The city prostitute
The return trip to Europe was insignificant, as any movement by air, and most importantly I had to part with Gianmaria and Barbara. Now I'm here in Brno Josef Hoffmann studied here and was imprisoned Pellico. The Czech Republic is familiar to me, not because there are already, but because the roads, buildings, parks, trams, people have something that I would call in Turin. Why do I feel this feeling in Brno and Warsaw? That is the model city that I absorbed over time?
European cities are born, in Roman or medieval, like enclosed spaces, other than what's out there. Look for the regularity of orthogonal or the presence of the walls that follow and amplify the curves of the hills on which it stands, the space inside them is organized and tidy.
This certainly conveys a sense of security, the city does not confuse us, nay, it is easy to navigate, and protects from external disorder, whatever their origin may be. Free from these concerns, orientation and external dangers, people do not start from scratch in their construction of a world in which to express individual and at the same time, find meaning to their activities. Secure the foundations of this world are already laid. We can now devote to what is within himself, at the same time, deeper and more refined, and this painting, architecture, trade or otherwise.
It is clear that over the centuries sediment layers, which strengthen the foundation and, thus, allow searches boldest of the new generations of citizens: the Gothic cathedrals, parks, subways, skyscrapers and shopping centers are all improvements that are made to the basic structure.
What happens to the traveler that reaches the walls, real or ideal, of the city? It offers the protection and restoration, but he wants something in return. The shows and asks to be admired. Hospitality is also made of this: one acts generously to build a good reputation, which in turn can be spent to ensure that hospitality is reciprocated or an added value, a kind of origin marking for products that depart from that city to be sold worldwide.
For example, what Paris gives the traveler in terms of charm and well-being, he moved to the more or less luxurious items which are then purchased by those who wish, through the object, experience the atmosphere lived along the Seine. The city itself can be transformed into products, traded on the tourism market, as well as in Paris knows how long this field.
In summary, the city created a distinguished and ordered space, holds and protects, it shows, for sound and prudent calculation vanity.
Now, what kind of citizens are the source of the city that I have described? Let's step back: the functions to which the city serves are those that meet the needs of its inhabitants. So, fear of chaos and external dangers, natural and / or human, must be present. I citizens, then, must also feel the need to build a good reputation, an attractive image, must, in short, feel the need to please others, to impress them. If their power, understood simply as the ability to survive and reproduce, is based on the use of force, we would not have cities, but inaccessible fortresses, built to intimidate.
arises because the city must be people who base their power on the contact and exchange with strangers, to whom they should give something, such as to inspire trust, in exchange for what they need. Obviously, I'm describing the commercial classes, which heads also that particular type of business that is diplomacy, as the exchange of political favors.
is so that citizens, through their judges, technicians rely on the task of building the city that, because of their shape, push foreigners to spend their money.
I'm trying to show that there is no city where there is no merchant class, then attempt a rebuttal. You can talk about neighborhoods in the city for housing in the capitalist world, remains to Soviet planning or urban agglomerations in Mexico or the Middle East? In their inhabitants, as employed or unemployed, there is no need to "pleasure": what economic benefits they derive from spending money to beautify the neighborhoods in which they live? Their salary would not increase even more, it would be an impoverishment.
what to build, however, traders from nineteenth-century industrialization? First, avenues, boulevards , which are no longer the narrow streets of medieval cities. It is not just a matter of meters, the path forward security and trust, anyone is welcome. Second difference: on the road no longer overlook the shops, in used to produce what you sell, but the shops, the production has been moved to other areas of the city. This fact adds elegance and coquetry of the road, which can thus become a place of ostentation which outlines the social status.
serves the same purpose, the spread of coffee, theater, cinema and other forms of entertainment, replacing the old parties they have fun together once a year.
Both in Anglo-French and the German and Austro-Hungarian railway stations become new points of the compass and the Avenue of the station is one of the main arteries, or even the principal for a walk. Spread quality architecture in private and the presence of districts in which the cams are confined and exhibited at the same time.
The Ethnographic Museum in Budapest seems to support theories that Jarrek and I have developed: highlight the emergence of the middle class to the middle of the nineteenth century and the consistency of the Calvinist component, which in 1890 represented 30% of Hungarians . Reformation and the middle class: the result is that Budapest is not Warsaw, because since 1808 the Archduke Joseph of Hapsburg had established the Commission for Landscaping city, in order to set a schedule that would prevent an urban sprawl.
, I think the Mexico City, Jerusalem and Warsaw are not true of cities like Turin, Milan, Trieste, Budapest, Barcelona and Brno, because I introjected models of the second industrial revolution and I look for in a city possession, and to secure payment of beauty.
Bratislava does not offer much in terms of art, but is very generous with those who want to walk in busy pedestrian streets and dine at outdoor restaurants in the historic center. The office information knows that mass tourism is directed to where they can meet basic needs in its brochures and reports the bar frequented "by Some of Bratislava's hottest women." For me, this stage marks the return to the Danube and I try to celebrate the winery Klastorna described by Claudio Magris Danube in his . Neither the brochure referred to above nor the international guides the appointment and I assume that this is not a place for love affairs or booze at low cost. I find, as the name suggests, under the cloister of the Franciscan church. It is friendly and the wine list is tempting, but, because of this, I do not feel like cenarci alone. I opt for a restaurant low vaults, with lots of photos on the walls and a bustle tourist permit, waiting for the food, relax and not feel lonely.
After dinner, I discover, behind the cathedral of San Michele, a deserted square: a staircase separates it from the busy street and there stands a building is not restored, perhaps the only one left in the center. Its walls are crumbling and the windows sealed with panels painted with subjects drawn from the paintings of Van Gogh, silhouettes of dogs and, on the ground floor, a stairway trompe l'oeil . There are no distractions, loneliness is inevitable.
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