All At One Point

For this week I read All At One Point by Italo Calvino. I definitely saw a lot of similarities in this with Aquatic Uncle that we read in class. I think it's really interesting to take the concept of the first atoms in the universe before the Big Bang and the way the author goes about it also makes it a compelling story and not just an entirely scientific reading. However, there are still elements to it that make it feel like you're reading something slightly scientific. Things like including exactly how the universe was created, using a lot of scientific phrasing, and even just their names hinting to the names of atoms and molecules. It's obviously not entirely scientific though because it's just a short story about an atom "living" with all the first atoms. They get personified, as well, talking about one character being busty and another having overalls, even though we know atoms don't have human characteristics. It kept switching between talking about how all the atoms are existing within each other and being scientific to talking about how someone walked up to the main character and how there are affairs and such. 
This being said, this story makes for a good example of a story that kind of breaks genre boundaries. It's kind of science fiction, its kind of actual science, and it's kind of just people living their lives. However, I think that a whole genre being dedicated to stories that don't fit into genres isn't very helpful because it begins to feel like the miscellaneous bin. I think the act of putting stories that don't fit into genre's into their own separate category enforces the walls of genres, making it harder for people and writers to break out of the genre they are used to. If the barriers of what makes a genre that genre, it hinders creativity and people wanting to branch out to find new things.