Buy The Unbearable Lightness of Being: A Novel and get The Book of Laughter and Forgetting at an additional 5% off Amazon.com's everyday low price.

Buy Together Today: $21.76

One Hundred Years of Solitude (P.S.) by Gabriel Garcia Marquez  (36)  $10.17

Immortality (Perennial Classics) by Milan Kundera  (66)  $11.20

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers  (899)  $10.17

The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Two-Disc Special Edition) DVD ~ Daniel Day-Lewis  (102)  $19.99

The Joke (Definitive Version) by Milan Kundera  (36)  $11.16

› Explore similar items : Books (49) Movies & TV (1)

From AudioFile
Jonathan Oliver employs a husky-voiced tone that proves the right match for this darkish story, one that requires of listeners a dollop of patience. Set first in Czechoslovakia, then in Switzerland, Kundera's story tells the sometimes laborious story of a womanizing Czech surgeon forced to flee the Russian invasion and take on menial roles, giving his passion for the flesh a slighly different perspective, as he is no longer a doctor but just a window-washer. His relationship with this current female-of-choice, the interesting and puzzling Tereza, is at the center of the novel. Oliver is good, very good, pausing with great effect, having just the right amount of low-key drama and contemplative musing in his narration. He's a good fit for a book that not everyone will like, but those who stay the course will generally be pleased they did. T.H. (c) AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

-- Jim Miller, Newsweek
"Kundera has raised the novel of ideas to a new level of dreamlike lyricism and emotional intensity."

See all Editorial Reviews

First Sentence:
The idea of eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other philosophers with it: to think that everything recurs as we once experienced it, and that the recurrence itself recurs as infinitum! Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
part dissimilarity, bulrush basket, unbearable lightness, muss sein, girl with the glasses, big chin, man with the rifle, chief surgeon Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Grand March, Petrin Hill, May Day, New York, Anna Karenina, Soviet Union, Two Thousand Words, Red Army, Academy of Fine Arts, Communist Party, Ministry of the Interior, Old Testament, Old Town Hall, President Carter, Second World War, Short Dictionary of Misunderstood Words, Son of God New!
Books on Related Topics |