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Should we close our worlds? Or open them out?

Cities need an overarching, positive narrative that binds all people to where they live, and where day to day behaviour and activities connect well with civic life. Interview.

Published:
1024px-Little_Venice_quay_flooded_with_tourists._Mykonos_island._Cyclades,_Agean_Sea,_Greece.jpg
1024px-Little_Venice_quay_flooded_with_tourists._Mykonos_island._Cyclades,_Agean_Sea,_Greece.jpg

Little Venice quay flooded with tourists. Mykonos island. Cyclades, Aegean Sea, Greece. Mstyslav Chernov/Wikimedia Common. All rights reserved.

“With cities, it is as with dreams: everything imaginable can be dreamed, but even the most unexpected dream is a rebus that conceals a desire or, its reverse, a fear. Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears, even if the thread of their discourse is secret, their rules are absurd, their perspectives deceitful, and everything conceals something else.”

- Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities