Numbers in the Dark

“Everybody telephones everybody at every possible moment, and nobody can speak to anybody … Distance has been the warp that supports the weft of every love story.”—from Numbers in the Dark

Written between 1943 and 1984, the stories in Numbers in the Darkspan the career of one of fiction’s modern masters: from Italo Calvino’s earliest fables, to tales informed by life in World War II–era Italy, to the delightful experimentation that would define his later work.
Here are speculative stories on life in the digital age, genre-bending wonders, and “impossible interviews” with the likes of Montezuma and a Neanderthal. Deftly translated by Tim Parks, Numbers in the Dark shows off Calvino’s lifelong gift for subtle humor and shimmering philosophical insight.

“Numbers in the Dark is a glorious grab-bag … [with] enough gems from every phase in Calvino’s career to make it feel indispensable.”—Seattle Times