Diving headfirst into the most famous Czech book in English: Milan Kundera's The Unbearable Lightness of Being (I have Complicated Feelings)
Ukraine Links:
-Victoria Amelina essay ("Nothing Bad Has Ever Happened"): [ Ссылка ]
-Razom (emergency response): [ Ссылка ]
Books & Articles Mentioned:
-The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera (translated from Czech by Michael Henry Heim)
-The Joke by Milan Kundera (translated from Czech by Michael Henry Heim, Aaron Asher, and Milan Kundera—it's a long story)
-Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (translated from Russian by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky)
-The Art of the Novel by Milan Kundera (translated from French by Linda Asher)
-Granta Interview with Ian McEwan (translated from French by Ian Patterson): [ Ссылка ]
-"The Tragedy of Central Europe" by Milan Kundera (translated from French by Edmund White): [ Ссылка ]
-Discourse on Colonialism by Aimé Césaire (translated from French by Joan Pinkham): [ Ссылка ]
-"Goodbye, Eastern Europe!" by Jacob Mikanowski: [ Ссылка ]
-"The Power of the Powerless" by Václav Havel (translated from Czech by Paul Wilson): [ Ссылка ]
-"Mystification as an Artistic Strategy in Milan Kundera's Work" by Jan Čulík: [ Ссылка ]
-Kunderovské paradoxy by Milan Jungmann: [ Ссылка ]
My channel is de-monetized for now (I haven't hit the threshold for annual views needed), so if you'd like to support these videos in a monetary way, you can buy me a $3 coffee here! (once or monthly): [ Ссылка ]
Bookshop.org (US): [ Ссылка ]
Blackwell's (UK, free US shipping): [ Ссылка ]
[Note: These are affiliate links. No pressure at all to buy from these sources (or to buy books in the first place), but if you do choose to buy through these links, I'll receive a small portion of the sale with no further cost to you.]
My thumbnails are designed by My Brilliant Friend, Matthew Sciarappa (you can find his bookish posts on Instagram here: [ Ссылка ])
Find me on Goodreads: [ Ссылка ]
This is not a sponsored video, and unless otherwise stated, I bought any books in this video myself.
00:00 Introduction
01:49 1968: The Prague Spring and the Invasion of Czechoslovakia
03:15 Anna Karenina and The Art of the Novel
04:15 "Meditative Interrogation"
05:18 A "book of ideas" (for real though)
07:26 Sabina & Franz
09:32 The Tragedy of Central Europe
11:28 The Narrator: Grand Narratives
13:44 The Narrator: Irony
15:50 The Narrator: Bullshitting
18:12 Tomas & Tereza (an adultery novel?)
21:34 The Czech Response
24:14 Some Final Thoughts!
