Review of “The Book of Laughter and Forgetting” - Book by Milan Kundera

Kundera is a brilliant surgeon. His scalpel cuts just through the upper layer and give you a sight, which you have never expected from anyone who writes with a good mix of political satire. You keep wondering that is it really so simple to understand human emotions. Do read this book, and I can not recommend it any higher. And that might be for all political satire in it or despite all political satire in it, I’m not sure. If you don’t find the book interesting, at least you will be more knowledgeable about the ways a novel can be written. For, this time, Kundera has shown that how characters keep changing their names and places, but the story doesn’t change at all.
This is the first time I am reviewing any book, and I can’t agree more with Kundera, when he says that somebody writes something like this (The book, I’m reviewing), only when one doesn’t find somebody, who will listen to him. And, that every author is nothing. When one tries to say something and finds that no body is really listening, he tries to entrap whatever he wanted to say in words, with high hopes of finding some reader, who will ‘listen’. And, that the author is nothing simply because, he wanted to be everything. He wanted to create the whole universe of his own and no one ever granted him this wish. In every book, every author preaches. It’s entirely a different matter, that some preach better than others.
Do Kundera preach? Yes, he does. But with this book, he got something important to preach – ‘Forgetting’ and ‘Laughter’. He verifies that the Greek philosopher’s perception of time was more convenient one (not correct one, mind you, after all who knows, what’s correct and what’s not). They saw themselves facing the past, while the future came from behind. Whatever we have at any moment, is our past. Even a loser exists, because he lost something in past not because he can win something in future. And at the same time, how important is it to realize that you have lived in the past. Isn’t it obvious? No, it’s not and that’s why this book.
And, how could I forget ‘Laughter’. Especially, how the angels and the demons fought over it as if it was the most important territory. And, how famous feminist, Annie Leclerc, used the same ‘Laughter’ as the most important weapon a women ever had.
Finally, don’t forget Kundera. Who’s he and where does he come from? The author is always a part of his narrative and when a reader loses this perspective, he’s no longer reading the same thing author has written. But, someone like Kundera doesn’t let this happen so easily. He’s too big a hedonist for that. It’s simply impossible to lose him in his narrative. The amount of political satire has not overpowered the more important human emotions, he has dealt with.