The name above is totally new to me. Ive never heard of this French-Czech novelist until recently when my friend Saras got us this book from India. Only then i knew he was a popular author with a number of interesting books. And the book she bought is titled THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING.
I thought the title itself was pretty interesting because why should Lightness be Unbearable ??? hmm...so i had to read it ...though i had an array of exciting books by Osho to begin with, I decided to read this one first. Yes, just because i was curious about how lightness could be unbearable ??
As i read through the first few chapters, i realised that it was not going to be easy grasping the essence of this book. His writing was in such a way that you need to pay full attention to every line and every chapter to be able to put the story together.
The story mainly takes place in Prague in the 1960s and 1970s set among the Czech community living during the Communist era. Its about a husband and wife and a dog. I will not get into the details of the story line here. I am still fascinated by the thought of lightness being unbearable !! so i will get straight to that! haha...
OK, the writer has taken an opposite view of Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy of eternal recurrence which means life is an eternal happening, similar to the Hindus belief that life has no end or beginning. Whatever ends....begins and whatever begins ...ends...so life goes on and on and we return again and again to life.
So as an alternative idea, the writer has built the base of this story with an understanding that life happens only once. We are born to live just once and it ends there when we die. So the lightness comes in knowing that we do not have to come back again and again to this world. So that was the whole idea....i can understand why anyone that has to live through an invasion and its aftermath might feel that coming back to this world is heavy! Yes...now i get the story and the title!
The lightness comes in knowing this is all happening just once and we are done with it forever! So, what does it matter if we break some rules, or go with our feelings...not bothering about humiliations or whatsoever pain inflicted upon us. Sounds reasonable doesn't it :)
But then, i see it this way, lightness is when we know that we are true to our heart no matter what the circumstances are. Whether life is a one time thing or recurrence, i don't know, but to me lightness is when we can go to sleep every night not feeling guilty or regret, waking up with no fear and going through the day without a mind full of contradictions or conflicts.
Still its not even about doing big things like charity, or hugging patients or rescuing animals or planting trees....no...just about having gone through the day with love. Nothing deliberate about it. Just being loving...to those around me ...people or animal or things...just being me is enough. That is lightness! What could be lighter than being yourself!
Heavy is when we go against our heart.
Light is when we go with it....that's my simple conclusion!
So, it was an interesting read. Tough one, but worth it!
have a light day :)
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