Quotes from Milan Kundera

It seemed to me an error in reasoning for a man to isolate a woman he loves from all the circumstances in which he met her and in which she lives, to try, with dogged inner concentration, to purify her of everything that is not her self, which is to say also of the story that they lived through together and that gives their love its shape.

In death, Franz at last belonged to his wife. He belonged to her as he had never belonged to her before. Marie-Claude took care of everything: she saw to the funeral, sent out announcements, bought the wreaths, and had a black dress made - a wedding dress, in reality. Yes, a husband's funeral is a wife's true wedding! The climax of her life's work! The reward of her sufferings!

One morning (and it will be soon), when everyone wakes up as a writer, the age of universal deafness and incomprehension will have arrived.

The moment Kafka attracts more attenetion than Joseph K., Kafka's posthumous death begins.

Now he too tried hard to think of something else (it was the only thing they had in common), so as to be able to go on making love to her.

Çünkü herkes ilgisiz bir evren içinde görülüp iÅŸitilmeden yokolup gideceÄŸi düÅŸüncesiyle ac? çekmektedir. Bu yüzden, daha vakit varken, kendisini sözcüklerden oluÅŸan bir evrene dönüÅŸtürmek ister.

A whole life has already been determined at a stage when we didn't know a thing

Cuando uno ataca otro tiene que retroceder, no hay más remedio. La retirada, como todos saben, es la más difícil de las maniobras militares

Se buscan así mismos en las mujeres, buscan su ideal y se ven repetidamente desengañados porque un ideal es como sabemos, aquello que nunca puede encontrarse

You must understand that by this time the only choice was among several varieties of defeat, but the town in question rejected compromise and would settle for nothing but victory. That was not reason talking; that was the voice of litost!

La verdadera prueba de la moralidad de la humanidad, la más honda (situada a tal profundidad que escapa a nuestra percepción), radica en su relación con aquellos que están a su merced: los animales

Plus vaste est le temps que nous avons laissé derrière nous, plus irrésistible est la voix qui nous invite au retour

Co-incidencia significa que dos acontecimientos inesperados ocurren al mismo tiempo, que se encuentran

Love is the glorification of the present

The life we've left behind us has a bad habit of stepping out of the shadows, of bringing complaints to us, of taking us to court.

La historia es igual de leve que una vida humana singular, insoportablemente leve, leve como una pluma, como el polvo que flota, como aquello que mañana ya no existirá.

En travaux pratiques de physique, n'importe quel collégien peut faire des expériences pour vérifier l'exactitude d'une hypothèse scientifique. Mais l'homme, parce qu'il n'a qu'une seule vie, n'a aucune possibilité de vérifier l'hypothèse par l'expérience de sorte qu'il ne saura jamais s'il a eu tort ou raison d'obéir à son sentiment. (partie I, ch. 16)

Alas, I found no guarantee I would have acted any better; but how has that affected my relationship with others? The consciousness of my own baseness has done nothing to reconcile me to the baseness of others. Nothing is more repugnant to me than brotherly feelings grounded in the common baseness people see in one another. I have no desire for that slimy brotherhood.

That idea would be embarrassing because there is something excessive about it, it would take to much energy to defend (while the best possible progressive idea, so to speak, defends itself)...

No esta obsesionado por las mujeres, esta obsesionado por lo que hay en cada una de ellas de inimaginable, esta obsesionado por esa millonésima diferencial que distingue a una mujer de las demás mujeres

Pero cuando a uno le llama la atención una mujer, hace todo lo posible para entrar en relación con ella, al menos de un modo indirecto, mediante alguna estratagema, para tomar contacto al menos desde lejos con su mundo y ponerlo en movimiento.

There is no perfection, only life

Behind Communism, Fascism, behind all occupations and invasions lurks a more basic, pervasive evil, and that the image of that evil was a parade of people marching by with raised fists and shouting syllables in unison. p. 100

Her life was split. Both day and night were competing for her.