Un-novelness

I did not care much for Invisible Cities and it’s “un-novelness.” I do admire this book for its fascinating structure in and of itself. The fact that different categories of stories and cities travel up and down in number sequence and are then replaced by others is very intriguing. All the cities seem to have the names of women as well. I think what kept me fascinated were the conversations between Marco Polo and Kublai Kahn about their different viewpoints of the cities, eventually questioning even their existence outside of each of their imaginations. But this book was still cold. There are many reasons to admire it, but I could not love it. Its form was an experiment that did not connect with its language to create a story. That was troubling.

On the outside, Invisible Cities is simply a dialogue between the Emperor Kublai Khan and the explorer, Marco Polo. Polo describes his cities physically or imaginatively. But through the progression of Polo’s stories, Khan is unsure of Polo and the truth about all these cities he has traveled to. I developed suspicion as well as the descriptions become more dense. The descriptions themselves are brilliantly written and organized between Polo and Khan opening and closing each section as to frame the different cities. It’s interesting how the city descriptions are tied loosely together by their repeating titles. But I still did not feel free to read the novel in any order I please.

The questions Calvino imposed made you really wonder what his point was in writing this novel. He explores the idea of the cities but then we take personal experiences and our own interactions with our environment to decide if we created the cities or if they created us. Going along with the same idea, I think the cities represent different aspects of ourselves. Calvino toys with experiences like fear of death, love, weakness, and longing. The novel as a whole probes at broader ideas like truth and permanence.

This was not a novel that I could not dive into all at once. Sometimes I found myself doing just that, which is why I’m not surprised I found the text confusing. Its beauty is better revealed when the story is slowly unraveled with time to think and, most importantly, understand the specific ideas and imagery Calvino expresses.

Names and Desire

All of the cities in Invisible Cities bear feminine names. For the traveler Marco Polo, who misses his homeland and the comforts that come with it, each city is female and represents the object of desire. The names are mostly exotic and even hint at the qualities of the city in some way. So, for example, the spider web city is Octavia. I feel its inhabitants constantly live in unease and tension but believe the city and “net” is protecting them. Invisible Cities is generally a dialogue between two men, and so the theme of desire in the novel is consistently a very male one in which woman are chased. This idea is explored quite literally in Cities and Desire 5, Zobeide. Zobeide is the white city under the moon that draws in the dreaming men. After building the city in hopes of reeling the woman from their dream in, they soon realize the city itself has trapped them. Calvino suggests that uncontrolled desire has resulted in “this ugly city, this trap.” Though the cities Marco Polo describes may or not exist, or the stories he tells may be multiple descriptions of the same place, it’s not the point. Marco Polo demonstrates that cities or places in general exist primarily in our imaginations and perceptions. Zobeide and Octavia portray desire through the longing yet trapped feeling that Marco Polo gives them.

Girl, Interrupted

After watching Girl, Interrupted, the only response that seems appropriate is one of shock. While it can be argued that Susanna did have a sort of mental disorder that caused her pain and anguish, it’s crazy that the mental institution that took her in just filled her with meds and never entirely explained to her what was wrong with her. And I think it’s so odd that Susanna spent two years of her life in a mental institution based on the findings of a man who had talked with her for maybe 15 minutes in the beginning of the film. I feel that if Susanna had been able to understand her disease, she may have been more cooperative in her treatment.

Susanna's narration in the beginning of the film said: "Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? Maybe I was just crazy. Maybe it was the 60's. Or maybe I was just a girl... interrupted." I believe the title, Girl, Interrupted, comes from the interruptions in Susanna’s life such as sexual relations with men and expectations from her family. Maybe these prevented her from living a normal life, and if certain things had not have happened maybe she would've been like any other teenager and not have ended up attempting suicide, being in a mental institution, or suffering from borderline personality disorder. So I think it means simply what it says: a girl whose life was interrupted. Susanna also toyed with madness, and Lisa represents what Susanna no longer wanted to become. Susanna was interrupted on her way to becoming Lisa, perhaps? By the end, I feel, she had begun to figure out how to be herself.

Virginia Woolf stresses and argues the fact that women need a room of their own, and their only way of achieving that is through money. Women’s creativity is hidden because of their lack of power and money. "Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses..." This era during Woolf’s writing held the idea that women are here only to encourage men and nothing else. Woolf is tired of this idea. So few women have written successful poetry, because she believes that writing novels occur with frequent starts and stops. Women must endure interruptions while they work without a room of their own. A woman needs time and space to engage in her writing, a luxury most women did not have. This room symbolizes privacy, leisure, and independence-all of which women were not accustomed to and what sets men and women apart. So at the end of Woolf's ranting she means, without money, women and their art will always remain second to men.

Tres Preguntas...

1. What are your strengths as a writer?
Curiosity-When assigned a topic I know previously nothing about, I find it easier to become excited about writing it. It's new. It's exciting. It makes me smarter in the end!
Understanding-It's incredibly important to not only realize both sides of a story or argument but be able to defend and learn more about each viewpoint. Being aware of the type of audience I'm writing for is also very important.

2. What do you need to improve in your writing? (not what do you need to do...what do you need)
Organization-Keeping my ideas straight is crucial in any writing. I always feel like I could have placed certain sentences or even paragraphs in a different order to improve the flow of the paper.
Pace-Sometimes I become too intense or slow in random parts of a writing which can confuse the reader. That's not a good thing. Repeating details and commentary also interrupt the paper's flow.

3. What two or three aspects of your writing would you most like to work on this semester?
Details-I would love to be able to include more commentary and details to back up my writing topic without sounding repetitive. Details develop an image of an event with attention to all senses and specifics. Details are small parts that create a whole and used incorrectly can disrupt a writing.
Style-It's about saying what I mean. It's as simple as that. I want to be able to give my writing a unique tone while getting my point across as straightforwardly as possible. Expressing my ideas more directly, persuasively, and elegantly will enhance my writing style.

4. What is your writing metaphor? In other words, complete this sentence: "For me, writing is like..."
Writing for me is like…catching a creature. I can discover ways to make my attempts more successful, but the actual hunt and capture are different each time. Finding my creature-my idea or argument-is the toughest part. They could be small or nearly anywhere. During the capture itself sometimes I’m sneaky, quiet, and patient. However, other times the writing could be a mad dash. Like finding a butterfly-the second it spots me it's on the move, so I have to follow. It's a race through the grass and trees, but it definitely gets me going and reveals what I am capable of.