Reading 1001 discussion

6. How does this book change our perceptions of authors as individuals, are authors the owners of the books they write?

I've always felt that the reader brings a piece of themselves to what the author has written. And this perspective, does alter the reading of the book and the perception of the book.

However, I still feel the author is the "owner" of the book that they write, regardless of outside influences and inspirations. There is one author in the book with severe writer's block, and Calvino delves into part of the cause as a kind of overthinking about the type of reader who ultimately will be reading the book. I expect this does happen to authors - - especially after their debut novel. How can you help thinking about what your particular reader might expect?

I agree that the reader brings their own experience to the book. The woman reader mentions that she prefers not to know the author but I also think it is hard not see the author in the writing, maybe wrongly, but the writer is writing from his/her perspective/world view. But also, I now see writers putting a lot of effort into writing politically correct, cover all basis writing and I think that has created some of those faults that the Calvino is hinting at in the later chapters.

I am frustrated because I can't find the quote about literature being the only art where the reader is a participant. Unlike art or music. I think when I read this quote I was thinking about this book.

No. Once the book is published it belongs to readers. The author can say what they were trying to say, but only each reader can speak to what the book actually says to them.