Between the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution

Yuan-tsung returned to Beijing in November 1960, but she could not forget what she had seen in the Red Flag Commune, and so she planned to circumvent another, probably worse catastrophe. She discussed options with Jack. Both agreed to leave China for Hong Kong, where Jack’s brother Percy ran the Marco Polo Club, a sort of bridge between Western businessmen and China. Jack would work as a freelance journalist. They consulted their friend Comrade Xia. Xia arranged for Jack to meet the foreign minister, Chen Yi, who liked to wear a French Beret. Chen Yi thought it was a good idea that Jack continue his work in a less restrictive environment. But Yuan-tsung and Jack disagreed on when to depart. She preferred 1965 and he, 1966. She was afraid that anything might happen in that one year.

Reseña. De Marco Polo al Low Cost. Perfiles del turismo contemporáneo

Resumen: Se trata de un libro de carácter multidisciplinar coordinado por Héctor Martínez Sánchez-Mateos y María Rubio Marín, que aborda la visión turística de España desde la perspectiva de las humanidades. Lo constituyen quince capítulos escritos por una veintena de profesores de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, estructurados en tres partes, que tratan en primer lugar la transformación y conversión del viaje en turismo; en una segunda parte, se muestran distintas tipologías turísticas, identificadas desde principios de s. XX, como los castillos como recurso turístico, la percepción turística en la postguerra, la red de residencias de la obra sindical, el turismo literario, el “efecto Guggenheim” o el caso de Málaga resignificada como ciudad turística cultural; por último, en la tercera parte del libro se reflexiona sobre el turismo en la comunidad de Castilla-La Mancha desde la perspectiva del desarrollo territorial, los materiales turísticos, el uso de la fotografía, el desarrollo territorial, el paisaje en espacios protegidos, las áreas volcánicas y la despoblación. Con ello los autores consiguen hacer una revisión del fenómeno turístico que supera la clásica visión economicista. Palabras clave: turismo rural, turismo cultural, despoblación, desarrollo territorial, paisaje.

A Glint of Lights in the Fog: Invisible Cities and the Riddles of Planning Practice

This paper examines Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities as a unique literary canvas to reformulate the relationship between narratives and planning practices. It does so from the vantage point of the Frame, namely, the dialogues between the Khan (the planner) and Marco Polo (the resident/traveler) punctuating the imaginary cities described in the book. Read through with the aid of narratological concepts, the Frame functions a mini-treatise on urban complexity, structured along nine dyads of oppositional concepts (e.g., chaos vs. meaning; reality vs. possibility), which call into question as many planning milestones (e.g., control, purpose, model, balance), fostering an original reflection on the limitations and potentials of planning practices.