Does an Italian equivalent of Grimms's Fairy Tales exist? Italo Calvino began his research into Italian folktales with that question in mind. When it became clear that there was no "readable master collection of Italian folktales which would be popular in every sense of the word," Calvino himself assumed the work of assembling one. It was a Herculean undertaking. Calvino collated, categorized, and compared "mountains of narratives." His work had two objectives, he tells us, the presentation of every type of folktale documented in Italian dialects and the representation of all regions of Italy. The "scientific" work, the direct transcription of folktales "from the mouths of the people," had already been done by several nineteenth century Italian folklorists. Calvino made his way through their anthologies, looking for the most unusual, beautiful, and original texts. These texts he then edited, enriched with variants, and translated into standard Italian...