highlights the different circum? stances of Calvino's journeys, but also reveals similarities in his approach which demonstrate his own interests as a traveller. An initial examination of the cir? cumstances of the trips and the style of the texts demonstrates how the former, not surprisingly, affected the latter, owing to the political constraints on writing about the USSR compared with Calvino's relative freedom when writing about the USA. However, there are many common points between the texts which reveal Calvino's main concerns as a traveller and travel writer, for example the obvious central themes of cities and people. The texts are also characterized

by a preoccupation with daily minutiae, on the one hand, and the search for the broader view, on the other. Finally, an examination of two later works, La

forma del tempo16 and Palomar, links the earlier travelogues into Calvino's wider

ceuvre, demonstrating how his approach to knowing the world develops as he continues to pur sue themes tackled in both the Taccuino and the Diario.

Calvino travelled in the USSR in October and November 1951, and the articles which make up the Taccuino di viaggio nelVUnione Sovietica were pub? lished in UUnitd the following spring. He was travelling with a group of visiting Italians who were constrained by an organized schedule of visits and trips, tak?

ing in the major cities of Moscow and St Petersburg (then Leningrad) as well as a short stay in Azerbaijan. The group visited a range of cultural and edu- cational institutions, various spectacles and shows, factories, farms, and even

private apartments. The Taccuino, as it is published in Saggi, is a combination of slightly different versions of the text, printed in various regional editions of L'Unitd.17 The twenty-two headed chapters ofthe Taccuino, which represent separate articles, are fairly uniform in length, each dealing with one or more

episodes. The chapters are broken into sections by day of the week and time of

day, but there is no indication of date, and the order of events is not necessarily strictly chronological.

The trip to the United States was funded by the Ford Foundation and began in November 1959, lasting for six months. The Diario americano, published posthumously in Eremita a Parigi, consists of the unedited letters that Calvino sent to his friends and colleagues at the Einaudi publishing house. The Diario letters represent Calvino's original, unrevised, and spontaneous impressions of America. It is for this reason that I have chosen to base my study principally on this version of the American travels, rather than the published articles, which cover the same events and experiences but with the benefit of hindsight and

editing. Although Calvino arrived in America with a small group of writers, he had a less imposing schedule than in the USSR and explored the country at

will, travelling independently of the group. He began and ended his stay with

long spells in New York, but also travelled across the country to visit Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and parts of the South. The fact that this Diario

16 Italo Calvino, 'La forma del tempo', in Collezione di sabbia (Milan: Garzanti, 1984; repr. Milan: Mondadori, 1994), pp. 163-233.

17 See Saggi, pp. 3019-25, for full details.

988 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

americano takes the form of letters addressed to colleagues at Einaudi, which were not edited for publication, means that much of their content, particularly the earlier ones sent from New York, deals with subjects thought to be of interest to their recipients: the literary world of New York and information about American publishers. However, the letters also cover many different

aspects of life in the United States and describe Calvino's various encounters and experiences. The Diario is divided, geographically, into eight parts, which are subdivided into headed sections each dealing with single events or details, varying from a couple of lines to several pages in length.

The two texts differ in style, which in part reflects their different motivations and readership. The Diario is more colloquial and has a looser structure since it was written as a series of spontaneous personal letters, while the more polished nature of the Taccuino indicates its preparation for publication in a newspaper. The chapters of the Taccuino each consist of self-contained episodes and the text has a unity as a whole, beginning with Calvino's arrival in the USSR and

ending with his departure. The Diario is more sporadic and, as Calvino admits, some sections are rather incomplete.18 The final letter, which sets out possible itineraries for the rest of his trip, is almost a prose-poem, but drifts off in mid-

sentence, perhaps reflecting his feeling of freely wandering at the end of his

journey. However, the most striking contrast arises from the different attitudes with which he approached, or was able to approach, each country. Travelling on an organized tour of the USSR, writing for a Communist newspaper, himself a member of the PCI, Calvino produced a portrait of the Soviet Union which is extremely one-sided and sometimes stilted and artificial. The content of the Diario, on the other hand, is indicative of his greater freedom to give his own

opinions, positive and negative, about America and American society. In the Taccuino Calvino delights in every minimal detail in the organization

of Soviet society and praises the smooth functioning of every institution. This

positive outlook is so relentless that the text sometimes reads like an advertise? ment for the USSR, as in the rather strange episode where he asks his guide to explain the queues outside the shops. This is written in a sort of parodic dialogue, with the guide explaining the complicated schedule of opening times and Calvino unable to fault the system: 'Cercavo di trovare una disorganiz- zazione, una magagna, invece tutto e semplice e naturale' (Saggi, p. 2432).I9 He admires every place, event, and individual he comes across, making a point of

dismantling several commonplace criticisms of Soviet society and deliberately giving a positive slant to every situation. To give just one example, he compares the daily pay of labourers in Russia with those in Azerbaijan, who are paid a little more: 'E questa e una nuova smentita a chi parla di sfruttamento russo

rispetto agli altri popoli dell'Unione' (Saggi, p. 2473). Calvino's approach to American society in the Diario is very different and

has a more natural tone. He reacts to his experiences with a range of emo?

tions, from wonder to boredom, from surprise to criticism. He is impressed by American advances in technology and he loves the cities, especially New York.

18 See, for example, Eremita, p. 98: 'Questa puntata di diario mi e venuta un po' moscia'. 19 Both Pischedda and Scarpa pay particular attention to this unusual episode see Pischedda,

pp. 184-86, and Scarpa, 'Come Calvino viaggio in Urss senza vedere Stalin', p. 22.

CATHARINE MEE 989

However, in contrast to his activities in the Soviet Union, he deliberately visits

poorer districts and writes about the underprivileged: 'Nelle grandi citta in- dustriali si vede che la poverta di grandi masse e necessaria al sistema, e spesso e poverta anche d'aspetto europeo, case negre che sono poco piu che baracche, vecchi che spingono carretti a mano (!) di pezzi di legna raccolti dagli slums in demolizione' (Eremita, p. 72). He also takes a critical interest in American poli? tics, which is, naturally, completely absent from the Taccuino: 'nessuno qui sa o sospetta l'esistenza del socialismo, il capitalismo avvolge e permea di se tutto, l'antitesi ad esso e una sparuta, fanciullesca rivendicazione spirituale senza linea ne prospettiva' (Eremita, p. 52).

Calvino's honesty about his impressions of America can be contrasted with his more constrained writing about the USSR in the examination of a couple of corresponding episodes. In the USSR he visits several 'case della cultura', while in Cleveland he visits the Karamu community centre. Calvino's descrip? tions imply similarities between the two types of centre, both of which provide a

setting for the pursuit of amateur arts and a place for local people to meet; how?

ever, his tone is very different. In the Taccuino, Calvino describes the various activities in the St Petersburg 'Casa', emphasizing the positive or at least never

dropping below a neutral tone. He highlights the differences between Italy and the USSR: 'Da noi, l'arte dei dilettanti ha spesso un carattere di malinconica

evasione, di patetica velleita. Qui la societa pare una gran pompa aspirante di vocazioni: quei che ognuno ha di meglio, poco o tanto, se c'e, deve saltar fuori in qualche modo' (Saggi, p. 2481). The implication is that although the Ita? lian reader might not understand the Soviet enthusiasm, the Soviet people are

genuinely motivated and culture is highly regarded. Calvino always tempers any implied criticism of Soviet society. In Baku, in another 'casa della cultura', he watches an agricultural dance show: 'E un idillio colcosiano, piuttosto in-

genuo, ma sincero, colorato ed esuberante. [. . .] e un esempio di come tutti i popoli sovietici coltivino, con ricchezza di mezzi, le proprie vocazioni piu caratteristiche, le proprie vene piu genuine' (Saggi, pp. 2461-62). Here again we see how the emphasis is always on the positive: the negative connotations of 'ingenuo' are qualified by the following words of praise. Calvino's visit to the Karamu centre in the Diario is narrated in a completely different tone: 'Vediamo il play, ma e una lacrimevole storia edificante moderato-sociale su tema razziale (d'autore negro), un esempio di teatro educativo da parrocchia o

meglio tale e quale un play consimile che ho visto nove anni fa a Leningrado in un consimile teatrino del Komsomol in una consimile Casa dei pionieri, ma li almeno l'ipocrisia era d'un altro tipo, non quello paternalistico sotto il quale mi si rivela tutta questa istituzione' (Eremita, p. 67). Here the author is freely expressing his own opinions, both positive and negative. Here also the Soviet

play has become a point of negative comparison?he is now more critical of Soviet hypocrisy. In the following sentence he picks up a leaflet advertising a series of political lectures and casually dismisses it as government propaganda.

In Due modernitd Pischedda describes how the myth of the USSR was upheld in UUnita through travel accounts in particular, such as Calvino's Taccuino. Pischedda examines the function ofthe myth for the PCI and wider Italian so?

ciety, but also how the individuals concerned involved themselves, apparently

990 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

quite willingly, in its perpetuation. He concludes: 'Sicuramente, questi intel- lettuali trovarono in Urss cio che vollero cercare e della cui mancanza pativano nelle situazioni di provenienza' (p. 184). It is clear from information Calvino

gave later, in particular in the article of 1979 'Sono stato stalinista anch'io?',20 that the Taccuino version of his travels in the USSR represented only a partial or false impression. As he explained in an interview: 'Ricordo benissimo che

quando mi capitava di andare in viaggio in qualche paese del socialismo mi sentivo profondamente a disagio, estraneo, ostile. Ma quando il treno mi ripor- tava in Italia, quando ripassavo il confine, mi domandavo: ma qui, in Italia, che cos'altro potrei essere se non comunista?'21 The intention here is not to ques? tion Calvino's lack of objectivity, nor to examine the particular political and social circumstances which surrounded the writing of the Taccuino, although it is important to be aware of them, but rather to examine his own documentation of his travels through comparison of the two texts. Nevertheless, it is inter?

esting to note, for example, that Calvino's version of the Soviet myth fits in with the four main points as identified by Pischedda (pp. 171-75): Moscow as ultra-modern metropolis, the didactic and wholesome nature of art and culture, female emancipation and social mobility.

As Pischedda's study of the Taccuino demonstrates and as Paola Castellucci remarks (p. 110) of Calvino's American articles, both texts can be read as

representing contemporary ltalian perceptions of the USA and USSR, even if neither is particularly representative of the reality. Despite the differences in style, there are many parallels between the Diario and the Taccuino. While Calvino is influenced by propaganda in the USSR, it would be wrong to suppose that his position with regard to the USA is completely free of political influences or other prejudices.22 He visits the USA as a former Communist, wary of American anti-Communism and cynical about capitalist consumer culture.23 He is also very willing to accept contemporary stereotypes and myths about America. Several times, for example, he compares the America familiar to him from the silver screen with the reality he encounters, projecting his own

expectations onto the reality: 'siedo in un bar dall'aria molto tough altra faccia dell'America che aspettavo invano di vedere a New York, con tipacci da cinema'

(Eremita, p. 69). Moreover, Calvino's vision of the USSR is not only based on Communist propaganda, but is also influenced by Russian literature: 'E il primo tuffo nell'umanita sovietica; mi par di riconoscere qualcosa che gia sapevo, ritrovo quel sapore di vecchia Russia imparato sui libri; perfino l'odore dolciastro dei cibi mi sembra subito inconfondibile, ed e la prima volta che lo sento' (Saggi, p. 2410). Thus Calvino's experiences in both countries are filtered through a series of expectations, which are cultural as well as political.

Our own expectations of Calvino might lead us to presume that much of

20 La Repubblica, 16 December 1979; now published in Eremita, pp. 196-203. 21 E. Scalfari, 'Calvino: "Quel giorno i carri uccisero le nostre speranze'" (interview), in La Repubblica, 13 December 1980; quoted in Scarpa, 'Come Calvino viaggio in Urss senza vedere Stalin', p. 21. 22 Marazzi, pp. 127?28, sets Calvino's experiences in the context of ltalian intellectual interest in America, describing some of the literary and intellectual influences to which Calvino was exposed before his actual contact with the country. 23 See, for example, Eremita, pp. 55 and 85?86.

CATHARINE MEE 991

his time and writing as a traveller would be devoted to a favourite theme, that of cities, and the reader is not disappointed.24 Calvino's writing on cities

par excellence is of course Le cittd invisibili, when the fictional traveller Marco Polo explores cities of elaborate invention. Calvino's enthusiasm for cities can be seen in his lively and detailed descriptions of the visible cities of America and the Soviet Union,25 which capture his imagination: 'Gia dal veloce giro che abbiamo fatto stamane, Leningrado si rivela una citta di quelle che basta viverci un poco perche sembri d'esserci vissuto sempre' (Saggi, p. 2476). In both texts he devotes paragraphs to describing the atmospheres of the cities he visits. In the final Diario entry, when contemplating how to spend his last two months in the States, Calvino concludes: 'ritorno a New York [.. .] perche New York, citta senza radici, e l'unica dove posso pensare d'aver radici io' (Eremita, p. 123). Calvino retained a lifelong love of that city, stating in an interview in 1984 that at that time he felt 'newyorkese': 'la mia citta e New York.'26 This contrasts with Calvino's lack of interest in the American landscapes: 'i "monumenti"

(quasi sempre qui si tratta di monumenti naturali: canyons, foreste pietrificate ecc.) non sono mai cose cosi travolgenti, e mi sono accorto che la natura in America non mi da grandi emozioni: si tratta solo di verificare cose viste al

cinema; cosi trascuro senza rimpianto la Death Valley (che non puo essere altro che un deserto piu deserto di tutto quello che ho visto in questi giorni) e il Gran Canyon (che sara soltanto un canyon piu canyon degli altri)' (Eremita, p. 102). He is less explicit about his preferences in the USSR, but gives scant

description of the countryside, barely qualifying the features of the landscape: 'In treno nel Daghestan. Da stamane siamo in riva al Caspio, mare grigio e triste tal quale lo s'immagina vedendolo nelle carte geografiche. Le montagne del Caucaso ci fiancheggiano sulla destra' (Saggi, p. 2455).

In the Cartoline daliAmerica articles Calvino declares his intention to 'im-

postare tutta la mia conoscenza dell'America sulle relazioni umane' (Saggi, p. 2574). His many encounters with people during the course of both journeys form an important part of his impressions. In the USSR most of Calvino's

meetings with Russians, like the rest of his trip, are pre-arranged; moreover the Russian language is a greater barrier to communication than English in the

USA, where Calvino seems to have coped adequately enough not to require an

interpreter. As a result, in the Taccuino Calvino mostly writes about the people as he observes them in the streets, in a crowd, in the theatre, without necessar?

ily interacting with them. In a Moscow theatre, for example, Calvino finds the audience as engaging as the performance: 'Per quanto lo spettacolo mi attragga moltissimo, alle volte mi sorprendo con lo sguardo rivolto al pubblico' (Saggi,

24 Calvino's interest in cities and the city as a theme in his work is well documented: see, for example, M. Balice, 'La citta di Calvino', Paragone, 438 (1986), 73-88; Andrea Battistini, 'Le citta visibili e invisibili di Italo Calvino', Esperienze Letterarie, 26.2 (2001), 21?38; JoAnn Cannon, 'The Image ofthe City in the Novels of Italo Calvino', Modern Fiction Studies, 24 (1978), 83?90; Martin McLaughlin, 'Calvino's Visible Cities', Romance Studies, 22 (1993), 67-82.

25 These visible cities may have provided inspiration for some of their invisible counterparts. Botta, for example, makes a connection between New York and Bauci in Le citta invisibili: Italo Calvino Newyorkese, ed. by Anna Botta and Domenico Scarpa (Cava de' Tirreni: Avagliano Edi- tore, 2002), p. 7. 26 Ugo Rubeo, 'La mia citta e New York' (interview, recorded in Palermo in September 1984); now published in Eremita, pp. 240-45 (p.245).

992 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

p. 2422). This is followed by detailed descriptions of the different 'types' in the crowd, their clothes and their manners. One Russian with whom Calvino becomes closely acquainted is his guide, V. Stepanovic, for whom he feels a

great affection and of whom he gives a more detailed character portrait (Saggi, p. 2452).

In the USA, though Calvino travels on his own for the most part, he seems to arrive in each city with an ample supply of contacts and invitations, es?

pecially from intellectuals involved in the literary scene. Just as the Diario is characterized by quick sketches of American cities, there are also frequent character portraits of American people: James Purdy, for example, 'e un tipo molto patetico, di mezz'eta grasso e grosso e dolce, biondo rossiccio e imberbe, vestito seriamente, una specie di Gadda senza isteria, tutto dolcezza' (Eremita, p. 51). Calvino's position as an outsider in the USSR restricts his access to Soviet society, but in the USA this same position can have the opposite effect. One of the most striking episodes in the Diario takes place in Montgomery Alabama, where he is present at a civil rights demonstration which deteriorates into a stand-off between whites and blacks: 'Questa e una giornata che non di- mentichero finche campo. Ho visto che cosa e il razzismo, il razzismo di massa, accettato come una delle regole fondamentali della societa' (Eremita, pp. 115- 16). During his stay Calvino has to juggle meetings with the leaders ofthe black civil rights movement, including Martin Luther King, with invitations from 'le signore dell'alta societa ultrarazzista e ultrareazionaria' (Eremita, p. 120), without letting the latter suspect that he has been fraternizing with the enemy.

In a study of Calvino as a traveller and travel writer, it is useful to consider his own views on the subject. After his first month in New York, Calvino finds he is writing less: 'succede che le cose da dire diventano meno, perche New York non e piu una citta nuova e se prima ogni persona che vedevo per la strada era lo spunto d'un'osservazione, adesso la folla e la solita folla newyorkese di tutti i

giorni, incontri e giornate s'inquadrano nello schema del prevedibile' (Eremita, pp. 50-51). This observation develops into a short piece entitled 'L'occhio e l'abitudine' in Diario delVultimo venuto, where he explains: 'Sono bastati pochi mesi e l'occhio ha fatto l'abitudine a tutto, ha perso d'acutezza, di capacita di selezionare le immagini. Gia come se fossi in giro per Torino, in una citta dove non penso piu a guardarmi intorno. E in questo che consiste la forza dei libri di

viaggio. D'un paese se ne puo scrivere solo quando non se ne sa ancora niente e lo si scopre, perche soltanto allora "lo si vede"' (Saggi, p. 2649). Calvino's concept of travelling and travel writing emphasizes the shock of the new, the immediate

contact, focusing on the visible in particular. Calvino considered beginnings in literature to be of utmost importance, full of energy and potential,27 and it seems that he places as much emphasis on beginnings in travel. After the beginning his enthusiasm wanes, but it is the eye in particular which loses its sharpness when

everything becomes familiar. The eye is Calvino's instrument for knowing the world as a traveller: both the Taccuino and the Diario are devoted in the main

part to creating a picture of the two countries as perceived by the eye of the

27 See, for example, 'Cominciare e finire', the incomplete initial lecture of Lezioni americane; now published in Saggi, pp. 734-53.

CATHARINE MEE 993

traveller, as captured by the Calvinian sguardo.28 In both texts Calvino takes two approaches to this task, which reflect his concept of travel writing outlined above. First of all, he is particularly concerned with the visual 'superficie': the

everyday details of life, the way people live, the apparently trivial detail. On the other hand, he considers each country and society as a whole, attempting to define the essence of America or the Soviet Union. These two perspectives are

closely connected, since Calvino often uses his close observations of the part as a base for his broader assumptions about the whole.

The structure and motivations of both texts emphasize Calvino's curiosity for the particular. Early in the Taccuino he defines its purpose: 'questo taccuino e destinato ad annotazioni spicciole e individuali' (Saggi, p. 2429). Years later, in the article 'Sono stato stalinista anch'io?', he explains that this choice of

style reflected his own ideological view of the USSR: 'nel Diario di un viag- gio in Urss,29 che pubblicai nel '52 sulYUnitd, annotavo quasi esclusivamente osservazioni minime di vita quotidiana, aspetti rasserenanti, tranquillizzanti, atemporali, apolitici. Questo modo non monumentale di presentare l'Urss mi

pareva il meno conformista' (Eremita, p. 202). The organization ofthe Diario, into little sections devoted to odd observations and events, also foregrounds the

daily minutiae of American life and again avoids dealing with the monumental. These minimalist studies often take similar subjects in the two texts. In

America, for example, Calvino is fascinated by the cars: 'E la cosa che ti diverte di piu, arrivando, vedere come in America le auto sono tutte enormi, non e che ci siano le piccole e le grandi, sono enormi talvolta in maniera da far ridere'

(Eremita, p. 25). He includes a whole paragraph on the range of shapes and sizes of the car tail-lights (Eremita, p. 50). In the Taccuino, the cars of the Soviet Union are also among Calvino's first observations on arrival (Saggi, pp. 2417-18). But a much broader range of topics is also covered in both texts. Calvino writes about the American supermarkets which sell everything, including the newest innovation: TV dinners (Eremita, p. 70). He comments on the importance of DIY (Eremita, p. 85) and the proliferation of tree-houses

(Eremita, pp. 96-97). In the Taccuino he notices how much the Soviet people read in public (Saggi, pp. 2420, 2427). He devotes a whole section to a football

match, including details about the teams and their previous matches, the people in the crowd, Russian exclamations (Saggi, p. 2442).

Among these details of daily life, Calvino pays particular attention to tech?

nology. During the fifties the USA and the USSR were models for the Italians of future societies, based not only on political ideologies, but also on scientific

development. In the Diario Calvino devotes a whole section to Wall Street, with its then extraordinary electronic systems for exchanging information and

making calculations (Eremita, pp. 43-44). Later on he visits the Space Com?

puting Center in Washington and an IBM factory (Eremita, pp. 59-61). But he

28 For further analysis ofthe 'sguardo' in Calvino's work see, for example, Marco Belpoliti, 'La superficie inesauribile: lo sguardo di Calvino', 77 Verri, 3-4 (September-December 1994), 145-66; Ruggero Pierantoni, 'Calvino e l'ottica', in Italo Calvino: atti del convegno internazionale, Firenze, Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, 26-28 febbraio 198 j, ed. by Giovanni Falaschi (Milan: Garzanti, 1988), pp. 277-83; Domenico Scarpa, Italo Calvino (Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 1999), pp. 230-34. 29 This does refer to the Taccuino. The difference in title is due to the different versions in various regional editions of L'Unita.

994 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

is as much interested in the little ways technology affects people's lives as in the

greater scientific advances: audio-guides in museums (Eremita, p. 68), gadgets in public washrooms (Eremita, p. 72), colour television (Eremita, p. 40). Tele? vision is also a subject of interest in the Soviet Union, where it is a sign of the

high standard of living: 'La televisione e gia molto diffusa nelle citta sovietiche, anche nelle famiglie. Ci sono apparecchi di televisione che costano meno degli apparecchi radio' (Saggi, p. 2435). In the Taccuino in particular, technology is often linked to the futuristic nature of Soviet life, as in the Moscow metro, for

example: 'Un tapis-roulant lunghissimo ci trasporta in luminosi abissi sotter- ranei. [. . .] Sto entrando nella citta del duemila?' (Saggi, p. 2420).

The strengths of the Diario and the Taccuino lie principally in Calvino's

sguardo, his talent for close observation and description. His lively depictions and perceptive attention to detail bring to light unusual and interesting aspects of American and Soviet life. As Calvino explained in the quote from 'L'occhio e l'abitudine' above, when places are not new any more, the eye of the traveller loses focus. However, the longer a traveller spends in one place, although s/he is no longer so attentive to what is new and different, s/he is better able to move

beyond the purely superficial, beyond the visible, to understanding at a more

profound level. Calvino declares a preference for the heightened perception of initial contact, but throughout both his journeys, as he often mentions in both Diario and Taccuino, he is also in search of ways of defining each country, society, and culture. However, when he moves from the small to the great, from the everyday to the general, his sguardo becomes blurred, exposing weaknesses in his understanding of the countries he is visiting. Already in the spontaneous letters of the Diario, he pauses to move away from the particular and tries to understand what lies beneath the surface, a task he continues in the American articles. Yet, as mentioned above, Calvino relies heavily on the established

myths and stereotypes he brought with him. Calvino's tendency to generalize is especially evident in the Taccuino, where

he reproduces the Soviet myth. He is constantly looking for evidence that the Soviet people are different and that their way of life is better. For example, soon after his arrival he scrutinizes the crowds shopping in Moscow: 'Ma cos'ha questa gente di cosi diverso dall'altra gente che stasera passa per le vie del centro di Milano, di Vienna o di Parigi? Alla prima occhiata, capisco subito che qui c'e una societa diversa, sento la presenza d'un elemento nuovo:

l'uguaglianza' (Saggi, p. 2416). He often takes the single places he visits or

experiences he has as being representative of the Soviet Union as a whole: 'Cosi si puo osservare, nel microcosmo del colcos, il processo che, in grande, si verifica in tutta l'U.R.S.S.: i cittadini vedono che il lavoro collettivo migliora continuamente le loro condizioni di vita, e s'appassionano sempre di piu ad esso e alla vita socialista' (Saggi, p. 2469). Elsewhere he simply makes flat

generalizations, such as when writing about the construction and reconstruction of houses: 'Nelle case come nelle vite umane nulla e definitivo, tutto puo e deve

migliorare' (Saggi, p. 2491). Among the Diario's scattered impressions, Calvino inserts rather sweeping

generalizations about American society and lifestyle: women (Eremita, pp. 34- 35), the middle classes (Eremita, pp. 66-67), provincialism (Eremita, pp. 82,

CATHARINE MEE 995

90), the atmospheres ofthe different cities (Eremita, pp. 62, 76, 93-94, etc). To

give just one example of the last category: 'Ho passato una decina di giorni tra Cleveland Detroit Chicago e in pochi giorni ho avuto piu il senso dell'America che in due mesi passati a New York. Piu America nel senso di essere continua- mente portato a dire: questa si e America' (Eremita, p. 62). He often moves from close observation of some detail to generalizations about the whole of Ameri? can society or culture. When writing about American tail-lights, for example, as mentioned above, Calvino reads into their shapes a much broader signifi? cance: 'Uno studio sull'animo americano si pud fare sopratutto osservando gli enormi didietro delle automobili e la grande varieta e felicita di forme dei fari

posteriori, che paiono esprimere tutti i miti della societa americana' (Eremita, P. 5o).

Castellucci, in her chapter on Calvino's various renditions of his American travels of 1959-60, identifies the weaknesses in his writing with this tendency to generalize and rely on prejudices and stereotypes (p. 110), adding: 'Sia che affronti temi politici, sociali o artistici, quando si tratta di confrontarsi con la

contemporaneita Calvino non riesce a sviluppare uno sguardo che vada piu in profondita' (p. 114). She recognizes that Calvino himself was aware of this

failing, having withdrawn his final version of the American travels from publi? cation. In both travel texts Calvino uses the small to try to reach the great, to catch a glimpse of the whole through close scrutiny ofthe part. But he lacks the

objectivity and the knowledge to be able to give any really insightful perspective on either country. In the USSR what he defines and redefines is the established Soviet myth, which gets between himself and the reality of Soviet life. Whatever he sees or experiences there, he feeds back into the myth, always taking what he sees and experiences to be representative of the country as a whole, willingly accepting a blinkered version of the USSR. In the USA Calvino's bias is less

overtly political, but he is still strongly influenced by accepted stereotypes. He

attempts to link his disparate and particular experiences into a more coherent vision of America through generalizations, yet America escapes definition. In his Diario americano 1960 article he admits: 'M'accorgo che piu sto qui e piu ogni discorso generale diventa difficile. Giro, osservo, ascolto, scrivo, e sento

sempre di piu l'insoddisfazione di chi azzarda approssimazioni su approssi- mazioni' (Saggi, p. 2657). Calvino's sguardo seems to be myopic; so effective when applied to close observation, it becomes unfocused as it tries to take in a much broader view. His concept of travelling and travel writing, which empha? sizes the new and the different, creates a discontinuity in the texts between the

accuracy of detail and the lack of clarity and depth in the general picture. This paper has concentrated on Calvino's American and Soviet travelogues,

but at this point it is useful to consider his other travel text, La forma del tempo, to examine how his approach to travel developed later on. This is a collection of short texts about Japan, Mexico, and Iran, dating from 1975 and 1976, which forms the fourth and final part oiCollezione disabbia (1984). In the first text, 'La vecchia signora in chimono viola', Calvino examines questions of travel, again emphasizing the visible. He refers once more to the contrast between the initial contact with a place, when everything is new and different, and a prolonged stay, when the new becomes familiar and comprehensible. Again it is the eye which is

996 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

at the centre of the experience: 'Quando tutto avra trovato un ordine e un posto nella mia mente, comincero a non trovare piu nulla degno di nota, a non vedere

piu quello che vedo. Perche vedere vuoi dire percepire delle differenze, e appena le differenze si uniformano nel prevedibile quotidiano lo sguardo scorre su una

superficie liscia e senza appigli' (Collezione, p. 168). This seems to repeat ideas

already expressed in the American writings, but he goes on to add: 'Viaggiare non serve molto a capire (questo lo so da un pezzo, non ho avuto bisogno d'arrivare in Estremo Oriente per convincermene) ma serve a riattivare per un momento l'uso degli occhi, la lettura visiva del mondo' (Collezione, p. 168). Thus Calvino fails back on his old favourite, the sguardo, cataloguing the visible as a way of knowing the world and claiming to have renounced any attempt at

understanding other cultures at a deeper level. The texts which follow certainly demonstrate much more restraint in attempting to draw conclusions about these new countries than was evident in the Taccuino and the Diario. Calvino tends rather to pile up rhetorical questions, expressing his confusion when faced with such alien cultures, but rarely attempting to find answers. There is a sense of

uncertainty, of not wanting to impose Western interpretations inappropriately, which is absent from the earlier travel texts. Rather than trying to read into the minds of the Japanese, Mexicans, or Iranians, he settles on an account of his own experiences and thought processes, or resorts to the words of other artists and writers, which conclude several of the texts. In 'La spada e le foglie', for

example, Calvino visits an exhibition of ancient Japanese weaponry. He wonders what the other visitors make of the exhibits: 'Cosa ci vedono in quei coltellacci

sguainati? Cosa li affascina?' (Collezione, p. 194). Instead of trying to answer these questions, he describes his own reaction: 'La mia visita all'esposizione si

svolge quasi a passo di corsa; il luccicare dell'acciaio trasmette una sensazione

piu auditiva che visiva, come rapidi sibili taglienti nell'aria. I drappi bianchi

m'ispirano un raccapriccio chirurgico' (Collezione, p. 194). If we were to accept Calvino's initial declaration that travel is good only for

the eyes, we would expect nothing except description in La forma del tempo. But, on the contrary, travel persistently reactivates the use of the brain. The later Calvino may avoid making generalizations about the places he visits, but his particular experiences in Japan, Mexico, and Iran lead him into broader

philosophical and anthropological contemplations. He uses these travel experi? ences not to analyse the different cultures, but to learn from them. 'Le fiamme in fiamme' is a particularly good example of this. Calvino is witness to rituals around the sacred flame in a Zoroastrian temple at Yazd in Iran. He describes in detail the rituals and their history, asking himself several times why he is

there, what he is there to learn. Watching the men and women around him, he wonders what they see in the flame. The answers he comes up with are all written as questions: Calvino is trying out possibilities, not providing concrete answers. He then makes connections between the flame and the stars, whose matter is also fire. He contemplates the nature of the universe, equating time with the flame. 'La cosa che mi sembra d'essere sui punto di capire e questa: dolersi che la freccia del tempo corra verso il nulla non ha senso, perche per tutto cio che c'e nell'universo e che vorremmo salvare, il fatto d'esserci vuoi dire pro- prio questo bruciare e nient'altro; non c'e altro modo d'essere che quello della

CATHARINE MEE 997

fiamma' (Collezione, p. 228). But this is not a definitive conclusion; Calvino im?

mediately puts his own thought processes into question: 'Chissa se nell'Avesta

potrei trovare una formula che esprima questi pensieri?' (Collezione, p. 228). Finally he gives the last word to another Western writer, Cocteau, reporting his

response to the question 'Se un incendio stesse distruggendo la tua casa, qual e la cosa che t'affretteresti a portare in salvo?', to which the poet replied 'II fuoco'

(Collezione, p. 228). La forma del tempo demonstrates a development in Calvino's approach to

travel, but also in his approach to knowing the world. These short texts, with their combination of description and contemplation, are closely bound up with another of Calvino's later works, namely Palomar. Just as Calvino moves from close observation ofthe part to contemplation ofthe wider world, so does Palo? mar. Calvino began writing the Palomar texts as articles for Corriere della Sera in 1975, the same year in which he travelled to Iran. Palomar's own travels take him to Iran, Mexico, and Japan, following Calvino's footsteps. Although only three travel texts made the final selection for Palomar when it was published in 1983,30 among the original Corriere articles are several on Mexico and Japan which provided the basis for parts of La forma del tempo.21 The genesis of La

forma del tempo and that of the Palomar travel texts are both contemporaneous and inextricably linked, though in their final published forms La forma del tempo seems to provide a stylistic stepping stone between the earlier travelogues and Palomar. In Un modo di stare al mondo Castellucci follows up her criticism of Calvino's American writings with the interesting argument that his experiences of America fed directly into his later writing, in particular the Cosmicomiche: 'La difficolta di descrivere la realta americana viene affrontata in una serie di elaborazioni progressive fino a trovare espressione nel genere fantastico, ossia in una scrittura che non cerca di dare spiegazione dell'America ma piuttosto di comunicarne l'emozione' (p. 106). She identifies direct references to America in certain Cosmicomiche stories, but also proposes that Calvino's confrontation with America inspired the atmosphere of the stories at a more profound level. Castellucci extends her arguments to // castello dei destini incrociati, Le citta invisibili, and Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore, but I would suggest that the pursuit of certain narrative themes which find unsatisfactory expression in the Diario, as well as the Taccuino, also influenced Palomar.

Calvino's sguardo perhaps achieves its culmination in the detailed descrip? tions of Palomar. Here he dramatizes the constant search of the eponymous protagonist for an all-embracing perception of the world developed from close examination of tiny details: the reflection ofthe sun in the sea (Palomar, pp. 15- 20), the gecko's underbelly (Palomar, pp. 59-62), the patterns in raked sand

(Palomar, pp. 93-96). As Pierantoni summarizes: 'Palomar e alle prese [. . .] con la difficolta centrale del conoscere, sapere l'unita attraverso il frammento, ricostruire la totalita attraverso il residuo; riattivare il fuoco mediante le ceneri'

(p. 283). In Calvino's own words, Palomar is 'uno che vede i fatti minimi della vita quotidiana in una prospettiva cosmica' (Palomar, p. v). Like Calvino in his

3? These are: 'L'aiola di sabbia' (Japan), 'Serpenti e teschi' (Mexico), and 'La pantofola spaiata' (Iran).

31 Francesca Serra, Calvino e il pulviscolo di Palomar (Florence: Le Lettere, 1996), p. 66 n. 28.

998 Calvino's Travels in the USA and the USSR

travel texts, Palomar moves from the visual detail to the universal, as in the central episode in the cheese shop: 'Questo negozio e un museo: il signor Palo? mar visitandolo sente, come al Louvre, dietro ogni oggetto esposto la presenza della civilta che gli ha dato forma e che da esso prende forma' (Palomar, p. 75). Thus Calvino carries preoccupations from his own travels into his fiction and there elaborates these themes into a highly successful literary work. The tightly knit structure of the Palomar texts combines the fragment with the whole more

effectively than in either the Diario or the Taccuino, moving from one to the other in a logical progression of well-polished paragraphs. Furthermore, there are significant differences in the choice of subject. In Palomar Calvino practises his skills of observation and description on smaller and more complex objects. On the other hand, the universal which Palomar seeks is more abstract and

philosophical, a shift which was already evident in La forma del tempo. The universal which Calvino tries to define in the Taccuino and the Diario is still

particular in the sense of being actual places in the world and actual groups of

people, albeit very large places and groups. However, ultimately Palomar is frustrated in his pursuit of knowledge, and

Palomar questions the possibility of achieving answers to universal questions, of finding the absolute model, the pattern in the arabesques of the carpet. As JoAnn Cannon has said, Palomar is both in tune with postmodern times and 'the author's final attempt to respond to the true vocation of fiction as a

"map ofthe world and the knowable".'32 Furthermore the use of fiction and the

separation of narrator and protagonist in Palomar introduce distancing devices, which cushion the profundity of the subject matter through ironic humour and characterization. That is not to say that humour is absent from the travelogues, but it is used to different effect. There, comic effect is directed away from the narrator/protagonist and projected instead onto the places visited. In the

Diario, for example, Calvino writes about the apparently ridiculous attitude to pedestrians, who risk being arrested, as he himself experiences, ending the

episode ironically: 'II pedone e sempre un tipo sospetto. Pero e protetto dalla

legge; quando si traversa la strada in un punto qualsiasi, tutte le macchine si fermano [. . .]. Essendo pochi, come i pellirossa, cercano di conservarli'

(Eremita, p. 98). The subject of the humour here, as elsewhere in the text, is the quirkiness of the American lifestyle. There are fewer comic moments in the Taccuino, and again they are also directed against the customs of the country visited, as for example when the ltalian party is inundated with apples (Saggi, pp. 2465-72). In the travelogues humour is not used as a counterbalance to the seriousness of certain themes, as it is in Palomar.

Considering the Taccuino and the Diario together, the metaphor of the my- opic eye seems a particularly appropriate one to express the difficulty of the observer's leap from part to whole. Both texts are demonstrative of Calvino's skill at close observation and his attention to detail, when his sguardo is sharply focused. However, as he moves away from the particular and tries to draw ge? neral definitions about the USA and the USSR, he becomes less compelling: his sguardo does not penetrate the visual surface to reach deeper conclusions.

32 JoAnn Cannon, Postmodern Italian Fiction: The Crisis of Reason in Calvino, Eco, Sciascia, Malerba (London: Associated University Presses, 1989), p. 95 (cf. p. 13).

CATHARINE MEE 999

Calvino's broader view is heavily influenced by the circumstances of his travels, the motivations behind the writing of the texts, and his rather blind adherence to contemporary myths about both countries. For these reasons, neither text is

particularly convincing as literature, as Calvino himself realized. It must also be recognized that creating a convincing all-embracing representation of any country or society is one of the most difficult tasks for any travel writer and one in which few succeed. Significantly, in his later travel writing he avoids any such

attempt completely: in La forma del tempo conclusions give way to questions. The Calvinian sguardo finds better literary expression in fictional works such as Palomar, where, it must be remembered, the myopic eye becomes one of the sources of humour which distance the reader. Nevertheless, the Taccuino and the Diario are important in a number of respects: first as historical documents, illustrative of contemporary Italian impressions ofthe USA and the USSR and of moments in the history of those countries. They are also significant as auto?

biographical documents, not only in describing events in Calvino's life, but also as indicative ofthe author's own personality, in particular his insatiable curios?

ity about other cultures. Finally, they also illustrate the way Calvino thought about the world and represent an important stage in his creative development. There is a clear movement from the practical experience of travel writing, as embodied in the Taccuino and the Diario, to the more speculative approaches to the larger questions of how one can gain knowledge of the world in La forma del tempo and Palomar. In a move consonant with other developments in his

oeuvre, Calvino shifts, in his travel writing, from writing about the object or

country observed to the process of observation itself. Nevertheless, the prob? lematic leap for the myopic eye, from detail to totality, remains challenging even in the later works. As the narrator of Palomar says:

' "Solo dopo aver conosciuto la superficie delle cose, [. . .] ci si pud spingere a cercare quei che c'e sotto. Ma la superficie delle cose e inesauribile"' (Palomar, p. 57).

Lincoln College, Oxford Catharine Mee