However, the subjective individual perceptions occur to be a large part of the decoding process, as the evocative descriptions of the imagined places has been investigated by numerous literary writers, yet all with different analogies. How do people relate to the spaces described? What is the architecture behind imagination and perception? Through trying to decode the messages held within his book, this thesis will cautiously investigate and interpret these questions by analysing the deep relations between people and their experience in architectural spaces. What was he doing? Where are these cities located? What purpose do they have? Why are they invisible? The creativity, the dreams, the imagination without limits. These never-seen cities become haptic - they become, almost, real. When reading Calvino’s narrative that space becomes tangible.

There is usually an abstract space we inhabit when we read a book. Calvino names these cities invisible, yet his narrative is extremely visual, in the mind. Mythic, unreal and ethereal descriptions of cities serve as a metaphor to describe the decaying of some architectural principles with the start of the modern era. Eleven themes are to be tackled and inserted alternately in nine chapters, whereas some contain different definitions or subjective interpretations. Its aim is to interpret and defragment it, thus the structural organisation being the same. This thesis is structured like the book Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. Rio Maior Alvarez e Serra, Mariana (TU Delft Architecture and the Built Environment TU Delft History & Complexity)Īrchitecture, Urbanism and Building Sciences GradeSaver, 26 December 2017 Web.Visualising the invisible: A visual (re)interpretation and defragmentation of the inexecutable cities of Italo Calvino 'Invisible Cities Metaphors and Similes'. Next Section Irony Previous Section Symbols, Allegory and Motifs How To Cite in MLA Format Braun, Michael. Will review the submission and either publish your submission or provide feedback. You can help us out by revising, improving and updatingĪfter you claim a section you’ll have 24 hours to send in a draft. Kublai Khan compares Marco Polo to a smuggler: 'This is what I wanted to hear from you: confess what you are smuggling: moods, states of grace, elegies!' This shows that he has finally understood that Marco Polo does not tell him stories of real cities instead, he conveys his own feelings of nostalgia. He has been suspecting that Polo is ridden by a deep feeling of nostalgia, so 'for an hour he had been toying with it, like a cat with a mouse,' which illustrates that he is sure he knows Polo's true intentions and will eventually get him to confess them. The emperor has had a feeling that Marco Polo has not told him stories about real cities. A Cargo of RegretsĪfter Marco Polo reveals that he has only been describing Venice the whole time to preserve his memory of his hometown, the emperor replies, 'You return from your voyages with a cargo of regrets!' This metaphor emphasizes how much Polo seems to miss Venice, and how much he thinks about missed opportunities and the decisions he made in the past.

As the corpse cannot be revived, the emperor implicitly acknowledges that the state of his empire cannot be improved.

Kublai Khan knows that his empire is 'rotting like a corpse in a swamp, whose contagion infects the crows that peck it as well as the bamboo that grows, fertilized by its humors.' By using this simile, he emphasizes the decayed state of his realm, which has a destructive effect on bordering territories as well. The narrator compares the journey of life with a tree: 'Futures not achieved are only branches of the past: dead branches.' This illustrates that at any given point there are countless branches to follow, but the ones we do not follow will be dead to us they may come to life for another person, though. We are thankful for their contributions and encourage you to make your own. These notes were contributed by members of the GradeSaver community.

Invisible cities themes