by (c) LibraD 2013

I have been trying to read more classics lately. I still have a destiny (or doom) which is tightly tied up with Ulysses by James Joyce, which I have so far failed to read. As I can’t stand not being able to read something, I have placed this book on a most prominent spot in my house. There it sits glaring at me accusingly, obviously wondering when I shall pick it up and finally devour its pages. It is a battle that keeps me occupied, but I really will succeed in the end. I must!

Now in my previous post I mentioned a book that is probably one of the most important books I’ve ever read, at least it is that for me, and therefore I cannot leave it ‘unblogged’. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera is a book that I re-read at least once a year. I’ve been told it is a very difficult book to read, but I have never had any problems with it. It basically is a love story between a man and a woman, however Kundera has put a little twist in it. He doesn’t just tell this story, but he also relates of the intimate feelings and the meaning of these feelings behind the scenes. It is almost like watching a play, while the director is sitting next to you explaining why the actors turn this way or that, what they giggled about in the last rehearsal, where the light comes from and who’s taking care of the food in the mid-break.

In his way Kundera turns this relatively simply, love-story into a psychological and philosophical masterpiece, in which the sounds of Tereza’s stomach are the start of a quest to find out what is more unbearable, lightness or heaviness. The actual exploration of this does not truly start after Tereza has left Thomas in Vienna and he suffers the extreme levity of his situation, Tereza having weighed him down for years with her jealousy and need for comfort and confirmation, and now, being freed of this, he finds that this is not the “easy-out” that he had been searching for.

Kundera seeks to prove with this story that lightness, the possibility to make your own choices, to design your own destiny, is much harder on the soul than heaviness, no choice, no own design would be. Simply put; when one can choose, then the choices weigh on the soul; when one has no choice, it’s a form of freedom as the responsibility has been taken away. When Tereza leaves Thomas in Vienna, he is suddenly free to pursue his romances and one-night stands without fear of discovery, without the knowledge that he hurts her and without her eyes on him when he returns to their house. But for the first time in his life, Thomas has no real longing for any woman, his soul is weighing him down as he wanders through the streets of Vienna and memories of Tereza haunt him.

Thomas chooses to follow Tereza back to Prague and when he stands in front of her in the door opening of their apartment he is suddenly so full of resentment against this relationship that he cannot speak. Tereza can’t speak either as she is weighed down with longing and, at the same time, fear of the future. The ‘heaviness’ of their relationship is of such a form that they stare at each other for minutes without being able to speak, both silenced by the heaviness of their souls and hearts.

Thomas’ need for physical release is what drives Tereza to search for a similar release. However she cannot separate physical need from emotional bonds and she finds it hard to cope with the act of it, feeling the need to cry out “Stop” before the act is through. The lightness of Thomas’ approach to the physical deed is what weighs most on her mind, and when she tries to copy this but fails, she feels lost and dreams of Thomas taking her on a trip to a mountain, where killers, hired by Thomas await her to finish her life. She is taken by them to choose the spot where she wants to be killed, however before the end, she breaks down in tears and tells them she wants to live.Once she has said this, the killers retreat, it is her choice to make. “We can only do it if you want it to be done” they say which has a strong opposite sound to Thomas’ “You know you want to” before she is ushered to climb the mountain by him.

The relationship between these two is of so many dimensions that I could keep going on writing about it. But it was not my intention to re-write this book, just to write about it. Kundera’s approach to the lightness of being, which to him is unbearable and much harder then heaviness is, for me, an ultimately lovely way of looking at life.

This is also exactly what drew my attention when first reading this book. I was seventeen and the world was still lying open for me, with so many choices to be made, so many possibilities out there for me to explore. The heaviness and (at the same time) joy that this brings is nearly impossible to bear, as you’re making the decisions for the rest of your life. Whatever you will become, whatever you will find yourself doing later in life, it all starts there… And that’s a heavy burden to carry, even if we’re not quite aware of it. There’s a reason why young adults have the urge to be unpredictable, grumpy and stand-offish. They might not realise it, but they are on the verge of the rest of their lives and all they do will change the future line of their possibilities.

Now I am 35 and although the world is still open, the amount of choices one can make is smaller and harder to achieve. When reading this book now I read it differently, I no longer have the levity of too many choices, I have moved towards the “Es soll sein” of Beethoven’s symphony, even if I’m not completely there yet. And this is normal; while we live our lives we slowly move from levity to heaviness. This is not a heaviness that weighs on the soul, it is a comfort, a blanket in which we curl up before we leave this life. Once one reaches the end of one’s life, one also reaches that ultimate “Es soll sein” as the choices become fewer and fewer. I’m sure that I will still read this book when I reach that age (be it with glasses or maybe even a magnifying glass), and again I will read it differently then.

The other reason why this book has claimed my utter devotion is the way Kundera mixes the storyline with his little philosophical debates. He relates of the story in simple, to-the-fact, sentences, which are then torn apart into bite-size bits and pieces, to be investigated from every angle. I absolutely loved his use of Beethoven, in which the phrase “Ja, es soll sein.” illustrates his explanation of the heaviness in life. And how lovely to be using Beethoven’s lighthearted joke, that turned into a heavy-set symphony, as an illustration to this story that so focusses on exactly those extremes.

Another loveliness, although this might just be my silly head, is that the story and the philosophical pieces are written down in small, easy to handle, chapters. Although normally I love to finish a book in the minimum required time (and usually less than that), with this book it is nice to be able to read a couple of short chapters and then mull it over. I usually read the book alongside another book, something simpler or something fantasy or science fiction. It is the only book I don’t finish in one night and for me that’s special!

So, as the title says, this should have been a piece about me and the classics. And although The Unbearable Lightness of Being seems to have taken over the piece, I do not want to leave it at that. There are so many books that have haunted my mind and my sleep, some of them have changed the way I look at things, some have altered how I see myself, and some were ‘just’ of such beauty and delicateness that I could probably go on forever talking about them. I will just have to save this for a next blog then!

*Editor’s Note: The featured picture is from the film adaptation of Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being.