The Unbearable Lightness of Being: Of kitsch and lightness and weight

My 1984 paperback purchased in India (in 1986) on my return flight.

As with Moby-Dick, it has been awhile since I last read Milan Kundera's most famous work. When I finished Blood Meridian, I knew that Moby-Dick would be next and The Unbearable Lightness of Being would come after that. Reading it again gave me cause to revisit my last review. I don't have much to add to the perspective I present in that post. It all still rings true to me.

My last review highlighted Sabina as the primary representative of lightness. The other three main characters are all weight. But, this time I realized that Tomas, even though he ultimately and contentedly chooses the weight of Tereza, is the only character of the four that experiences both weight and lightness. When he is with Sabina he shares her lightness. So he is a traveler, of sorts. Experiencing moments of erotic lightness but consistently returning to weight of marriage (along with a lot of infidelities, which seem to be a form of lightness for him).

What gripped me this time through the novel was something incredibly obvious. Kundera expresses a complex philosophy of kitsch that is a critical component of the novel. It is so important from Kundera's perspective that when the excellent film adaptation was released, Kundera hated the result so much that he refused to ever sell the film rights to any of his other novels. To say the least, this was a very strong reaction. I have always been curious what about the film drove him to such decisive means. There will be no more films based on Kundera novels. Why?

Well, of course, the film focuses on the sexual and emotional aspects of the four characters in relation to one another, especially Sabina, Tomas and Tereza. But the film has nothing whatsoever to do with kitsch, which must have been incomprehensible to Kundera, who made it a cornerstone of his brilliant fiction. In the film “kitsch” is reduced to a couple of lines of dialog. It is trivialized in a way Kundera must have disliked, though this is just an assumption on my part.

Whatever, kitsch is a big deal in the novel and I focused more on it this time than in previous readings. It is strange I haven't done that before. Kundera obviously advances a philosophy of kitsch and it was my first exposure to that term. On my first readings I was not 100% positive I understood what he meant by kitsch. It was a strange word to me.

Sabina says to Tomas after their love-making, “you're the complete opposite of kitsch. In the kingdom of kitsch you would be a monster.” That is the only mention of kitsch in the film, quoted directly from the early pages of the novel, the first time Kundera uses the word. After that, kitsch does not appear again until near the end of Part Six – The Grand March, more than 80% of the way through the novel.

Kitsch cannot be understood without the Grand March of History in which Franz so adamantly believes. “The Grand March is the splendid march on the road to brotherhood, equality, justice, happiness; it goes on and on, obstacles notwithstanding, for obstacles there must be if the march is to be the Grand March.

“The dictatorship of the proletariat or democracy? Rejection of the consumer society or demands for increased productivity? The guillotine or an end to the death penalty? It is all beside the point. What makes a leftist a leftist is not this or that theory but his ability to integrate any theory into the kitsch called the Grand March.” (page 257). Clearly, Franz's “intoxicating” belief is a parade of pathetic banal shit (kitsch) to Kundera.

So, the title of Part Six of the novel refers to “political” kitsch but the section reveals the nature of kitsch in its many varieties, to which Kundera devotes considerable analysis. He uses the word kitsch 46 times over the next 30 pages. It is easy to see why the film chose not to include much of this as it is hardly the focal point of the actual story. Nevertheless, for Kundera, you can't understand the novel without understanding its statement on kitsch upon which the film is silent.

Kundera's “prologue” to kitsch is to discuss the word “shit” as a necessary component. “The fact that until recently the word “shit” appeared in print as s--- has nothing to do with moral considerations. You can’t claim that shit is immoral, after all! The objection to shit is a metaphysical one. The daily defecation session is daily proof of the unacceptability of Creation. Either/or: either shit is acceptable (in which case don’t lock yourself in the bathroom!) or we are created in an unacceptable manner. It follows, then, that the aesthetic ideal of the categorical agreement with being is a world in which shit is denied and everyone acts as though it did not exist. This aesthetic ideal is called kitsch.” (page 248)

Kitsch is fostered by the great pretending (and probable suppression) that the ordinary cliché endless sameness of everyday existence in politics and consumerism does not exist in spite of its engulfing shitty nature. It is something that the most common segment of society projects into the world, perhaps even the greatest contribution of the masses (voters, shoppers) to the world.

“The feeling induced by kitsch must be a kind the multitudes can share. Kitsch may not, therefore, depend on an unusual situation; it must derive from the basic images people have engraved in their memories: the ungrateful daughter, the neglected father, children running on the grass, the motherland betrayed, first love...The brotherhood of man on earth will be possible only on a base of kitsch.” (page 251)

Though he implies the working class basis for kitsch, Kundera is primarily concerned with Franz's Grand March and, hence, with political kitsch. Communism as kitsch, democracy as kitsch, totalitarianism as kitsch.

“Kitsch is the aesthetic ideal of all politicians and all political parties and movements. Those of us who live in a society where various political tendencies exist side by side and competing influences cancel or limit one another can manage more or less to escape the kitsch inquisition: the individual can preserve his individuality; the artist can create unusual works. But whenever a single political movement corners power, we find ourselves in the realm of totalitarian kitsch. When I say “totalitarian,” what I mean is that everything that infringes on kitsch must be banished for life: every display of individualism (because a deviation from the collective is a spit in the eye of the smiling brotherhood); every doubt (because anyone who starts doubting details will end by doubting life itself); all irony (because in the realm of kitsch everything must be taken quite seriously); and the mother who abandons her family or the man who prefers men to women, thereby calling into question the holy decree “Be fruitful and multiply.” In this light, we can regard the gulag as a septic tank used by totalitarian kitsch to dispose of its refuse.” (pp. 251 – 252)

Against all this, Sabina, in her embrace of lightness, is the antithesis of Franz's Grand March. She is a creative individual, one of the certain enemies of kitsch. “My enemy is kitsch, not Communism!” she declares. But even Sabina, with her lightness and creativity, cannot fully escape the insatiable grasp of kitsch according to Kundera. “For none among us is superman enough to escape kitsch completely. No matter how we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition. Kitsch has its source in the categorical agreement with being.” (page 256)

Being a “categorical agreement with being” means kitsch is culturally as diverse as the varied forms of human endeavors. Kitsch is compartmentalized by Kundera, reflecting its overwhelming diversity. It is metastasized into countless varieties, each distinctive with its problems and impacts. “But what is the basis of being? God? Mankind? Struggle? Love? Man? Woman? Since opinions vary, there are various kitsches: Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Communist, Fascist, democratic, feminist, European, American, national, international....The fantasy of the Grand March that Franz was so intoxicated by is the political kitsch joining leftists of all times and tendencies. The Grand March is the splendid march on the road to brotherhood, equality, justice, happiness; it goes on and on, obstacles notwithstanding, for obstacles there must be if the march is to be the Grand March. The dictatorship of the proletariat or democracy? Rejection of the consumer society or demands for increased productivity? The guillotine or an end to the death penalty? It is all beside the point. What makes a leftist a leftist is not this or that theory but his ability to integrate any theory into the kitsch called the Grand March.” (pp. 256 – 257)

Kitsch is pervasive, invasive and completely engulfing. The Grand March as presented in the novel is just the clearest expression of it. Through the character of Franz, we see how the “intoxicating” grandeur of history plays out. He joins a small crusade to Cambodia to protest that country's refusal to allow doctors into the troubled nation. But this ends in utter failure. Franz's commitment never amounts to anything. He ends up being beaten and robbed while returning to Europe and dies as a result of this brutal attack. This is the ultimate reality of Franz's Grand March of History. Not high ideals but, rather, nothing at all, only another trivial death. As Kundera concludes: “Before we are forgotten, we will be turned into kitsch. Kitsch is the stopover between being and oblivion.” (page 278)

This is hardly an uplifting perspective. Kundera is totally cynical about high ideals for a better world. He questions all political alternatives. For him, they are all unified in the bland sameness of kitsch. The point is rendered so forcefully in the novel that it is easy to see how Kundera could not tolerate the film, which he likely thought was kitsch itself because it ignored his diatribe against kitsch. Again, I find the film excellent. But, with this reading of the novel, I can see for the first time at least one reason the author could not stomach it. Perhaps it would have been an even better film had kitsch been more pronounced in it. I never noticed the full gravity of kitsch in Kundera's writing until this reading of it. Like I said, it is all obvious, I knew it was all there from my past readings. But the weight of the idea resonated more fully with this reading.

Following this statement of Kundera's philosophy of kitsch, and Franz's subsequent demise, we come to the final part of the novel, which revolves around Karenin, Tereza's dog. Throughout his body of work, it is typical of Kundera to come back to the magic of ordinary life after presenting any heady concept. It is with this magic that Kundera offers his most intimate and poignant expressions of the human condition.

Karenin is put down due to his suffering in old age. By now, Tereza and Tomas are living on a collective farm. Tomas's promising career as a surgeon has been derailed by the Communists who didn't like a piece he wrote for a newspaper around the time of the Czech revolt in 1968. For awhile, he was a window washer, which offered him many opportunities to have sex with women living in various buildings. But now he is settled. He is resigned to the weight of Tereza and is more committed to her than at any prior time in the novel.

Their relationship has reached a period of mutual contentment. But their dog is dying. Tomas will give him an injection. Kundera sees how humanity treats animals, those without any real power to resist, as the greatest measure of human “goodness.” In the eyes of Tereza, the dog represents ten years of her relationship with Tomas. Euthanizing her pet is sad, but, oddly enough, it is within her sadness that Tereza realizes that she is actually happy. The sadness of the Karenin's death mixes with the happiness of knowing she and Tomas are together. They survived all those liaisons.

When Tereza attempts to apologize to Tomas for “causing” his “downfall” Tomas is genuinely puzzled with what she is talking about. She feels responsible for how they have ended up, on a collective farm, nobodies among other nobodies instead of a renown surgeon and his photographer wife. But Tomas, somewhat surprisingly, responds almost gratefully. Tereza says “surgery was your mission.” To which Tomas replies, that he has no mission and adds that it is “terrific to realize that you are free, free of all missions.”

In this way, Kundera's final word in the novel is that the happiness of human connection can fill the gulf of sadness and kitsch in the world. The contentment of being together, even in a nothing of a job, overwhelms the death of Tereza's treasured pet. Which is an unexpectedly upbeat ending. In reading it this time, I found myself wondering, has Tomas somehow embraced lightness within the weight of his relationship with Tereza? Kundera is ambiguous about this.

But it sure seems that way. His declaration of freedom is unique throughout the whole of the narrative. Tereza has always been a heaviness to him, a needed weight from which there was no escape because he genuinely loves her. But, just as Tereza finds happiness inside the sadness of her dog's death, so too does Tomas find freedom within the weight of being with her. As I said, Tomas is the one character who travels to and from the lightness of Sabina and the weight of Tereza. Tomas states that he has no “mission. No one has.” And in the freedom of that, Tomas genuinely accepts the unbearable lightness of Being despite being weighed down with his relationship with her.

If so, Kundera describes Sabina's lightness as an “emptiness” but for Tomas it is about being “free.” Perhaps it has always been that way. His many infidelities were certainly free of any sort of commitment or even of his love for Tereza. His sporadic intercourse with Sabina was always a splendid time of sharing in her lightness. But, perhaps, at long last, the freedom from “missions” he has found in his journey with Tereza, in sharp contrast to Franz's heavy Grand March of History, has wrought a kind of lightness of Being that is not only bearable, but preferable.

Recall that Sabina told Tomas that he would be a “monster” in the kingdom of kitsch. According to her, he is “the complete opposite of kitsch.” Perhaps this is the very quality that allows him to experience freedom and possibly lightness at the end of the novel. Indeed, if kitsch is ultimately inescapable, even for Sabina as Kundera suggests, then it is obviously in spite of kitsch that one can embrace lightness no matter how unbearable it might seem.

Lightness of Being is unbearable because it affords no meaning to life. Kundera writes that that which happens but once might as well not have happened at all. It is insignificant. Franz was motivated by the Grand March to find meaning in his life. Tereza finds meaning in her discovery of photography and her relationship with Karenin and Tomas. This is equally true of Tomas. He finds meaning in his marriage despite his infidelities, in which he no longer participates by the novel's end.

Tomas realizes no one has a mission, something Franz would find ridiculous. Does the freedom Tomas experiences at the end of the novel equate to lightness? I think it does. While Sabina's lightness is an emptiness, Tomas finds lightness in the freedom from the constraints of ego and societal expectations.

Rather than seeking meaning through causes or ideals, like Franz, Tomas accepts simple contentment in merely Being. His lightness comes from relinquishing prescribed roles and missions. It is the lightness of inner stillness, not restless pleasure-seeking. This is a seismic change for him. Perhaps this represents personal growth. Perhaps Tomas is actually the most changed character in the novel. He embraces lightness as inner freedom, penetrating the sadness of Karenin's death. Tereza finds happiness in spite of her sadness, but this is not the freedom that Tomas has. Kundera leaves us with a really fascinating puzzle here, which I will continue to ponder.

This time through it, the novel puzzled me in yet another respect. Kundera clearly states “History is as light as individual human life, unbearably light, light as a feather, as dust swirling into the air, as whatever will no longer exist tomorrow.” And yet, the reader is lead to believe that Franz's Grand March of History has weight in some way. How should we resolve this?

We need to understand Kundera's critique of kitsch. He sees history itself as ultimately light and meaningless. But people like Franz falsely try to burden it with significance through belief systems. Unlike Tomas, they cling to the weight of "missions" and causes, mistaking this for meaning. But in Kundera's view, these ideologies only obscure life's lightness.

This gives a somewhat sinister characteristic to the Grand March in that, as political kitsch, it is actually a dangerous (or at least highly confused) attempt to give weight to history's inherent lightness. While existence is fleeting, uncertain and insignificant, kitsch masks this with the illusion of order and purpose.

Kundera shows how kitsch provides false comfort from life's meaninglessness. Totalitarian kitsch viciously eliminates doubt, irony and individualism which reveal life's chaos. It imposes ideological burdens that only veil life's ephemeral nature. Kitsch tricks people into imposing higher purpose upon life's lightness. Kitsch carries completely spurious weight. Its solemnity and meaning are utterly fraudulent, masking the unbearable lightness of Being.

While reality is fleeting, slivers of transient beauty emerge in moments of love and intimate connection as demonstrated with Tomas and Tereza at the end of the novel. Causes and beliefs only veil life's lightness. Kundera shows we can find glimpses of contentment by accepting our impermanent, subjective experiences. Kitsch's illusion of weight and purpose is a false promise that Franz cannot see.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being rewards repeat readings with ever more interesting questions. As a reader, there is more to ponder here than one might assume given the relative simplicity of the text. Kundera's style is succinct with as few details of character and emotion and thought as possible. Like almost all of his work, the novel takes on profound and fundamentally human questions without overly long expositions. It emphasizes mundane human experiences in place of epiphanies. That inevitably leads to the types of questions that confronted me with this reading.

Which is a wonderful experience. Like Moby-Dick (but with far fewer words) this novel is definitely on my Top 10 list of great literary achievements. But I don't know if it completes my Top 5 list. I am still searching for that elusive fifth novel. And I am enjoying the hunt. Kundera's minimalist writing style is refreshing though many readers find it frustrating. The characters are not fleshed out enough for many critics, for example. Nevertheless, the novel manages to evoke questions such as I have offered in this review that are as profound as anything Proust or Tolstoy or Dostoevsky pondered. That is quite an accomplishment considering Kundera's splendidly concise style.