Jun'ichirō Tanizaki
In a letter written to critic Lucio Lombardo Radice dated November 13, 1979 (published in "Italo Calvino: letters, 1941–1985"), Calvino mentions Mikhail Bulgakov, Yasunari Kawabata, Jun'ichirō Tanizaki, Juan Rulfo, José María Arguedas, Jorge Luis Borges and G.K. Chesterton as having influenced, in various ways, the narrative style of the ten stories that comprise the book.