T ZERO

More Cosmicomics (1968) with the same concerns and conceits. Occasionally brilliant and notional, often stultifying. Cf. the title story in which our universal character takes a second...one second...to contemplate thenuances of an expanding and contracting universe and stops time ("T Zero" point) for an interminably long chapter. But there are two delightful tales—one in which "Qfwfq" and Sibyl sit on the back porch sometime in pre-history and watch the moon drip down—"The Earth is all sheathed in waterproof, crushproof, dirt proof materials; even if a bit of this Moon much drips onto us, we can clean it up in a hurry." And one in which "Qfwfq" exists as a unicellular organism about to do aDouble Helix...chains and change and mystic crystal revelations about the nature of "I." Not everyone will want to help Mr. Calvino chase points of reference across a timelessness where the only constant is flux. But in science fiction he's a sophisticated novelty.