Reviews

A Insustentável Leveza do Ser, by Milan Kundera

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wearyoctopus's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Even if you're struggling in the middle, read to the very end. It's worth it.

sassylk's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This was slightly disappointing to me - I read it very fast, but I wasn’t sure that I was enjoying it per se. I don’t know what to make of it, which makes me feel like I haven’t understood it all that well. It felt very modernist, with the author’s voice coming through at points to remind us of its fictional identity, as well as the weaving in of dreams into the main narrative. I liked some of the messages - ‘happiness is the desire for repetition’ is a beautiful idea, and there was a lot of very interesting philosophy explored within it; the idea of body and soul, good and evil, light vs weight. I liked the motifs that echoed throughout - ‘es muss sein’ felt really beautiful. However, I think my problem may lie with the actual narrative itself. I didn’t really care about the characters, I found them slightly interchangeable, even if they were realistic they still didn’t feel 100% fleshed out. There was a lot that Kundera was trying to do with them, but the story was also disarmingly simple, which might appeal to some but I found it tiresome. I guess that’s sort of the point - repetition is found in everyday humanity, the combination of the very simple outside vs the very complex interior monologue is an interesting modernist idea, and one that appeals to me in theory, but in practise I found (at least in this case) that this theme bordered on pretentious quite a lot of the time. I don’t know if I’ll spend a lot of time thinking about it in the future, but if I do, maybe I’ll move my 3 stars to a 3.5. We’ll see.

zabs90's review against another edition

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challenging dark sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

likewhereisshe's review against another edition

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reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No

2.75

ana_az_books's review against another edition

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4.0

My friend asked me to help him with a paper on this book. That's why I have discussion questions here.

Tomas' application of erotic friendships and rule of threes:
I'm not sure, but I think this is the objective of Tomas' affairs. Like he has affairs to find out what's hidden and special about each woman he sleeps with. Anyway, Tomas' rule of threes was either to see a woman only after three weeks after the last time he has seen her, or to see a woman three times in succession but then to never see her again after that. This is so that he won't form too much of a bond with the women which could ruin his objective view of them.

Tereza's dream of naked women in the swimming pool:
Tereza dreamt of marching, smiling and singing with other naked women and if one of them missed a step, Tomas would shoot them, and they would fall into a pool that's behind them, and the remaining women would cheer. This dream combined Tereza's dislike of Tomas's affairs and her mother's treatment of the body. Tereza's mother treated the body as nothing special since everybody has one. She would walk around naked in her house with the curtains open, fart in public, etc. Tereza wanted to guard her body like she would guard her soul. In the dream, being naked with other women was a sign that she wasn't special, her body wasn't special. Tomas has sex with her as he does with other women.

Tereza's dream of a cat; meaning of a cat:
Tereza dreamt of having a cat attack her, scratching her face. The meaning of a cat was another woman. In this case, Tomas's other women

Sabina's paintings as on the surface an intelligible lie; underneath the unintelligible truth" or as her paintings as "double exposures”:
Her kind of paintings started as an accident, paint dripped onto one of her paintings. I think this is her way of doing her own thing while still seemingly doing what is acceptable to society. Like she liked Picasso's style but in school, she was told to only use realism. She hides who she really is through her paintings, the ones underneath them