His mission was clear: to select the most beautiful and original versions of stories told in various dialects and rewrite them in a clear, vibrant Italian that still preserved the "flavor" of their regional origins.

This wasn't just a simple transcription; it was a literary labor of love that transformed oral traditions into a national treasure.

Commissioned by the publisher Einaudi, Calvino spent two years immersed in 19th-century folklore archives. Much like the Brothers Grimm in Germany or Charles Perrault in France, Calvino realized that Italy lacked a unified national collection of fairy tales.

Have you ever wondered what happened to the stories told in the stables of Lombardy or the sunny squares of Sicily before they were written down? In 1956, the legendary writer gave Italy a priceless gift: Fiabe italiane , a monumental collection that rescued 200 traditional folktales from the risk of being forgotten.

Unlike the sanitized versions we often see today, Calvino’s collection is a "mosaic" of the human spirit. According to Wikipedia , the collection covers every corner of Italy, from the Riviera to the tips of Sicily. lettura Fiabe Italiane di Italo Calvino