The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Rating:
Summary: Over-rated, but not bad. Typical Kundera.
Review: Anyone who has read any Kundera knows what to expect - narrative, history, and philosophical musings mixed into an "experimental" novel. They will not be disappointed (or perhaps they will, if that's not what they were looking for).

For those new to Kundera, a few words of advice. If you don't like one of his books, you won't like any of his others, except for possibly some of his earlier ones. If you like one, you'll most likely like the rest. Kundera is smart - very smart - though possibly not as much as he thinks he is (some of his profound-sounding quotes take a way-too-large logical leap). The essence of his novels is not in the narrative but in the surrouding essays. The plot can almost never be condensed to a few sentences. The "I" in much of his works is him, Kundera himself, regardless of what some lit-critters want you to think. Finally, Kundera's books are intellectual, demanding, rewarding, and insufferable.

On to The Unbearable Lightness of Being. All you've come to expect from Kundera is there - the musings on kitsch are among his best; discussion of eternal return is insightful (pay particular attention to his remark about not rehearsing for life), sex is everywhere (and, in his books, should be), the dream (or is it?) on the hill is absolutely brilliant, and on and on.

But there are flaws - unavoidable, classical Kunderan flaws. First, he fails to convince the reader that lightness is bad and weight is good. *All* the characters are wretched, whether they're light like Tomas and Sabina or heavy like Tereza, Franz, the son, the editor, and others.

Next - and this occurs every time in his books - Kundera has no timing, and chooses not to. It is my personal opinion that the only purposes of literature are 1) to make the reader think and 2) hit the reader's emotions. Kundera disdains the emotions (he hates feelings and is an uber-rationalist) and for some reason chooses not to go for part 1, either. Let me explain. Assuming the purposes of literature are those listed, then books that hit the reader's emotions or thoughts harder are the "better" books. The point should be to hit harder and harder. How to do so - by building up to one climactic point, such as when Winston betrays Julia in the face of the rats, when the boys burn down to island to kill Ralph, when Yossarian wanders through the dregs of humanity, and on and on.

But Kundera purposefully puts the climax of his books before the ending (he wants his works to be like a "feast" not a "bicycle race"), with the result that the reader is enchanted by the beginning but let down by the end. If Kundera ended "Being" with Franz's death or the dream-not-a-dream sequence in Part 4, if Kundera ended "The Book of Laughter and Forgetting" with Tamina's drowning, if Kundera ended "Immortality" with Agnes's death, these three books would have been raised from, in my scale, "very good" to "one of the best books I have read."

Rating:
Summary: Tragic, Insightful
Review: Anyone with a background in philosophy might do a double take upon reading the title of this book; "Being" is not typically thought of as being unbearably light but as heavy. The difference in this book is that for Kundera, amidst the Communist invasion of Czechoslovakia, our being becomes utterly without weight, devoid of substantive meaning.

The book begins with Kundera explaining Nietzsche's idea of the eternal return (and Kundera is incredibly well read, citing not just philosophy but religion and mythology as well): the only way that anything can have any meaning is if it can be repeated. Since this life cannot be repeated, the question becomes whether or not this life can have any meaning? Kundera does not give an answer to that question, choosing to instead flesh out his characters by not only giving philosophical weight - no pun intended - to the narrative, but by giving psychological insights on their motives and actions.

It is hard to say what the real narrative of the book is. Is it the meaninglessness with which Tomas engages in his endless womanizing? Is it the utter falsehood that Tomas tries to make real in claiming that sex has nothing to do with love? Despite his telling his wife that his womanizing has no effect on his love for her, it could easily be argued that what makes his promiscuity so depthless is the fact that he has no love for anyone. In the end, we see that the body and the soul are intimately connected, not divorced from one another. The interweaving of these multiple narratives is part of what makes the book so insightful.

The book would be little more than a trashy (at points) psychological romance novel, however, if it weren't set in the Communist invasion of Czechoslovakia; indeed, it is the psychological and philosophical insights that are born of the experience of Communism that give the book its weight. Communism's utopian ideology was so fanatical as to be murderous - similarities between this and violent religious fundamentalists today beg for comparison - and was utterly indifferent to the particular people in the particular countries that it imposed itself upon. Communism is the socio-political embodiment of the indifference of someone such as Tomas and as such is horrifically insightful.

The unbearable lightness of being is heavy; this is not a bad pun, but a recognition of the tremendous irony of it all. The isolation and erasure of meaningful, particular histories in a world devoid of giving and listening renders everything unbearably light: and therefore unavoidably and oppressively heavy. Substantive notions such as love lose all of their substance; to borrow from Marx, "all that is solid melts into air."

Kundera's book is both well written and incredibly tragic. Ideology at the expense of humanity - either your own or another's (or both!) - is at the root of any soul/body dualism: the infidelity between lovers or the totalitarianism of Communism (and isn't Communism simply soul/body dualism politically imposed on a mass scale?). Such soul/body dualism is nothing more than the imaginings of philosophers; the unbearable lightness of being cannot help but to become indifferent, oppressive and violent.

Rating:
Summary: Unbearable to let go...
Review: I almost feel sad that I have finished this book! In my opinion, a much better book than "The Book of Laughter and Forgetting" - I cared more about the characters, and the descriptions were clenching and vibrant. It grabbed on to my melancholy self, which is the most European part of me... Sabina, Franz, Thereza and Thomas (+Karenin the dog!) were so delicately, yet strongly presented - the only drawback (or is it?) was that I pictured the actors from the movie as the written characters - it became impossible for me to think of Thereza without seeing Juliette Binoche! The settings were also well characterized - I mused over the various American comments and reflections in particular. I especially liked the description of New York as a place of "beauty by mistake" as compared to the well-planned, "rigid" beauty of European architecture (Sabina loves it, Franz does not). Part of the tactics described of the Communist Regime reminded me of Orwell's 1984. This is certainly a book I will read again some day! Highly recommended!

Rating:
Summary: read it
Review: I should first say that this is the first Milan Kundera book I've read and it was not as scary/difficult/intense as I thought it might be. Kundera's writing has an almost fairy taleish feel to it that makes the story rather inviting. I think Kundera's skill is the ability to create characters and situations that most people can identify with. Everyone I know who's read this book finds elements of himself in one or a combination of the characters. Kundera articulates emotions infinitely better than I do in my own head, which makes the reading pretty cathartic.

The book is divided into seven sections of short, sometimes dense, yet digestbile chapters. It took me about 4 days to read, but you could spend weeks going over and over it. I really recommend it.

If you want to know a little about the substance of the book read on:

The beginning section is devoted to explanation. The difficulty in human existence, Kundera writes, is that life only happens once and thus nothing, bad or good, ever returns or repeats itself. Depending on one's perspective this makes life either fantastically liberating or unbearably pointless and insignificant (and thus the title).
Tomas is caught between his wife Tereza, who despises feeling insignificant and longs for substance and value in life, and his mistress Sabina, who thrives in life's lightness and rejects any inkling of imposed burden. Tomas is unclear what to do. Does one want the freedom of nothingness or the substance of burden? Which makes a man feel more real? Most of the book tells the events and and dynamics of the two couples.

The final (and very creative) section section of the book ties things up beautifully. It tells the story Tereza and her relationship with Karenin, Tomas and Tereza's dog. Kundera opens the section with a recap of man being expelled from Paradise, which, he reminds us, immediately prompts the human obsession with right and wrong, moral and immoral, tasteful and distasteful, embarassment and comfortability. Animals, however, were not expelled from Paradise and therefore don't worry at all about such issues. Unlike humans, Karenin does not want progress or improvement or success or achievement. Karenin wants the same thing every day from his masters: a walk and his food.

Rating:
Summary: Love Story as a Philosophy Text Book
Review: Kundera is a fascinating author. A product of the Czech Republic when it was a satellite nation of the Soviet Union (and called Czechoslovakia), this book deals with the 1968 "Prague Spring"- a time when things seemed to be lightening up in Czechoslovakia. Its a book of the decisions that a woman must make, and how she deals with her surroundings. This book is a combination of a lot of things, hard to understand at times but utterly relevant, in today's world and for thousands of years from now. There's a lot of philosophy as well, which deals with the way people live, and how we live our own. How are our lives shaped by events we are able or unable to control? Kundera really understands men and women, and love as well. Like its title, The Unbearable Lightness of Being is full of contradictions. It was the kind of book I had to read several times in order to understand what Kundera was saying. Even now there are some things I don't quite grasp about this novel. I had to allocate a lot of time in order to re-read it. Also recommended: The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, also by Kundera.

Rating:
Summary: Ain't it a little overrated?
Review: Milan Kundera employs his trademark meditative, philosophical writing style in his, novel "The unbearable lightness of being". If you are looking for a flowing cohesive storyline, look elsewhere, for this book is essentially a book of musings and inner speculations based loosely on the themes of love and infidelity. The story revolves around two couples, Franz and Sabina, Tomas and Tereza and their attempts at infidelity and betrayal of love.

The book makes for an interesting, light-hearted read, which inevitably sets you to ponder over some of the issues raised. Milan Kundera approaches certain subjects from pretty unconventional ways of thinking, such as those on the kitsch, the duality of soul and body, weight and lightness and the non-recurring nature of life. He exposes you to a plethora of perspectives and compels you to question your own beliefs and viewpoints. The narrative is unimportant here. Removing the veil of the flimsy storyline, what you get is what Milan intends to explore - the essence of "being". Though this book may have come from a Czech writer, with various allusions to Czech history and its way of life, the topics discussed are universal and will resonate with any reader in any part of the world.

I was touched by the last chapter, "Karenin's smile" (which related the death of a dog) and amused by the chapter "Words Misunderstood" (which offered contrasting viewpoints on a single topic). "The unbearable lightness of being" is yet another book which deserves a re-reading, for only so will you uncover and better appreciate many of the gems hidden in the pages. "3 stars" for I expected much more out of the book - perhaps something heavier and more gripping. Nevertheless the novel is one of the more representative reads of Czech literature.


Rating:
Summary: No Meta for Milan
Review: No doubt Kundera's most famous book,_Unbearable_'s fame seems more derived from its subject than its form. The novel more overtly deals with erotic/romantic love than many of Kundera's other works, a great commerical sell, but fails to convincingly stamp out a more transcendental meaning. Sure the amazing Kundera-esque insights abound, but they are somehow are unable to overcome a certain levity and at times frivolity, like old-wives tales that go in one ear and out the other. Perhaps this was Kundera's attempt to justify and invoke the title of the novel, but no matter how witty, it leaves the reader feeling at times patronized. To me Kundera's gift lies not in his ability to manipulate words, but as a writer who both seeks and is able to evoke tremendous understanding and empathy from his readers. This intent is more explicit in his best work,_The Book of Laughter and Forgetting_, which I highly recommend along with "The Hitchhiker's Game" in the short story volume _Laughable Loves_. But nonetheless read the novel before seeing the movie, which in all honesty, you could do without.

Rating:
Summary: Spell-binding
Review: The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera is the uncanny, carefully structured, multi-layered love story I greatly cherished. More than a love story, the Unbearable Lightness is a full exploration into love and human relationships including disappointment, guilt, devotion and how lovers can grow to hate one another. Tomas is a respected surgeon in Prague, Czechoslovakia, with a die-hard habit of womanizing. Tereza an unhappy, mistreated girl from a small town outside of Prague, is one of his women. Tomas marries her out of a combination of love and pity. Tomas' desire to be a responsible husband creates a conflict with his lifestyle as Tereza's need and adulation of Tomas conflicts with her guilt of changing his lifestyle with Sabina, Tomas's favorite mistress intruding and enjoying it, all creating a spectrum of emotions, all studied and explained from several angles by Kundera, our gentle narrator who simultaneously presents Freudian, metaphysical and historical perspectives. Meanwhile, the book is given a political layer as Communist Russia takes hold of the books' backdrop of Prague. The Unbearable Lightness of Being is unlike any other book I have read. Kundera dissects emotions with the care of a surgeon and the grace of a maestro. Unbearable Lightness is an unforgettable, lyrical and life-altering novel.

Rating:
Summary: The Unbearable Lightness of Being
Review: The Unbearable Lightness of Being is an interesting mix of social commentary, history lesson and relationship examination all rolled into one novel that is told, not by a narrator, but by Kundera himself.

The lightness of being is at the focal point of this novel. We are first presented with a brief essay-like section on whether life is a light or a heavy experience, and if it differs for others. He uses historical figures as evidence as to the weight of life, some, like Parmenides, consider life to be a light burden, as 'lightness' is positive and so is being alive, and Nietzsche appears to agree, though for very different reasons. Throughout the novel, Kundera takes over the narration to discuss, contrast and compare the actions of the characters as regards to the philosophy of great men, trying to determine whether life is in fact light or heavy. The conclusion he seems to come to is that it is up to the person themselves to decide, and after that, to decide which out of light or heavy is the negative aspect.

In terms of story, most of the activity centres around Tomas and Tereze, who met through a bizarre sequence of activities. In another show of polarity, Tereze considers these amazing coincidences proof that they should be together forever, whereas as Tomas thinks it means that their relationship will be as fleeting and ephemeral as the chance of them ever meeting. We also get to see on of Tomas' (many) mistresses, Sabine, although the details of her life are presented more to understand Tomas.

About halfway through the novel, we are taken on an excursion into the way life was in Czechoslovakia, with the threat of the Russians and communism, and the way people were deluded. This part is interesting from a historical and social aspect, as our heroes are involved in the proceedings, but thankfully the author does not let his own political ideology take over the narrative at the expense of the characters.

Since we are being told this story by Kundera and not some nameless, faceless narrator, the writing is very playful, tangential and casual. Many things are explained then further explained in brackets (like so), which might seem like the author is bashing our head with the point he is trying to make, but it never comes across as this. Rather, we are thankful for such personal insight.

The book can be very sad, and very weighty, but most of the time it remains light-weight and playful - thus mimicking the subject matter and narrative structure of the story itself. The insight into the Czechoslovakia as a nation and as people is quite interesting also, but as said above, the focus remains on Tomas and Tereze's relationship, and through that, an analysis of all relationship's is made.

Rating:
Summary: The lightness and heaviness of love
Review: There was a time when Milan Kundera was the be-all, end-all in writers for me. He found a way to mix philosophy with everyday banalities with seemingly random events with an obsession for the intriguing other with history with surreal characters popping in and out of multiple threaded stories. I have moved on but not moved from the opinion that Kundera is a great writer. The Unbearable Lightness of Being is a book I've recently returned to and this is what I found.

I have read the majority of Kundera's works and find that though he is best known for "The Unbearable Lightness," it is not his best works. The story is intriguing and you will found yourself twisted into the lives of Tereza and Tomas, Franz and Sabina, and the St. Bernard Karenin. A few of Kundera's philosophical detours didn't hold me as the reader rapt and the writing space could have been better served expanded on some of the more relevant thinking threads throughout the book. The writing is quite adept, the chapters broken up into 2-5 page vignettes which keep the book moving and make it a perfect one to read aloud with a significant other. You find yourself getting in the skin, heart, soul, and head of Tereza and Tomas. When you find yourself there, you find one can't escape the inescapable pull of attraction between two people regardless of circumstance regardless of will regardless of the balance or imbalance of heaviness or lightness in your relative world.

Don't miss reading Kundera's "The Unbearable Lightness of Being." If you aren't thoroughly impressed with the writing style it will make you think and feel just a little more for just a little while.
--MMW