'Invisible Cities' is not exactly a novel. It is rather a collection of short descriptions (or prose poems) of eleven groups of fifty-five fictitious cities arranged in a mathematical order. Having travelled through all the fifty-five cities with Marco Polo I felt I got a glimpse of the many aspects of the human (as a result, my own) existence - life, experience, culture, memory, time, death and many more... The book is endless as our quest is.

'Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears, even if the thread of their discourse is secret, their rules are absurd, their perspectives deceitful, and everything conceals something else.'
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'There is no language without deceit.'
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Arriving at each new city, the traveler finds again a past of his that he did not know he had: the foreignness of what you no longer are or no longer possess lies in wait for you in foreign, unpossessed places.'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
'You take delight not in a city's seven or seventy wonders, but in the answer it gives to a question of yours.'
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Memory's images, once they are fixed in words, are erased," Polo said. "Perhaps I am afraid of losing Venice all at once, if I speak of it, or perhaps, speaking of other cities, I have already lost it, little by little.'
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'The city, however, does not tell its past, but contains it like the lines of a hand'
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'The inferno of the living is not something that will be; if there is one, it is what is already here, the inferno where we live every day, that we form by being together. There are two ways to escape suffering it. The first is easy for many: accept the inferno and become such a part of it that you can no longer see it. The second is risky and demands constant vigilance and apprehension: seek and learn to recognize who and what, in the midst of inferno, are not inferno, then make them endure, give them space.'

THERE are books that you read and forget. And then there are books that you read and they get etched in your mind forever; Italo Calvino’s ‘Invisible Cities’ is one such book.

image:
Marco Polo the magnificent.

Marco Polo visits the imperial palace of Chinese Emperor Kublai Khan and describes to him all the beautiful cities of the world that he has visited.
But can these magnificent cities really exist? Are they just a figment of Mr Polo’s imagination? Or is he just describing Venice while stretching his creative powers to the fullest?

image:
There is something special -- extraordinarily special -- about Venice.

You know Mr Calvino is writing about Venice when he says: “In Esmeralda, city of water, a network of canals and a network of streets span and intersect each other. To go from one place to another you have always the choice between land and boat: and since the shortest distance between two points in Esmeralda is not a straight line but a zigzag that ramifies in tortuous optional routes, the ways that open to each passerby are never two, but many, and they increase further for those who alternate a stretch by boat with one on dry land. And so Esmeralda's inhabitants are spared the boredom of following the same streets every day.”

image:
A gondola ride for those in a romantic mood. And if you can recite a sonnet by Shakespeare, your day is made -- and maybe night too!

However, you can definitely make out that it can’t be Venice when he writes: “In Ersilia, to establish the relationships that sustain the city's life, the inhabitants stretch strings from the corners of the houses, white or black or gray or black-and-white according to whether they mark a relationship of blood, of trade, authority, agency. When the strings become so numerous that you can no longer pass among them, the inhabitants leave: the houses are dismantled; only the strings and their supports remain. From a mountainside, camping with their household goods, Ersilia's refugees look at the labyrinth of taut strings and poles that rise in the plain. That is the city of Ersilia still, and they are nothing.”
Each chapter starts with a meaningful dialogue between the Chinese emperor and the Italian traveller. Each ends with an extremely clever exchange of words between the two. If Emperor Kublai Khan is wise, then Marco Polo is worldly-wise and street-smart being so well-travelled. The following is an excerpt from the book to help you get an idea:
“Marco Polo describes a bridge, stone by stone. ‘But which is the stone that supports the bridge?’ Kublai Khan asks. ‘The bridge is not supported by one stone or another,’ Marco answers, ‘but by the line of the arch that form.’ Kublai Khan remains silent, reflecting. Then he adds: ‘Why do you speak to me of the stones? It is only the arch that matters to me.’ Polo answers: ‘Without stones there is no arch.’”
The book is so surrealistic that you often feel that you are dreaming. However, the book is not all visions and dreams. It also mentions real cities from our world. It talks about the environment and how man in his greed to grab more and more land is destroying natural habitats and the grazing ground of cattle and other animals. But Mr Calvino does it in such a way so as not to make you feel bored or disinterested even for a second while going through its contents.
The short 150-page book has an extremely unusual cover. It has seven chapters each of which has several sections. The sections could be dealing with ‘Cities and memory, ‘Cities and desire’, ‘Cities and signs’, ‘Thin cities’, etc.
You neither have any heroes or villains in the fictitious book nor do you have a plot. Yet the book is as exciting as one can be.

image:
Italo Calvino photographed at work on his desk.

This is the first tome that I have read of Mr Calvino’s and I am feeling absolutely impatient to grab another one. What a tale has the Cuban-born writer woven! As much credit goes to William Weaver for his superb translation. You will enjoy his alliterations to the hilt. Mr Weaver was honoured with the National Book Award Finalist for Translation in 1975.
Let me say this before I end my review. This is one book that I am most willing to read again and again as the prose of the book reads like poetry. And beautiful poetry is meant to be read over and over again. If you don’t read this tome, then you will be truly missing something. So please get hold of ‘Invisible Cities’ at the first opportunity you get.

image:
Film poster of "Marco Polo the Magnificent".

image:
Sixties star Horst Buchholz.

One last piece of information: I have seen only one film made on the travels of Marco Polo called "Marco Polo the Magnificent" (1965) in which he embarks on a journey with some relatives, taking him all the way to China. It shows less of his travels and more of his adventures in the land of Chinese Emperor Kublai Khan.
The film starred handsome German actor Horst Buchholz as Marco Polo and Anthony Quinn as Chinese Emperor Kublai Khan.

A city inhabiting one’s inside, its streets, lanes and by-lanes running in the veins and arteries, the hubbub of the city enlivening even the tiniest fraction of a being. The city; living, breathing, growing and leaving an impression in the very essence, even if it is never visited in one’s lifetime. And then - a multitude of such cities, standing under the auspices of their heritage, a witness to the chronicles of their golden times, cities with their halos; an invisible but inescapable allure. Cities; rising with dusk, their pulses throbbing to the rhythm of stars. Cadence of street lights; illuminating in its glow, the stones of the wall of a building standing silently and witnessing bare human emotions/acts – love, passion, deceit, despair, joy, pain, indifference but above all a discreteness embodying the city. Cities, with its uneven alleys where an old man sit outside the door of his house, the wrinkles on his face telling the story of his life, his eyes a testimony of submission in the face of the inevitable, and a young, beautiful woman, selling seasonal flowers by the side; unnerving a quiescent thought. The labyrinthine roads which never seem to end, taking one forward, on and on, with their flow, adding a clutter of houses by the side, a face sneaking from a window; seeming a gateway to the unknown. The outline of houses in the sea by which they stand; the shadows in clear water defying the ephemeral. Cities, with those parks and boulevards where a curious seeker seeks the traces of path trodden by great authors and thinkers; an eagerness to associate with that one idea, a particular thought, capable of creating a summer inside…..



Let me seek those cities O my mind, cities invisible but living inside me….

Postoje dva načina da se ne pati. Prvi mnogima uspjeva: prihvatiti pakao i postati dio njega do te mjere da ga ne primjećuješ. Drugi je rizičan i zahtjeva neprekidnu pažnju i učenje: usljed pakla tražiti i prepoznavati ono što nije pakao, i činiti da traje, dati mu prostora.

Štagod da se izjalovi, gradovi će biti prisutni sa finesama koji će putniku pružati novu dimenziju. Ta dimenzija ne samo da ima svoj unutrašnji oblik, to će putnik u sebi morati da spozna, već će i spoljni, novi simboli da preuzmu vođstvo u tome kako će putnik da određuje svoj pogled na grad, pa i da ga pamti. Simboli grada moraju da se održavaju i njeguju kako bi grad održao spoljni izgled i time bio prigodan čovjekovom oku, jer u suprotnom oni polako propadaju i gase se odnosno prerastaju u nešto drugo. Tako Kalvino jednom prilikom kaže da je tajna grada u tome što poznaje samo odlaske a ne i povratke. Možda je kod putnika obrnut slučaj te on pamti samo dolaske? Kalvinovi gradovi su puni neke tajanstvenosti, poput Borhesovih priča, skloni su vječnom previranju iz jednog ka drugom pogledu. Kopanju rupe bez dna. Kalvino kroz Marka Pola prikazuje da unutrašnji život može da bude isto onako raznovrstan, šarolik i bogat iskustvom kao i život onog koji osvaja carstva i pronalazi nepoznate zemlje kao što je to svojevremeno činio mongolski poglavica Kublaj-kan.

Since my copy of if on a winter's night a traveler is on its way, I thought of equipping myself with writings of Italo Calvino. In the meanwhile I laid my hands upon Invisible Cities. It’s one of the few books to which I have given 5 stars making it clearly evident as to how much I loved it. This work of Calvino is an unadulterated imagination booksonified. It can best be described as the figment of everybody’s imagination. I hope I can safely say for everyone that once in our lives we have imagined a particular world, a particular life where the existence is on our terms and conditions. We are the sole architect of that world where everything is perfect, imperfect, unreal or simply invisible and only we are allowed to see it or live in it.

While reading this book, the memories of my childhood surfaced where I used to imagine a place where everything is made up of chocolates, (well..ok!! I imagine it today also), a little later, I used to imagine of getting a whole new wardrobe every day. At present I imagine of reading Ulysses in one day, Gravity’s Rainbow another day, assimilating every aspect these books offer to their readers. What else!! Yes…writing an International Bestseller novel in a matter of days, winning Booker Prize and getting a chance to meet my all favorite authors and discussing their books.

And this one I particularly like...Being the sole survivor when the world ends and starting a whole new civilization the way I want it, where procreation is not the only option of creating a life for human beings (No, I am not a sadist but yes, this book hit me hard in the head). So I hope you got the gist.

Imagination is like a ship without a shore and the only option it has is to keep on moving. Keep Reading :)

Και κάποιοι τυχεροί θα λέμε εγώ ταξίδεψα εκεί

Yapı Kredi Yayınları bu kitabın türü için "Anlatı demiş, ne de güzel söylemiş. Çünkü bu bir roman değil, bir öykü kitabı da değil. İtalyanların şiir kültürüyle bezenmiş, çevirmesi (okudukça gördüm ki) inanılmaz zor bir "anlatı".

Calvino sevdiğim yazarlar arasında. Ancak onun her kitabında aynı şeyi yaşarım. Başlarda kitaba giremem, biraz sıkılırım, sonra da elimden bırakamam. Bu kitap da geleneği bozmadı açıkçası. Yine yapmış yapacağını, gitmiş en özgün fikirleri bulmuş yazar.

Tatar imparatoru Kubilay Han ve Marco Polo'yu aynı çatı altında toplayan bir eser bu. Üstelik, Binbir Gece Masalları gibi, Marco Polo her gece Kubilay Han'a hikayeler anlatıyor! Anlattıkları kadın isimlerine sahip hem çok farklı, hem de birbirine çok benzer şehirler. Polo oralara gerçekten gitti mi, gitmedi mi, bunlar hep muamma. Ama zaten kitabın doğasında bir soyutluk hakim. Burada İtalyan edebiyatının şiir temellerinin de etkisi var, yazarın kurgusundaki yoğun düşünsel anlatının da.

Görünmez Kentler, Kubilay Han ve Marco Polo'nun bazı sayfalarda konuştuğu, ağırlıklı olaraksa Polo'nun farklı kategoriler altında anlattığı şehirlere dayanıyor. Italo Calvino bize sayısız şehir inşa etmiş. Adamın içinde bir mimar gizli!

Bu kitapla ilgili 2 tespitim var. Kubilay Han mantığın ve dünyevi şeylerin sesiyken Marco Polo spiritüel bir yan taşıyor. O varoluşu sorgulayan bir filozof şair adeta. İkisi de rolünü harika şekilde sürdürüyor. Bir imparatorun mantık ve dünyevi şeyleri temsil ederken, tek yere bağlanamayan bir gezginin daha spiritüel bir yan taşıması bana oldukça makul göründü.

Bir diğer tespitimse Virginia Woolf'un sözlerini destekler nitelikte bir şey. Italo Calvino'nun her şehre bir kadın adı vermesi ve Marco Polo'nun da merakla her birini keşfeden yerinde durmaz bir gezgin olmasından yola çıkarak, Woolf'un "Tarih boyunca en çok merak edilmiş hayvan kadındır." sözünü adeta destekliyor.

Bu kitap bence Calvino okumaya başlanacak kitap değil. Çevirisi YKY'ye yakışan cinsten, ama çevirmen notları atlanmamalı. Buradan kocaman bir "helal olsun" gönderiyorum çevirmen Işıl Hanım'a, çünkü çok zor bir metni o şiirselliği kaybetmeden taşıyabilmiş. Editörü de aynı övgü ve teşekkürleri kesinlikle hakediyor. Eminim ki bu bir takım çalışmasının eseri.

Görünmez Kentler okuduğunuz hiçbir şeye benzemiyor, benden söylemesi. Eh, Italo Calvino deyince daha azı beklenemezdi.

This work is not like the only other Calvino I’ve read, If on a Winter's Night a Traveller, but with both books, I felt Calvino read my mind at times. Whenever I wasn’t engaged with this text (it felt Borgesian at times and that’s not really for me), he’d wrap up quickly and/or present me with a startling line of prose. Once, when I thought a particular city had a mathematical bent, he completely destroyed its perfect proportions and laughed at me. Nearing the end, I can pinpoint the moment the “I” narrating the stories felt different; became more prominent; turned into Calvino himself.

Every one of the invisible cities carries a female name. I want to think that means something, but maybe it’s nothing, like naming a ship—or it's an emperor’s-clothes tactic. Several sections end with a trio of adjectives. I loved those, though I don’t know if they mean anything beyond a stylistic preference. For a work I’m not sure I “really like,” I highlighted a lot of passages. I also have no idea how to rate it.

Perhaps I should’ve written an even shorter (non)-review: named it Itala or Calvina; ended it with “cagey, capricious, vigilant.” (I think it’s appropriate I’ve changed these adjectives several times and could do so again, but I must stop.)

Fui forasteira cega através destas 55 cidades só visíveis com os olhos da mente. São cidades deslumbrantes e inacreditáveis num mundo de fantasia que tanto me fez lembrar os cenários labirínticos de Jorge L. Borges.
Os livros não se leem todos da mesma maneira; As Cidades Invisíveis são para ler de mente aberta e vazia, deixando que as imagens se apossem de nós livremente, e a nossa imaginação as consolide.

Porém, estas cidades, os seus habitantes, as suas práticas, por mais absurdas e improváveis que possam parecer, são igualmente um conjunto de símbolos reflexivos que nos encaminham pela viajem e experiência históricas da humanidade nas relações com os outros e com o seu espaço, em qualquer lugar e tempo.

Bu dönem kendiliğinden gelişen bir şekilde sevdiğim birkaç kitabı baştan okudum. Görünmez Kentler bu kez de bir farklı görünüp gittiler, sevgiler.

Bahsettiği kentler içimde fazlasıyla orada olma isteği uyandırdı ama anlattığı halihazırda içinde yaşadığım kentin de ta kendisi aynı zamanda. Öyle bir kent ki; hem içinden kaçmak, hem de oraya gitmek isteyeceğiniz; kaçıp, kurtulup, dinlenmek için durduğunuz anda kendinizi orada bulacağınız, kaçan ve takip eden. Görünmez ve kendini gözümüze sokan bir şeyler var herbirinde.

Birçok kent ve sadece bir kent.

Orası neresi?

In Jeanette Winterson's n  Sexing the Cherry,n Fortunata tells Jordan of a city of dancers and acrobats that dealt with disaster by using ropes as roads and walkways; a city without floors that slowly abandoned gravity and eventually floated away. Not since Winterson have I felt what I felt reading n  Invisible Cities,n—and I picked it up because the back has a quote by her claiming this as 'The book [she] would choose as pillow and plate, alone on a desert island.'

In my mind, Winterson's Fortunata is slowly blurring into Calvino's Marco Polo taking his host, the emperor Kublai Khan, on a tour of marvelous cities and metaphysical states through words, gestures, and ideas. I have realised, emerging slowly from the binds of this book—the spell of it—that there is no point attempting to describe its magic; there are no spoilers in this review because nothing can spoil the experience of it.

All there is to say is that I loved these invisible cities. I will come back to them time and again. I have been taken captive, and I would recommend it to everyone else with a passion.