Difficult Loves

Difficult Loves (Italian: Gli amori difficili) is a 1971 short story collection by Italo Calvino. It concerns love and the difficulty of communication.

The published English translation by William Weaver omits a number of the stories, and also includes other Calvino stories about the Second World War and postwar period, including those from The Crow Comes Last; some of these were translated by Archibald Colquhoun and Peggy Wright. "The Argentine Ant" and "The Cloud of Smog" (as "Smog") do not appear in this book, but rather in the translated The Watcher and Other Stories.

Stories

Starred stories are those also included in the English translation.

Difficult Loves

• The Adventure of a Soldier*
• The Adventure of a Bandit
• The Adventure of a Bather*
• The Adventure of a Clerk*
• The Adventure of a Photographer*
• The Adventure of a Traveler*
• The Adventure of a Reader*
• The Adventure of a Nearsighted Man*
• The Adventure of a Wife
• The Adventure of Two Spouses
• The Adventure of a Poet*
• The Adventure of a Skier
• The Adventure of a Motorist

Difficult Life

• The Argentine Ant
• The Cloud of Smog

Adaptations

The "Adventure of Two Spouses" was loosely adapted into the "Renzo and Luciana" act of Boccaccio '70; the "Adventure of a Soldier" appears as one part of L'amore difficile, a film by Nino Manfredi.