Um crime à décima segunda potência: considerações sobre a arte combinatória em Italo Calvino

Abstract

This paper proposes a lecture on the short story “The burning of the abominable house”, by Italo Calvino, and intends to explore the manner in which the crime, central issue of the story, contributes to highlight the combining character of the narrative, or even how it consists in a combination art per se. In order to accomplish such an aim, we bring to reconsideration the discussions regarding the literature as an “intellectual fact” and “intelligence’s product”, presented by Jorge Luis Borges in “The 75 detective story”, as well as the ones proposed by Calvino himself about the narrative as a “literary machine”, in “Cybernetics and ghosts: notes toward a definition of the narrative form as a combinative process”.