Disclosure : This site contains affiliate links to products. We may receive a commission for purchases made through these links.

Imaginary Cities

Inspired by the surreal accounts of the explorer and `man of a million lies` Marco Polo, Imaginary Cities charts the metropolis and the imagination, and the symbiosis therein. A work of creative nonfiction, the book roams through space, time and possibility, mapping cities of sound, melancholia and the afterlife, where time runs backwards or which float among the clouds. In doing so, Imaginary Cities seeks to move beyond the cliches of psychogeography and hauntology, to not simply revisit the urban past, or our relationship with it, but to invade and reinvent it. Following in the lineage of Borges, Calvino, Chris Marker and Kenneth White, the book examines the city from global macrocosm to the microcosm of its inhabitants` perspectives. It proceeds through opium dreams, sea voyages, the hallucinations of prisoners, nocturnal decadence, impossible Soviet skyscrapers, marauding golems, subterranean civilisations, apocalyptic prophecies and the work of architectural visionaries such as Antonio Sant`Elia, Archigram and Buckminster Fuller. It rethinks the ideas of utopias and dystopias, urban exploration, alienation and resistance.It claims that the Situationists lacked ambition when they suggested, โ€Beneath the paving stones, the beach.โ€ Instead, beneath the paving stones, we may just be able to discern the entire universe. Imaginary Cities demonstrates that each city dreamt up by artists, writers, architects and lunatics has a real-life equivalent and that the great Marco Polo was no liar. Imaginary Cities need not simply exist in fiction or the mind. We already inhabit them.

Related Products:

Underground Cities: Mapping the Tunnels, Transits and Networks of Our Cities Imaginary Fred Invisible Cities Imaginary Fred – Gift Edition Cities The Book of Imaginary Beings Chasing a Dream: The Exploration of the Imaginary Pacific European Cities and Towns: 400-2000 Cities: The First 6,000 Years Global Undergrounds: Exploring Cities Within The Imaginary Friends The Imaginary Lives of James Poneke How to Read Towns and Cities: A Crash Course in Urban Architecture An Atlas of Imaginary Places Restorative Cities: urban design for mental health and wellbeing Sylvan Cities: An Urban Tree Guide Foodie City Breaks: Europe: 25 Cities, 250 Essential Eating Experiences The World`s Best Cities: Celebrating 220 Great Urban Destinations The Language of Cities Urban Rambles: 20 Glorious Walks Through English Cities Nine Worlds in Nine Nights: A Journey Through Imaginary Lands The Monocle Guide to Building Better Cities Nature in Towns and Cities Cities of the Imagination Great Cities Through Travellers` Eyes How Cities Work Cities – Then & Now The Ultimate Book of Cities How Cities Work Activity Book Subterranean Cities: The World Beneath Paris and London, 1800-1945 Mallorca Marco Polo Holiday Map The Death and Life of Great American Cities The Cities of Roman Africa Xanadu – Marco Polo and the Discovery of The East The Complete Cities of Ancient Egypt Salzburg Marco Polo City Map Basel Marco Polo City Map Strasbourg Marco Polo City Map Austria Marco Polo Road Map The Quantum Astrologer`s Handbook: a history of the Renaissance mathematics that birthed imaginary numbers, probability, and the new physics of the universe