Confessions of a Young Novelist

Abstract

French publishing house Grasset has brought out a new book by Italian novelist and semiotician Umberto Eco entitled Confessions of a Young Novelist . This is a special book in that it does not deal with theoretical issues related to the art of the novel, but is content to go through a series of reflections on narrative worlds as created by humanity since the dawn of history. These reflections attempts to tame an "astray" temporality lost in a human livelihood that could embrace all illusory worlds but tighten to refer to a valueless daily issue. In Eco's view, narrative has diverse functions including the desire to be free of the confines and constraints of the real world.