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Milan Kundera

Milan Kundera Quotes

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“A route differs from a road not only because it is solely intended for vehicles, but also because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A route has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A route is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and a waste of time.”

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“No episode is a priori condemned to remain an episode forever, for every event, no matter how trivial, conceals within itself the possibility of sooner or later becoming the cause of other events and thus changing into a story or an adventure. Episodes are like land mines. The majority of them never explode, but the most unremarkable of them may someday turn into a story that will prove fateful to you.”

MayMatterStoriesTurnsCausesForeverLandEventsPossibilityMinesAdventureBecomingProveMajoritySomedayEpisodesSooner Or Later
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“The man hunched over his motorcycle can focus only on the present... he is caught in a fragment of time cut off from both the past and the future... he has no fear, because the source of fear is in the future, and a person freed of the future has nothing to fear.”

MenInspirationalPersonsPastTimeFearFreedomFocusCuttingHe ManSourceFutureCaughtNo FearFragmentsOvercoming FearMotorcycleHave No FearPast Present FutureSlownessAbsolute FreedomFear NoneUltimate Freedom
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“If our planet has seen some eighty billion people it is difficult to suppose hat every individual has had his or her own repertory of gestures. Arithmetically, it is simply impossible. Without the slightest doubt, there are far fewer gestures in the world than there are individuals. That finding leads us to a shocking conclusion: a gesture is more individual than an individual. We could put it in the form of an aphorism: many people, few gestures.”

PeopleIfsWorldFormIndividualDifficultDoubtImpossiblePlanetsFindingsBillionsConclusionHatsFewerAphorismGesturesShockingEightyOur Planet
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“The characters in my novels are my own unrealized possibilities. That is why I am equally fond of them all and equally horrified by them. Each one has crossed a border that I myself have circumvented. It is that crossed border (the border beyond which my own "I" ends) which attracts me most. For beyond that border begins the secret the novel asks about. This novel is not the author's confession; it is an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become.”

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“Aesthetic racism is almost always a sign of inexperience. Those who have not made their way far enough into the world of amorous delights judge women only by what can be seen. But those who really know women understand that the eye reveals only a minute fraction of what a woman can offer us. When God bade mankind be fruitful and multiply, Doctor, He was thinking of the ugly as well as of the beautiful. I am convinced I might add, that the aesthetic criterion does not come from God but from the devil. In paradise no distinction was made between ugliness and beauty.”

ThinkingKnowsWorldWayWellsDoeMadeEnoughMightEyeBeautifulMinutesMankindJudgingOffersRacismDevilDoctorsAddDelightUglyConvincedParadiseDistinctionAestheticUglinessCriteriaFractionsInexperienceAmorous
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“The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture, its history. Then have somebody write new books, manufacture a new culture, invent a new history. Before long that nation will begin to forget what it is and what it was... The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”

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“The reason is that everyone has trouble accepting the fact that he will disappear unheard of and unnoticed in an indifferent universe, and everyone wants to make himself into a universe of words before it's too late. Once the writer in every individual comes to life (and that time is not far off), we are in for an age of universal deafness and lack of understanding.”

WantReasonFactsAgeUniverseIndividualUnderstandingAcceptingTroubleLateUniversalDisappearToo LateIndifferentUnnoticedUnheardDeafnessLack Of UnderstandingBefore It's Too Late
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“Her kitsch was the image of home, all peace, quiet, and harmony, and ruled by a loving mother and a wise father. It was an image that took shape in her after the death of her parents. The less her life resembled the sweetest of dreams, the more sensitive she was to its magic, and more than once she shed tears when the ungrateful daughter in a sentimental film embraced the neglected father as the windows of the happy family's house shone out into the dying day.”

HomeDreamFilmMotherFatherHouseParentWiseMagicDyingTearsShapesQuietDaughterWindowHarmonySensitiveShedSentimentalNeglectedSweetestLoving LifeUngratefulKitschHappy FamilyLoving Mother
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“At a time when history made its way slowly, the few events were easily remembered and woven into a backdrop, known to everyone, before which private life unfolded the gripping show of its adventures. Nowadays, time moves forward at a rapid pace. Forgotten overnight, a historic event glistens the next day like the morning dew and thus is no longer the backdrop to a narrator's tale but rather an amazing adventure enacted against the background of the over-familiar banality of private life.”

WayMadeShowsMovingNextKnownMorningEventsAdventureForgottenBackgroundsTalesFamiliarMoving ForwardRememberedPaceNext DayHistoricRapidsPrivate LifeDewWovenGrippingBanalityNarratorsBackdropMorning DewGlisten
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