The Unbearable Lightness of Being

The bestselling modern classic for fans of Dostoyevsky’s White Nights and Sabahattin Ali’sMadonna in a Fur Coat: the iconic novel of love, angst and politics in communist Czechoslovakia.

A young woman is in love with a successful surgeon: a man torn between his love for her and his womanising. His mistress, a free-spirited artist, lives her life as a series of betrayals, while her other lover stands to lose everything because of his noble qualities. In a world where lives are shaped by choices and events, and everything occurs but once, existence seems to lose its substance and weight – and we feel ‘the unbearable lightness of being’.

Kundera’s classic provoked a whole generation, encompassing passion and philosophy, body and soul, the Prague Spring and modern America, political acts and private desires, comedy and tragedy – in fact, all of human existence.

What readers are saying:
‘Some books change your mind, some change your heart, the very best change your whole world … A mighty piece of work, that will shape your life forever.’

‘One of the best books I’ve ever read … A book about love and life, full of surprises. Beautiful.’

‘This book is going to change your life … It definitely leaves you with a hangover after you’re done reading.’

‘Kundera writes about love as if in a trance so the beauty of it is enchanting and dreamy … Will stay with you.’

‘Shamelessly clever … Exhilaratingly subversive and funny.’ Independent

‘A modern classic … As relevant now as when it was first published. ‘ John Banville