Reflections on the unbearable lightness in life

Reflections on the unbearable lightness in life (1)

Recently, I read the novel The Unbearable Lightness of Life by Czech writer Milan Kundera, and I was deeply inspired by the author's thinking about the fate and value of life, as if I had solved a mystery that has puzzled me for many years. I took a long breath and couldn't help but sigh: life was so beautiful and so helpless!

In Milan Kundera's view, life is painful, and this kind of pain stems from our wrong grasp of the goal of life. Many people in the world are fighting for it in their own way, and life has become vulgar. Human beings have become slaves of "pursuit", constantly repeating their predecessors, whether they are degenerate or conform to the rules. So there are only two words left in human history-"kitsch".

Thomas, the hero of the book, has always stubbornly refused to "kitsch", as has the pursuit of love. He fell in love with Teresa irresistibly, but he didn't want to be a vassal of family responsibilities, nor did he want to live a dull life and love like others. He showed his lover in a very irresponsible and forced way: I love you, but I don't belong to you! He is constantly with other women, forcing the people he loves not to stick to himself and giving himself freedom. However, when he felt free and the "lightness" of losing his responsibility, he soon became empty. He found how important the "heavy feeling" of taking on family responsibilities is to life itself!

The pursuit of love is the same, as is the pursuit of material and career. Sabina, a painter, resolutely opposes "kitsch". He thinks it is most important to stick to his own personality and opposes the pursuit of money and fame by any means. However, when China *, she was forced to flee to a foreign country to live, but there was no landing. She had to accept others' sympathy and sell her poor paintings at a high price to earn higher profits. She saw with her own eyes that people gathered to oppose the war and support the weak. This is an act of extreme elimination of individuality and "kitsch", but it is also a patriotic and just act and an irreconcilable contradiction.

What if people are born with all the conditions of lightness? Flantz is such a young man. He has a good background, outstanding talent, stable career and family, and a good reputation. You have everything you need and it's easy to come. However, he feels that life is too "light" and he can't stand it. He has a strong desire to resist, and he longs for the passion of struggling and shouting in suffering. So he took part in the *, *, and somehow shouted. Embarrassed, all efforts, like the stupid struggle between Don Giad and the windmill, ended in vain and irony.

The contradiction between "pursuit" and "anti-pursuit" of these young people reveals the absurdity and paradox of life itself: everyone has a purpose and reason for life, but each purpose has its own emptiness. In the pursuit of love, resentment is more than joy, and the pursuit of fame is far like a flower in the mirror. In the end, the pursuit of money will draw water with a sieve. Through various hallucinations, Milan Kundera felt that perhaps this "pursuit" itself was a mistake.

I remembered the "good song" sung by the lame Taoist in A Dream of Red Mansions:

Everyone knows that immortals are good, but their fame is unforgettable. Where will the past and present be? A pile of grass on the wasteland is missing.

Everyone knows that immortals are good, but gold and silver can't be forgotten. There are only a few scars in life, and my eyes are closed for a long time.

Everyone knows that immortals are good, but a wife can't forget them. You said hello on your birthday, and you died with others.

Everyone knows that immortals are good, but children and grandchildren can't forget them. There have been many infatuated parents since ancient times. Who has seen filial piety for children and grandchildren?

The moral of this "Good Song" is "Everything in the world, good is good, and bad is good. If not, that's not good. If it is good, it must be. " It implies the persistent insistence of western pessimistic philosophers: existence is pain, and without pain, there must be no existence.

There are so many unforgettable people in the world, but they don't realize the absurdity of life and "recognize another country as their hometown".

If you don't understand the true meaning between "good" and "good", in the end, you will make a wedding dress for others.

The life around us, those mediocre lives that struggle for vulgar purposes, are busy with fame and fortune, money, wife and children and grandchildren all their lives. Finally, everything is nothing, nothing is illusory, nothing is empty!

As the Bible says, "The silver chain is broken, the golden jar is broken, the bottle in the spring is broken, and the waterwheel at the wellhead is broken."

This passive "forgetting" is not good, it is a sigh and an irony, and it is a fatal irony to so many people who can't forget it. People struggle with desires and will never be free. It's like "putting a stone mill around their necks and throwing it into the sea", living in the ocean of desire with a millstone, a sad life!

However, we are still busy, still pursuing, and never stop struggling. As Yang Shen, a poet in Ming Dynasty, wrote in Sancha Post:

Sanchagang, crossroads, north to south for several days.

Appear in front of me, hug me and get back to the car at dusk.

In ancient times, fame and fortune were heavy, and short pavilions and flowing water were long pavilions.

Streets and alleys, roadside kiosks, red dust, people come and go. Proud people and frustrated people are bound by fame and fortune and have been working hard. No one can really stop.

Maybe this is the tragedy of life. Our "upward spirit" comes from ignorance, and our "enterprising spirit" comes from ignorance, while the blind enterprising spirit at least gives life a feeling of "weight" and makes life seem to have "meaning" and "satisfaction", just like a proud person being covered with pride at a fork in the road. But in fact, blind motivation can only create generations of blind self, seemingly happy, but actually empty. Especially when the "pursuit" itself is in doubt, life will fall into complete emptiness, lose any "lightness" of life, make all the satisfaction disappear, and the self can no longer support itself. The fate of life is so helpless and irritating.

Life is so helpless, I want to envy the immortal and get rid of the "heavy" troubles of fame and fortune, money, wife, children and grandchildren, but life can't bear the "lightness" of weightlessness after getting rid of the troubles, and it repeats itself in this eternal tragedy generation after generation.

In this case, how should people face this seemingly inevitable and seemingly impossible living situation?

Lin Yutang, a writer in China, thinks in China that since the pursuit and the satisfaction after the pursuit are emptiness, then "returning to nature" is the eternal source of all beauty and happiness. A person's life should consider how to really live, rather than planning how to develop; We should cherish and enjoy the present time instead of working hard; You should save your energy for some unexpected things, not use your energy.

Montaigne, a French essayist, has the same confusion, but he opposes nihilism and advocates that people should always have a little spirit. In Montaigne Notes, he thinks: "A confused person is dull and uneasy all his life, but he places all his hopes on the afterlife, which in itself violates the meaning of survival. The happiness of life depends on how much we care about life, not the influence of any external things. Only oneself is the master of life. Our life is a gift from nature and superior. If we feel overwhelmed and waste our lives, we have only ourselves to blame. If people don't have certain goals and pursuits to occupy and restrain the mind, the mind will wander around and enter the empty realm of fantasy. Without a goal, the soul will lose itself. Even in my spare time, I can't let my soul lose its goal. Otherwise, it will eventually lead to countless monsters, without order and purpose, one after another. "

The value and significance of life lies in the process. In the pursuit process, there is a sense of happiness and satisfaction. Maybe that's enough. Why care about its ultimate gain and loss?

It seems that we should bravely face the "heavy" of life, instead of avoiding "heavy" and "light".

Reflections on the unbearable lightness in life (2)

The unbearable lightness of life is the Czech writer Milan? Kundera's masterpiece. When I first read it last year, I was deeply disturbed and confused ―― this is a work with complex images and many "incomprehensible words" flashing between the lines ―― and it is difficult for my understanding to cross its difficult and obscure semantic river. With the psychology of self-challenge, I reread it carefully this summer vacation. Rereading this book gave me a completely different feeling ―― as if I had never read it! It is a mysterious and profound castle intertwined with sensibility and rationality. The seemingly simple love story contains rich philosophical speculation and shines with dazzling ideological light. With a satirical, humorous and calm style, the author cuts open the coat of human life, explores the secrets of the soul, uncovers the hidden secrets in the depths of human nature, shows the life picture of social unrest and ups and downs of fate, and exposes the "kitsch" essence of human beings. After reading this book, I seem to see a three-dimensional picture of modernism: a dilapidated city, a group of people, a lingering corpse, a pair of sad eyes-all of which are intertwined and overlapped into a gray dream. Behind all these dreams is an extremely warm and quiet picture of a distant mountain village, where the sunset is warm and idyllic.

This is indeed a work worth reading again and again. It's like a leafy tree. With my humble understanding and stupid brushwork, I will be lucky if I can barely touch three or two brilliant leaves!

First, between light and heavy.

"If every second of our life can be repeated indefinitely, we will be crucified forever like Jesus was crucified. This idea is cruel. In the world of eternal reincarnation, every move bears an unbearable burden of responsibility, which is why Nietzsche said that the concept of eternal reincarnation is the heaviest burden.

In the first chapter of the novel, the writer throws out Nietzsche's theory of "eternal reincarnation" with an inscrutable attitude of a philosopher. With a long philosophical speculation, I have to fall into a dignified thinking about severity.

"Heavy is really cruel, but light is really beautiful?"

"The heaviest burden oppresses us, makes us succumb to it, and crushes us to the ground. However, in the love poems of past dynasties, women are always eager to bear the weight of a man's body, so the heaviest burden has become the image of vitality. The heavier the burden, the closer our life is to the earth and the more real it is.

On the contrary, when the burden is completely gone, people will become lighter than air and float away from the earth and life on it. Man is only a semi-real existence, and his movement becomes free and meaningless.

So, what should I choose? Heavy or light? "

Yes, what should I choose? Heavy or light? Until the end of the novel, this problem has not been solved ... perhaps this is a life puzzle that even the writer himself has not found the answer? I can only try to find clues to the author's thoughts from the protagonist of the work.

A small portrait of two characters

Thomas, a surgeon in Prague, was born freely and deeply loved Teresa. After the Soviet Union occupied the Czech Republic, it took Teresa Switzerland. Then I returned to Prague for love. I used to be a glass cleaner because of politics, and I was forced by the pressure of the environment to live in a secluded mountain village and become a truck driver. He has been wandering all his life, constantly struggling in the whirlpool of heavy and light life. In the end, both of them died in a car accident with Teresa.

Teresa-a weak, loyal, naive and kind woman, a lover who constantly examines her soul. She started as a waitress in a country hotel in a small town near Prague, and later became a photojournalist of a news photo agency in Prague, the wife of Thomas. Deeply in love with Thomas, I can't bear the jealousy and pain caused by Thomas's derailment, and live in nightmares and dizziness. I also drifted all my life, from a small town to Thomas' city Prague, and then to Switzerland. I left home and returned to my motherland in the pain of my feelings, and then I lived in seclusion in a mountain village with Thomas and became a shepherdess. Finally, I died in a car accident with Thomas.

Sabine, a young female artist in Prague, is Thomas' most important lover. The object of Franz's worship. Free and independent in thought, rebellious in nature and opposed to kitsch. She constantly betrayed her original position: betrayed her family, betrayed her parents, betrayed her motherland, betrayed her love, and abandoned Franz, who loved her deeply; She constantly rebelled against herself, and finally reached the point where she could not be betrayed. Her life is infinitely light, weightless, without any care and responsibility, like floating in mid-air. She kept wandering, from Prague to Geneva, then to Zurich, and finally to the United States to live with an elderly couple who liked her paintings. Soon the elderly couple would leave her for their daughter. In the endless betrayal and wandering, she felt the unbearable cruel weight of the lightness of life, and in the infinite desolation and loneliness, she longed for a window with warm lights in a distant fairy tale. She is the survivor of the four protagonists and the most tragic victim of fate.

Flantz is a professor at a university in Geneva. He is a dreamer, handsome and simple-minded. He is keen on all political movements, worships and deeply loves Sabin. He left his unloved wife in pursuit of Sabine. After Sabin left without saying goodbye, he regarded the young female college students as Sabin's shadow, and finally devoted himself to the "great March" to support Cambodia's international medical team for the sake of ethereal love fantasy. The reason why he joined the "Great March" is also full of irony ―― because Cambodia and Sabine's motherland are both countries suffering the same fate of occupation. He thought: If Sabine knew that he joined the Great March to support Cambodia, he would certainly feel his distant support and sympathy for her motherland, and she would be happy for it! When he finally woke up from his love dream pinned on the Great March, he was unfortunately killed by an accidental robbery.

Third, Thomas-the real existence in the light and heavy game.

Thomas stood at the window of his apartment, staring blankly at the wall of the opposite building. He recalled his acquaintance with Teresa in his mind and thought over and over again: How should I choose? Do you accept Teresa to live with her and shoulder the heavy responsibility of love, or continue to enjoy the freedom and lightness of the past? This is the scene that the author described for us at the beginning of the story. Moreover, this scene appears repeatedly in the novel, which is meaningful.

"People never know what they want, because people can only live once, which can neither be compared with previous lives nor corrected in the afterlife".

Therefore, whenever he is faced with the choice between light and heavy in life, he will be so overwhelmed and hesitant. In fact, Thomas' short life was really spent in the choice and struggle between weight and lightness. He is a surgeon in Prague. He used to live a free life. Since he fell in love with Teresa, he has shouldered all the love and responsibility of a woman. This kind of weight overwhelmed him, and he kept falling, falling, floating in the air like a piece of flying floc, wet by the rain, falling to the ground and blending with the earth. His life was thus given meaning. In his view, soul and body are completely separated, and his pursuit of many women's hobbies will not damage his unique and profound love for Teresa at all. On the one hand, he loves Teresa deeply and thinks that Teresa is "a child floating in an oiled basket and accidentally drifting to his own bed". He has deep sympathy and "unspeakable love" for the weak Teresa. On the other hand, he refused to give up the lifestyle of freely interacting with many girlfriends in the past and kept dating other girlfriends behind Teresa's back. He lives in the entanglement of Teresa's painful nightmare caused by jealousy and helplessness, shuttling between lies and love. Guilt of disloyalty, sympathy and pity for Teresa and deep love are intertwined to form a powerful whirlpool, which brings Thomas, a free-floating canoe, into the deep valley of fate again and again.

Thomas's return to the motherland from Geneva with Teresa, who ran away from home, should be a major turning point in his fate after Switzerland, and it is also the most obvious example of his choice between light and heavy. I'm thinking that if Thomas didn't go back to Prague to find Teresa after she left, but stayed in Geneva to continue his affair and enjoy the freedom and sweetness of life, his fate would be a completely different picture. We wouldn't have seen the tragic ending of this novel. In fact, when he lingered at the crossroads again, stood at the window of his apartment and looked blankly at the wall of the opposite building, he repeatedly repeated Beethoven's words in his heart: it must be like this! Why does it have to be like this? This may be the voice in his soul. In the first few days after Teresa left him, he wandered the streets alone, enjoying the short sweetness of free space, but never met any women again. His mind is always filled with Teresa's infinite sad eyes and painful expressions. He felt and amplified Teresa's inner pain. He can't get rid of Teresa's weakness, which has a strong control over his spirit and emotion, and can't bear the "lightness of life" after leaving Teresa. So, he gave up his suicide and returned to his motherland and Teresa-he chose "heavy".

Thomas, a maverick, was dragged into the quagmire of fate again and again under the infinite freedom and lightness of life. Besides his responsibility for love, this quagmire of fate has an important root, which is the powerful and irresistible social * and "political darkness". The author seems to be telling us that an ordinary individual, in the powerful vortex of social politics, is no different from a weak ant. His personal life will be easily crushed to pieces under the crushing of disorderly and crazy state machines. The beginning of his bad luck came from a letter, which insinuated that Oedipus in Greek mythology committed the great crime of killing his father and marrying his mother in complete ignorance. When he learned about *, he felt deeply guilty and ashamed to see the world, so he gouged out his eyes and went to a foreign country to confess his ignorance. Shouldn't an ignorant person be responsible for his own sins? Some producers of the Soviet Union * * * used "I didn't know anything at that time" to escape the guilt, which he thought should be condemned. It is such a letter that seems to have nothing to do with his personal life, which completely changed his fate. As a result, he changed from a surgeon to a "glass cleaner" on the street.

However, what is his motivation for writing this letter? Is it a simple passion for politics? I don't think so. Judging from Thomas' maverick personality, he is a "devil in the kitsch world", and he will not be keen on political noise to participate in any radical remarks. The reason why he wrote this letter is more secret comes from his "danger metaphor", which is also related to his love.

He deeply felt countless times that Teresa was a child who was put in a basket and floated down the river. One day, she accidentally drifted to the shore of his bed. He took her in. This dangerous metaphor made him feel deep sympathy and indescribable love for the weak Teresa. Isn't this fate? And Oedipus, the god of atonement in Greek mythology, is not a child who is carried down the river in a basket? This is similar to how deadly Teresa is! Then, one day when Thomas accidentally turned to the book Oedipus on the shelf, he thought of that deadly metaphor again. So, the devil took the time to write the article about Oedipus that changed his fate. I think this is the so-called "conspiracy of fate"? Therefore, when he refused to sign the exemption document with the frankness and detachment of intellectuals, his fate of being tightly grasped by political giants could not escape. As a result, he lost the comfortable life of a doctor and became a glass cleaner.

Prague at that time was shrouded in Stalin's "proletarian movement". The streets are full of the noise of political discourse, and every corner of life seems to have the eyes and ears of the secret police. Everything people say and do seems to be in danger of being monitored and recorded as reactionary evidence. Day after day, people live in fear under this extremely heavy political pressure. However, at this time, Thomas' life was displayed in an unprecedented form of "light". Because he finally got rid of the doctor's sacred mission of "saving human life", which he has been seriously believing in and practicing for many years, he was relaxed and devoted to exploring the "career" of different women as always, and even more enthusiastically "cut open the mysterious one-millionth difference of different women with the scalpel of life", and enjoyed it.

This is really a meaningful life Rondo with "heavy" and "light" ensemble!

When political chaos and social darkness replace humanity and civilization, and when "political kitsch" openly enters the hall of fraternity and democracy, small individuals can only struggle in the unbearable whirlpool of "weight" and "light". It is difficult for us to judge him with the eyes of moralists. Thomas, in him, there are too many "meanness"-debauchery, lewdness, disloyalty and deception. He has all the characteristics of a "shameless man" that a moral gentleman is not ashamed of. However, in him, there are also justice, kindness, kindness, compassion, frankness and lofty. He is a real existence struggling in the game of "heavy" and "light" life. The author didn't make any moral judgment on him ―― in a morally degraded world, "everything is forgiven in advance and everything is despicable".

Life is a sketch that can't be drawn.

"There is no way to test which choice is correct. Because there is no comparison. If the first rehearsal of life is life itself, what value will life have? That's why life is always a sketch. But the word "sketch" is not exact, because sketch is the prototype of something, such as a sketch of a painting, but our life is not a sketch of anything, but a sketch that can't be drawn. "

The tragedy of the protagonists in the novel is not only the tragedy of their own time, but also the tragedy of many modern people. Perhaps, it is in Thomas and them that the author entrusts his exploration of the infinite unknown possibilities of life. Seeing the end of the novel, I couldn't laugh easily, and a deep sadness came from the distant sky.

As the screenwriter feels, the first rehearsal of life is life itself, and life is always a sketch that can't be drawn! The painting of life is so sloppy that it has never been corrected before, and there is no chance to correct it at all. It is finished in a hurry. Perhaps all the results, whether dim or brilliant, are not worth regretting or admiring, and all the choices are right or wrong. It's just a trajectory of life, because we have no chance to compare the advantages and disadvantages of the road we choose! And the reason why we have to go on like this is the inevitability under countless accidental appearances, and it is your destiny takes a hand's "inevitable". "I have to do this" is the curse that fate has put on us. It may be the part you want most but can't get, and it is your real desire. We always make the same mistakes and repeat the same tragedies in one place. It is from this tragedy that we see our own life and our own nature. It has nothing to do with morality, but comes from the heart.

Reflections on the unbearable lightness in life (3)

Last time I was studying in Milan. Kundera's unbearable lightness of life, I can't remember when. Anyway, it was a long time ago At that time, because I was young, I liked to follow the plot when I was studying. Most of my analysis, reasoning and comments on human nature are swallowed up, and the water is left behind, which is clear at a glance. After reading it, I put it on the shelf, without thinking or aftertaste, and I didn't leave any impression in my heart. So this time, when I picked up the book again and opened every page, I felt so fresh. Every detail in the book was unfamiliar and was soaked with a sense of deja vu.

The impulse to reread this book stems from a nap at noon one day. Lying on the sofa in the office, I habitually picked up a book and opened a page at will, ready to take a rest after reading it for a while, so I met a book review about the unbearable lightness of life, and the door of fuzzy memory slowly opened.

I read slowly this time, subconsciously following the old footsteps, and thinking between the lines replaced the pursuit of the plot. Especially in the second paragraph of the opening paragraph, I chew the soul of the whole book repeatedly every time I open the book, and I am lost in thought for a long time.

Parmenides proposed in the 6th century BC that the world is divided into two opposing halves: light and darkness; Taste both refined and popular; Cold and warm; Yes, it isn't. He called half of them positive (bright; Elegant, warm and existential), the other half is naturally negative. Light is positive, heavy is negative. Kundera thinks this dichotomy is naive and thinks that "perhaps the heaviest burden is also a symbol of the most fulfilling life." The heavier the burden, the closer our life is to the earth, and the closer we are to truth and reality. On the contrary, there is no burden at all. People become lighter than the atmosphere and fly very high. Leaving the earth means leaving real life. He will become unreal, free and meaningless. " Then he asked, "So what should we choose? Heavy or light? "

Between busyness and leisure, between bondage and freedom, between hard work and getting something for nothing, between sticking to responsibility and shirking responsibility, people tend to avoid "heavy" and "harmful", the latter and the former. But imagine, is it empty to have too much leisure? Do people want to be busy with work or leisure after retirement? Infinite freedom is the helplessness of the soul, like a broken kite falling everywhere; People who get something for nothing are often frivolous and impetuous when they treat wealth and even life. Money comes quickly and goes quickly. Only by working hard can they know how to cherish it. People who shirk their responsibilities seem relaxed and carefree, thinking that they can walk faster in this way, but they never thought that not being cared for and needed would be tantamount to being abandoned by relatives, friends, comrades-in-arms and colleagues. A person who dares to take responsibility will eventually go further than someone who is used to shirking responsibility.

Yes, busyness, bondage, toil, responsibility and various burdens are the gravity that makes us fall from impetuous clouds, the gravity that makes us take root in the earth under our feet, the gravity that makes us feel the texture of life, and the real gravity that makes us feel life!

However, how heavy are the crosses of the victims struggling in the dark? As a mother, facing her son who got the college admission notice, she can't afford the tuition; When a daughter, facing her father who is suffering from severe carbuncle, can't even afford the operation fee, when a wife, facing her husband imprisoned in unjust prison, calls the weather bad and the land unsuitable, whether it is heavy or easy, where can they make other choices! What they pray is to give them even a little chance to choose!

Sometimes, I just give you a choice. How difficult is this choice? In the movie Sophie's Choice, Sophie holds her daughter in her right hand and her son in her left hand. When Nazi officers ordered Sophie to leave only one child, and the other must be sent to the incinerator at once, was the son still a daughter? This kind of living pain that tears people in two lasts until the end of life!

Yes, we know that the darkness will eventually pass and the dawn is coming; We also know that when winter comes, spring is not far away. However, the pain now is so suffocating that people can only crawl on the ground under the burden of reality. Many people often wait until dawn and spring, and they will be silent in the night and winter forever!

How to choose between heavy and easy?