Invisible Cities

Kublai Khan owns an atlas that maps out all his empire’s cities and those of the neighboring realms. He realizes that he’s not going to hear from Marco Polo about neighboring cities such as Kambalu, the capital of China, or the island of Java. Kublai asks if Marco is going to repeat his stories when he returns to the west. Marco notes that listeners only retain the words they expect to hear, so what Kublai, gondoliers, and possibly, the story he tells to a cellmate after being imprisoned by Genoese pirates will be entirely different. The listener controls the story, not the speaker. Kublai says that sometimes, he feels like Marco is far away and that he himself is the prisoner of “a gaudy and unlivable present,” in which human society has reached an extreme. He can hear the invisible reasons why cities live.

Kublai’s atlas depicts the entire globe, continents, ships’ routes, and illustrious cities. Kublai pulls out his atlas to test Marco. Marco can recognize Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Samarkand. He recognizes Granada, Timbuktu, and Paris. Marco recognizes other cities by studying small drawings on the map. There are some cities that Marco and the geographers aren’t sure exist, like Cuzco and Lhassa. Marco still lists names and suggests routes, knowing that names change with every new language and that it’s possible to reach a place from anywhere by driving, riding, or flying. Kublai declares that Marco knows cities in the atlas better than he does in person, but Marco insists that through travel, cities all begin to look the same. The atlas preserves the differences.

Kublai’s atlas contains maps of all the cities, including those that are gone and those that will exist someday. Marco leafs through the pages and points to Troy, where there was once a wooden horse. At Constantinople, Marco sees Mohammad and through Constantinople and Troy, he sees San Francisco—and that in the future, it will be part of an empire greater than Kublai Khan’s. That atlas reveals cities’ forms, even if they don’t yet have a form or a name. Marco can see Amsterdam, York, and New York’s skyscrapers and streets. The possible forms are endless and cities will rise until there are no more forms. At the end of the atlas, there are networks without beginning or end in the shape of Los Angeles or Kyoto.

Cities and the Dead. 5. Most cities have a second city in their cemetery. Laudomia doesn’t just have a second city; it has a third city of the unborn. As the Laudomia of the living expands and gets crowded, the tombs grow and begin to repeat the patterns of the Laudomia of the living. Both cities get increasingly crowded and the living often visit the dead to look for their own names. The living look for explanations and reasons from the dead. There’s also a huge place for the unborn to live. Presumably there are infinite people there, but the area is empty and the unborn could be any size. It’s possible to contemplate a thousand years of Laudomia’s future in a single vein of marble.

The living of Laudomia visit the house of the unborn often to ask questions. They always ask questions about themselves or their legacies, not about future generations. The future inhabitants seem too unreal. Visitors to the house of the unborn ultimately come to one of two equally alarming possibilities: one is that there are more unborn than dead and living, and the house is filled with invisible hordes; the other option is that at some point, Laudomia and its citizens will disappear. In this option, the Laudomia of the living and that of the unborn are like the two bulbs of an hourglass. Someday, the final inhabitant will be born and the final grain will fall to the bottom.

Cities and the Sky. 4. Astronomers established the lines of Perinthia according to the stars and the zodiac so that the city would be guaranteed to reflect harmony, reason, and the gods’ benevolence. People arrived to populate it. Today, travelers find all manner of deformed individuals there, but the most monstrous are hidden in cellars and lofts. The astronomers must either admit that their calculations are wrong and they’re unable to describe the heavens, or they must admit that they described the heavens correctly and their monstrous city reflects the gods.

Continuous Cities. 3. Marco Polo says that every year, he stops in Procopia and stays at the same inn. From his window, he can see a ditch, a bridge, a hill, and chickens. The first year, he saw no one outside. The second year, he noticed a face among the leaves. In following years, he noticed more and more faces and now, he can only see faces, not the landscape. He thinks that he should just stop looking out the window, but it’s hard to move away—there are 26 people in his room. Fortunately, they’re all polite.

Hidden Cities. 2. Life isn’t happy in Raissa. People curse at children, spend their lives in bad dreams, and domestic disputes abound. However, at every turn, there seems to be something happy. Children laugh at dogs, and women smile at men on horseback whose horses are thrilled to be flying over jumps. There are birds in the sky, having been freed by painters. The painter’s picture of the bird will accompany a philosopher’s words. The philosopher says that in Raissa, there’s an invisible thread binding living beings together, making it so the unhappy city contains a happy city that doesn’t know it exists.

Cities and the Sky. 5. Andria was built to follow a planet’s orbit. Events flow calmly and nothing is left to human error. Marco Polo recalls telling residents that he can understand why, since they think of themselves as cogs in clockwork, they try not to change anything and rejoice in staying the same. The residents looked at him, dumbfounded, and showed him a new suspended street, theater, river port, and toboggan slide. Marco asked if the new additions disturb the city’s rhythm, and the residents responded that any change in Andria corresponds to a change in the stars. Astronomers look for change in the sky when things happen in Andria. Marco notes that residents are self-confident and prudent. They’re convinced that every change in the city influences the sky, and before doing new things, they calculate risks and advantages for themselves and for all worlds.

Continuous Cities. 4. Marco Polo address Kublai Khan and says that in answer to Kublai’s comment that he never describes the spaces between cities, he’ll now describe Cecelia. In Cecelia, Marco once met a goatherd who asked where they were. The goatherd explained that he and his goats pass through cities and can’t tell them apart, but he can name all the grazing land in between the cities. Marco explained that he’s the opposite; he knows the cities but not the lands between. Many years later, Marco got lost in a neighborhood and asked a passing man where they were. He recognized the man as the old goatherd, and the goatherd explained that they were still lost in Cecelia. Marco exclaimed that he got lost in a different city long ago and asked why he’s in Cecelia now. The goatherd explained that the cities have mingled and now, Cecelia is everywhere.

Hidden Cities. 3. Long ago, someone said that there are two cities in Marozia: one of the rat and one of the swallow. Today, vicious, fighting rats swarm Marozia. A new century is about to start, however, and in it residents will fly like swallows. It’s possible to see, beneath the viciousness, that there’s already preparation underway for the next phase. Marco Polo returns after many years and sees that though the city is at its height, he senses suspicion and sees that people struggle to fly. He notes that if a person moves through Marozia, they can see different cities in the cracks. He wonders if one person’s pleasure is enough to transform the city, but thinks that it must happen by chance. He thinks that Marozia consists of two cities: one of rats, one of swallows. The second is always freeing itself from the first.

Continuous Cities. 5. Marco Polo says that he should describe Penthesilea by talking about the city’s entrance. Most people believe that until a person reaches the walls of a city, they’re still outside—but in Penthesilea, this is incorrect. People advance for hours and it’s unclear if they’re inside or outside. It’s possible to wander and reach places that seem to indicate a change in the city’s texture, but beyond that spot is more suburbs, a carnival, or a cemetery. If a traveler asks where Penthesilea is, residents gesture vaguely and point in any given direction. Finally, if a traveler asks for the road out of Penthesilea, they’ll pass suburbs and neighborhoods. Travelers will eventually give up on trying to discern if Penthesilea is anything more than suburbs—and, disturbingly, will begin to wonder if a world outside of Penthesilea even exists.

Hidden Cities. 4. Theodora has been invaded multiple times throughout the centuries. Residents finished with one enemy, only to begin fighting another. They fought off condors, serpents, spiders, flies, and termites. Eventually, it became an exclusively human city. The rats were the last to hold on. They were hard to get rid of, as each successive generation became increasingly tougher. Finally, humans massacred them. Theodora became a cemetery of the animal kingdom and humans established the true order of the world. Its library contains records of extinct species—or so the residents believe. Animals that have been hiding for ages are beginning to reemerge and others come out of the library’s basement. Sphinxes, chimeras, dragons, unicorns, and basilisks are retaking their city.

Hidden Cities. 5. Marco Polo refuses to tell Kublai Khan about Berenice, the unjust city. Instead, he’ll describe the Berenice of the just, which is hidden. People handle materials in shadowy back rooms, and when giant cogs jam, a quiet ticking suggests that something else is governing the city. Instead of describing perfumed baths where unjust people in Berenice eye women, he’ll share how the just cautiously evade spies and recognize each other by their punctuation and their cuisine. From this, it’s possible to deduce Berenice’s future, but it’s important to keep in mind that within the city of the just, there’s a malignant seed containing certainty and pride. This seed turns into bitterness, resentment, and the desire of the just to both get revenge on the unjust and live the way the unjust do.

Marco warns Kublai that most important in all of this is that there’s always an element of the unjust city developing within the just city. Looking more closely at the seed of justice, however, it’s possible to pick out a spreading spot, which is the desire to impose what’s just through unjust means—which might lead to a huge city. Marco says that Berenice is indeed a succession of just and unjust cities, but he wants to warn Kublai that all future Berenices are already present.

Kublai Khan’s atlas contains maps of promised lands that haven’t yet been visited or founded. these include New Atlantis, Utopia, and New Harmony. Kublai asks Marco Polo to tell him which of these will become the future. Marco replies that he can’t draw routes or set dates for these places. Sometimes he only needs a glimpse to know that he can set out and put together a city, but he and Kublai cannot stop actively searching for it. It might be rising up right now in Kublai’s empire, but they can only look for it in this way.

As Marco says this, Kublai flips through his atlas and focuses on the nightmare cities such as Enoch, Babylon, and Brave New World. He cries that it’s useless if they’re inevitably going to end up in the infernal city. Marco warns that if the inferno is going to come true, they’re already living it. He says that there are two ways to keep from suffering in it. Like many, they can accept the inferno and become a part of it. Or, they can take the more difficult route and vigilantly look for people, places, and things that aren’t part of the inferno and seek to preserve them.