There is much to learn from history, especially from Eastern Europe under USSR’s rule. Milan Kundera’s classic novel ‘The unbearable lightness of being’ set the story in the background of Prague Spring in 1968. There was a short period of liberation after the Czech reformist Dubcek came into power. The Prague Spring lasted for half a year and ended up in the Soviet Union’s invasion and suppression.

The novel was famous for its blend of philosophy and literature. Kundera frequently interferes with his unique philosophical perspective in history, politics and love. The remarkable opening of the novel is Kundera’s thought on Nietzsche’s concept of eternal return. It is a hypothesis that posits that the universe has been recurring, and will continue to recur, for an infinite number of times across infinite time or space. Kundera argued that even though the universe recurs, it will not be the same as the previous one. In the novel, Kundera used a metaphor: as long as Robespierre came back into life, he would no longer be the same Robespierre in the previous French revolution. In other words, we only live once; therefore, we could not evaluate which option is the best first before making a decision. Kundera drew a conclusion: it’s decay in morality. Everything is firstly forgiven. Everything is firstly allowed.

On the other hand, it’s also a love story. Tomas is a womaniser and has sexual relationships with uncountable women. But he only loves his wife, Tereza. She’s depressed, anxious about Tomas’ infidelity and treats herself as a weaker person. Sabina is Tomas’ mistress and soul mate. Sabina also knows Tereza and even introduces Tereza to work as a photographer. In the history of literature, there are famous examples of two female figures as a mirror image to each other. To name a few, Naoko and Midori in Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood; Red Rose and White Rose in Eileen Chang’s novel. To me, Tereza and Sabina are another pair of classical mirror images.

There is a lot to explore in the novel. This article is not capable of covering them all. I just want to share two episodes here. Tomas and Tereza once fled to Switzerland after the USSR’s suppression. Tereza took a lot of photos when the Soviet troops marched into Czech. She then went to a Swiss magazine to share the photos with an editor. The editor pretended to be very interested in the photos, but then he told Tereza he could not publish them as it’s already been eight months since the suppression. It’s too distant. Tereza thought it still kept going in Czech. Later, his colleague put the photos of nudity of people sunbathing in front of the editor. It drew his attention immediately. The World works in this way. Everything is forgotten very soon. Every unrelated (to local) piece of news disappears very fast.

Finally, Tereza chose to go back to Czech. The encounter with the editor was one of the factors pushing her. She did not notify Tomas before she left. Tomas initially felt relieved, after spending 7 years with her. After few days, he found that he could not stand without seeing her. Hence he went back to Prague as well. He knew that he was unable to leave the country anymore. Stay or leave, sometimes (or always?), is because of one person only. Kundera has profound insight into life. It’s one of the reasons why I love his works so much. Nevertheless, we never know whether it’s the right decision for Tomas since we could not live twice. Everything is allowed. To every Hong Konger, it applies to every decision of whether to stay in Hong Kong as well.

(Pat To Yan, Active in Hong Kong and German Theatre. Playwright, Director, Lecturer. Elected Council Member and the Chairman of the committee of Literary Art of Hong Kong Arts Development Council.)

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