bridges made from sheets of music. The unreal city is made of desires and
memories, but is as important as the physical city. There are many unreal
cities in Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities (1978), an example was given in
Chapter 7, Example 7.7.
Above I have used headings to talk very briefly about some aspects of each
of these ‘cities within cities’. For Exercise 4 use these headings to write a
series of creative short texts, one for each heading. For example, under the
heading ‘the diasporic city’, you could fictionalise a migrant’s first impres-
sions in a strange city; under ‘the consumerist city’ you might want to chart
the ups and downs of a shopping expedition. You might also wish to add
your own headings such as ‘the non-western city’ or ‘the intellectual city’.
THE POEM STRIDES OUT
Exercise 5 (create a walk poem) further situates the idea of the city as a site
of difference, but mobilises it as a walk poem. When you walk the city you
are in some senses writing it. The advantage of the walk poem is that it
retains a sensation of mobility, the impression of place never ossifies. The
walk is in some respects representative of contemporary life, because it is
improvised, transient and ephemeral. A walk may be planned out, but
often it changes as different directions suggest themselves, and is short-
ened or lengthened according to circumstances. In a walk poem you write
from a position of active involvement, situate yourself as a point of refer-
ence, and interface with the environment.
Walking involves a unique mixture of observing, thinking and feeling.
Memories, desires and extraneous thoughts are constantly obtruding onto
the more immediate perceptions of the surrounding events. In fact, it is
possible to walk and not notice what is going on in the outside world: to
be totally engrossed in thought.
Nevertheless, to walk in the city is to encounter the marginalised and
disadvantaged: the beggar, the prostitute and the homeless. The walk may
traverse districts that sharply contrast in economic wealth. In some cities
certain areas may have to be avoided because it would be unwise to walk
there. Walking through the city means confronting and disturbing nor-
mally hidden aspects of city life.
When we walk in the city we write it in our own way. Cultural theorist de
Certeau (1984) believed that walking was a creative act in which pedestrians
write (but are unable to read) their own texts. He suggests that in walking
the city we create texts that subvert its hegemonic power structures. We take
whatever routes we desire, and fragment and transform spaces as we move,
Mapping worlds, moving cities 263