ABSTRACT

This article reassesses the view of Calvino as an eminently cerebral author by recognising the experiential and embodied dimension of his work and dismantling the false dichotomy between abstraction and bodily experience. I describe Calvino’s imagination as spatial (a) because it is grounded in an embodied experience of space, and (b) because he tends to manipulate the material of imagination – ideas, structures, images – as if they were spaces with which narrators and characters interact. Focusing on ‘Dall’opaco’ (1971), I show how the Ligurian landscape impacted Calvino’s cognitive style by inspiring some privileged patterns in making sense of experience. Then, I illustrate how image schemas derived by embodied experience shape narrative structures and strategies of readerly engagement in the cosmicomical tales. My hypothesis is that the lens of enactivism – which understands imagination as manipulation and holds subject-cogniser and the world as entangled and co-constitutive – may highlight some neglected aspects of Calvino’s work.

摘要

本文通过认识卡尔维诺作品的经验和具体维度并消除抽象与身体经验之间的错误二分法，重新评估了卡尔维诺作为一位杰出的理性作家的观点。我将卡尔维诺的想象力描述为空间（a）因为它基于空间的具体体验，（b）因为他倾向于操纵想象力的材料——想法、结构、图像——就好像它们是叙述者和人物互动的空间。我以“Dall'opaco”（1971）为中心，展示了利古里亚景观如何通过激发一些理解经验的特权模式来影响卡尔维诺的认知风格。然后，我阐述了由具体经验衍生的图像图式如何塑造叙事结构和读者参与宇宙喜剧故事的策略。