INVISIBLE CITIES

Italo Calvino was born in Cuba in 1923. He grew up in Italy. He was an essayist and journalist and a member of the editorial staff of Einaudi in Turin. In 1973 he won the prestigious Premio Feltrinelli. He died in 1985In Invisible Cities Marco Polo conjures up cities of magical times for his host the Chinese ruler Kublai Khan but gradually it becomes clear that he is actually describing one city: Venice. As Gore Vidal wrote Of all tasks describing the contents of a book is the most difficult and in the case of a marvellous invention like Invisible Cities perfectly irrelevant.A subtle and beautiful meditation Sunday Timesso important for thinking about the rich layers of life around us our frailties how we question and how we find meaning.Invisible Cities changed the way we read and what is possible in the balance between poetry and prose... The book I would choose as pillow and plate alone on a desert islandWhole chapters of unforced poetic prose in which insight and fantasy are perfectly matchedan exquisite worldInvisible Cities is perhaps his most beautiful workthe artist seems to have made peace with the tension between mans ideas of the many and the oneThe most beautiful of his books throws up ideas allusions and breathtaking imaginative insights on almost every page. Each time he returns from his travels Marco Polo is invited by Kublai Khan to describe the cities he has visitedAlthough he makes Marco Polo summon up many cities for the Khans imagination to feed on Calvino is describing only one city in this book. Venice that decaying heap of incomparable splendour still stands as substantial evidence of mans ability to create something perfect out of chaos