My Reflection on Invisible Cities

Italo Calvino's 7 short stories on invisible cities seems bewildering at first. Particularly the city of Zobeide caught my attention because of the message it sends. Zobeide was a city created by men who followed their dreams. These men created the city to catch a woman that they saw in their dreams but they rearranged the city so that if the woman appeared she would be trapped and she would forever stay in that city. As time passed the men gave up on their dream, they became hopeless. With this new sense of hopelessness they carried on with their lives and forgot about that dream that drove them to create the city. New men arrived with hopes of following their dreams, but now these men were looked at differently because no one could think of any reason as to why anyone would want to live in that city that was now considered a trap.

The city of Zobiede to me can be compared to the U.S. Men with dreams of a place where one could be free all came together to create this "city." At first they thought that this "city" would give them liberty and freedom, but when they realized that things were hard on them they decided to give up. New men then arrived with the same hopes and dreams of living the American Dream, and the people who had originally come with hopes of bettering their lives were now bewildered at the fact that anyone would want to come to the U.S. because they saw nothing but hardship and struggle.