Part 5 of “The Unbearable Lightness of Being”.

Tomas is the main character in this section and Tereza only plays a small part near the end. This section is basically about how Tomas writes an article and it gets published. His chief surgeon wants Tomas to write a retraction for his article but Tomas doesn’t want to lose the respect of the other doctors so he refused. He gets sacked and gets a new job s a GP at a different surgery. 2 years later a secret policeman ends up talking to Tomas and then tells him to retract the article he wrote. Tomas refuses and then after some time he ends up as a window washer. His ex-patients feel sorry for him as they know he shouldn’t be washing windows so they specially ask him to wash their windows so that he gets work. Luckily for Tomas though, his new job allows him to meet lots more women. He thinks of his window washing job asa holiday as he doesn’t think of it as his real life. He gets contacted by his son and a man with a large chin and asked by them to sign a petition against harsh treatment to political prisoners. Tomas refused to sign it and leaves. The next day Tomas sees the petition published in the paper and everyone who signed it got slated badly. So that was lucky for him that he chose not to sign it.
Tereza and Tomas have become very far apart now and Tereza has another bad dream about Tomas cheating on her when she is dead. Tereza suggest to Tomas that they should both move to the countryside. Tereza explains to Tomas how she has had to put up with the smells of other women in his hair for along time and that she hates it. Tomas wants to stop womanising and he wants to be good to Tereza so he decides that they will move to the countryside together.

The Unbearable Lightness Of Being Part 4

This section is about Sabina and Tomas again back in Prague. An interesting part of this section is in chapter 5 when sabina is in a sauna with a few other women, Sabina pays attention to one woman in particular as she finds her naked image disturbing, she says how the woman had hue breasts but a childish pretty face. This makes Sabina concered/worried about her own image. She looks at herself naked in a mirror and notices how small her breasts are, we hear how her mother used to "ridicule" her for her small breasts. Sabina then goes on to show us how she is ashamed and embarressed by dark lines arond her nipples. I think this bit is interesting as Kunderashows us, thorugh Sabina, how unhappy women can be with thier bodies. They tend to be more embarresed and worried about thier anatomy than men. This seems to partially explain her low self esteem and why she lets Tomas push her around and treat her badly. I dont think that Sabina values herself very highly at all. I think that this is mainly because of her mothers rudeness about her body (women dont like being told that they have bodily flaws especially coming from the person you should respect and trust most in the world, your mother, this would have had a very bad effect on her view of herself.)

Another good part of this section is when Tereza finds out that the photos she took of the Prague spring may be being used by the Russian secret police. This upsets her as she didnt intend her photos to be used in this way. she thought she was risking her life for her country when in fact she was helping out the hated Russian police. This seems like Kundera showing us that good intentions can be used for bad.Or maybe he is telling us that a good deed will also have something negative alongside it. so for exaple if you give money to charity when your family are poor, you are doing a good deed but also a bad deed as you should support your family.

The third relevant part of this section is where Sabina has a dream where she thinks that Tomas has sent her to die. She is on a hill called Petrin hill and there are some suicidal women with her, a man with a rifle is also there, helping the women commit suicide. Sabina goes away saying that she isnt suicidal and then realised that Tomas shent her up there so that she would be killed. This disturbs and upsets her. It is an interesting fact that all of her dreams involve tomas hurting her in some way. Like the dream in the swimming pool for example. It seems as if we are being show that Tomas is ouit to get her.dreams are supposedly your deepest thoughts so this should mean that Sabina is sure that staying with Tomas will be her death. The way Sabina confuses dreams with her reality is also quite interesting as it has made me wonder whether she has some kind of mental issue....

The Unbearable Lightness of being part 3 Summary

In part 3 we find out that Sabina has another lover - Franz, he suggests a trip to Palermo with Sabina, but she refuses. she eventually agrees to go after a wierd ecsapade in front of te mirror where she strips down and puts a bowler hat on her head. When Sabina is alone she remembers Tomas putting a bowler hat on her head during sex. Sabina thinks the hat undermines her dignity as a woman. the thins that by Tomas putting the hat on her head he was humiliatiating her and for some reason she liked it. It seems like Sabina ans Franz dont really understand what each other mean when they say/use certain words. E.g. Franz bases womanhood on his mother, and considers Sabina a woman. Sabina considers herself an non-gendered being. She thinks of her sex as secondary, an occurance of birth and not crucial to her identity. Another example of this is thier different views on music. Franz loves music and makes no distinction between different types of music. Sabina on te other hand hates music and thinks of as noise associated with loud communist youth summer camps.

Later in the section Franz's wife Marie Claude holds a dinner party for local artists. Her loudness offends Franz. When Sabina enters, Marie Claude makes a loud, rude comment about Sabinas pendant. (She seems to say this to put beautiful Sabina in her place, not because she thinks Franz and Sabina are having an affair).
Franz packs his bags and tells Marie-Claude he has been having an affair. She reacts unexpectadly and does not get angry. Franz then leaves to meet Sabina.
Sabina tries to put an end to her life of betrayal, but she is liking Franz less and less. Franz thinks he will spend the rest of his life with Sabina but Sabina has resolved to leave Franz the next day.
Franz finds out Sabina has left and doesnt understand. He finds a small apartment and starts living alone. Preferring the ideal to the real, he starts to feel happy that Sabina has left him as he realises that he likes remembereing his relationship with her rather than actually being with her. He starts living with one of his students and his wife refuses to divorce him. Sabina moves to Paris and Tomas's son writes a letter saying that Tomas and Tereza have died. Sabina thinks of death and imagines the scaryness of a heavy gravestone trapping her down.

SAFE BLUD!

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Reading Journal – Part One

This novel is basically about the love life of a man called Tomas. Tomas lives in Prague and the novel is set in 1968 during the cold war between communism and capitalism. This time was the beginning of the famous Prague Spring where strikes, feminist movements and riots occurred. Russia decided to send thousands of troops into Prague and obviously the Czechoslovakian people were not impressed. People begged the soldiers to leave but they wouldn’t, this caused a lot of distress and the Czechoslovakian people were angry.

I have found that the novel so far has been very historical and philosophical. It is about sexuality, relationships, dreams, fear and love. It is not a chronological novel and the story seems to jump around between chapters.

Tomas is the main character in the novel and the first section gives us a lot of information about his lifestyle. Tomas is supposedly in love with a girl called Tereza but he sleeps around with other women. This obviously upsets Tereza greatly as she seems to love him. Tomas is an odd character with odd habits, for example, he likes to have sex with women but he hates sleeping beside them and waking up next to them. Tomas also doesn’t think that his polygamous ways do not affect his “love” for Tereza. For this reason I think that he is a weird character.

The woman who Tomas sleeps with most is a woman called Sabina. Sabina writes Tomas letters asking him to sleep with her and Tomas does. Tereza is not happy with this and she finds the letter. Tomas doesn’t get angry with her for reading his letters however.

Dreams are frequently mentioned in the first section of the novel. Tereza for example has a couple of bad dreams involving Tomas, she wakes screaming and distraught and angry at Tomas.