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eva_azaz 's review for:
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
by Milan Kundera
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come.
This was so strange… It talks about so much: the weight we accord to our actions, the dichotomy of body and soul, kitsch and politics, disgust and pleasure… Lots and lots to think about. Some parts of it were so very strange (my favorite being the “theodicy of shit”), some parts blindingly wise, and yet other parts I could personally identify with. It was also extremely self aware and I thoroughly enjoyed Kundera’s fourth-wall-breaking digressions about writing novels. Just like life I guess, this has a bit of everything.
Also huge Anna Karenina spoiler which made me really mad…
There are so many quotes I want to keep for my records so I’ll just put them here.
About overproduction of knowledge:
Culture is perishing in overproduction, in an avalanche of words, in the madness of quantity. That's why one banned book in your former country means infinitely more than the billions of words spewed out by our universities.
About writing:
The novel is not the author's confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become.
About history:
Einmal ist keinmal. What happens but once might as well not have happened at all. The history of the Czechs will not be - repeated, nor will the history of Europe. The history of the Czechs and of Europe is a pair of sketches from the pen of mankind's fateful inexperience. History is as light as individual human life, unbearably light, light as a feather, as dust swirling into the air, as whatever will no longer exist tomorrow.
This was so strange… It talks about so much: the weight we accord to our actions, the dichotomy of body and soul, kitsch and politics, disgust and pleasure… Lots and lots to think about. Some parts of it were so very strange (my favorite being the “theodicy of shit”), some parts blindingly wise, and yet other parts I could personally identify with. It was also extremely self aware and I thoroughly enjoyed Kundera’s fourth-wall-breaking digressions about writing novels. Just like life I guess, this has a bit of everything.
Also huge Anna Karenina spoiler which made me really mad…
There are so many quotes I want to keep for my records so I’ll just put them here.
About overproduction of knowledge:
Culture is perishing in overproduction, in an avalanche of words, in the madness of quantity. That's why one banned book in your former country means infinitely more than the billions of words spewed out by our universities.
About writing:
The novel is not the author's confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become.
About history:
Einmal ist keinmal. What happens but once might as well not have happened at all. The history of the Czechs will not be - repeated, nor will the history of Europe. The history of the Czechs and of Europe is a pair of sketches from the pen of mankind's fateful inexperience. History is as light as individual human life, unbearably light, light as a feather, as dust swirling into the air, as whatever will no longer exist tomorrow.