Writer, essayist and journalist, Italo Calvino was born in 1923 in Cuba, of Italian parents. He spent his early years in San Remo, and studied at Turin, where he worked as a publisher. Calvino’s whimsical and imaginative fables made him one of the most important Italian fiction writers in the 20th century. He died in Siena in 1985.

This book contains The Queen’s Necklace and The Workshop Hen.

‘The inspector ordered that the bird be searched. One of the agents stalled saying it made him feel sick, and after some fierce pecking another withdrew sucking a bleeding finger.’

In these two stories from an inventive, comic master of the form, old friends and friendly rivals Pietro and Tommasso discover a treasure lost by the side of the road, and become suspected of abusing a blameless chicken for devious ends. Italo Calvino’s writing explores the fringes of these small, unusual scenes and finds incalculable wisdom and humor there.

(Top, L-R: Anne Tyler, Desmond Bagley, Ed McBain, Evelyn Waugh and Friedrich Nietzsche. Bottom, L-R: Oscar Wilde, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Michael Morpurgo and Italo Calvino)

This week we celebrate authors of the past and present who had birthdays in the month of October. Check them out below.

Oscar Wilde

(October 16, 1854- November 30, 1900)

Novelist/playwright/poet Oscar Wilde dazzled 19th century society with his legendary wit and unflappable personality. He penned: The Picture of Dorian Gray and The Happy Prince and Other Stories, among other works.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

(October 21, 1772- July 25, 1834)

English Romantic poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, penned many famous works, including The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Friedrich Nietzsche

(October 15, 1844 – August 25, 1900)

Philosopher/poet/composer Nietzche penned many classics such as Why I Am So Wise.

 Italo Calvino

(October 15, 1923 – September 19, 1985)

Calvino, an Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels, wrote hits like The Queen’s Necklace.

Evelyn Waugh

(October 28, 1903 – April 10, 1966)

An English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; and also was a prolific journalist and reviewer, Waugh wrote many popular novels such as A Handful of Dust.

Anne Tyler

(October 25, 1941 – )

American author, Tyler, has written several novels, four of which have been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. She wrote The Accidental Tourist and won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction in 1985 and the Ambassador Book Award for Fiction in 1986. The novel was adapted into a 1988 award-winning film.

Michael Morpurgo

(October 5, 1943- )

Morpurgo is an English author, poet, playwright and librettist who is known best for children’s novels. His novel, War Horse, has been adapted as a radio broadcast and as a stage play. It was also adapted as a 2011 British film.

Desmond Bagley

(October 29, 1923 – April 12, 1983)

Bagley was a British journalist and novelist known for a series of best-selling thrillers. One such thriller is The Enemy which was turned into a film in 2001.

Ed McBain

(October 15, 1926 – July 6, 2005)

McBain was an American author and screenwriter but was best known for his crime fiction such as King’s Ransom.