"Invisible
Cities are not known cities, but fictional ones. I entitled all of them with
women names; the book consists of brief sections. Each one of these sections
should give a clue which is relevant for every city or, in general sense, for
every city concept."
(Italo Calvino,
"Italo Calvino on Invisible Cities" [not the original translation],
1983)
Invisible Cities (Le Città
Invisibili) is the book written by Italo Calvino, published in 1972. The
book includes the dialogues between the Venetian traveler Marco Polo and
the Mongolian Emperor (it was mentioned as Tatarian in the book) Kublai
Khan. The dialogues are on the trips by Marco Polo. The narrated places
correspond to fictional cities entitled with a woman name. Calvino has
constructed his narration on the signs, and thus, the book is among the
masterpieces of literary works, in terms of the semiology. Dialectic
dual-contradictions form the foreground of the work.
The cities are classified in 11 groups in Invisible
Cities:
memory,
desire,
signs,
thin cities,
trading,
eyes,
names,
the dead,
the sky,
continuous cities,
hidden cities.
In this classification, 55 cities are
described. Each group contains 5 cities, and each city is coded with a woman
name:
memory:
|
Diomira, İsidora, Zaira, Zora, Maurilia
|
desire:
|
Dorotea, Anastasia, Despina, Fedora, Zobeide
|
signs:
|
Tamara, Zirma, Zoe, İpazia, Olivia
|
thin cities:
|
İsaura, Zenobia, Armilla, Sofronia, Ottavia
|
trading:
|
Eufemia, Cloe, Eutropia, Ersilia, Smeraldina
|
eyes:
|
Valdrada, Zemrude, Bauci, Fillide, Moriana
|
names:
|
Aglaura, Leandra, Pirra, Clarice, İrene
|
the dead:
|
Melania, Adelma, Eusapia, Argia, Laudomia
|
the sky:
|
Eudossia, Bersabea, Tecla, Perinzia, Andria
|
continuous cities:
|
Leonia, Trude, Procopia, Cecilia, Pentesilea
|
hidden cities:
|
Olinda, Raissa, Marozia, Teodora, Berenice
|
It is generally claimed that the narrative
in Invisible Cities describes 13th-century life, because the
periods when Marco Polo (1254-1324) and Kublai Khan (1215-1294) had lived coincide, and because
of the spatial properties of the places hosting the conversations. However,
descriptions of the cities are actually independent from the time with, for
example, their references to the industrialized city-life of the 20th
century, and thus, with the chronological tides. Similarly, though each
city-description has a rich visuality with its space-life pattern, and though
many descriptions almost directly refer to the existing cities (like New York,
Venice, and Istanbul), it should, indeed, be considered that these cities are
also independent from the space. In Invisible Cities, the time and
space compose their original and holistic context by intertwining and melding,
and they also decompose in this very context, and de-contextualize themselves.
By this way, the reader trying to view the Invisible Cities composes these
cities via his/her mind, and also he/she makes the visible/existing
cities melted into air by transforming them into images. Even only because
of this characteristic, we can claim that the book was shaped by the Modern
perception and style of the 20th century. Therefore, we can also assert that
the success of Invisible Cities roots in the fact that it
touches every space and time without belonging to any of them.
