The Art of the Novel [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

Thus Milan Kundera affirms the wonder and beauty of the novel and explains the difference between how philosophers think and how novelists think. Born of the Modern Era ushered in by seventeenth century rationalism, the novel contemplates and explores existence in the Modern Era. Like the Modern Era, the novel is distinguished by its ambiguity and complexity. For Kundera, the novel's core is an inquiry, not a moral position. It makes sense, therefore, that in a world where humans long for black/white, wrong/right distinction, that the "wisdom of uncertainty" which Kundera calls the wisdom of the novel, should be so hard to accept and understand.

This remarkable short book shares the seven part form of several of Kundera's novels: each can stand alone but all are connected by vital and pervading themes. The seven parts comprise two essays, a collection of notes, two dialogues, a dictionary of sixty-three words, and an acceptance speech for a literary prize--and not in the order just mentioned. This mosaic structure works well to underscore part of Kundera's point: there are many ways to approach an understanding of the novel. Is Don Quixote a critique or a celebration of idealism? Both cases have been made often, neither is right--the novel's spirit of complexity and continuity brooks no dogmatism. In fact, the novel has its own "radical autonomy" which Kundera uses to illuminate the works of Franz Kafka. It can say and show things humans cannot achieve in any other way.

If the novel that is art--the novel that truly says something new--is to survive, novelists would do well to think more like Milan Kundera. Readers of THE ART OF THE NOVEL, meanwhile, will gain a new appreciation for the genre as well as valuable insight into the thought process of one of the world's greatest living novelists.

I read this book in French, "L'Art Du Roman" and while it does not attempt to reduce Kundera's works to neat theories, it does shed light on the philosphical underpinnings of many of his novels.

In fact, one of the main themes of this book is the critique of reductionism. He exalts the "Wisdom of Uncertainty" and eschews any art work that proceeds from an ideology or moral high ground as such leads to judgement rather than understanding. Somewhat in an existentialist vein, Kundera promotes the idea of "l'ambiguite" as the ideal for the novel. That is to say that given we live in a world where there is no right or wrong way to proceed, the role of the novel is to understand each character within his own constructs, not according to some extrnal morality or ideology.

Kundera's debt to Heidegger is made obvious throughout the book, and Kundera quotes him often. One is left wondering what Kundera's ideas on morality might be. However, I would not go so far as saying that he follows suit with Heidegger on this mattter. Heidegger's "Sein und Zeit" is interested in the question of being. For Da-Sein, morality is secondary, and relativistic, not primary and essential. No doubt, this indiffference towards morality led to Heidegger's nazism. However, if Kundera does not take a moralistic posture in "unbearable Lightness of Being", he defintiely implies that we suffer or thrive on a spiritual level with certain choices that we make....

-Thomas Seay