The book of laughter and forgetting sparknotes

In , while exiled in France, the Czechoslovakian writer Milan Kundera wrote a novel destined to become an international success. Forbidden to be published in his homeland, Kundera's The Book of Laughter and Forgetting was written in Czech but first published in French as Le livre du rire et de l'oublie in It was subsequently translated into English and published in the United States in Although the book is generally classified as a novel, it does not have the traditional structure of beginning, middle, and end. Rather, the seven parts of the book have individual characters and different plot lines.

And translations really matter with Kundera — he is notoriously choosy, but approved of this one. Which, interestingly enough, was translated from the French translations of the original Czech. It is, indeed, a book of laughter and forgetting — themes which haunt the book like characters, offering the only unity available. Structurally, the book is divided into seven sections. But sections are not simple, discrete tales.

Kundera opens with a story about Gottwald, the first Communist president of Czechoslovakia, and Clementis, later an enemy of the state. When Clementis falls from grace, the propaganda department has his image removed from a famous photo of him with Gottwald. It's a great way to introduce the story of Mirek, a private citizen who's about to be arrested and erased by the government. Instead of staying home and burning his incriminating papers, Mirek takes a road trip to the house of his old ladylove, Zdena, to retrieve his love letters. He realizes that he's being tailed, but he continues, anyway.