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Nieznośna lekkość bytu
Wydana po raz pierwszy w 1984 roku „Nieznośna lekkość bytu” jest najsłynniejszą powieścią Milana Kundery oraz swego rodzaju ukoronowaniem jego twórczości.
Zbiegają się w niej wszystkie tematy, do których pisarz w swojej twórczości nieustannie powraca. Splot życiorysów kilku postaci (i psa), które na różne sposoby dochodzą do wniosku, że jedynym, co zostaje im dane jest właśnie tytułowa lekkość. Głównym problemem, który interesuje Kunderę w tej książce jest kwestia przypadku jako czynnika, który determinuje ludzkie losy. Miłość jest przypadkiem. To przypadek decyduje, że zakochujemy się właśnie w tej, a nie w innej osobie. Przypadek decyduje również o tym, czym zajmujemy się przez całe życie, kim jesteśmy, z jakimi ludźmi się stykamy. W epoce totalitaryzmu zaś czynnik losowy jest tym bardziej paradoksalny, im bardziej wszechwładny ustrój stara się go wyeliminować i narzucić obywatelom sztuczne ograniczenia. Pomiędzy tymi dwoma żywiołami – prawdziwym i wymyślonym – poszczególne biografie wirują jak folia na wietrze.
Sposób w jaki napisana jest „Nieznośna lekkość bytu” doskonale koresponduje z tematem - napisana jest lekko, pozornie chaotycznie. Wypełniona stwierdzeniami o charakterze ogólnym, których nie można traktować inaczej niż jako stwierdzenia właściwie nieważne.
„Wtedy, w Paryżu, Milan dał mi rękopis »Nieznośnej lekkości bytu«. Przeczytałam go z ogromnym przejęciem. Nie tylko przypomniało mi to moje doświadczenia z Pragi w 1968 roku, ale jakoś niebywale korespondowało z emigracją i polskim Sierpniem. Wydawało mi się, że w tej powieści zawarta jest suma doświadczeń, które mogą być cenne dla polskiego czytelnika, i spytałam Kunderę, czy zgodzi się, bym przetłumaczyła powieść na polski. Zgodził się z entuzjazmem, a potem bardzo uważnie przeczytał przekład, chociaż polskiego nie zna, więc nie mógł ocenić jego jakości”.
– Agnieszka Holland, Newsweek
Zbiegają się w niej wszystkie tematy, do których pisarz w swojej twórczości nieustannie powraca. Splot życiorysów kilku postaci (i psa), które na różne sposoby dochodzą do wniosku, że jedynym, co zostaje im dane jest właśnie tytułowa lekkość. Głównym problemem, który interesuje Kunderę w tej książce jest kwestia przypadku jako czynnika, który determinuje ludzkie losy. Miłość jest przypadkiem. To przypadek decyduje, że zakochujemy się właśnie w tej, a nie w innej osobie. Przypadek decyduje również o tym, czym zajmujemy się przez całe życie, kim jesteśmy, z jakimi ludźmi się stykamy. W epoce totalitaryzmu zaś czynnik losowy jest tym bardziej paradoksalny, im bardziej wszechwładny ustrój stara się go wyeliminować i narzucić obywatelom sztuczne ograniczenia. Pomiędzy tymi dwoma żywiołami – prawdziwym i wymyślonym – poszczególne biografie wirują jak folia na wietrze.
Sposób w jaki napisana jest „Nieznośna lekkość bytu” doskonale koresponduje z tematem - napisana jest lekko, pozornie chaotycznie. Wypełniona stwierdzeniami o charakterze ogólnym, których nie można traktować inaczej niż jako stwierdzenia właściwie nieważne.
„Wtedy, w Paryżu, Milan dał mi rękopis »Nieznośnej lekkości bytu«. Przeczytałam go z ogromnym przejęciem. Nie tylko przypomniało mi to moje doświadczenia z Pragi w 1968 roku, ale jakoś niebywale korespondowało z emigracją i polskim Sierpniem. Wydawało mi się, że w tej powieści zawarta jest suma doświadczeń, które mogą być cenne dla polskiego czytelnika, i spytałam Kunderę, czy zgodzi się, bym przetłumaczyła powieść na polski. Zgodził się z entuzjazmem, a potem bardzo uważnie przeczytał przekład, chociaż polskiego nie zna, więc nie mógł ocenić jego jakości”.
– Agnieszka Holland, Newsweek
384 pages, Paperback with flaps
First published January 1, 1984
About the author
Milan Kundera
198 books18.1k followersMilan Kundera (1 April 1929 – 11 July 2023) was a Czech and French novelist. He went into exile in France in 1975, acquiring citizenship in 1981. His Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979, but he was granted Czech citizenship in 2019.
Kundera wrote in Czech and French. He revises the French translations of all his books; people therefore consider these original works as not translations. He is best known for his novels, including The Joke (1967), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (1979), and The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), all of which exhibit his extreme though often comical skepticism.
Kundera wrote in Czech and French. He revises the French translations of all his books; people therefore consider these original works as not translations. He is best known for his novels, including The Joke (1967), The Book of Laughter and Forgetting (1979), and The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), all of which exhibit his extreme though often comical skepticism.
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June 16, 2008
There is probably one novel that is the most responsible for the direction of my post-graduation European backpacking trip ten years ago which landed me in Prague for two solid weeks. Shortly before my friend Chad and I departed, he mailed me a letter and directed me to get my hands on a copy of Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Just read it, he wrote. Whatever else you do, just read this book. It is about everything in the world.
Being already a Kafka fan of some long-standing, I was quite open to another absurdly minded Czech telling the story of his city and by extension the rest of the world. The title itself was familiar, though not the author’s name, and I rather innocently mistook Kundera for a woman at first glance at the cover.
Suffice to say, Kundera had me at the very first paragraph. Has any other modern novel had such a wonderfully philosophical opening than this one?
The idea of eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other philosophers with it: to think that everything recurs as we once experienced it, and that the recurrence itself recurs ad infinitum! What does this mad myth signify?
In two sentences, the very first two, Kundera not only manages to break several writing rules of style (an exclamation mark, followed by a direct address to the reader being the most obvious), but he also succinctly sums up one of the most challenging philosophical concepts, yet is wise enough to address it on its own terms: as a “mad myth.”
From the earliest possible chance, the author is telling us that he is indeed an intellectual, that he writes energetically, playfully, and that serious Ideas with the full timbre basso profundo tolling out that capital “I” are the very pith and marrow of novels and are not to be stuffed, labeled, and set up high on a shelf reserved for great thoughts too refined and delicate to mingle among the common rabble of characters and dialogue and action.
Needless to say, this is a heady mix, the kind of thing to go straight to a recent college graduate with literature and philosophy on the brain. And we haven’t even touched on the sex yet. Kundera’s books are rife with sex, sex is the other engine driving this dually powered writer, sex both passionate and routine, sex filled up with deep emotional meaning and sex stripped down to its tangible physicality, sex as recurring motif in one’s life illuminating greater insights into one’s personality and sex as secret door into the aesthetics of our time.
To write, as some have, that the book is primarily about erotic encounters is as much as to say that Beethoven was a guy who played piano. Instead it is a book about tyranny, the large and the small, the ones we endure and the ones we resist, the ones we submit to for love and the ones that always rankle silently. The tyranny of kitsch, as understood by the novel, kitsch to mean a subjective, sentimental folding screen that hides away the sight of death. The questions that the book seeks to explore circle around the ideas of polar opposites, truth and lies, love and hate (or indifference), freedom and slavery, heaviness and lightness.
The Kundera style is a very delightful bit and piecework manner. We focus on one character, that character’s perceptions, that character’s perspectives, in little miniatures, some essay-like, that elaborate on the character’s psychology or history. Then we shift to another character and learn new things about that person, sometimes touching on the same pieces we’ve seen already. It’s like Rashomon but more expansive, drawing circles around lives and eras instead of merely one night’s events.
Part of what Kundera does is move the story along through first one person, then go back in time and retell only some of that story focused on a second person and demonstrate how our best attempts at comprehending each other remains woefully inadequate. There will always be layers fathoms below our drilling. Yet at the same time, Kundera moves the story forward, stops, switches character again and in this third instance either goes back to person number one or switches to person number three and repeats the process, and repeats again. What emerges is rather like conflicting court testimony, multiple moving parts simultaneously illuminating their own motivations and obscuring others’.
If there is a weakness to all of this it is that Kundera’s novels sometimes develop the quality of theoretical exercises between characters embodying certain philosophical conceits. While the author may touch the mind and the libido, the heart often remains chilly. There is a sense of artificiality when you stare too longly at the book’s constructs, as though the author were merely embodying an essay with puppets for illustrative purposes. Though what precisely does lie behind our disagreements and disconnections from others than differing mental states? We fall out of love with someone not because of the size of her bottom or his new haircut, but because our lives shift in differing directions and we can no longer think in the same cohesive manner with the other person. Our ideas become different. What are our wants but our ideas given concrete form and targets?
“Metaphors are dangerous,” the author writes more than once throughout the novel. “Metaphors are not be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love.” So thinks the novel’s “hero” Tomas, the epic womanizer, as he reflects on how he came to love Tereza who is soon his wife. This couple, a marriage dancing around secrets and each of the partner’s inability to communicate finally the truth about who they are to their spouse, is used for comparison and contrast with Franz, a middle aged married professor in Switzerland who is in love with one of Tomas’ exiled Czech mistresses, the artist Sabine. Their stories are told against the backdrop of the Russian invasion and subjugation of Czechoslovakia during the Cold War.
Kundera twines their two stories together examining how love can either lift us up to heights of ecstasy or weigh us down with its solidity and unchangeable reality — then poses the surprising question: which condition should we view as the negative in binary opposition? Is it the uncentered lack of gravity that makes love real and powerful or does that quality make us too airy and flighty, unserious when we most need it? Or rather can it be love’s grounding quality that allows us to feel with stability the other’s existence — or does that weight merely pin us down, smother us with its heft? Can it be both? Can it be that when couples part it is because what is lighter than a breeze for one has become a leaden drag on the other?
This is push and pull of ideas and language and sentiments is beautifully illustrated in the novel’s third part, titled “Words Misunderstood,” in which Kundera examines how Sabina and Franz’s inability to understand the terms the other uses leads to their separation. This is done through a sort of anecdotal dictionary that allows each character to demonstrate their grasp of an idea. The shortest bluntly captures some of the magic of this portion:
CEMETERY
Cemeteries in Bohemia are like gardens. The graves are covered with grass and colorful flowers. Modest tombstones are lost in the greenery. When the sun goes down, the cemetery sparkles with tiny candles. It looks as though the dead are dancing at a children’s ball. Yes, a children’s ball, because the dead are as innocent as children. No matter how brutal life becomes, peace always reigns in the cemetery. Even in wartime, in Hitler’s time, in Stalin’s time, through all occupations. When she felt low, [Sabina] would get into the car, leave Prague far behind, and walk through one or another of the country cemeteries she loved so well. Against a backdrop of blue hills, they were as beautiful as a lullaby.
For Franz a cemetery was an ugly dump of stones and bones.
And this too is part of the novel’s recurring genius. At every stage, there is an elegiac note to happiness as though all these dances have been gone through before, as though all love affairs, even should Nietzsche be wrong, carry within them the seeds of their own endings. Franz and Sabina’s inability to even understand each other on very basic levels dooms their romance from the beginning. Their tragedy is commonplace and follows a pattern as though ritualized.
Tereza and Tomas’ marriage we see is held together only by each other’s willingness to commit to it and to some third greater thing than either of themselves, though what that third thing is neither of them understand. For each of them separately, it is a kind of death to be together and a kind of death to be apart, and together their momentary happinesses are a kind of staving off of this specter.
Kundera nicely ends The Unbearable Lightness of Being, foreshadowing what happens later after the closing scenes, which gives the novel a sadly sweet tone instead of merely tragic. Instead of simply ending with death, as a kind of negation, the book closes with sleep, part of the circling motif, the cycle we go through, our lives one passing hoop.
After my initial reading of the novel, I found myself rereading it immediately, going through all of it again, underlining passages, committing certain ones to memory. Over the years, I have returned again and again to this novel, more than many others, much more than Kundera’s other novels despite my having read them repeatedly as well. To return to Kundera’s world is like reliving your best relationships (and maybe your worst ones as well), but reliving them as though you had been smarter, wiser, deeper at the time than you really were. It is a kind of exorcism and a kind of nostalgia and it is a beautiful example of writing that matters, beyond all else, writing that matters.
Being already a Kafka fan of some long-standing, I was quite open to another absurdly minded Czech telling the story of his city and by extension the rest of the world. The title itself was familiar, though not the author’s name, and I rather innocently mistook Kundera for a woman at first glance at the cover.
Suffice to say, Kundera had me at the very first paragraph. Has any other modern novel had such a wonderfully philosophical opening than this one?
The idea of eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other philosophers with it: to think that everything recurs as we once experienced it, and that the recurrence itself recurs ad infinitum! What does this mad myth signify?
In two sentences, the very first two, Kundera not only manages to break several writing rules of style (an exclamation mark, followed by a direct address to the reader being the most obvious), but he also succinctly sums up one of the most challenging philosophical concepts, yet is wise enough to address it on its own terms: as a “mad myth.”
From the earliest possible chance, the author is telling us that he is indeed an intellectual, that he writes energetically, playfully, and that serious Ideas with the full timbre basso profundo tolling out that capital “I” are the very pith and marrow of novels and are not to be stuffed, labeled, and set up high on a shelf reserved for great thoughts too refined and delicate to mingle among the common rabble of characters and dialogue and action.
Needless to say, this is a heady mix, the kind of thing to go straight to a recent college graduate with literature and philosophy on the brain. And we haven’t even touched on the sex yet. Kundera’s books are rife with sex, sex is the other engine driving this dually powered writer, sex both passionate and routine, sex filled up with deep emotional meaning and sex stripped down to its tangible physicality, sex as recurring motif in one’s life illuminating greater insights into one’s personality and sex as secret door into the aesthetics of our time.
To write, as some have, that the book is primarily about erotic encounters is as much as to say that Beethoven was a guy who played piano. Instead it is a book about tyranny, the large and the small, the ones we endure and the ones we resist, the ones we submit to for love and the ones that always rankle silently. The tyranny of kitsch, as understood by the novel, kitsch to mean a subjective, sentimental folding screen that hides away the sight of death. The questions that the book seeks to explore circle around the ideas of polar opposites, truth and lies, love and hate (or indifference), freedom and slavery, heaviness and lightness.
The Kundera style is a very delightful bit and piecework manner. We focus on one character, that character’s perceptions, that character’s perspectives, in little miniatures, some essay-like, that elaborate on the character’s psychology or history. Then we shift to another character and learn new things about that person, sometimes touching on the same pieces we’ve seen already. It’s like Rashomon but more expansive, drawing circles around lives and eras instead of merely one night’s events.
Part of what Kundera does is move the story along through first one person, then go back in time and retell only some of that story focused on a second person and demonstrate how our best attempts at comprehending each other remains woefully inadequate. There will always be layers fathoms below our drilling. Yet at the same time, Kundera moves the story forward, stops, switches character again and in this third instance either goes back to person number one or switches to person number three and repeats the process, and repeats again. What emerges is rather like conflicting court testimony, multiple moving parts simultaneously illuminating their own motivations and obscuring others’.
If there is a weakness to all of this it is that Kundera’s novels sometimes develop the quality of theoretical exercises between characters embodying certain philosophical conceits. While the author may touch the mind and the libido, the heart often remains chilly. There is a sense of artificiality when you stare too longly at the book’s constructs, as though the author were merely embodying an essay with puppets for illustrative purposes. Though what precisely does lie behind our disagreements and disconnections from others than differing mental states? We fall out of love with someone not because of the size of her bottom or his new haircut, but because our lives shift in differing directions and we can no longer think in the same cohesive manner with the other person. Our ideas become different. What are our wants but our ideas given concrete form and targets?
“Metaphors are dangerous,” the author writes more than once throughout the novel. “Metaphors are not be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love.” So thinks the novel’s “hero” Tomas, the epic womanizer, as he reflects on how he came to love Tereza who is soon his wife. This couple, a marriage dancing around secrets and each of the partner’s inability to communicate finally the truth about who they are to their spouse, is used for comparison and contrast with Franz, a middle aged married professor in Switzerland who is in love with one of Tomas’ exiled Czech mistresses, the artist Sabine. Their stories are told against the backdrop of the Russian invasion and subjugation of Czechoslovakia during the Cold War.
Kundera twines their two stories together examining how love can either lift us up to heights of ecstasy or weigh us down with its solidity and unchangeable reality — then poses the surprising question: which condition should we view as the negative in binary opposition? Is it the uncentered lack of gravity that makes love real and powerful or does that quality make us too airy and flighty, unserious when we most need it? Or rather can it be love’s grounding quality that allows us to feel with stability the other’s existence — or does that weight merely pin us down, smother us with its heft? Can it be both? Can it be that when couples part it is because what is lighter than a breeze for one has become a leaden drag on the other?
This is push and pull of ideas and language and sentiments is beautifully illustrated in the novel’s third part, titled “Words Misunderstood,” in which Kundera examines how Sabina and Franz’s inability to understand the terms the other uses leads to their separation. This is done through a sort of anecdotal dictionary that allows each character to demonstrate their grasp of an idea. The shortest bluntly captures some of the magic of this portion:
CEMETERY
Cemeteries in Bohemia are like gardens. The graves are covered with grass and colorful flowers. Modest tombstones are lost in the greenery. When the sun goes down, the cemetery sparkles with tiny candles. It looks as though the dead are dancing at a children’s ball. Yes, a children’s ball, because the dead are as innocent as children. No matter how brutal life becomes, peace always reigns in the cemetery. Even in wartime, in Hitler’s time, in Stalin’s time, through all occupations. When she felt low, [Sabina] would get into the car, leave Prague far behind, and walk through one or another of the country cemeteries she loved so well. Against a backdrop of blue hills, they were as beautiful as a lullaby.
For Franz a cemetery was an ugly dump of stones and bones.
And this too is part of the novel’s recurring genius. At every stage, there is an elegiac note to happiness as though all these dances have been gone through before, as though all love affairs, even should Nietzsche be wrong, carry within them the seeds of their own endings. Franz and Sabina’s inability to even understand each other on very basic levels dooms their romance from the beginning. Their tragedy is commonplace and follows a pattern as though ritualized.
Tereza and Tomas’ marriage we see is held together only by each other’s willingness to commit to it and to some third greater thing than either of themselves, though what that third thing is neither of them understand. For each of them separately, it is a kind of death to be together and a kind of death to be apart, and together their momentary happinesses are a kind of staving off of this specter.
Kundera nicely ends The Unbearable Lightness of Being, foreshadowing what happens later after the closing scenes, which gives the novel a sadly sweet tone instead of merely tragic. Instead of simply ending with death, as a kind of negation, the book closes with sleep, part of the circling motif, the cycle we go through, our lives one passing hoop.
After my initial reading of the novel, I found myself rereading it immediately, going through all of it again, underlining passages, committing certain ones to memory. Over the years, I have returned again and again to this novel, more than many others, much more than Kundera’s other novels despite my having read them repeatedly as well. To return to Kundera’s world is like reliving your best relationships (and maybe your worst ones as well), but reliving them as though you had been smarter, wiser, deeper at the time than you really were. It is a kind of exorcism and a kind of nostalgia and it is a beautiful example of writing that matters, beyond all else, writing that matters.
July 1, 2009
I was hesitant to start this, and figured for awhile that it would be one of those books that maybe I’d get around to or maybe I wouldn’t. It just didn’t seem like something I’d enjoy – it seemed too soft, or too postmodern, or too feel-good, or too based in hedonism, or too surface oriented. What caused me to give it a shot was the simple fact that I’ll be traveling to Prague in a few weeks, and since the book's setting takes place there, I figured it may put me in the mood for the trip. I figured it was “now or never” in regards to reading it. And yet, even with that being the case, I hesitated a bit. That is, until the mere mentioning it received an almost overzealously positive response from two close friends (whose opinions I hold in high regard). Their response was so enthusiastic that I was pushed over the edge; shoved into thinking that the novel’s chances of being lame had been lessened, and that it would be worth the trial.
And I’m glad I decided to give this book a shot. Damn glad.
The novel traces the lives of two couples during the Soviet occupation of Prague, during the late 1960’s. The novel deep-heartedly charts their struggles against communism, their pasts, their lovers, and themselves.
Kundera observes the stuff that goes on internally amongst the characters; he intellectualizes it, and tells you about it. He’s quite philosophical, and you feel like the narrator is talking to you, offering very insightful observations about the characters and life in general. This is one reason why reading is often more valuable than watching TV or a movie: when reading a good book you get direct psychological explanations, and you get to go inside the heads of characters.
Taken as a whole, I found this novel to be profound, but in unusual ways. It’s not a direct novel, but rather one that represents, and lets one feel, disconnections and various glimpses of perceptions. And it wasn’t a smooth novel, either. It even felt choppy on occasion. But the chapters are short, which fits its feel, and also gives you time to think about the penetrating thoughts that Kundera puts across. Kundera strikes me as a craftsman of sorts. He switches timelines deftly and effectively – even when I thought he was crazy to do so; when I thought he gave up the climax of the novel towards its middle, he proved me dead wrong. He proved to me that he knew exactly what he was doing because he’s a master of the craft. This novel is not full of sweeping, pounding paragraphs of poignant, soul-hitting, philosophical depth, but rather offers up constant glimpses; nuggets of insightful observations on almost every page, that when added up together, reveal an impressive, heartfelt, and real work.
I love the way this novel portrays love. It recognizes and represents its beauty while at the same time showing how psychological and manipulatable it can be. The loves in this novel are accurate ones, not at all cheapened by gimmicky slogans or conventional lines. "The dance seemed to him a declaration that her devotion, her ardent desire to satisfy his every whim, was not necessarily bound to his person, that if she hadn't met Tomas, she would have been ready to respond to the call of any other man she might have met instead."
Kundera brilliantly portrays how simple things like our past, our country, images, family – even metaphors, can affect our psyche and major life decisions. "Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love."
Its fragility and delicacy: "What would happen if Tomas were to receive such a picture? Would he throw her out? Perhaps not. Probably not. But the fragile edifice of their love would certainly come tumbling down. For that edifice rested on the single column of her fidelity, and loves are like empires: when the idea they are founded on crumbles, they, too, fade away."
"Perhaps if they had stayed together longer, Sabina and Franz would have begun to understand the words they used. Gradually, timorously, their vocabularies would have come together, like bashful lovers, and the music of one would have begun to intersect with the music of the other. But it was too late now."
Sometimes even one sentence can say a lot: "Looking out over the courtyard at the dirty walls, he realized he had no idea whether it was hysteria or love."
"While people are fairly young and the musical composition of their lives is still in its opening bars, they can go about writing it together and exchange motifs (the way Tomas and Sabina exchanged the motif of the bowler hat), but if they meet when they are older, like Franz and Sabina, their musical compositions are more or less complete, and every motif, every object, every word means something different to each of them."
And it’s worth reiterating that the philosophical ideas in this novel are very thought provoking: "Tomas thought: Attaching love to sex is one of the most bizarre ideas the Creator ever had."
The importance of our decisions. The lack of importance of our decisions. The unavoidable importance of life. The unavoidable lack of importance of life.
That's how this novel feels.
If I'm to give a book five stars, it needs to affect me in some profound ways -- it needs to change me, at least a little. This novel has affected my view of life; how I see the world. Specifically, it’s helped me better understand beauty. I have trouble elaborating on that because beauty is such an abstract concept; you know it when you see it, or rather— you know it when you feel it. Beauty has some melancholy; it is appreciative -- special but fleeting -- and never fully absorbed as its full whole. Maybe that's a major aspect of beauty -- knowing it is beyond your grasp. Beyond you.
Life is ultimately a crapshoot. You don't know what's going to happen. You might as well hang on to something. And that something might as well be love -- whether it be plutonic, romantic, or, if you’re lucky, both. And if that's what you're going to hang on to (and you are), then you might as well understand its simplicity and its complexity, and its beauty -- you might as well understand and appreciate as much of it as you can. It only makes sense that you do.
This novel can help you do that.
And I’m glad I decided to give this book a shot. Damn glad.
The novel traces the lives of two couples during the Soviet occupation of Prague, during the late 1960’s. The novel deep-heartedly charts their struggles against communism, their pasts, their lovers, and themselves.
Kundera observes the stuff that goes on internally amongst the characters; he intellectualizes it, and tells you about it. He’s quite philosophical, and you feel like the narrator is talking to you, offering very insightful observations about the characters and life in general. This is one reason why reading is often more valuable than watching TV or a movie: when reading a good book you get direct psychological explanations, and you get to go inside the heads of characters.
Taken as a whole, I found this novel to be profound, but in unusual ways. It’s not a direct novel, but rather one that represents, and lets one feel, disconnections and various glimpses of perceptions. And it wasn’t a smooth novel, either. It even felt choppy on occasion. But the chapters are short, which fits its feel, and also gives you time to think about the penetrating thoughts that Kundera puts across. Kundera strikes me as a craftsman of sorts. He switches timelines deftly and effectively – even when I thought he was crazy to do so; when I thought he gave up the climax of the novel towards its middle, he proved me dead wrong. He proved to me that he knew exactly what he was doing because he’s a master of the craft. This novel is not full of sweeping, pounding paragraphs of poignant, soul-hitting, philosophical depth, but rather offers up constant glimpses; nuggets of insightful observations on almost every page, that when added up together, reveal an impressive, heartfelt, and real work.
I love the way this novel portrays love. It recognizes and represents its beauty while at the same time showing how psychological and manipulatable it can be. The loves in this novel are accurate ones, not at all cheapened by gimmicky slogans or conventional lines. "The dance seemed to him a declaration that her devotion, her ardent desire to satisfy his every whim, was not necessarily bound to his person, that if she hadn't met Tomas, she would have been ready to respond to the call of any other man she might have met instead."
Kundera brilliantly portrays how simple things like our past, our country, images, family – even metaphors, can affect our psyche and major life decisions. "Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love."
Its fragility and delicacy: "What would happen if Tomas were to receive such a picture? Would he throw her out? Perhaps not. Probably not. But the fragile edifice of their love would certainly come tumbling down. For that edifice rested on the single column of her fidelity, and loves are like empires: when the idea they are founded on crumbles, they, too, fade away."
"Perhaps if they had stayed together longer, Sabina and Franz would have begun to understand the words they used. Gradually, timorously, their vocabularies would have come together, like bashful lovers, and the music of one would have begun to intersect with the music of the other. But it was too late now."
Sometimes even one sentence can say a lot: "Looking out over the courtyard at the dirty walls, he realized he had no idea whether it was hysteria or love."
"While people are fairly young and the musical composition of their lives is still in its opening bars, they can go about writing it together and exchange motifs (the way Tomas and Sabina exchanged the motif of the bowler hat), but if they meet when they are older, like Franz and Sabina, their musical compositions are more or less complete, and every motif, every object, every word means something different to each of them."
And it’s worth reiterating that the philosophical ideas in this novel are very thought provoking: "Tomas thought: Attaching love to sex is one of the most bizarre ideas the Creator ever had."
The importance of our decisions. The lack of importance of our decisions. The unavoidable importance of life. The unavoidable lack of importance of life.
That's how this novel feels.
If I'm to give a book five stars, it needs to affect me in some profound ways -- it needs to change me, at least a little. This novel has affected my view of life; how I see the world. Specifically, it’s helped me better understand beauty. I have trouble elaborating on that because beauty is such an abstract concept; you know it when you see it, or rather— you know it when you feel it. Beauty has some melancholy; it is appreciative -- special but fleeting -- and never fully absorbed as its full whole. Maybe that's a major aspect of beauty -- knowing it is beyond your grasp. Beyond you.
Life is ultimately a crapshoot. You don't know what's going to happen. You might as well hang on to something. And that something might as well be love -- whether it be plutonic, romantic, or, if you’re lucky, both. And if that's what you're going to hang on to (and you are), then you might as well understand its simplicity and its complexity, and its beauty -- you might as well understand and appreciate as much of it as you can. It only makes sense that you do.
This novel can help you do that.
February 11, 2019
This review is sung by Freddy Mercury to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody.
Is this a fiction?
Is this just fantasy?
Not just a narrative
Of Czech infidelity.
Reader four eyes
Look onto the page and read
I'm just a Prague boy, I’ve sex with empathy
Because I'm easy come, easy go
A little high, little low
Any Soviet era Czech knows, unbearable lightness of being
Good Reads, just read a book
Put a bookmark on the page
Played my audio now it’s read
Good Reads, the book had just begun
But now I've read all Milan had to say
Good Reads, ooo
Didn't mean to make you sigh
If I'm not back again this time tomorrow
Carry on, carry on, unbearable lightness of being
Too late, this book is done
A short book no need to break the spine
Body’s just egalitarian
Good read everybody – I’ll say so
Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth
Good Reads, ooo (any Soviet era Czech knows)
I don't want the book to end
I sometimes wish I'd never started to read at all
I read a little dialogue from of a man
Tomas, Tomas will you make love to Teresa?
Thunderbolt and lightning very nearly enticing me
Repetition! Repetition!
Repetition! Repetition!
Repetition Kundera– Metaphor!
But I'm just a Prague boy and many women love me
He's just a Prague boy from a Czech family
Flair is his prose from this virtuosity
Easy come easy go will you let me go
Bohemia! No we will not let you go - let him go
Bohemia! We will not let you go - let him go
Bohemia! We will not let you go let me go
Will not let you go let me go (never)
Never let you go let me go
Never let me go ooo
No, no, no, no, no, no, no
Oh Milan Kundera, Milan Kundera says its so
Premier Brezhnev has a gulag put aside for me
For me
For me
[Brian May melts our faces with a blistering guitar solo while Wayne and Garth head bang in a Pacer]
Soviet tanks can occupy and eat our pie
Naked women can sing and leave me to die
Oh Milan, Kant German sex Milan
Just gotta go Swiss just gotta get right outta here
Ooh yeah, ooh yeah
Unbearable lightness
Anyone can read
Unbearable lightness unbearable lightness
of being
Any Soviet era Czech knows
Is this a fiction?
Is this just fantasy?
Not just a narrative
Of Czech infidelity.
Reader four eyes
Look onto the page and read
I'm just a Prague boy, I’ve sex with empathy
Because I'm easy come, easy go
A little high, little low
Any Soviet era Czech knows, unbearable lightness of being
Good Reads, just read a book
Put a bookmark on the page
Played my audio now it’s read
Good Reads, the book had just begun
But now I've read all Milan had to say
Good Reads, ooo
Didn't mean to make you sigh
If I'm not back again this time tomorrow
Carry on, carry on, unbearable lightness of being
Too late, this book is done
A short book no need to break the spine
Body’s just egalitarian
Good read everybody – I’ll say so
Gotta leave you all behind and face the truth
Good Reads, ooo (any Soviet era Czech knows)
I don't want the book to end
I sometimes wish I'd never started to read at all
I read a little dialogue from of a man
Tomas, Tomas will you make love to Teresa?
Thunderbolt and lightning very nearly enticing me
Repetition! Repetition!
Repetition! Repetition!
Repetition Kundera– Metaphor!
But I'm just a Prague boy and many women love me
He's just a Prague boy from a Czech family
Flair is his prose from this virtuosity
Easy come easy go will you let me go
Bohemia! No we will not let you go - let him go
Bohemia! We will not let you go - let him go
Bohemia! We will not let you go let me go
Will not let you go let me go (never)
Never let you go let me go
Never let me go ooo
No, no, no, no, no, no, no
Oh Milan Kundera, Milan Kundera says its so
Premier Brezhnev has a gulag put aside for me
For me
For me
[Brian May melts our faces with a blistering guitar solo while Wayne and Garth head bang in a Pacer]
Soviet tanks can occupy and eat our pie
Naked women can sing and leave me to die
Oh Milan, Kant German sex Milan
Just gotta go Swiss just gotta get right outta here
Ooh yeah, ooh yeah
Unbearable lightness
Anyone can read
Unbearable lightness unbearable lightness
of being
Any Soviet era Czech knows
January 7, 2008
I have a bone to pick with Kundera and his following. People, this has got to be the most over-rated book of human history. I mean, references to infidelity alone (even infidelity that makes use of funky costumes like '50s ganster hats--the only note-and-applauseworthy aspect this book!) do NOT make for good literature, and such is The Unbearable Lightness of Being, in a nutshell. The male protaganist is, hands down, a one-dimensional and boring buffoon, while the female protaganist is lackluster and underdeveloped. This book is not but chicken soup for those obnoxious, lonely intellectuals who wish they could be playaz, and therefore admire Dr. Love's trite antics. In addition, Kundera's references to philosophy and Beethoven were clearly extracted from a cracker jack box. In conclusion, the emperor has no clothes! Kundera-following (and you are the majority), free yourselves (!), and stop pretending that this book is good.
June 6, 2022
4.5
Jeden z moich ulubieńców
Jeden z moich ulubieńców
March 23, 2013
13% and I'm done.
I have had a run of books that have bored me, or annoyed me, or just did nothing for me. This one is... You know, I don't even know how to describe this one.
I pretty much hated it from the first page. I do not understand the high rating on Goodreads for this book. I can barely stand the thought of picking it up again and reading more of the words telling me things about characters that I could not possibly care less about.
We have Tomas, whom we meet standing on his balcony and vacillating between whether he should ask a woman that he's "in love with" (read: met in a chance encounter and became infatuated with) to move in with him. He's saved from making any kind of fucking decision by her showing up on his doorstep (literally) with her bags packed and ready to move in. Which she does. And then she clings to him (literally) every night - to the point that he controls her sleep patterns. He even, charmer that he is, fucks with her partially-asleep mind and tells her that he's leaving her forever, so that she'll chase him and drag him back home.
Tereza (that's the woman - I had to look up her name) begins to have nightmares that he's cheating on her and forcing her to watch after finding a letter from a woman in Tomas's drawer describing that very thing. So then, in the course of a sentence, we learn that Tomas has never stopped womanizing, then that he lied to Tereza about it, then tried to justify it, and now just tries to hide it from her, but won't stop.
And she stays. He gets her a dog, because the dog will hopefully "develop lesbian tendencies" and love Tereza, because Tomas can't cope with her and needs help.
So yes, Tereza not only stays, but marries him.
Why? *shrug* The book said so.
So then war comes, and they relocate... but after a while Tereza leaves Tomas (taking the female dog that they named Karenin and now refer to using male pronouns... Maybe to make Tomas feel as though Tereza has a lover as well? Who knows. This book is so stupid...).
She leaves him, and I think, "About frigging time." There's no reason for her having decided to leave him NOW, as opposed to any day of the 7 previous years of dreading him coming home smelling of another woman, of fearing that every single woman she sees will be her husband's next conquest. She decided to leave now... because the book said so.
And then he realizes that he can't be without her, and goes to her, and she takes him back, and then he realizes he feels nothing for her but mild indigestion and "pressure in his stomach and the despair of having returned".
I am a character reader. I need characters that I can identify with, that I can understand, maybe like... but these were none of those things. I don't know them, I don't understand them, I don't identify with them in any way... and I don't want to.
I just want to stop reading about them.
And so I did.
I have had a run of books that have bored me, or annoyed me, or just did nothing for me. This one is... You know, I don't even know how to describe this one.
I pretty much hated it from the first page. I do not understand the high rating on Goodreads for this book. I can barely stand the thought of picking it up again and reading more of the words telling me things about characters that I could not possibly care less about.
We have Tomas, whom we meet standing on his balcony and vacillating between whether he should ask a woman that he's "in love with" (read: met in a chance encounter and became infatuated with) to move in with him. He's saved from making any kind of fucking decision by her showing up on his doorstep (literally) with her bags packed and ready to move in. Which she does. And then she clings to him (literally) every night - to the point that he controls her sleep patterns. He even, charmer that he is, fucks with her partially-asleep mind and tells her that he's leaving her forever, so that she'll chase him and drag him back home.
Tereza (that's the woman - I had to look up her name) begins to have nightmares that he's cheating on her and forcing her to watch after finding a letter from a woman in Tomas's drawer describing that very thing. So then, in the course of a sentence, we learn that Tomas has never stopped womanizing, then that he lied to Tereza about it, then tried to justify it, and now just tries to hide it from her, but won't stop.
And she stays. He gets her a dog, because the dog will hopefully "develop lesbian tendencies" and love Tereza, because Tomas can't cope with her and needs help.
So yes, Tereza not only stays, but marries him.
Why? *shrug* The book said so.
So then war comes, and they relocate... but after a while Tereza leaves Tomas (taking the female dog that they named Karenin and now refer to using male pronouns... Maybe to make Tomas feel as though Tereza has a lover as well? Who knows. This book is so stupid...).
She leaves him, and I think, "About frigging time." There's no reason for her having decided to leave him NOW, as opposed to any day of the 7 previous years of dreading him coming home smelling of another woman, of fearing that every single woman she sees will be her husband's next conquest. She decided to leave now... because the book said so.
And then he realizes that he can't be without her, and goes to her, and she takes him back, and then he realizes he feels nothing for her but mild indigestion and "pressure in his stomach and the despair of having returned".
I am a character reader. I need characters that I can identify with, that I can understand, maybe like... but these were none of those things. I don't know them, I don't understand them, I don't identify with them in any way... and I don't want to.
I just want to stop reading about them.
And so I did.
April 23, 2011
Kundera is an unconventional writer, to say the least. If you are looking for fully fleshed characters or a smooth plot, The Unbearable Lightness of Being is not for you. Kundera merely uses plot and characters as tools or examples to explain his philosophy about life, and that is what this novel is all about. He will provide a glimpse of his characters' lives, hit the pause button and then go on to explain all about what just happened, the philosophy and psychology which drives the lives of his characters and often real lives as well. In keeping with this format, the novel is fragmentary in structure. It is easy to see how a reader can get annoyed at the author's getting lost in his philosophical musings so very often. But if you can find some meaning in those, the novel just might work for you.
Decisions and dilemmas. Kundera's characters seem to searching for an elusive something, trying to find that perfect place in life where they would want to live forever. However, it is difficult to know for sure the direction in which that perfect place lies. If they find their current lives suffocating, going the other way could be liberating. But is it worth leaving behind all that will be lost? The moment they take a step ahead, they begin feeling the pull of what they had just turned their back to. Often the choice is not between perfection and imperfection, it is a trade-off.
The ability to shape our own lives, to some extent at least, is a power. Sometimes it can be a burden too. Specially when there is no way of knowing what waits for us at the next corner. Do we choose being happy today at the expense of 'What ifs..' plaguing us tomorrow? Or do we put us through an ordeal now in anticipation of it paying off in the future? What if we end up in a mess, unable to turn back?
"And therein lies the whole of man's plight. Human time does not run in circles; it runs ahead in a straight line. That is why man cannot be happy: happiness is the longing for repetition."
Sometimes we can find the right answers only in retrospect.
"We can never know what we want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come."
Kundera speaks of the irony of human life. Having only one life to live, makes the life choices difficult and onerous. It is also because of this very fact of living only one life that these life choices do not have much weight in the bigger picture. And it is this irony which causes the unbearable lightness of being. The only thing that relieves us from this unbearable lightness are fortuitous occurences which, love it or hate it, have a say in making up our lives.
"They (human lives) are composed like music. Guided by his sense of beauty, an individual transforms a fortuitous occurence (Beethoven's music, death under a train) into a motif , which then assumes a permanent place in the composition of the individual's life."
Love. Kundera does not speak of love in a poetic, all-beautiful manner. What happens when one of the characters packs her life in a suitcase and goes off to be with her lover? Is there music in the air, fluttering butterflies? No. Her stomach makes a rumbling sound the moment she sees her lover...because she hasn't eaten anything all day.
"If a love is to be unforgettable, fortuities must immediately start fluttering down to it like birds to Francis of Assisi's shoulders."
Finding love does not miraculously solve all their problems. Love is often accompanied by jealousy, mistrust, lies, deceit, pain. Yet they do find some strength in love and do all they can to hold on to it.
""Love is a battle," said Marie-Claude, still smiling. "And I plan to go on fighting. To the end.""
Along with these, Kundera touches upon a few other themes as well. Some of those hit the right note, while there were parts that I found trite or pretentious or simply lacking any sense. Take this for example. One of the characters sleeps with every other woman who crosses his path. Kundera philosophizes his physical desire and explains it as a deep-seated intellectual curiosity. Naah, I don't buy that. Then there were pretending-to-be-deep quotes that just went over my head.
"Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love.
Umm, What?
Another thing I found odd was that the author breaks the fourth wall and tries to be defensive about the novel. He comes in and explains how he is not just telling a story, but investigating human lives. He tells us that the characters are merely figments of his imagination (so we shouldn't expect them to be realistic). He tells us that it is wrong to chide a novel for mysterious coincidences (so we shouldn't question the unrealistic events in the plot).
Agreed there are some flaws, but I would have forgiven them even without the author explaining himself away.
July 13, 2008
This book definitely wins the award for Most Pretentious Title Ever. People would ask me what I was reading, and I would have to respond by reading the title in a sarcastic, Oxford-Professor-of-Literature voice to make it clear that I was aware of how obnoxiously superior I sounded. Honestly, Kundera: stop trying so hard. Chill. Out.
When I first started reading this book, I really disliked it. Kundera wastes the first two chapters on philosophical ramblings before he finally gets around to telling the story, and even then his own voice darts in and out of the story, interjecting his own opinion into the plot. It's like trying to watch a movie with the director's commentary playing in the background - all you can think is, "shut up and let me watch the movie in peace!" I also thought he was trying way too hard to be a Critically Acclaimed Author; for example: "Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love."
Um...sure. Why not.
But once he decides to relax a little and actually tell a coherent story, it becomes really engrossing. I was never crazy about Tomas and Tereza, who love each other despite the fact that Tomas is a selfish man-whore (Kundera phrased it more poetically, but that's basically the truth), but I think I understood them. Also, the last 50-some pages of the book were AMAZING, made me cry, and are the reason this book gets four stars instead of three.
"We can never know what we want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come."
When I first started reading this book, I really disliked it. Kundera wastes the first two chapters on philosophical ramblings before he finally gets around to telling the story, and even then his own voice darts in and out of the story, interjecting his own opinion into the plot. It's like trying to watch a movie with the director's commentary playing in the background - all you can think is, "shut up and let me watch the movie in peace!" I also thought he was trying way too hard to be a Critically Acclaimed Author; for example: "Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love."
Um...sure. Why not.
But once he decides to relax a little and actually tell a coherent story, it becomes really engrossing. I was never crazy about Tomas and Tereza, who love each other despite the fact that Tomas is a selfish man-whore (Kundera phrased it more poetically, but that's basically the truth), but I think I understood them. Also, the last 50-some pages of the book were AMAZING, made me cry, and are the reason this book gets four stars instead of three.
"We can never know what we want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come."
September 9, 2023
- نحن امام كتاب غير تقليدي، ورواية لا تشبه ��لتعريف، فإذا كنت تبحث عن حبكة وعقدة وحل ونتيجة في آخر الرواية، فهذه الرواية لا تنتمي لذلك الصنف ولن تعجبك ابداً.
- شخصيات الرواية اربعة والقارئ خامسهم، يأخذ كونديرا الأربعة، يستعملهم كأدوات لشرح فلسفته في الحياة، يشرّح كل شخصية على حدى، يتمهّل يشرح لك ما حصل من زاوية فلسفية ونفسية ويعاود السرد. الشخصية الخامسة (القارئ) يمكنه الآن ان يتوقف، ان يعيد ما قرأ او ان يتابع الرحلة المجنونة مع كونديرا.
- الخفّة والثقل: ينطلق كونديرا من فكرة نيتشة في العود الأبدي وحتمية تكرار التاريخ، فيعارضها و"يسخّفها" ويحاول اثبات عكسها. جدلية الخفة والثقل هي امتداد للديالكتيك الأزلي ولتصارع الأضداد والمتناقضات رغم ان كونديرا يجنح الى معنى الثقل ووزنه في الحياة البشرية وعبثية الخفة في العديد من المواضع لكنه يبتعد عن الحتمية ويتركك تتسأل، تحكم وتقرر بنفسك.
- القرارات و"ماذا لو": إن ��خصيات كونديرا تحاول العثور على مكان مثالي في الحياة حيث يريدون العيش إلى الأبد، ولكن هل يستحق الأمر ترك كل ما سيضيع؟ في اللحظة التي يتخذون فيها خطوة إلى الأمام ، يبدأون في الشعور بما تركوه خلفهم للتو (سابينا حين تركت توماس، فرانسز على الحدود الكمبودية كمثال)، خاصة عندما لا توجد طريقة لمعرفة ما الذي ينتظرنا على الضفة الأخرى. هل نختار أن نكون سعداء اليوم على حساب التعاسة غداً؟ أم نضحّي ونشقى في الحاضر آملاً بنتائج جيدة في المستقبل؟ ماذا لو انتهى بنا المطاف في فوضى، وبالتأكيد لا عودة!! عبثية او حكمة؟! .. لا ادري، لكننا "لا يمكننا أبدا أن نعرف ما نريده ، لأننا نعيش حياة واحدة فقط ".
- الحب: لم يتطرق كونديرا الى الحب من زاوية شاعرية، ولم يجعله الحل المثالي لمشكلة الحياة، فحين حزمت تيريزا حقائبها واتت اليه كانت "كركرة" معدتها هي المقدمة لأنها جائعة وباردة! كما ان الحب الذي نشأ بينهم واكبته مشاعر خوف، وغيرة وكذب وخيانة وقلة ثقة وخداع متبادل ورغم ذلك تشبثا به عله يكون منقذهما. (اعتقد ان نزار قباني استلهم قصيدة التناقضات من ميلان (وكيف تكون الخيانة حلاً..))
- الشيوعية والحرب: قدّم ميلان نظرة عامة عن الوضع إبّان احتلال السوفيات للتشيك، وكيف تغيّرت الأحوال والتعامل مع المحتل، وملاحقة المثقفين ونفيهم واحتقارهم وسجنهم واعدام بعضهم، كما اعطى صورة عامة كيف تغيرت الحياة وكيف تأثر التشيك بهذا الوضع.
- يتركنا ميلان كونديرا مع الكثير من الأسئلة الوجودية المقلقة للتأمل وذلك عائد، ربما، الى انه لا توجد إجابات واضحة لهذه الأسئلة.
- الفكرة المبتذلة في هذه الرواية كانت كمية "المضاجعات" ومحاولة فلسفتها واعطائها جذور فكرية وفلسفية!
- سأقرأها مرة ثانية وثالثة ...
---
بعض الإقتباسات الجميلة واللاذعة:
- ص11" في بداية أساطير كثيرة هناك احد ما ينقذ طفلاً لقيطاً"
- ص20" ان نحب احداً شفقة به فهذا يعني اننا لا نحبه حقاً" ذكرني ب "حذار من الشفقة" لستيفان زفايج
- ص30" ان المنا بالذات ليس بأثقل من الألم الذي نعانيه مع الآخر ومن اجل الآخر وفي مكان الآخر، الم يضاعفه الخيال وترجعه مئات الأصداء"
- ص43" وكي يكون الحب غير قابل للنسيان، يجب ان تجتمع الصدف من اللحظة الأولى"
- ص64" كلنا ضعفاء في مواجهة قوّة اعظم منا"
- ص67" ان الإصابة بالدوار تعني ان يكون المرء سكران من ضعفه الخاص.. فهو يعي ضعفه لكنه لا يرغب بالتصدي له بل الإسترسال فيه" كان يمكن استعمال مفردة افضل من الدوار، "التيه" كانت لتكون افضل.
- ص 77" ليست كل النساء جديرات بأن يدعين نساء"
- ص82" الحدود القصوى ترسم الفاصل الذي تختفي من بعده الحياة" وهذا مناقض لنيتشة وجبران
- ص82" من بفتش عن اللانهاية ما عليه الا ان يغمض عينيه"
- ص108" ما الذي يبقى حين لا يعود هناك اهل لنخونهم او زوج او حب او وطن"
- ص109" وبدل ان يكون سكان المقابر اكثر تعقلاً بعد موتهم فإنهم اكثر حماقة مما كانوا وهم على قيد الحياة"
- ص120" إن سؤالاً بلا جواب حاجز لا طرقات بعده" "الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب هي التي تشير الى حدود الإمكانات الإنسانية، وهي التي ترسم حدود وجودنا"
- ص163" لكي نتحاشى العذاب نلجأ في اكثر الأحيان الى المستقبل"
- ص168" علاقات الحب مثل الإمبراطوريات، ما ان يختفي المبدأ الذي بنيت على اساسه حتى تختفي معه ايضاً"
- ص172" الأنظمة المجرمة لم ينشأها اناس مجرمون وانما اناس متحمسون ومقتنعون بأنهم وجدوا الطريق الوحيد الى الجنة"
- ص225" التاريخ خفيف بقدر ما هي الحياة الإنسانية خفيفة، خفيفة بشكل لا يطاق، خفيفة مثل الوبر، مثل غبار، مثل شيئ سيختفي غداً"
- ص230" في جميع الأحوال لن ارى شيئاً. هناك فجوتان مكان العينين"
- ص277" إن دفن الزوج اخيراً هو عرس الزوجة الحقيقي، وهو تتويج بحياتها ومكافأة تكفّر عن كل عذاباتها"
-ص 286" جاء في سفر التكوين ان الله خلق الإنسان وجعله يسيطر على الطيور والأسماك والماشية. وبالطبع الّف سفر التكوين انسان، لا حصان. وليس من المؤكد ان الله اراد حقاً ان يحكم الإنسان سائر المخلوقات"
- ص288" لنتصور الإنسان وقد اوثقه احد سكان المريخ بعربة ثم قلّبه احد سكان المجرة على سيخ ليشويه، ربما سيتذكر حتماً حينئذ ضلع العجل الذي اعتاد على تقطيعه في صحنه، وسيقدم اعتذاره (ولو متأخراً جداً) للبقرة"
- شخصيات الرواية اربعة والقارئ خامسهم، يأخذ كونديرا الأربعة، يستعملهم كأدوات لشرح فلسفته في الحياة، يشرّح كل شخصية على حدى، يتمهّل يشرح لك ما حصل من زاوية فلسفية ونفسية ويعاود السرد. الشخصية الخامسة (القارئ) يمكنه الآن ان يتوقف، ان يعيد ما قرأ او ان يتابع الرحلة المجنونة مع كونديرا.
- الخفّة والثقل: ينطلق كونديرا من فكرة نيتشة في العود الأبدي وحتمية تكرار التاريخ، فيعارضها و"يسخّفها" ويحاول اثبات عكسها. جدلية الخفة والثقل هي امتداد للديالكتيك الأزلي ولتصارع الأضداد والمتناقضات رغم ان كونديرا يجنح الى معنى الثقل ووزنه في الحياة البشرية وعبثية الخفة في العديد من المواضع لكنه يبتعد عن الحتمية ويتركك تتسأل، تحكم وتقرر بنفسك.
- القرارات و"ماذا لو": إن ��خصيات كونديرا تحاول العثور على مكان مثالي في الحياة حيث يريدون العيش إلى الأبد، ولكن هل يستحق الأمر ترك كل ما سيضيع؟ في اللحظة التي يتخذون فيها خطوة إلى الأمام ، يبدأون في الشعور بما تركوه خلفهم للتو (سابينا حين تركت توماس، فرانسز على الحدود الكمبودية كمثال)، خاصة عندما لا توجد طريقة لمعرفة ما الذي ينتظرنا على الضفة الأخرى. هل نختار أن نكون سعداء اليوم على حساب التعاسة غداً؟ أم نضحّي ونشقى في الحاضر آملاً بنتائج جيدة في المستقبل؟ ماذا لو انتهى بنا المطاف في فوضى، وبالتأكيد لا عودة!! عبثية او حكمة؟! .. لا ادري، لكننا "لا يمكننا أبدا أن نعرف ما نريده ، لأننا نعيش حياة واحدة فقط ".
- الحب: لم يتطرق كونديرا الى الحب من زاوية شاعرية، ولم يجعله الحل المثالي لمشكلة الحياة، فحين حزمت تيريزا حقائبها واتت اليه كانت "كركرة" معدتها هي المقدمة لأنها جائعة وباردة! كما ان الحب الذي نشأ بينهم واكبته مشاعر خوف، وغيرة وكذب وخيانة وقلة ثقة وخداع متبادل ورغم ذلك تشبثا به عله يكون منقذهما. (اعتقد ان نزار قباني استلهم قصيدة التناقضات من ميلان (وكيف تكون الخيانة حلاً..))
- الشيوعية والحرب: قدّم ميلان نظرة عامة عن الوضع إبّان احتلال السوفيات للتشيك، وكيف تغيّرت الأحوال والتعامل مع المحتل، وملاحقة المثقفين ونفيهم واحتقارهم وسجنهم واعدام بعضهم، كما اعطى صورة عامة كيف تغيرت الحياة وكيف تأثر التشيك بهذا الوضع.
- يتركنا ميلان كونديرا مع الكثير من الأسئلة الوجودية المقلقة للتأمل وذلك عائد، ربما، الى انه لا توجد إجابات واضحة لهذه الأسئلة.
- الفكرة المبتذلة في هذه الرواية كانت كمية "المضاجعات" ومحاولة فلسفتها واعطائها جذور فكرية وفلسفية!
- سأقرأها مرة ثانية وثالثة ...
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بعض الإقتباسات الجميلة واللاذعة:
- ص11" في بداية أساطير كثيرة هناك احد ما ينقذ طفلاً لقيطاً"
- ص20" ان نحب احداً شفقة به فهذا يعني اننا لا نحبه حقاً" ذكرني ب "حذار من الشفقة" لستيفان زفايج
- ص30" ان المنا بالذات ليس بأثقل من الألم الذي نعانيه مع الآخر ومن اجل الآخر وفي مكان الآخر، الم يضاعفه الخيال وترجعه مئات الأصداء"
- ص43" وكي يكون الحب غير قابل للنسيان، يجب ان تجتمع الصدف من اللحظة الأولى"
- ص64" كلنا ضعفاء في مواجهة قوّة اعظم منا"
- ص67" ان الإصابة بالدوار تعني ان يكون المرء سكران من ضعفه الخاص.. فهو يعي ضعفه لكنه لا يرغب بالتصدي له بل الإسترسال فيه" كان يمكن استعمال مفردة افضل من الدوار، "التيه" كانت لتكون افضل.
- ص 77" ليست كل النساء جديرات بأن يدعين نساء"
- ص82" الحدود القصوى ترسم الفاصل الذي تختفي من بعده الحياة" وهذا مناقض لنيتشة وجبران
- ص82" من بفتش عن اللانهاية ما عليه الا ان يغمض عينيه"
- ص108" ما الذي يبقى حين لا يعود هناك اهل لنخونهم او زوج او حب او وطن"
- ص109" وبدل ان يكون سكان المقابر اكثر تعقلاً بعد موتهم فإنهم اكثر حماقة مما كانوا وهم على قيد الحياة"
- ص120" إن سؤالاً بلا جواب حاجز لا طرقات بعده" "الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب هي التي تشير الى حدود الإمكانات الإنسانية، وهي التي ترسم حدود وجودنا"
- ص163" لكي نتحاشى العذاب نلجأ في اكثر الأحيان الى المستقبل"
- ص168" علاقات الحب مثل الإمبراطوريات، ما ان يختفي المبدأ الذي بنيت على اساسه حتى تختفي معه ايضاً"
- ص172" الأنظمة المجرمة لم ينشأها اناس مجرمون وانما اناس متحمسون ومقتنعون بأنهم وجدوا الطريق الوحيد الى الجنة"
- ص225" التاريخ خفيف بقدر ما هي الحياة الإنسانية خفيفة، خفيفة بشكل لا يطاق، خفيفة مثل الوبر، مثل غبار، مثل شيئ سيختفي غداً"
- ص230" في جميع الأحوال لن ارى شيئاً. هناك فجوتان مكان العينين"
- ص277" إن دفن الزوج اخيراً هو عرس الزوجة الحقيقي، وهو تتويج بحياتها ومكافأة تكفّر عن كل عذاباتها"
-ص 286" جاء في سفر التكوين ان الله خلق الإنسان وجعله يسيطر على الطيور والأسماك والماشية. وبالطبع الّف سفر التكوين انسان، لا حصان. وليس من المؤكد ان الله اراد حقاً ان يحكم الإنسان سائر المخلوقات"
- ص288" لنتصور الإنسان وقد اوثقه احد سكان المريخ بعربة ثم قلّبه احد سكان المجرة على سيخ ليشويه، ربما سيتذكر حتماً حينئذ ضلع العجل الذي اعتاد على تقطيعه في صحنه، وسيقدم اعتذاره (ولو متأخراً جداً) للبقرة"
September 15, 2007
The Unbearable Lightness of Being was almost unbearable to read. There was a lot of pseudo-intellectual meandering about things that deserved a little more grit. Rather, I prefer a little more reality. I didn't care about the characters, and I didn't feel like they cared about anything. I feel like saying I was impressed with the thoughtiness of this book, but by the time I typed it I'd be so buried under multiple levels of irony that I'd suddenly be accidentally sincere again. What was I saying? Oh, yeah. I'd probably like this book a lot more if I was having more sex.
NC
NC
August 2, 2021
(Book 256 From 1001 Books) - Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí = L’insoutenable légèreté de l’être = The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
The Unbearable Lightness of Being is a 1984 novel by Milan Kundera, about two women, two men, a dog and their lives in the 1968 Prague Spring period of Czechoslovak history.
From the book: “The heavier the burden, the closer our lives come to the earth, the more real and truthful they become. Conversely, the absolute absence of burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant. What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness? ...When we want to give expression to a dramatic situation in our lives, we tend to use metaphors of heaviness. We say that something has become a great burden to us. We either bear the burden or fail and go down with it, we struggle with it, win or lose. And Sabina – what had come over her? Nothing. She had left a man because she felt like leaving him. Had he persecuted her? Had he tried to take revenge on her? No. Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden, but the unbearable lightness of being.”
عنوانها: «بار هستی»؛ «کلاه کلمنتیس»؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش روز هشتم ماه سپتامبر سال 1987میلادی؛ و بار دوم سال2007میلادی
عنوان: بار هستی؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ مترجم: پرویز همایون پور؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، گفتار، 1365، در 275ص، موضوع: داستانهای نویسندگان چک - سده ی 20م
عنوان: کلاه کلمنتیس؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ مترجم: احمد میرعلائی؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، دماوند، 1364، در 178ص، انتشارات باغ نو نیز در سال1381هجری خورشیدی کتاب را از همین مترجم و در 127ص منتشر کرده است؛ چاپ سوم 1387؛ شابک 9647425104؛ نشر نو، 1397؛ در136ص؛ شابک 9786004901208؛ موضوع: نویسندگان چک؛ نقد و بررسی - سده 20م
فهرست: یادداشت؛ «مصاحبه ای با میلان کوندرا»؛ «غرب در گروگان یا فرهنگ از صحنه بیرون میرود»؛ «جایی آن پشت و پسله ها»؛ «نامه های گمشده (کلاه کلمنتیس)»؛ «فرشته ها»؛
کوندرا در توصیف قهرمانان خود میگویند: شخصیتهای رمانی که نوشته ام، امکانات خود من هستند که تحقق نیافته اند، بدین سبب هراسانم، آنها را دوست میدارم، آنها از مرزی گذر کرده اند که من فقط آن را دور زده ام
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 31/05/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 10/05/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی
The Unbearable Lightness of Being is a 1984 novel by Milan Kundera, about two women, two men, a dog and their lives in the 1968 Prague Spring period of Czechoslovak history.
From the book: “The heavier the burden, the closer our lives come to the earth, the more real and truthful they become. Conversely, the absolute absence of burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant. What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness? ...When we want to give expression to a dramatic situation in our lives, we tend to use metaphors of heaviness. We say that something has become a great burden to us. We either bear the burden or fail and go down with it, we struggle with it, win or lose. And Sabina – what had come over her? Nothing. She had left a man because she felt like leaving him. Had he persecuted her? Had he tried to take revenge on her? No. Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden, but the unbearable lightness of being.”
عنوانها: «بار هستی»؛ «کلاه کلمنتیس»؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش روز هشتم ماه سپتامبر سال 1987میلادی؛ و بار دوم سال2007میلادی
عنوان: بار هستی؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ مترجم: پرویز همایون پور؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، گفتار، 1365، در 275ص، موضوع: داستانهای نویسندگان چک - سده ی 20م
عنوان: کلاه کلمنتیس؛ نویسنده: میلان کوندرا؛ مترجم: احمد میرعلائی؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، دماوند، 1364، در 178ص، انتشارات باغ نو نیز در سال1381هجری خورشیدی کتاب را از همین مترجم و در 127ص منتشر کرده است؛ چاپ سوم 1387؛ شابک 9647425104؛ نشر نو، 1397؛ در136ص؛ شابک 9786004901208؛ موضوع: نویسندگان چک؛ نقد و بررسی - سده 20م
فهرست: یادداشت؛ «مصاحبه ای با میلان کوندرا»؛ «غرب در گروگان یا فرهنگ از صحنه بیرون میرود»؛ «جایی آن پشت و پسله ها»؛ «نامه های گمشده (کلاه کلمنتیس)»؛ «فرشته ها»؛
کوندرا در توصیف قهرمانان خود میگویند: شخصیتهای رمانی که نوشته ام، امکانات خود من هستند که تحقق نیافته اند، بدین سبب هراسانم، آنها را دوست میدارم، آنها از مرزی گذر کرده اند که من فقط آن را دور زده ام
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 31/05/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 10/05/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی
February 6, 2021
لا يوجد وصف حاضر في ذهني
لا توجد كلمات تسعفني
أشعر بالعجز التام
كلما ارتأيت مفتاحا مناسبا
للكتابة عن هذه التحفة خذلني قلمي
أرتبك وأتحير وأتلعثم
وأصمت
وأصمت كثيرا
أولم يقولوا
"والصمت في حضرة الجمال جمال"
تعلمني الرواية
-نعم أقول تعلمني لا علمتني
لأنها لاتزال للآن في دمي
تعلمني أن أتواضع كثيرا
أن أتعلم رؤية العالم بطريقة جديدة
بروح جديدة
أن أعود كائنا بدائيا يفتح عيونه بدهشة
ويتعرف على الخطوط،،الألوان،،الأصوات
كل شيء جديد ومبهر بعيون كونديرا
سأعود بعد قراءتي الخامسة ربما
ربما أستطيع أن أكتب شيئا
أما الآن
فلا شيء سوى مزيد من الصمت
والانغماس بكليتي في متعة أن تقرأ معجزة روائية
June 1, 2024
رواية تقيلةو مكتوبة بطريقة مختلفة وعبقرية في نفس الوقت ..هي مش رواية بالمعني المتعارف عليه..يعني هو مش بس بيحكي عن أشخاص الرواية لكن كمان بيحلل شخصيتهم بطريقة فلسفية..ومفيهاش ترتيب الروايات التقليدي..
كتاب مش سهل ومنكرش إن في لحظة حسيت إني مش فاهمة حاجة وكنت مش حكمله..بس مع الوقت بدأت أستوعب واحدة واحدة..
هل فهمتها كويس؟أكيد لأ..
هل كان عندي حق إني كنت خايفة من كونديرا؟آه طبعاً..طلع مرعب:)
والسؤال الأخير هل حقرأ لكونديرا تاني؟ أكيد😍
"الزمن الانساني لا يسير في شكل دائري بل يتقدم في خط مستقيم.من هنا ،لا يمكن للإنسان أن يكون سعيداً لأن السعادة رغبة في التكرار.."
كتاب مش سهل ومنكرش إن في لحظة حسيت إني مش فاهمة حاجة وكنت مش حكمله..بس مع الوقت بدأت أستوعب واحدة واحدة..
هل فهمتها كويس؟أكيد لأ..
هل كان عندي حق إني كنت خايفة من كونديرا؟آه طبعاً..طلع مرعب:)
والسؤال الأخير هل حقرأ لكونديرا تاني؟ أكيد😍
"الزمن الانساني لا يسير في شكل دائري بل يتقدم في خط مستقيم.من هنا ،لا يمكن للإنسان أن يكون سعيداً لأن السعادة رغبة في التكرار.."
February 12, 2020
Milan Kundera’s book was the first title I added to Goodreads back in 2013. Despite that, it took me a while to finally read it. I guess I was a bit afraid that the philosophy dense prose will be too much for me without background in this subject. I needn’t had worried as I enjoyed most of it and I did not feell overwhelmed.
“We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can either compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come”
I believe that Kundera’s characters are searching for the ideal life without actually knowing which one it is and they are confused about what is the direction they should take. They make life altering decisions and then they feel chocked by them. However, when considering the option to go the other way and free themselves there is the fear that the road could lead to their peril. Having the ability to make choices gives one power but can also be overwhelming.
The author is saying that, since we live only one life, our decisions are difficult to make as there is no comparison. However, as we live only one life our decisions do not matter much in the big picture as reputation increase the importance. As Tomas puts it, Einmal is keinmal.
“The novel is not the author’s confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become. “
I feel like the characters are trapped by the social and political environment, their own choices and the incapacity to realise what they want from life.
There were some parts I did not enjoy as much about the book. I was a bit furious with the misogyny of Kundera and wanted to shake Teresa to come back to her senses. She said she wanted more from her life and then she ends up accepting a cheating husband although it made her miserable.
“We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can either compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come”
I believe that Kundera’s characters are searching for the ideal life without actually knowing which one it is and they are confused about what is the direction they should take. They make life altering decisions and then they feel chocked by them. However, when considering the option to go the other way and free themselves there is the fear that the road could lead to their peril. Having the ability to make choices gives one power but can also be overwhelming.
The author is saying that, since we live only one life, our decisions are difficult to make as there is no comparison. However, as we live only one life our decisions do not matter much in the big picture as reputation increase the importance. As Tomas puts it, Einmal is keinmal.
“The novel is not the author’s confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become. “
I feel like the characters are trapped by the social and political environment, their own choices and the incapacity to realise what they want from life.
There were some parts I did not enjoy as much about the book. I was a bit furious with the misogyny of Kundera and wanted to shake Teresa to come back to her senses. She said she wanted more from her life and then she ends up accepting a cheating husband although it made her miserable.
October 11, 2020
ΚΟΥΝΤΕΡΑ ΣΕ ΑΓΑΠΑΩ
Και θα σε αγαπάω απο δω και πέρα είτε με την αγάπη που βρίσκεται στο πεδίο της βαρύτητας,είτε με την αβάσταχτη ελαφρότητα στη ρευστότητα του κόσμου.
Μου έμαθες απλά λιτά και απέριττα όποτε μπορώ να επιλέγω εγώ μια απο τις δυο ιδιότητες: βαρύτητα-ελαφρότητα.
Αυτό το μυθιστόρημα που αυτομάτως πέρασε στα αιώνια αγαπημένα μου είναι ένας ύμνος δοξολογίας γραμμένος στις χιλιάδες παρτιτούρες του κόσμου προς τον έρωτα.
Μέσα και βαθιά σε αυτή την μοναδική γραφή κρύβονται απροκάλυπτα πολιτικά,φιλοσοφικά,μουσικά,ποιητικά,θρησκευτικά και ιστορικά αφηγήματα.
Είναι ένα πολυδιάστατο έργο,ένα πρωτοποριακό γραπτό απλό και κατανοητό ενώ πραγματεύεται θεωρίες,σημασίες,έννοιες και πνευματικές αναζητήσεις που ταλαιπωρούν και βασανίζουν την ανθρώπινη ζωή απο καταβολής κόσμου.
Όλα έιναι τόσο απλά τόσο συγκεκριμένα. Φτάνει να κατανοήσεις ότι τίποτα δεν επαναλαμβάνεται,ότι ποτέ δεν θα υπάρξει δεύτερη ευκαιρία στο ανθρώπινο ταξίδι της ύπαρξης μας με "πρώτο"προορισμό τη γη.
"Δεν μπορεί κανείς ποτέ να ξέρει αυτό που πρέπει να θέλει , γιατί έχουμε μόνο μια ζωή και δεν μπορούμε ούτε να την συγκρίνουμε με προηγούμενες ζωές, ούτε να την επανορθώσουμε σε ζωές επερχόμενες.
Το να μην μπορείς να ζήσεις παρά μόνο μια ζωή, είναι σαν να μην τη ζεις καθόλου".
"Το τυχαίο είναι που κάνει τέτοια μάγια, όχι το αναγκαίο . Για να είναι ένας έρωτας αξέχαστος πρέπει τα τυχαία να συναντιόνται σ΄αυτόν από την πρώτη στιγμή".
Έτσι ξεκινάει ο έρωτας του Τόμας και της Τερέζα.
Η Τερέζα μια συνειδητοποιημένα ευαίσθητη σερβιτόρα αγαπάει κτητικά,δίνει τεράστια βαρύτητα στο φορτίο του έρωτα της και υποφέρει απο ζήλεια για τις ερωμένες που αφθονούν εξ αρχής στη ζωή του Τόμας.
Ο Τόμας καταξιωμένος χειρουργός διάγει έναν βίο άκρως ερωτικό προς όλες τις γυναικείες υπάρξεις ψάχνοντας με χειρουργική ακρίβεια να βρει αυτό το κάτι διαφορετικό που κρύβεται στις απόκρυφες στιγμές της γυναικείας ψυχής. Για τον Τόμας ο έρωτας και η σεξουαλική πράξη είναι διαχωρισμένα γενετήσια ένστικτα. Χωρισμένος, με έναν γιο που αρνείται να τον δεχτεί στη ζωή του γιατί γυναίκα και παιδί θα του χαλούσαν την αβάσταχτη ελαφρότητα. Θα τον καταδίκαζαν στα "πρέπει" που μισεί ή και όχι...
"Ο έρωτας αρχίζει από μια μεταφορά. Μ’ άλλα λόγια : Ο έρωτας αρχίζει από τη στιγμή που μια γυναίκα εγγράφεται με μια από τις κουβέντες της,στην ποιητική μας μνήμη".
Ανάμεσα στις ερωμένες του Τόμας η Σαμπίνα. Μια καλλιτέχνιδα που απολαμβάνει τη ζωή χωρίς δεσμεύσεις και μέσα στην απόλυτη ελαφρότητα του είναι της θεωρεί πως χωρίς προδοσία η ύπαρξη δεν έχει νόημα,γίνεται απελπιστικά προβλέψιμη. Έτσι αρνείται τον μεγάλο της έρωτα τον Φράντς όταν αρχίζει να την βαραίνει με αποκλειστικότητα και επιλέγει για μια ακόμη φορά την ιδιότητα της ελαφρότητας.
Η Σαμπίνα ταξιδεύει πολύ για να ξεφύγει απο όλα.
Ο Τόμας επισημοποιεί τη σχέση του με την Τερέζα αλλά το πεδίο της ζωής του δεν αλλάζει. Προτιμάει πάντα την ελαφρότητα.
Όλα αυτά πραγματοποιούνται λίγο πριν και μετά την "Άνοιξη της Πράγας".Η ρωσική εισβολή του 1968 και οι κοινωνικές και πολιτικές αλλαγές δεν αφήνουν κανέναν ανέγγιχτο. Οι ζωές των ηρώων μας επηρεάζονται και συνδέονται με όλες τις εξελίξεις.Το "κιτς" του κομμουνισμού δέρνει συνειδήσεις.
"Σε μια κοινωνία που κυβερνά ο τρόμος οι δηλώσεις δεν σε δεσμεύουν σε τίποτα γιατί τις αποσπούν με τη βία κι ένας έντιμος άνθρωπος έχει το χρέος να μην τους δίνει σημασία,να μην τις ακούει".
Το τελευταίο κεφάλαιο "το χαμόγελο του Καρένιν" μου κομμάτιασε την καρδιά. Ο Καρένιν είναι το θηλυκό σκυλάκι που ζει τα τελευταία δέκα χρόνια με τον Τόμας και την Τερέζα.
Κανένα ανθρώπινο πλάσμα δεν μπορεί να κάνει σε ένα άλλο τη δωρεά του ειδυλλίου. Μόνο το ζώο μπορεί γιατ�� δεν το έδιωξαν απο τον Παράδεισο. Η αγάπη ανάμεσα στο σκυλί και τον άνθρωπο είναι ειδυλλιακή. Χωρίς συγκρούσεις,χωρίς σκηνές,χωρίς εξέλιξη.
Χαράζει γύρω απο τον άνθρωπο τον κύκλο της ζωής του που είναι θεμελιωμένος στην επανάληψη και περιμένει το ίδιο πράγμα απο αυτούς.
Ναι, η ευτυχία είναι επιθυμία της επανάληψης.
ΚΟΥΝΤΕΡΑ ΣΕ ΑΓΑΠΗΣΑ!!
Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.
Και θα σε αγαπάω απο δω και πέρα είτε με την αγάπη που βρίσκεται στο πεδίο της βαρύτητας,είτε με την αβάσταχτη ελαφρότητα στη ρευστότητα του κόσμου.
Μου έμαθες απλά λιτά και απέριττα όποτε μπορώ να επιλέγω εγώ μια απο τις δυο ιδιότητες: βαρύτητα-ελαφρότητα.
Αυτό το μυθιστόρημα που αυτομάτως πέρασε στα αιώνια αγαπημένα μου είναι ένας ύμνος δοξολογίας γραμμένος στις χιλιάδες παρτιτούρες του κόσμου προς τον έρωτα.
Μέσα και βαθιά σε αυτή την μοναδική γραφή κρύβονται απροκάλυπτα πολιτικά,φιλοσοφικά,μουσικά,ποιητικά,θρησκευτικά και ιστορικά αφηγήματα.
Είναι ένα πολυδιάστατο έργο,ένα πρωτοποριακό γραπτό απλό και κατανοητό ενώ πραγματεύεται θεωρίες,σημασίες,έννοιες και πνευματικές αναζητήσεις που ταλαιπωρούν και βασανίζουν την ανθρώπινη ζωή απο καταβολής κόσμου.
Όλα έιναι τόσο απλά τόσο συγκεκριμένα. Φτάνει να κατανοήσεις ότι τίποτα δεν επαναλαμβάνεται,ότι ποτέ δεν θα υπάρξει δεύτερη ευκαιρία στο ανθρώπινο ταξίδι της ύπαρξης μας με "πρώτο"προορισμό τη γη.
"Δεν μπορεί κανείς ποτέ να ξέρει αυτό που πρέπει να θέλει , γιατί έχουμε μόνο μια ζωή και δεν μπορούμε ούτε να την συγκρίνουμε με προηγούμενες ζωές, ούτε να την επανορθώσουμε σε ζωές επερχόμενες.
Το να μην μπορείς να ζήσεις παρά μόνο μια ζωή, είναι σαν να μην τη ζεις καθόλου".
"Το τυχαίο είναι που κάνει τέτοια μάγια, όχι το αναγκαίο . Για να είναι ένας έρωτας αξέχαστος πρέπει τα τυχαία να συναντιόνται σ΄αυτόν από την πρώτη στιγμή".
Έτσι ξεκινάει ο έρωτας του Τόμας και της Τερέζα.
Η Τερέζα μια συνειδητοποιημένα ευαίσθητη σερβιτόρα αγαπάει κτητικά,δίνει τεράστια βαρύτητα στο φορτίο του έρωτα της και υποφέρει απο ζήλεια για τις ερωμένες που αφθονούν εξ αρχής στη ζωή του Τόμας.
Ο Τόμας καταξιωμένος χειρουργός διάγει έναν βίο άκρως ερωτικό προς όλες τις γυναικείες υπάρξεις ψάχνοντας με χειρουργική ακρίβεια να βρει αυτό το κάτι διαφορετικό που κρύβεται στις απόκρυφες στιγμές της γυναικείας ψυχής. Για τον Τόμας ο έρωτας και η σεξουαλική πράξη είναι διαχωρισμένα γενετήσια ένστικτα. Χωρισμένος, με έναν γιο που αρνείται να τον δεχτεί στη ζωή του γιατί γυναίκα και παιδί θα του χαλούσαν την αβάσταχτη ελαφρότητα. Θα τον καταδίκαζαν στα "πρέπει" που μισεί ή και όχι...
"Ο έρωτας αρχίζει από μια μεταφορά. Μ’ άλλα λόγια : Ο έρωτας αρχίζει από τη στιγμή που μια γυναίκα εγγράφεται με μια από τις κουβέντες της,στην ποιητική μας μνήμη".
Ανάμεσα στις ερωμένες του Τόμας η Σαμπίνα. Μια καλλιτέχνιδα που απολαμβάνει τη ζωή χωρίς δεσμεύσεις και μέσα στην απόλυτη ελαφρότητα του είναι της θεωρεί πως χωρίς προδοσία η ύπαρξη δεν έχει νόημα,γίνεται απελπιστικά προβλέψιμη. Έτσι αρνείται τον μεγάλο της έρωτα τον Φράντς όταν αρχίζει να την βαραίνει με αποκλειστικότητα και επιλέγει για μια ακόμη φορά την ιδιότητα της ελαφρότητας.
Η Σαμπίνα ταξιδεύει πολύ για να ξεφύγει απο όλα.
Ο Τόμας επισημοποιεί τη σχέση του με την Τερέζα αλλά το πεδίο της ζωής του δεν αλλάζει. Προτιμάει πάντα την ελαφρότητα.
Όλα αυτά πραγματοποιούνται λίγο πριν και μετά την "Άνοιξη της Πράγας".Η ρωσική εισβολή του 1968 και οι κοινωνικές και πολιτικές αλλαγές δεν αφήνουν κανέναν ανέγγιχτο. Οι ζωές των ηρώων μας επηρεάζονται και συνδέονται με όλες τις εξελίξεις.Το "κιτς" του κομμουνισμού δέρνει συνειδήσεις.
"Σε μια κοινωνία που κυβερνά ο τρόμος οι δηλώσεις δεν σε δεσμεύουν σε τίποτα γιατί τις αποσπούν με τη βία κι ένας έντιμος άνθρωπος έχει το χρέος να μην τους δίνει σημασία,να μην τις ακούει".
Το τελευταίο κεφάλαιο "το χαμόγελο του Καρένιν" μου κομμάτιασε την καρδιά. Ο Καρένιν είναι το θηλυκό σκυλάκι που ζει τα τελευταία δέκα χρόνια με τον Τόμας και την Τερέζα.
Κανένα ανθρώπινο πλάσμα δεν μπορεί να κάνει σε ένα άλλο τη δωρεά του ειδυλλίου. Μόνο το ζώο μπορεί γιατ�� δεν το έδιωξαν απο τον Παράδεισο. Η αγάπη ανάμεσα στο σκυλί και τον άνθρωπο είναι ειδυλλιακή. Χωρίς συγκρούσεις,χωρίς σκηνές,χωρίς εξέλιξη.
Χαράζει γύρω απο τον άνθρωπο τον κύκλο της ζωής του που είναι θεμελιωμένος στην επανάληψη και περιμένει το ίδιο πράγμα απο αυτούς.
Ναι, η ευτυχία είναι επιθυμία της επανάληψης.
ΚΟΥΝΤΕΡΑ ΣΕ ΑΓΑΠΗΣΑ!!
Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς.
January 22, 2016
بار هستی برایم فراتر از یک کتاب بود
شیفته آثار کهن و کلاسیک بودم و نتوانسته بودم با آثار مدرن ارتباطی برقرار کنم
شاید چون انسان های عصر جدید را نمی فهمیدم
ولی کوندرا در این کتاب مثه یک جراح ماهر،شخصیت ها را کالبد شکافی کرد
و این کتاب یکی از بهترین تجربه های کتابخوانی ام شد
خواندن این کتاب شگفت انگیز نزدیک به چهل روز طول کشید
هرروز نهایتا می توانستم 10 صفحه بخوانم
برای من که آنموقع روزی 50 تا 150 صفحه می خواندنم چیز عجیبی بود
ولی مگر می شد از یه خط براحتی گذشت؟
با اینکه از سبکی تحمل ناپذیر هستی می گفت ولی سنگینی بارش ذهنم رو زود از پای در می آورد
!!!
یه جمله در کتاب هست که خیلی منو به فکر فرو میبره
يك بار حساب نيست،يك بار چون هيچ است.فقط يكبار زندگي كردن مانند هرگز زندگي كردن است
اما در اشعار اریش فرید هم چیز جالبی پیدا کردم
کجا می آموزیم زیستن را
و کجا می آموزیم آموختن را
و کجا از یاد می بریم
که فقط آنچه را فرا گرفته ایم زندگی نکنیم؟
ميلان كوندرا مي گويد كه اين ها شخصيت هايي بودن كه هرگز جرات عبور از مرز آنان رو نداشته است
پس يك انسان مي تواند تركيبي از اين شخصيت ها رو داشته باشد
ترزا و سابينا دو شخصيت مخالف هم بودند.ترزا شجاعتي داشت كه از روبه رو شدن با مرگ هم نمي هراسيد (عكس گرفتنش در مناطق جنگي) ولي در برابر قلبش ضعف داشت و نمي توانست بخاطر عشقي كه داشت از مرد خائنش دل بكند
سابينا يك فراري بود و از داشتن يك زندگي مسئوليت پذير مي ترسيد
و هرگاه به مرزهاي ان مي رسيد با شعبده بازي خاص خود از انجا ناپديد مي شد
ولي سابينا براي زن بودن خود ارزش قائل بود و اجازه نمي داد كه بازيچه مردان گردد، بلكه بدترش را هم آنجام مي داد يعني مردان را بازيچه خود مي كرد
اما هر انسانی نقطه ضعف دارد. توما نقطه ضعف سابینا است
ولي توما به طرز فاجعه باري وي را شبيه خود مي يافت و انسان هيچوقت نميتواند دو نفر شبيه خود را براي سالها تحمل كند
:به گفته آندره ژید
ناتانائیل! در کنار آن چه شبیه توست نمان ! هرگز نمان
توما برعكس عاشق شخصيت ترزا بود چون دنيايش كاملا متفاوت تر از دنياي وي و سابينا بود
فرانز هم عاشق سابينا شد چون سابينا هم دنيايي داشت كه براي فرانز ناشناخته بود
...
تمامي محكوميت انسان در اين جمله نهفته است:زمان بشري دايره وار نمي گذرد،بلكه به خط مستقيم پيش مي رود.و به همين دليل انسان نمي تواند خوشبخت باشد،چرا كه خوشبختي ميل به تكرار است
آنچه به انسان عظمت مي بخشد آن است كه آدمي چنان سرنوشت خود را در دست گيرد كه اطلس گنبد آسمان را بر دوش مي گرفت
توما در طول داستان گاه اطلس می شود و گاه می خواهد از زیر گنبد آسمان شانه خالی کند
شیفته آثار کهن و کلاسیک بودم و نتوانسته بودم با آثار مدرن ارتباطی برقرار کنم
شاید چون انسان های عصر جدید را نمی فهمیدم
ولی کوندرا در این کتاب مثه یک جراح ماهر،شخصیت ها را کالبد شکافی کرد
و این کتاب یکی از بهترین تجربه های کتابخوانی ام شد
خواندن این کتاب شگفت انگیز نزدیک به چهل روز طول کشید
هرروز نهایتا می توانستم 10 صفحه بخوانم
برای من که آنموقع روزی 50 تا 150 صفحه می خواندنم چیز عجیبی بود
ولی مگر می شد از یه خط براحتی گذشت؟
با اینکه از سبکی تحمل ناپذیر هستی می گفت ولی سنگینی بارش ذهنم رو زود از پای در می آورد
!!!
یه جمله در کتاب هست که خیلی منو به فکر فرو میبره
يك بار حساب نيست،يك بار چون هيچ است.فقط يكبار زندگي كردن مانند هرگز زندگي كردن است
اما در اشعار اریش فرید هم چیز جالبی پیدا کردم
کجا می آموزیم زیستن را
و کجا می آموزیم آموختن را
و کجا از یاد می بریم
که فقط آنچه را فرا گرفته ایم زندگی نکنیم؟
ميلان كوندرا مي گويد كه اين ها شخصيت هايي بودن كه هرگز جرات عبور از مرز آنان رو نداشته است
پس يك انسان مي تواند تركيبي از اين شخصيت ها رو داشته باشد
ترزا و سابينا دو شخصيت مخالف هم بودند.ترزا شجاعتي داشت كه از روبه رو شدن با مرگ هم نمي هراسيد (عكس گرفتنش در مناطق جنگي) ولي در برابر قلبش ضعف داشت و نمي توانست بخاطر عشقي كه داشت از مرد خائنش دل بكند
سابينا يك فراري بود و از داشتن يك زندگي مسئوليت پذير مي ترسيد
و هرگاه به مرزهاي ان مي رسيد با شعبده بازي خاص خود از انجا ناپديد مي شد
ولي سابينا براي زن بودن خود ارزش قائل بود و اجازه نمي داد كه بازيچه مردان گردد، بلكه بدترش را هم آنجام مي داد يعني مردان را بازيچه خود مي كرد
اما هر انسانی نقطه ضعف دارد. توما نقطه ضعف سابینا است
ولي توما به طرز فاجعه باري وي را شبيه خود مي يافت و انسان هيچوقت نميتواند دو نفر شبيه خود را براي سالها تحمل كند
:به گفته آندره ژید
ناتانائیل! در کنار آن چه شبیه توست نمان ! هرگز نمان
توما برعكس عاشق شخصيت ترزا بود چون دنيايش كاملا متفاوت تر از دنياي وي و سابينا بود
فرانز هم عاشق سابينا شد چون سابينا هم دنيايي داشت كه براي فرانز ناشناخته بود
...
تمامي محكوميت انسان در اين جمله نهفته است:زمان بشري دايره وار نمي گذرد،بلكه به خط مستقيم پيش مي رود.و به همين دليل انسان نمي تواند خوشبخت باشد،چرا كه خوشبختي ميل به تكرار است
آنچه به انسان عظمت مي بخشد آن است كه آدمي چنان سرنوشت خود را در دست گيرد كه اطلس گنبد آسمان را بر دوش مي گرفت
توما در طول داستان گاه اطلس می شود و گاه می خواهد از زیر گنبد آسمان شانه خالی کند
July 12, 2023
This is the story of 2 men, 2 women and a dog, during and after the 1968 Prague Spring, in what was then Czechoslovakia. It's also about challenging Friedrich Nietzsche's eternal recurrence concepts, by countering (in this story) that each of us, has but one unique life to live - i.e. the lightness of being. So note, that there is a fair bit of philosophical wanderings, especially in the second half of the book. The "unbearable lightness" also refers to Kundera's portrayal of love being transient, random and rooted in accumulated coincidences, despite how much we see it as much more.
How did the book make me feel?
I was hypnotised by Kundera's storytelling, largely focussed on his cast and getting to only see the world they saw, even when it was limited to the four walls of a room that they were in. It tells the story of the crushing of the Czech privileged, and tells that story less emotionally, just through the eyes of the cast, something that works really well and in the end feels more powerful, a lot more powerful. I knew little of the details of the Prague Spring, but reading this has now inspired to learn more about this, and the Hungarian uprising of this era.
I was almost in tears at the end. The book has shaken me with the simplicity of its story and the deepness of its message. There's also one of the greatest ever non-human dramatical scenes in this book, which also totally absorbed and consumed me. I dragged my heels reading this, because I wanted to savour each scene, immerse myself in each page. A simple story about people, a story about enshrined political oppression, a story about love? In addition I feel that this is one of those books, that I knew within the first few pages, was something special, as Kundera's quality is apparent from the first page to the last. 10 out 12, a Five Star Read.
2020 read
How did the book make me feel?
I was hypnotised by Kundera's storytelling, largely focussed on his cast and getting to only see the world they saw, even when it was limited to the four walls of a room that they were in. It tells the story of the crushing of the Czech privileged, and tells that story less emotionally, just through the eyes of the cast, something that works really well and in the end feels more powerful, a lot more powerful. I knew little of the details of the Prague Spring, but reading this has now inspired to learn more about this, and the Hungarian uprising of this era.
I was almost in tears at the end. The book has shaken me with the simplicity of its story and the deepness of its message. There's also one of the greatest ever non-human dramatical scenes in this book, which also totally absorbed and consumed me. I dragged my heels reading this, because I wanted to savour each scene, immerse myself in each page. A simple story about people, a story about enshrined political oppression, a story about love? In addition I feel that this is one of those books, that I knew within the first few pages, was something special, as Kundera's quality is apparent from the first page to the last. 10 out 12, a Five Star Read.
2020 read
January 21, 2010
I spent part of my lazy weekend reading this book on the grassy hills of The Huntington Library surrounded by gardens, art, and beauty. Even the serene surroundings and my sensational reading date could not make up for this book. Weak characters, horrible assumptions, pseudo philosophy, and no clear grasp of how women are actually motivated.
Only wannabe Lotharios who pride themselves as philosophers would enjoy this.
I tried. I really did.
Only wannabe Lotharios who pride themselves as philosophers would enjoy this.
I tried. I really did.
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December 21, 2022
LEGGEREZZA?
Daniel Day Lewis, Tomas, e la sua amante Sabina, interpretata da Lena Olin.
Non so se sarebbe cambiato qualcosa andando nel giusto ordine, prima il libro e poi il film.
Non lo so perché in effetti con Kundera non ho mai avuto un buon rapporto: non sono mai riuscito a penetrare la sua arte che mi è sempre sembrata troppo incline al filosofeggiare, all’illuminismo, e forse perfino voce sentenziosa.
Comunque, le cose sono andate che prima ho visto il film ed è stata una delusione.
Delusione perché ho stima di Philip Kaufman: ho apprezzato The Right Stuff – Uomini veri e anche la sua versione del classico Invasion of the Body Snatchers – Terrore dallo spazio profondo, e The Wanderers – I nuovi guerrieri dal romanzo di Richard Price.
Ho ancora più stima del suo sceneggiatore Jean-Claude Carrière, che solo la collaborazione con Luis Buñuel rende mito e leggenda.
E poi il protagonista, Daniel Day Lewis, forse il più grande attore della storia, se non altro il più grande tra i viventi.
E Lena Olin che sembrava potesse sollevare il mondo.
E Sven Nykvist a illuminare. E…
Juliette Binoche è Tereza, la moglie tradita e sempre innamorata.
Ma il film non funziona. È troppo lungo, tanto più per i suoi tempi (quasi tre ore). Ha momenti di assiomi più che dialogo. Ha un ritmo regolato su un metronomo, il che è tutto meno che un complimento (morte di ogni sorpresa…).
E così sono approdato al libro maldisposto. E il pregiudizio non ha giovato, è stato purtroppo confermato.
Qualsiasi studente nell’ora di fisica può provare con esperimenti l’esattezza di un’ipotesi scientifica. L’uomo, invece, vivendo una sola vita, non ha alcuna possibilità di verificare un’ipotesi mediante un esperimento, e perciò non saprà mai se avrebbe dovuto o no dare ascolto al proprio sentimento.
Daniel Day Lewis, Tomas, e la sua amante Sabina, interpretata da Lena Olin.
Non so se sarebbe cambiato qualcosa andando nel giusto ordine, prima il libro e poi il film.
Non lo so perché in effetti con Kundera non ho mai avuto un buon rapporto: non sono mai riuscito a penetrare la sua arte che mi è sempre sembrata troppo incline al filosofeggiare, all’illuminismo, e forse perfino voce sentenziosa.
Comunque, le cose sono andate che prima ho visto il film ed è stata una delusione.
Delusione perché ho stima di Philip Kaufman: ho apprezzato The Right Stuff – Uomini veri e anche la sua versione del classico Invasion of the Body Snatchers – Terrore dallo spazio profondo, e The Wanderers – I nuovi guerrieri dal romanzo di Richard Price.
Ho ancora più stima del suo sceneggiatore Jean-Claude Carrière, che solo la collaborazione con Luis Buñuel rende mito e leggenda.
E poi il protagonista, Daniel Day Lewis, forse il più grande attore della storia, se non altro il più grande tra i viventi.
E Lena Olin che sembrava potesse sollevare il mondo.
E Sven Nykvist a illuminare. E…
Juliette Binoche è Tereza, la moglie tradita e sempre innamorata.
Ma il film non funziona. È troppo lungo, tanto più per i suoi tempi (quasi tre ore). Ha momenti di assiomi più che dialogo. Ha un ritmo regolato su un metronomo, il che è tutto meno che un complimento (morte di ogni sorpresa…).
E così sono approdato al libro maldisposto. E il pregiudizio non ha giovato, è stato purtroppo confermato.
Qualsiasi studente nell’ora di fisica può provare con esperimenti l’esattezza di un’ipotesi scientifica. L’uomo, invece, vivendo una sola vita, non ha alcuna possibilità di verificare un’ipotesi mediante un esperimento, e perciò non saprà mai se avrebbe dovuto o no dare ascolto al proprio sentimento.
December 22, 2022
turns out an unbearable lightness and an unsustainable heaviness aren't that different, after all.
anyway, this book is whip-smart and brain-expanding, a real pleasure to read. i don't even want to get into it - i'd prefer the pleasure stand on its own.
if you like feeling smart, working hard for your books, philosophical vibes, or books with cool titles...read this please!
bottom line: a book that speaks enough for itself!
------------------
currently-reading updates
and the Greatest Title Of All Time award goes to............
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tbr review
more like the unbearably HEAVY BURDEN of being am i right
anyway, this book is whip-smart and brain-expanding, a real pleasure to read. i don't even want to get into it - i'd prefer the pleasure stand on its own.
if you like feeling smart, working hard for your books, philosophical vibes, or books with cool titles...read this please!
bottom line: a book that speaks enough for itself!
------------------
currently-reading updates
and the Greatest Title Of All Time award goes to............
------------------
tbr review
more like the unbearably HEAVY BURDEN of being am i right
October 17, 2008
I felt this book was contrived and to me it seemed as if the author tried desperately to sound intellectual. Instead he came off egotistical. First off all the meandering about Nietzche and quite frankly he set me off to start off by making statements I couldn't agree but he goes right on as if it is a trueism that everyone must believe in.
To be quite frank the characters were boring. The prose was uninteresting. There was no emotion, no real depth, and how many times to I have to hear about him pluking the woman from the reed basket - please!
Another reviewer mentioned slogging thorugh life and this book - I couldn't agree more - it was a chore and that's not what we read for. I finally "gave up the ghost" so maybe I shouldn't review it since I've not read it all the way through but bad is bad, and I can't see how this was going to turn itself around.
This author has created a facade - he talks a good story, with lots of smoke and mirrors with words that sound intellectual but there is no real depth there.
(Overrated) Rhetorical games, combined with recurrent references to Nietzsche and Beethoven, create an intellectual facade that seems much weightier than it really is. Built on many false presumptions and bolstered by an epic, scholarly tone, the novel has potential to be interesting in its musings, but just can't be taken seriously as a work of philosophical or psychological depth.
I would recommend that people avoid this book - There are so much better uses of their time.
Robin
[email protected]
Medieval fantasy series: The Crown Conspiracy (Oct 2008), Avempartha (April 2009)
Upcoming Book Signings at: http://www.michaelsullivan-author.com...
To be quite frank the characters were boring. The prose was uninteresting. There was no emotion, no real depth, and how many times to I have to hear about him pluking the woman from the reed basket - please!
Another reviewer mentioned slogging thorugh life and this book - I couldn't agree more - it was a chore and that's not what we read for. I finally "gave up the ghost" so maybe I shouldn't review it since I've not read it all the way through but bad is bad, and I can't see how this was going to turn itself around.
This author has created a facade - he talks a good story, with lots of smoke and mirrors with words that sound intellectual but there is no real depth there.
(Overrated) Rhetorical games, combined with recurrent references to Nietzsche and Beethoven, create an intellectual facade that seems much weightier than it really is. Built on many false presumptions and bolstered by an epic, scholarly tone, the novel has potential to be interesting in its musings, but just can't be taken seriously as a work of philosophical or psychological depth.
I would recommend that people avoid this book - There are so much better uses of their time.
Robin
[email protected]
Medieval fantasy series: The Crown Conspiracy (Oct 2008), Avempartha (April 2009)
Upcoming Book Signings at: http://www.michaelsullivan-author.com...
July 13, 2023
În romanele lui Kundera, dar mai ales în Insuportabila ușurătate... (titlul original e imposibil de tradus), există întotdeauna un personaj în plus, supranumerar. Nu e numaidecît naratorul, e altcineva, l-am putea numi Eseistul, l-am putea numi Autorul. Funcția lui e să ridice întrebări (cît prețuiește ființa?, de ce sîntem covîrșiți de kitsch?) și să folosească povestea ca pe o ilustrație a ipotezelor filosofice. Așadar, alături de Tereza, Sabina, Tomas și Franz - personaje care evoluează la nivelul „pămîntesc”, trebuie să plasăm, undeva, deasupra tuturor, și figura Autorului (care nu e Kundera, firește).
Din această pricină romanele lui Milan Kundera par (și chiar sînt) artificioase. Au multe în comun cu fabulele filosofice ale lui Diderot și Voltaire. Sigur, și în cărțile altor prozatori apar comentarii, digresiuni, dar ele aparțin unuia dintre personaje sau naratorului omniscient. La Kundera e pe dos. Citim, în realitate, un eseu (despre eterna reîntoarcere, despre actul sexual în paradis și opinia lui Ioannes Scottus Eriugena, despre kitsch, despre hazard) și, din cînd în cînd, discursul este întrerupt de mici inserții narative: în lenjerie intimă, scrutată de oglinzi, Sabina probează o pălărie-melon de culoare neagră.
În plus, sîntem preveniți din capul locului că personajele sînt inventate, niște pioni în mîna indiferentă a șahistului: „Ar fi o prostie din partea autorului, dacă ar încerca să-l facă pe cititor să creadă că personajele lui au existat în realitate. Acestea nu s-au născut din trupul unei mame, ci din cîteva fraze sugestive...”. Prin această răsturnare narativă, Kundera încalcă sistematic „legile” povestirii (clasice) și așteptările cititorului. Romanul devine aproape neverosimil. Acțiunea e numai pretextul unui raționament.
Ce rămîne dacă eliminăm pasajele eseistice? Rămîne un roman despre iubire și deșertăciune, o „demonstrație” a nimicniciei umane. Ființa nu valorează mare lucru și lipsa ei de „greutate” (importanță) îngrozește.
Există un episod care nu-mi va ieși niciodată din minte, un exemplu de „vanitas vanitatum”. Motivul i-a obsedat dintotdeauna pe scriitori: îl întîlnim în satirele medievale, în poezia veche engleză (la Thomas Nashe), în Povestea lui orișicine de Philip Roth. Să citim acest pasaj:
Din această pricină romanele lui Milan Kundera par (și chiar sînt) artificioase. Au multe în comun cu fabulele filosofice ale lui Diderot și Voltaire. Sigur, și în cărțile altor prozatori apar comentarii, digresiuni, dar ele aparțin unuia dintre personaje sau naratorului omniscient. La Kundera e pe dos. Citim, în realitate, un eseu (despre eterna reîntoarcere, despre actul sexual în paradis și opinia lui Ioannes Scottus Eriugena, despre kitsch, despre hazard) și, din cînd în cînd, discursul este întrerupt de mici inserții narative: în lenjerie intimă, scrutată de oglinzi, Sabina probează o pălărie-melon de culoare neagră.
În plus, sîntem preveniți din capul locului că personajele sînt inventate, niște pioni în mîna indiferentă a șahistului: „Ar fi o prostie din partea autorului, dacă ar încerca să-l facă pe cititor să creadă că personajele lui au existat în realitate. Acestea nu s-au născut din trupul unei mame, ci din cîteva fraze sugestive...”. Prin această răsturnare narativă, Kundera încalcă sistematic „legile” povestirii (clasice) și așteptările cititorului. Romanul devine aproape neverosimil. Acțiunea e numai pretextul unui raționament.
Ce rămîne dacă eliminăm pasajele eseistice? Rămîne un roman despre iubire și deșertăciune, o „demonstrație” a nimicniciei umane. Ființa nu valorează mare lucru și lipsa ei de „greutate” (importanță) îngrozește.
Există un episod care nu-mi va ieși niciodată din minte, un exemplu de „vanitas vanitatum”. Motivul i-a obsedat dintotdeauna pe scriitori: îl întîlnim în satirele medievale, în poezia veche engleză (la Thomas Nashe), în Povestea lui orișicine de Philip Roth. Să citim acest pasaj:
„În toiul nopţii, [Tomas] o trezi [pe Tereza] din somn, ca să-i potolească plînsetele.
[Ea] îi povesti:
– Eram îngropată. De multă vreme. Tu veneai să mă vezi, o dată pe săptămînă. Ciocăneai în piatra cavoului şi eu ieşeam din mormînt, cu ochii plini de ţărînă. Îmi spuneai: În felul ăsta nu mă poţi vedea, şi-mi scoteai ţărîna din ochi. Şi eu răspundeam: Oricum nu pot să văd. În loc de ochi am două găuri”.
January 27, 2024
The wisdom of uncertainty.
This novel's definition was stated to Kundera during its work opening this monument of 20th-century literature. Man has only one life, and the weight of his choices is matched only by the lightness of his existence. It is impossible to rewind his life and know what would have been the course of his story if he had taken other paths. To endure this impasse and not whip up eternal regrets, we might as well accept life as it comes.
The story is well known, but you might as well ramble on it because it is beautiful. Tomas is a brilliant surgeon who lived in Prague in 1968. He is more interested in his feminine conquests than in political agitation. He marries Teresa, a tormented young woman, jealous and drunk with political and loving ideals. Stifled, Tomas multiplies the infidelities, particularly with a friend, Sabina, a photographer, individualist, and in love with freedom.
During the Prague Spring, Tomas and Teresa flee to Switzerland, but the young woman cannot bring herself to live far from home and returns alone. Tomas must then choose between a light Helvetian life where he can blossom in his profession and quench his thirst for love or join Teresa, lose his job, and expose himself to communist repression. He returns to Prague and becomes a tile washer, and the couple goes to live in the countryside with their dog, Karenina.
Like all romantic palaces, access to this book is impressive. The title alone requires taking Paracetamol. I put the skates to glide on this waxed prose with felted steps. From the first sentence, Nietzsche is quoting. You have to hang on to ODP. I sometimes had to reread specific paragraphs because it was awkward to wink between two sentences. It must be said that a philosophical commentary follows each decision of a character. Remember never to invite Milan Kundera to a dinner party. Suddenly, getting attached to the story is difficult because the digressions leave the reader spectator. I understood the author was not trying to grab my attention and attend a lecture. It took me a long time (I'm only a man) to know that this step back intends to reflect on life's unique meaning. I am glad I waited until maturity to engage in this reading. Greener, gravity would have gotten the better of my lightness.
So it's not just a beautiful love story amid Russian tanks. Nor is it the novel of an intellectual exiled against the communist regime and its mythologies. His characters are as many victims of the story as their personal choices. Instead, I believe it is a meditation on individual freedom and the opposing forces that shake our lives.
Each reader of this novel keeps a memory of this literary journey. It will be the end of the Karenina dog's life. Thomas and Teresa's attachment to this beast testifies to more humanity than all the states of mind that tormented their romantic passion.
This novel's definition was stated to Kundera during its work opening this monument of 20th-century literature. Man has only one life, and the weight of his choices is matched only by the lightness of his existence. It is impossible to rewind his life and know what would have been the course of his story if he had taken other paths. To endure this impasse and not whip up eternal regrets, we might as well accept life as it comes.
The story is well known, but you might as well ramble on it because it is beautiful. Tomas is a brilliant surgeon who lived in Prague in 1968. He is more interested in his feminine conquests than in political agitation. He marries Teresa, a tormented young woman, jealous and drunk with political and loving ideals. Stifled, Tomas multiplies the infidelities, particularly with a friend, Sabina, a photographer, individualist, and in love with freedom.
During the Prague Spring, Tomas and Teresa flee to Switzerland, but the young woman cannot bring herself to live far from home and returns alone. Tomas must then choose between a light Helvetian life where he can blossom in his profession and quench his thirst for love or join Teresa, lose his job, and expose himself to communist repression. He returns to Prague and becomes a tile washer, and the couple goes to live in the countryside with their dog, Karenina.
Like all romantic palaces, access to this book is impressive. The title alone requires taking Paracetamol. I put the skates to glide on this waxed prose with felted steps. From the first sentence, Nietzsche is quoting. You have to hang on to ODP. I sometimes had to reread specific paragraphs because it was awkward to wink between two sentences. It must be said that a philosophical commentary follows each decision of a character. Remember never to invite Milan Kundera to a dinner party. Suddenly, getting attached to the story is difficult because the digressions leave the reader spectator. I understood the author was not trying to grab my attention and attend a lecture. It took me a long time (I'm only a man) to know that this step back intends to reflect on life's unique meaning. I am glad I waited until maturity to engage in this reading. Greener, gravity would have gotten the better of my lightness.
So it's not just a beautiful love story amid Russian tanks. Nor is it the novel of an intellectual exiled against the communist regime and its mythologies. His characters are as many victims of the story as their personal choices. Instead, I believe it is a meditation on individual freedom and the opposing forces that shake our lives.
Each reader of this novel keeps a memory of this literary journey. It will be the end of the Karenina dog's life. Thomas and Teresa's attachment to this beast testifies to more humanity than all the states of mind that tormented their romantic passion.
February 22, 2020
Broadly speaking the power source motoring this novel is the battle between arguably the two most fundamental and often conflictual drives in the human psyche - the desire for commitment and the desire for freedom. Commitment Kundera classes as heaviness; freedom as lightness. "When we want to give expression to a dramatic situation in our lives, we tend to use metaphors of heaviness. We say that something has become a great burden to us. We either bear the burden or fail and go down with it, we struggle with it, win or lose. Sabina had left a man because she felt like leaving him. Had he persecuted her? Had he tried to take revenge on her? No. Her drama was a drama not of heaviness but of lightness. What fell to her lot was not the burden but the unbearable lightness of being. Until that time, her betrayals had filled her with excitement and joy, because they opened up new paths to new adventures of betrayal. But what if the paths came to an end? One could betray one's parents, husband, country, love, but when parents, husband, country, and love were gone - what was left to betray? Sabina felt emptiness all around her. What if that emptiness was the goal of all her betrayals? Naturally she had not realized it until now. How could she have? The goals we pursue are always veiled. A girl who longs for marriage longs for something she knows nothing about. The boy who hankers after fame has no idea what fame is. The thing that gives our every move its meaning is always totally unknown to us. Sabina was unaware of the goal that lay behind her longing to betray. The unbearable lightness of being - was that the goal?"
"The brotherhood of man on earth will be possible only on a basis of kitsch." One of my favourite themes explored in the book was the role kitsch plays in our lives. Empathy is often created through kitsch. American cinema knows and exploits this. The tearful reunion at the end of the film makes us feel good about the human race. "It is always nice to dream that we are part of a jubilant throng marching through the centuries..."
Kundera is often at pains to point out we don't respond privately to an experience as we would collectively. "Not long ago, I caught myself experiencing a most incredible sensation. Leafing through a book on Hitler, I was touched by some of his portraits: they reminded me of my childhood. I grew up during the war; several members of my family perished in Hitler's concentration camps; but what were their deaths compared with the memories of a lost period in my life, a period that would never return?" This is not the reaction he ought to be feeling. He's showing us what he privately feels is at odds with the prescribed feeling. And we understand there's often an element of kitsch in the proscribed collective feeling. Because we're pretending we favour the interests of the collective over the personal. "For Sabina, living in truth, lying neither to ourselves nor to others, was possible only away from the public: the moment someone keeps an eye on what we do, we involuntarily make allowances for that eye, and nothing we do is truthful. Having a public, keeping a public in mind, means living in lies."
But Kundera isn't too hard on kitsch in our personal lives - "She knew only too well that the song was a beautiful lie. As soon as kitsch is recognized for the lie it is, it moves into the context of non-kitsch, thus losing its authoritarian power and becoming as touching as any other human weakness. For none among us is superman enough to escape kitsch completely. No matter how we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition." It's the role kitsch plays in politics that gets his back up. "Kitsch is the aesthetic ideal of all politicians and all political parties and movements." Of course, it's blatantly apparent how much of political and nationalistic and military theatre is pure kitsch. The Nazis took kitsch to a whole new level. It would be comical to watch now if we didn't know what it led to. A whole nation bamboozled into idiocy by kitsch. "Political movements rest not so much on rational attitudes as on the fantasies, images, words, and archetypes that come together to make up this or that political kitsch." National anthems bring it out - the absurdly stiff posture, the clenched fist on heart. Taking pride in something as random and unearned as nationality is little but hollow posturing when you think about it. Nationality is not something you have achieved after all. It's simply the result of a thrown dice. And the same nationality can evoke an inexhaustible number of different images in any given individual. It's essentially a bogus idea of unity.
Totalitarian regimes include nations which historically denied women equal rights, countries which enforced racial segregation and persecuted homosexuality. "But the people who struggle against what we call totalitarian regimes cannot function with queries and doubts. They, too, need certainties and simple truths to make the multitudes understand, to provoke collective tears." Which is why women in early 20th century Britain, blacks in America and gays throughout the world were constrained to exaggerate pride in a factor of their lives they had no control over, their sex, their skin colour, their sexuality. And when we see films now about these struggles kitsch is always present. They enable us to feel we are part of the jubilant throng marching through the centuries... Everything is perhaps ultimately turned into kitsch.
This probably isn't quite Kundera's best novel but it's a fabulous and inspiring read for all its wisdom and the playful possibilities of fiction it embraces and dramatizes. "As I have pointed out before, characters are not born like people, of woman; they are born of a situation, a sentence, a metaphor containing in a nutshell a basic human possibility that the author thinks no one else has discovered or said something essential about. But isn't it true that an author can write only about himself? Staring impotently across a courtyard, at a loss for what to do; hearing the pertinacious rumbling of one's own stomach during a moment of love; betraying, yet lacking the will to abandon the glamorous path of betrayal; raising one's fist with the crowds in the Grand March; displaying one's wit before hidden microphones-I have known all these situations, I have experienced them myself, yet none of them has given rise to the person my curriculum vitae and I represent. The characters in my novels are my own unrealized possibilities. That is why I am equally fond of them all and equally horrified by them. Each one has crossed a border that I myself have circumvented. It is that crossed border (the border beyond which my own "I" ends) which attracts me most. For beyond that border begins the secret the novel asks about. The novel is not the author's confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become."
"The brotherhood of man on earth will be possible only on a basis of kitsch." One of my favourite themes explored in the book was the role kitsch plays in our lives. Empathy is often created through kitsch. American cinema knows and exploits this. The tearful reunion at the end of the film makes us feel good about the human race. "It is always nice to dream that we are part of a jubilant throng marching through the centuries..."
Kundera is often at pains to point out we don't respond privately to an experience as we would collectively. "Not long ago, I caught myself experiencing a most incredible sensation. Leafing through a book on Hitler, I was touched by some of his portraits: they reminded me of my childhood. I grew up during the war; several members of my family perished in Hitler's concentration camps; but what were their deaths compared with the memories of a lost period in my life, a period that would never return?" This is not the reaction he ought to be feeling. He's showing us what he privately feels is at odds with the prescribed feeling. And we understand there's often an element of kitsch in the proscribed collective feeling. Because we're pretending we favour the interests of the collective over the personal. "For Sabina, living in truth, lying neither to ourselves nor to others, was possible only away from the public: the moment someone keeps an eye on what we do, we involuntarily make allowances for that eye, and nothing we do is truthful. Having a public, keeping a public in mind, means living in lies."
But Kundera isn't too hard on kitsch in our personal lives - "She knew only too well that the song was a beautiful lie. As soon as kitsch is recognized for the lie it is, it moves into the context of non-kitsch, thus losing its authoritarian power and becoming as touching as any other human weakness. For none among us is superman enough to escape kitsch completely. No matter how we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition." It's the role kitsch plays in politics that gets his back up. "Kitsch is the aesthetic ideal of all politicians and all political parties and movements." Of course, it's blatantly apparent how much of political and nationalistic and military theatre is pure kitsch. The Nazis took kitsch to a whole new level. It would be comical to watch now if we didn't know what it led to. A whole nation bamboozled into idiocy by kitsch. "Political movements rest not so much on rational attitudes as on the fantasies, images, words, and archetypes that come together to make up this or that political kitsch." National anthems bring it out - the absurdly stiff posture, the clenched fist on heart. Taking pride in something as random and unearned as nationality is little but hollow posturing when you think about it. Nationality is not something you have achieved after all. It's simply the result of a thrown dice. And the same nationality can evoke an inexhaustible number of different images in any given individual. It's essentially a bogus idea of unity.
Totalitarian regimes include nations which historically denied women equal rights, countries which enforced racial segregation and persecuted homosexuality. "But the people who struggle against what we call totalitarian regimes cannot function with queries and doubts. They, too, need certainties and simple truths to make the multitudes understand, to provoke collective tears." Which is why women in early 20th century Britain, blacks in America and gays throughout the world were constrained to exaggerate pride in a factor of their lives they had no control over, their sex, their skin colour, their sexuality. And when we see films now about these struggles kitsch is always present. They enable us to feel we are part of the jubilant throng marching through the centuries... Everything is perhaps ultimately turned into kitsch.
This probably isn't quite Kundera's best novel but it's a fabulous and inspiring read for all its wisdom and the playful possibilities of fiction it embraces and dramatizes. "As I have pointed out before, characters are not born like people, of woman; they are born of a situation, a sentence, a metaphor containing in a nutshell a basic human possibility that the author thinks no one else has discovered or said something essential about. But isn't it true that an author can write only about himself? Staring impotently across a courtyard, at a loss for what to do; hearing the pertinacious rumbling of one's own stomach during a moment of love; betraying, yet lacking the will to abandon the glamorous path of betrayal; raising one's fist with the crowds in the Grand March; displaying one's wit before hidden microphones-I have known all these situations, I have experienced them myself, yet none of them has given rise to the person my curriculum vitae and I represent. The characters in my novels are my own unrealized possibilities. That is why I am equally fond of them all and equally horrified by them. Each one has crossed a border that I myself have circumvented. It is that crossed border (the border beyond which my own "I" ends) which attracts me most. For beyond that border begins the secret the novel asks about. The novel is not the author's confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become."
September 7, 2016
The Unbelievable Lightness of The Novel
I had started reading this in 2008 and had gotten along quite a bit before I stopped reading the book for some reason and then it was forgotten. Recently, I saw the book in a bookstore and realized that I hadn't finished it. I picked it up and started it all over again since I was not entirely sure where I had left off last time. I was sure however that I had not read more than, say, 30 pages or so.
I definitely could not remember reading it for a long period of time. I only remembered starting it and bits and pieces about infidelities and the russian occupation of the Czech. And so, I started reading it, sure that soon a page will come from where the story will be fresh and unread.
I was soon into the fiftieth page and was amazed that as I read each page, I could distinctly remember every scene, every philosophical argument, even the exact quotes and the sequence of events that was to come immediately after the scene I was reading- But I could never remember, try as I might, what was coming two pages further into the novel.
"This is what comes from reading serious books lightly and not giving them the attention they deserve," I chastised myself, angry at the thought that my habit of reading multiple books in parallel must have been the cause of this. I must, at the risk of appearing boastful, say that the reason this bothered so much was that I always used to take pride in being able to remember the books that I read almost verbatim and this experience of reading a book that I had read before with this sense of knowing and forgetting at the same time, the two sensations running circles around each other and teasing me was completely disorienting. I felt like I was on some surreal world where all that is to come was already known to me but was still being revealed one step out of tune with my time.
In any case, this continued, to my bewilderment well into the two hundredth page. Even now, I could not shake the constant expectation that the story was going to go into unread new territories just 2 or 3 pages ahead of where I was. Every line I read I could remember having read before and in spite of making this mistake through so many pages, I still could not but tell myself that this time, surely, I have reached the part where I must have last closed the book three years ago.
Thus I have now reached the last few pages of the book and am still trying to come to terms with what it was about this novel that made me forget it, even though I identified with the views of the author and was never bored with the plot. Was this an intentional effect or just an aberration? Will I have the same feeling if I picked up the book again a few years from today?
I also feel a slight anger towards the author for playing this trick on me, for leading me on into reading the entire book again, without giving me anything new which I had not received from the book on my first reading. Usually when I decide to read a book again, I do it with the knowledge that I will gain something new with this reading, but Kundera gave me none of that.
What I do appreciate about this reading experience is this: as is stated in the novel, anything that happens only once might as well have not happened at all - does it then apply that any novel that can be read only once, might as well have not been read at all?
Beethoven & The Art of The Sublime
To conclude, I will recount an argument from the book that in retrospect helps me explain the experience:
Kundera talks (yes, the book is full of Kundera ripping apart the 'Fourth Wall' and talking to the reader, to the characters and even to himself) about an anecdote on how Beethoven came to compose one of his best quartets due to inspiration from a silly joke he had shared with a friend.
So Beethoven turned a frivolous inspiration into a serious quartet, a joke into metaphysical truth. Yet oddly enough, the transformation fails to surprise us. We would have been shocked, on the other hand, if Beethoven had transformed the seriousness of his quartet into the trifling joke. First (as an unfinished sketch) would have come the great metaphysical truth and last (as a finished masterpiece)—the most frivolous of jokes!
I would like to think that Kundera achieved this reverse proposition with this novel and that explains how I felt about it. And, yes I finished reading the second last line of the book with the full awareness of what the last line of the novel was going to be.
September 13, 2010
منذ متى وانا لم اقرأ رواية بتلك الروعة ...
ميلان كونديرا أعادني من جديد الى عالم الروايات المترجمة الذي كنت برحته منذ زمن ليس بقليل ..
من أين جاء كونديرا بكل هذه الفلسفه ...وهذه المعاني الراقيه
يطرح كونديرا تساؤل عميق حول "" إمكانيةإدانة ما هو زائل؟ "" بمعني هل يمكننا الحكم على صحه او خطأ أفعالنا أن كانت حياتنا هي واحده فقط ...
وعلى ضوء هذه الأشكالية الفلسفيه العميقه يقص علينا حكاية الدكتور توماس وحياته ...الصدف التي تحكمت فيها و إختياراته التي تسببت في تغيير مساراها أكثر من مره ...
الدكتور توماس كان نموذج للكثير من المثقفين التشكيين إبان الاجتياح الروسي للتشيك وما صاحب ذلك من تغيرات سياسية و أجتماعية أثرت على شكل المجتمع وعلى حياة الأفراد.
يضع كونديرا مشاعرنا في ميزان الحياه لنحدد وزنها ثم نعيد تعريف معني الثقل والخفه
لنتعرف من جديد اي تلك المشاعر قد أرهق حياتنا لثقله وربما لخفته ...!
أذن فأي المشاعر أفضل لحياتنا الثقيل منها أم الخفيف ..! ربما هذا واحد من الاسئله التي قال عنها الكاتب ..
"" وحدها الأسئلة الساذجة هي الأسئلة الهامة فعلاً. تلك الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب. إن سؤالاً دون جواب حاجز لا طرقات بعده. وبطريقة أخرى: الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب هي التي تشير إلى حدود الإمكانات الإنسانية، وهي التي ترسم وجودنا.""
ميلان كونديرا أعادني من جديد الى عالم الروايات المترجمة الذي كنت برحته منذ زمن ليس بقليل ..
من أين جاء كونديرا بكل هذه الفلسفه ...وهذه المعاني الراقيه
يطرح كونديرا تساؤل عميق حول "" إمكانيةإدانة ما هو زائل؟ "" بمعني هل يمكننا الحكم على صحه او خطأ أفعالنا أن كانت حياتنا هي واحده فقط ...
وعلى ضوء هذه الأشكالية الفلسفيه العميقه يقص علينا حكاية الدكتور توماس وحياته ...الصدف التي تحكمت فيها و إختياراته التي تسببت في تغيير مساراها أكثر من مره ...
الدكتور توماس كان نموذج للكثير من المثقفين التشكيين إبان الاجتياح الروسي للتشيك وما صاحب ذلك من تغيرات سياسية و أجتماعية أثرت على شكل المجتمع وعلى حياة الأفراد.
يضع كونديرا مشاعرنا في ميزان الحياه لنحدد وزنها ثم نعيد تعريف معني الثقل والخفه
لنتعرف من جديد اي تلك المشاعر قد أرهق حياتنا لثقله وربما لخفته ...!
أذن فأي المشاعر أفضل لحياتنا الثقيل منها أم الخفيف ..! ربما هذا واحد من الاسئله التي قال عنها الكاتب ..
"" وحدها الأسئلة الساذجة هي الأسئلة الهامة فعلاً. تلك الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب. إن سؤالاً دون جواب حاجز لا طرقات بعده. وبطريقة أخرى: الأسئلة التي تبقى دون جواب هي التي تشير إلى حدود الإمكانات الإنسانية، وهي التي ترسم وجودنا.""
August 19, 2017
Three hikers are out on a walk, and it starts to rain. Within minutes, they realize that they've been caught in a powerful storm, and they quickly find shelter under a rock overhang. As they are pressed back against the side of the sharp rock, they unknowingly perceive the storm in three very different ways.
Hiker #1 finds the unpredictability of the storm wild, wonderful and erotic. She knows that you can not control nature, nor would she be foolish enough to think that she could understand what was happening, what it means, or when it will end. She loves the feel of the rain on her face and the wind in her hair.
Hiker #2 is terrified by the storm. She is crouched down, eyes closed, hands over her ears, and she is convinced that they are going to die. She winces as each bolt of lightning strikes down before them and her heart is racing in discomfort and confusion. She wishes it would all go away.
Hiker #3 is a busy guy, a man who had to be convinced to join the hike in the first place. He realizes that this storm will delay them by at least a good half hour, and, in his disgust, he refuses to speak to or acknowledge the fear or excitement of his fellow hikers. He feels angry that his time is being wasted, and he's anxious over the loss of cell service.
After the storm, the three hikers have three different responses to the storm:
Hiker #1 goes home to write a poem and prepare a hearty meal.
Hiker #2 vows to give up caffeine and swears she'll never hike again.
Hiker #3 posts a nasty tweet (disparaging Mother Nature) from his car, as soon as his cell service is restored.
Coincidentally, all three hikers were reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera, at the time of the storm, but the topic never came up on their walk.
They will finish the book at three different times and go on to have three completely different reactions to the writing.
Ironically, they will respond similarly to how they responded to the storm.
Hiker #1 finds the unpredictability of the storm wild, wonderful and erotic. She knows that you can not control nature, nor would she be foolish enough to think that she could understand what was happening, what it means, or when it will end. She loves the feel of the rain on her face and the wind in her hair.
Hiker #2 is terrified by the storm. She is crouched down, eyes closed, hands over her ears, and she is convinced that they are going to die. She winces as each bolt of lightning strikes down before them and her heart is racing in discomfort and confusion. She wishes it would all go away.
Hiker #3 is a busy guy, a man who had to be convinced to join the hike in the first place. He realizes that this storm will delay them by at least a good half hour, and, in his disgust, he refuses to speak to or acknowledge the fear or excitement of his fellow hikers. He feels angry that his time is being wasted, and he's anxious over the loss of cell service.
After the storm, the three hikers have three different responses to the storm:
Hiker #1 goes home to write a poem and prepare a hearty meal.
Hiker #2 vows to give up caffeine and swears she'll never hike again.
Hiker #3 posts a nasty tweet (disparaging Mother Nature) from his car, as soon as his cell service is restored.
Coincidentally, all three hikers were reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera, at the time of the storm, but the topic never came up on their walk.
They will finish the book at three different times and go on to have three completely different reactions to the writing.
Ironically, they will respond similarly to how they responded to the storm.
January 25, 2020
Seems odd that I'd read Kundera seven times previously and one of those seven books was not The Unbearable Lightness of Being. But for whatever reason that's the way it went down. All I can say is that it was worth the wait. I simply loved Immortality, Laughable Loves too, and this was every bit as good. If anything, I found it even better.
Before I even started reading I pondered over this cover. I knew as little as possible about the novel previously. Other than Prague, sex, and a dog featured. Was it a man who liked wearing women's underwear? Or a woman who had a thing for Bowler hats? Or a hat, a bra, and a pair of panties from three different people? Now all becomes clear! And I can't stop thinking about Sabina's orgasmic shout!
Kundera's Philosophical musings blended together with lots of romping didn't surprise me one bit. What did though was how everything came together to make a novel with characters I truly cared for. Don't think I've come across such a warm bonding with Kundera's men and women previously. Oh, and of course there's Karenin too, who could forget, and I'm normally a cat lover. How I would have loved to play catch with him, take him for walks, let him sleep at the end of my bed, lick me in the face to wake me up in the morning. Now I want a dog!
Back to the humans - Tomas is one of four main characters born frankly of images in Kundera's mind. All of them to one extent or another enact the paradox of choices that are not choices, of courses of action that are indistinguishable in consequence from their opposite. He shows us Sabina, a painter, as she is deciding whether or not to keep her current lover, Franz, a university professor. Franz is physically strong. If he used his strength on her and ordered her about, Sabina knows she wouldn't put up with him for more than five minutes. But he is gentle, like a pacified bear, and because she believes physical love must be violent she finds Franz rather dull.
Either way, whatever Franz does, she will have to leave him and move on.
Sabina lives by betrayal by abandoning family, her lovers, and, in the end, her country, in a way that condemns her to what Kundera calls a lightness of being, by which he means an existence so lacking in commitment, fidelity, or moral responsibility to anyone else as to be unattached to the real world. By contrast, his fourth character, Tereza, the loyal wife of Tomas, suffers an unflagging love for her philandering husband that finally is responsible for his ruin in the medical profession, because it's her unwillingness to live in exile that brings him back to his fate in Czechoslovakia after he has set himself up nicely in a Swiss hospital. Thus, Tereza, the exact opposite of Sabina in commitment and rootedness, descends under an unbearable moral burden, weight and lightness, in the Kunderian physics, which adds up to the same thing. I could try and pick bits and pieces of the novel that stood out for me. Only I can't. Because I loved everything about it, all equally. Without a single moment when I thought 'Umm, does that really need to be in there'
This for me is Kundera in truly formidable form. And it's no surprise the book was, is, and will continue to be, so popular with readers. And let's face it, would it have been so popular if it wasn't for the sex? I doubt it. But it's so much more than that, and if it isn't one of the best things I end up reading this year, then I've gone completely round the bend!
Thank you Mr Kundera, You're an absolute genius!
Before I even started reading I pondered over this cover. I knew as little as possible about the novel previously. Other than Prague, sex, and a dog featured. Was it a man who liked wearing women's underwear? Or a woman who had a thing for Bowler hats? Or a hat, a bra, and a pair of panties from three different people? Now all becomes clear! And I can't stop thinking about Sabina's orgasmic shout!
Kundera's Philosophical musings blended together with lots of romping didn't surprise me one bit. What did though was how everything came together to make a novel with characters I truly cared for. Don't think I've come across such a warm bonding with Kundera's men and women previously. Oh, and of course there's Karenin too, who could forget, and I'm normally a cat lover. How I would have loved to play catch with him, take him for walks, let him sleep at the end of my bed, lick me in the face to wake me up in the morning. Now I want a dog!
Back to the humans - Tomas is one of four main characters born frankly of images in Kundera's mind. All of them to one extent or another enact the paradox of choices that are not choices, of courses of action that are indistinguishable in consequence from their opposite. He shows us Sabina, a painter, as she is deciding whether or not to keep her current lover, Franz, a university professor. Franz is physically strong. If he used his strength on her and ordered her about, Sabina knows she wouldn't put up with him for more than five minutes. But he is gentle, like a pacified bear, and because she believes physical love must be violent she finds Franz rather dull.
Either way, whatever Franz does, she will have to leave him and move on.
Sabina lives by betrayal by abandoning family, her lovers, and, in the end, her country, in a way that condemns her to what Kundera calls a lightness of being, by which he means an existence so lacking in commitment, fidelity, or moral responsibility to anyone else as to be unattached to the real world. By contrast, his fourth character, Tereza, the loyal wife of Tomas, suffers an unflagging love for her philandering husband that finally is responsible for his ruin in the medical profession, because it's her unwillingness to live in exile that brings him back to his fate in Czechoslovakia after he has set himself up nicely in a Swiss hospital. Thus, Tereza, the exact opposite of Sabina in commitment and rootedness, descends under an unbearable moral burden, weight and lightness, in the Kunderian physics, which adds up to the same thing. I could try and pick bits and pieces of the novel that stood out for me. Only I can't. Because I loved everything about it, all equally. Without a single moment when I thought 'Umm, does that really need to be in there'
This for me is Kundera in truly formidable form. And it's no surprise the book was, is, and will continue to be, so popular with readers. And let's face it, would it have been so popular if it wasn't for the sex? I doubt it. But it's so much more than that, and if it isn't one of the best things I end up reading this year, then I've gone completely round the bend!
Thank you Mr Kundera, You're an absolute genius!
March 6, 2008
There are many unbearable things in this book, none of them having to do with the lightness of being. The unbearable misogyny of this book. The unbearable self-importance of this book. I have read this book two or three times because people around me love it, and every time I get the sense that it was written by either a fifteen-year old boy or a narcissistic sociopath with a real knack for language. there is something really comic about the book (which is made incredibly obvious if you ever decide to watch the movie), especially any of the scenes related to seduction/sex. Of course there are very pretty and even poignant parts of the novel, but it is so self-congratulatory and entitled about its own prettiness, it comes off as nothing but clever, and more than a little soulless.
August 22, 2021
قبل از مطالعه این کتاب خوب، فیلم آن به کارگردانی فیلیپ کافمن را دیده بودم. ترس خاصی داشتم و آن این بود که کتاب سانسور شده باشد و مطمئن بودم که شده است؛ به این خاطر اکراه داشتم آن را بخوانم. از طرفی قادر به خواندن نسخه انگلیسی هم نبودم. با سوالاتی که از دوستان پرسیدم تعدادی اکیدا خواندن کتاب را رد کرده بودند و تعدادی با وجود سانسور مطالعه آن را اکیدا توصیه کردند. به هر حال توصیه های به خواندن بیشتر بود و من به آن گوش دادم. در حال حاضر از خواندن کتاب پشیمان نیستم و لذت بردم. با این وجود باز به دوستان خوبم که کتاب را خوانده اند یا نخوانده اند و قصد خواندن دارند، توصیه می کنم که حتما فیلم آن را هم ببینند که خالی از لطف نیست و لذت خاص خود را دارد. هر چند قبول دارم که دنیای فیلم و کتاب متفاوت است و در ضمن در این مورد ویژه، خود کوندرا اذعان کرده است که رمان های او برای اقتباس سینمایی مناسب نیستند اما در ساخت این فیلم به عنوان مشاور همکاری کرده است.
در ضمن فیلم اقتباس خیلی قوی و تاپی نیست. ولی فیلم بدی هم نیست که امتیاز 7.3
IMDB و متااسکور 73 را دارد.
به امید روزگاری آزاد و بدون سانسور برای مملکتمان
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«همرزم من میلان کوندرا رمانهایی نوشت که از آبشخور سنت ادبی ما آب میخوردند، و به دورانی رجوع کرد که تفکر فلسفی و تاریخی بخشی از ادبیات بود و عرضه کنندهی یک دور- نگاه روایی یا پیامبرانه. رمانهای کوندرا، فارغ از پیچیدگی یا بکر بودنشان، با مخاطبان همعصرش سخن میگفتند. آثار او علائم بیماریهای زمانهای را که به آن پای میگذاریم، و باید زمانهای «زیست محیطیتر» باشد، مینمایاند.» روح پراگ. ایوان کلیما. خشایار دیهیمی. ص 180 کتاب
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توما این ضرب المثل آلمانی را با خود زمزمه میکرد: یکبار حساب نیست، یکبار چون هیچ است. فقط یکبار زندگی کردن مانند هرگز زندگی نکردن است. ص 39 کتاب
کتاب به او فرصت گریختن از نوعی زندگی را میداد که هیچ گونه رضایت خاطری از آن نداشت. ص 77 کتاب
چیزی را که نتیجهی یک «انتخاب» نیست نمیتوان شایستگی یا ناکامی تلقی کرد. او معتقد است در برابر چنین وضعی تحمیلی باید رفتار درستی پیش گرفت. به نظرش عصیان در برابر این واقعیت که زن زاده شده است، به اندازهی افتخار به زن بودن ابلهانه است. ص 115 کتاب
باور کن، تنها یک کتاب ممنوع در کشورت، بیشتر از میلیاردها کلمه که دانشگاههای ما بیرون میریزند، معنا و مفهوم دارد. ص 131 کتاب
معنای «در حقیقت زیستن» چیست؟ به سادگی میتوان یک تعریف مثبت از آن ارائه داد: دروغ نگفتن، پنهان کاری نکردن، و هیچ چیزی را مخفی نکردن، در حقیقت زیستن است. ص 142 کتاب
میتوان به پدر و مادر، به همسر، به عشق و به وطن خیانت کرد، اما زمانی که دیگر نه پدر و مادر، نه شوهر، نه عشقی و نه وطنی باقی بماند، به چه چیز میتوان خیانت کرد؟ ص 153 کتاب
اگر بیخبر باشیم، بیگناه هستیم؟ آیا آدم ابلهی که بر اریکهی قدرت تکیه زده است، تنها به عذر جهالت، از هر گونه مسئولیتی مبراست؟ ص 200 کتاب
رمان، اعترافات نویسنده نیست، بلکه کاویدن زندگی بشری در دامی است که جهان نام دارد. ص 238 کتاب
ما هرگز نمیتوانیم با قاطعیت بگوییم که روابط ما با دیگران تا چه حدی از احساسات ما، از عشق ما، از فقدان عشق ما، از لطف و مهربانی ما، و یا از کینه و نفرت ما، سرچشمه میگیرد و تا چه حد از قدرت و ضعف در میان افراد تاثیر میپذیرد. ص 304 کتاب
همهی ما میخواهیم در وجود قدرتمند، یک خطاکار پیدا کنیم و در آدمیزاد ضعیف، یک قربانی بیگناه را بجوییم. ص 327 کتاب
اکنون ترزا همان خوشحالی عجیب و همان غم غریب را احساس میکرد. معنای غم این بود: به آخرین ایستگاه رسیدهایم! معنای خوشحالی این بود: با هم هستیم! غم شکل و خوشحالی محتوا بود و خوشحالی فضای غم را آکنده میساخت. ص 331 کتاب
در ضمن فیلم اقتباس خیلی قوی و تاپی نیست. ولی فیلم بدی هم نیست که امتیاز 7.3
IMDB و متااسکور 73 را دارد.
به امید روزگاری آزاد و بدون سانسور برای مملکتمان
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«همرزم من میلان کوندرا رمانهایی نوشت که از آبشخور سنت ادبی ما آب میخوردند، و به دورانی رجوع کرد که تفکر فلسفی و تاریخی بخشی از ادبیات بود و عرضه کنندهی یک دور- نگاه روایی یا پیامبرانه. رمانهای کوندرا، فارغ از پیچیدگی یا بکر بودنشان، با مخاطبان همعصرش سخن میگفتند. آثار او علائم بیماریهای زمانهای را که به آن پای میگذاریم، و باید زمانهای «زیست محیطیتر» باشد، مینمایاند.» روح پراگ. ایوان کلیما. خشایار دیهیمی. ص 180 کتاب
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توما این ضرب المثل آلمانی را با خود زمزمه میکرد: یکبار حساب نیست، یکبار چون هیچ است. فقط یکبار زندگی کردن مانند هرگز زندگی نکردن است. ص 39 کتاب
کتاب به او فرصت گریختن از نوعی زندگی را میداد که هیچ گونه رضایت خاطری از آن نداشت. ص 77 کتاب
چیزی را که نتیجهی یک «انتخاب» نیست نمیتوان شایستگی یا ناکامی تلقی کرد. او معتقد است در برابر چنین وضعی تحمیلی باید رفتار درستی پیش گرفت. به نظرش عصیان در برابر این واقعیت که زن زاده شده است، به اندازهی افتخار به زن بودن ابلهانه است. ص 115 کتاب
باور کن، تنها یک کتاب ممنوع در کشورت، بیشتر از میلیاردها کلمه که دانشگاههای ما بیرون میریزند، معنا و مفهوم دارد. ص 131 کتاب
معنای «در حقیقت زیستن» چیست؟ به سادگی میتوان یک تعریف مثبت از آن ارائه داد: دروغ نگفتن، پنهان کاری نکردن، و هیچ چیزی را مخفی نکردن، در حقیقت زیستن است. ص 142 کتاب
میتوان به پدر و مادر، به همسر، به عشق و به وطن خیانت کرد، اما زمانی که دیگر نه پدر و مادر، نه شوهر، نه عشقی و نه وطنی باقی بماند، به چه چیز میتوان خیانت کرد؟ ص 153 کتاب
اگر بیخبر باشیم، بیگناه هستیم؟ آیا آدم ابلهی که بر اریکهی قدرت تکیه زده است، تنها به عذر جهالت، از هر گونه مسئولیتی مبراست؟ ص 200 کتاب
رمان، اعترافات نویسنده نیست، بلکه کاویدن زندگی بشری در دامی است که جهان نام دارد. ص 238 کتاب
ما هرگز نمیتوانیم با قاطعیت بگوییم که روابط ما با دیگران تا چه حدی از احساسات ما، از عشق ما، از فقدان عشق ما، از لطف و مهربانی ما، و یا از کینه و نفرت ما، سرچشمه میگیرد و تا چه حد از قدرت و ضعف در میان افراد تاثیر میپذیرد. ص 304 کتاب
همهی ما میخواهیم در وجود قدرتمند، یک خطاکار پیدا کنیم و در آدمیزاد ضعیف، یک قربانی بیگناه را بجوییم. ص 327 کتاب
اکنون ترزا همان خوشحالی عجیب و همان غم غریب را احساس میکرد. معنای غم این بود: به آخرین ایستگاه رسیدهایم! معنای خوشحالی این بود: با هم هستیم! غم شکل و خوشحالی محتوا بود و خوشحالی فضای غم را آکنده میساخت. ص 331 کتاب
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