Six Walks in the Fictional Woods is a book by Umberto Eco

Umberto Eco

Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...

. Originally delivered at Harvard for the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures

Charles Eliot Norton Lectures

The Charles Eliot Norton Professorship of Poetry at Harvard University was established in 1925 as an annual lectureship in "poetry in the broadest sense" and named for the university's former professor of fine arts. Distinguished creative figures and scholars in the arts, including painting,...

 in 1992 and 1993, the six lectures were published in the fall of 1994.

The book derives its title from Italo Calvino

Italo Calvino

Italo Calvino was an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy , the Cosmicomics collection of short stories , and the novels Invisible Cities and If on a winter's night a traveler .Lionised in Britain and the United States,...

's Six Memos for the Next Millennium

Six Memos for the Next Millennium

Six Memos for the Next Millennium is a book based on a series of lectures written by Italo Calvino for the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard, but never delivered as Calvino died before leaving Italy. The lectures were originally written in Italian and translated by Patrick Creagh. The...

but Eco also cites Calvino's If On a Winter's Night a Traveler

If on a winter's night a traveler

If on a winter's night a traveler is a 1979 novel by the Italian writer Italo Calvino. The narrative is about a reader trying to read a book called If on a winter's night a traveler. Every odd-numbered chapter is in the second person, and tells the reader what he is doing in preparation for...

as inspiration because the novel "is concerned with the presence of the reader in the story" which was also the subject of the lectures and book.

Eco's general concerns, besides that of literary criticism

Literary criticism

Literary criticism is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often informed by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of its methods and goals...

, fall under the subjects of techniques of fiction

Fiction

Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...

 and narration or rhetoric

Rhetoric

Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...

.

Table of contents

1. Entering the Woods
2. The Woods of Loisy
3. Lingering in the Woods
4. Possible Woods
5. The Strange Case of Rue Servandon
6. Fictional Protocols

See also

• Italo Calvino
  Italo Calvino
  Italo Calvino was an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels. His best known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy , the Cosmicomics collection of short stories , and the novels Invisible Cities and If on a winter's night a traveler .Lionised in Britain and the United States,...
  
  

• Protocols of the Elders of Zion