Subtle Cities 5 (my translation of a chapter fragment in Italo Calvino´s Invisible Cities)

If you want to believe me, good. Now I will tell you how Ottavia, the spiderweb-city, is made. There is a precipice in the middle of two steep mountains: the city is over the gap, tied to both peaks by ropes and chains and catwalks. One walks on the wooden rail sleepers, careful not to put one’s feet in the open spaces, or one clings to the hemp mesh. Underneath there is nothing for hundreds and hundreds of metres: some cloud passes; one catches a glimpse of the bottom of the ravine further down below.

     This is the core of the city: a net that works as a crossing and a support. All the rest, instead of rising above, is hanging below: rope ladders, hammocks, houses made like sacks, clothes-hangers, terraces like spaceships, water bags, gas burners, roasters, baskets hung by string, hoists, showers, trapezes and rings for games, cable-cars, chandeliers, pots with vines.

      Suspended over the abyss, the life of Ottavia’s inhabitants is less uncertain than in other cities. They know that more often than not the net does not hold up.