if on a winters night a traveler is a marvel of ingenuity an experimental text that looks longingly back to the great age of narrationwhen time no longer seemed stopped and did not yet seem to have exploded italo calvinos novel is in one sense a comedy in which the two protagonists the reader and the other reader ultimately end up married having almost finished if on a winters night a traveler in another it is a tragedy a reflection on the difficulties of writing and the solitary nature of reading the reader buys a fashionable new book which opens with an exhortation relax concentrate dispel every other thought let the world around you fade alas after 30 or so pages he discovers that his copy is corrupted and consists of nothing but the first section over and over returning to the bookshop he discovers the volume which he thought was by calvino is actually by the polish writer bazakbal given the choice between the two he goes for the pole as does the other reader ludmilla but this copy turns out to be by yet another writer as does the next and the nextthe real calvino intersperses 10 different pastichesstories of menace spies mystery premonitionwith explorations of how and why we choose to read make meanings and get our bearings or fail to meanwhile the reader and ludmilla try to reach and read each other if on a winters night is dazzling vertiginous and deeply romantic what makes lovemaking and reading resemble each other most is that within both of them times and spaces open different from measurable time and space