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Loading... Identity (1998)by Milan Kundera
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Ӕ Kundera explores a question we all face, who am I? It's simple on the surface but extremely complex and nuanced. Kundera goes there. He peels the simple explanations and explores the more complex second thoughts. Yes, it changes, especially with your present mode. It's not constant, but it's always there, it won't go away. The amazing thing is that Kundera helps us explore by looking at someone else's exploration. Perhaps it's always easier when you can detach yourself from it and think this applies to them and not really you. But that's the magic, it's all about you. Just the names have been changed to allow you some deniability. You don't have to admit he's talking about the truth of everyone's existence. Fascinating trick. And done by a Czech, probably thinking in Czech, writing in French, and then translated by someone else into English. Amazing that it still rings true despite all the hoops it's gone through. Chantal's the central character, her first marriage ended in divorce long ago. Her young son died at five years old, and she was feeling family pressure to have another. She resisted having sex with her husband to rebel against the pressure. Finding a lover, Jean-Marie, she quickly ended the marriage. She's been living with Jean-Marie for years. Is it time to marry? She's getting older, and let Jean-Maire know she's noticed that men no longer look at her. Suddenly, letters appear in her mailbox without going through the postal system. Someone is watching her. She's intrigued and puts the letters in the drawer where she stores her brassieres, under them, and does not tell Jean-Marie about them. The letters keep coming and contain details that make her wonder who could be sending them and how they know so much about her. They're signed C.D.B. She begins to suspect neighbors and people standing in the street. She gets aroused by them and even purchases a red slip at their suggestion. She realizes C.D.B. stands for Cyrano du Bergerac, the famous fictional person who hides both his identity and his love for Roxanne. Eventually she realizes the author must be Jean-Marie, who has clearly discovered that she keeps the letters in her drawer. Rather than being flattered, she is insulted that Jean-Marie has violated her private space and confronts him. How Kundera works out where this is going keeps us wondering. I'll only say there's a plot twist at the end which changes everything. I recommend reading it. Love story between Chantal and Jean-Marc existing in the fine line between love and the insecurity and panic of losing it. It feels very fragile, the relationship could disintegrate because of a suspicion that makes them question if they know each other. Very humane, lays bare how fragile we are to ourselves and others and how we carry our pasts with us.
Ein schönes Buch sicherlich, eine angenehm melancholische Lektüre für ein paar Stunden. Und ein Buch, das uns dazu anregt, wieder einmal nach seinen alten Meisterwerken zu greifen. Awards
Sometimes - perhaps only for an instant - we fail to recognise a companion; for a moment their identity ceases to exist, and thus we come to doubt our own. The effect is at its most acute in a couple where our existence is given meaning by our perception of a lover, and theirs of us. With his astonishing skill at building on and out from the significant moment, Kundera has placed such a situation and the resulting wave of panic at the core of the novel. In a narrative as intense as it is brief, a moment of confusion sets in motion a complex chain of events which forces the reader to cross and recross the divide between fantasy and reality. Profound, sad and disquieting but above all a love story, Identity provides further proof of Kundera's astonishing gifts as a novelist. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)891.868354Literature Literature of other languages Literature of east Indo-European and Celtic languages West and South Slavic languages (Bulgarian, Slovene, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Serbo-Croatian, and Macedonian) Czech Czech miscellany 1450–1620LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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