Eventually, Marco learns the language and Kublai begins to ask if he’ll possess his empire once he learns the meaning of every object. Kublai memorizes the meanings of the objects. When Marco begins describing things to Kublai, he doesn’t speak Kublai’s language so he uses objects and gestures.
Isaura was built over an underground lake, and there’s debate as to whether the city’s gods live in the wells or in its lake. Zirma repeats itself so that people can remember it, but different visitors remember different things. Marco tells Kublai about Despina, which looks different depending on where a traveler comes from. Zora is a city that is unforgettable, but only because it never changed. Because of this, he insists that people can never discover the city. Instead, people see pictures or sculptures of things that refer to other things. Marco details his experience in Tamara, a city in which people don’t see things. In this sense, Zaira’s past is written in those things while making people feel as though they can enjoy the city.
Marco then tells Kublai about Zaira, where the measurements of certain things correspond to events from Zaira’s past.
INVISIBLE CITIES ITALO CALVINO DRIVER
It’s possible to describe Dorothea by listing its exports, but it’s also possible to say, as a camel driver once told Marco, that Dorothea opens up horizons. In Isidora, a person can find every delight-but men who arrive there arrive in old age, not in their youth. It makes people feel envious of others who believe they’ve experienced similar evenings and think that they were happy. Marco describes Diomira, a city with towers. Through Marco’s stories, Kublai begins to see that there’s a pattern to his empire. Kublai’s empire is huge and he knows that he’ll never be able to truly understand his conquered territories, which makes him feel melancholy and as though his empire is an unfixable, corrupt ruin.
Kublai Khan listens attentively as Marco Polo tells him about fantastical cities, even though he doesn’t entirely believe everything Marco says.
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