He's describing women he's known, in a kind of code, describing them intimately without giving away details. Why cities? Because when you fall in love, you are immersed in a whole new geography of mind and heart and place. Khan is the part of him that just tallies his conquests, Marco is the part of him that encounters them as real individuals. Ultimately they both admit they're not real, which means that the "cities" are the only reality.

This book is a masterpiece for me. It accompanied me throughout a long journey that I took in Europe in the past. It is written in a poetic way that makes you think, reflect and enter into the fantastic world of the invisible cities of Kublai Khan's empire, created by Calvino. Marco Polo works for the Khan. He has to visit many towns of the Mongolian empire so that later he can share his impressions with the great Khan. This is mainly because the empire is so big that Kublai Khan would never be able to visit all towns of his empire.

Each chapter has the name of a town, which is described by Marco Polo. In addition, there are many dialogs between Kublai Khan and Marco Polo that are, in my point of view, the most exciting part of the book. The dialogs are so intelligent and stimulating that I read some of them many times. They can trigger our natural curiosity about the way we see things around us, the future, the past, the present, etc. It is a book to be read in a slow pace so we can reflect upon each part. It helped me to slow down my frequently rushed rhythm of life. How conscious are we while we write the pages of our lives?

_Invisible Cities_ is presented as a dialogue between explorer Marco Polo and the great Kublai Khan, in which the former is allegedly describing cities he has visited in the Khan's empire. In his story telling, Marco Polo characterizes these cities in every which way possible: by their inner structures, their denizens, from above, below, within, through their mirror images, and even utilizing modern day urban settings. We come to realize, through Kublai Khan's eyes, that Marco Polo is not speaking at all of various cities in Khan's Tartar empire, but of Marco Polo's native Venice.

I refer to _Invisible Cities_ as "Calvino's Mantra" because Mr. Calvino continually repeats, almost like a mantra, the birth, death, and rebirth of a city throughout history. Calvino's images of his city are death-ridden: deterioration, vermin, rot, and a sense of a perpetual pessimism as the old city is dying just as a new city is beginning to germinate. This is echoed throughout the book ad infinitum.

Italo Calvino's book is a puzzler, much as the circumstances seem to Kublai Khan, who is forced to face the facts of his crumbling empire during Marco Polo's talk. It took me at least half the book to figure out the point of Calvino's cleverly written and imaginative, if greatly frustrating novel. I cannot say that I am entirely satisfied with the results. For all its fancifulness, _Invisible Cities_ is not a particularly fun read.

Consisting entirely of descriptions of fantastical cities supposedly reported by Marco Polo to Kublai Khan, Calvino's fiction is sui generis, a completely original mixture of fable and philosophy that is even more imaginative than his more critical theory-oriented "If On A Winter's Night A Traveler." This is the kind of novel Borges might have written. A celebration of the unbridled imagination, "Invisible Cities" is also, I am convinced, a secret love letter to a single city: the imaginary dream-city of Venice, a place that exists partly as its own reflection in the sea.

Generally I like my books fast and plot-driven, with minimal description and at least quasi-linear plots lines. While Invisible Cities is none of those things, I would rate it among my favorite books. The prose is incredible, rich, almost erotic. At times I felt my heart beating faster as I read it. This is a book to linger inside of, to re-read often, to keep by your bedside to read snatches of before you go to sleep.