Farewell Waltz by Kundera

"It seemed to him that with every oversalted mouthful he was tasting Kamila's tears, and it was his own guilt that he was swallowing."

"For a moment his photograph had acquired a three-dimensional reality, a warmth, a weight, and then had again become an impalpable. colorless image reproduced in thousands of copies and thus all the more abstract and unreal."

"Blonde hair and black hair are the two poles of human nature. Black hair signifies virility, courage, frankness, activity, while blonde hair symbolizes femininity, tenderness, weaness, and passivity.Therefore a blonde is in fact doubly a woman."

"I'm curious about how pigments exercise their influence over the human soul," said Bertlef doubtfully."

"If black hair became a universal fashion, life in this world would clearly be better. It would be the most useful social reform ever achieved."

Now, he's just making fun...

"Why do you think they try to seduce us? Solely to defy and humiliate their fellow women. God instilled in women's hearts a hatred of other women because He wanted the human race to multiply.

Both Klima and Ruzena have groups of their own sex trying to advise them what to do in situation. Basically: what men and women do in case of an unwanted pregnancy.

"Just as love makes the beloved woman more beautiful, anxiety inspired by a woman one fears brings her smallest flaws into disproportionate relief..."

"[...] the sadness that emanated from these words of Klima's had for her a pleasant odor. She sniffed at it as if it were roast pork."

Sadness is very attractive in a vain kind of way.

"Only now having lost its charm, was the mouth suddenly what it was, a real mouth, an nonindustrial orifice through which the young woman had already taken in cubing meters of dumplings, potatoes, and soups, a mouth containing teeth pocked with fillings and saliva that was no longer an intoxicating liqueur but the cousin of a glob of spit."

Pregnancy = Power

"It thrills me so to think of giving you a child."

This is such power- overrides that he has a wife!! She isn't even in a position of saying such a thing, but just because she's pregnant- he has to pay for it. It's funny, but some women take pleasure in blaming the man for his natural "reaction". It takes two to tango.

Marriage Metaphor:
"Every time we climbed up there," Skreta went on, "Suzy tried to convince me we should get married. And I'd be so worn out by the climbing that I felt old and that there was nothing left for me but to marry. But in the end I always controlled myself, and when we came back down from the scening view my strength would come back and I'd no longer want to get married. But one day Suzy made us take a detour, and the climb took so long and I agreed to get married even before we got to the top. And now we're expecting a child, and I have to think a bit about money."

"Olga was actually one of those modern women who readily divide themselves into a person who lives life and a person who observes it."

"If Olga had been a little more foolish, she would have found herself quite pretty. But since she was an intelligent girl, she considered herself much uglier than she really was, for she was actually neither ugly nor pretty, and any man with normal aesthetic requirements would gladly spend the night with her."

"I picture my soul with a strong chin and sensual lips, but my chin is small and so is my mouth. If I'd never seen myself in a mirror and had to describe my outside appearance from what I know of the inside of me, the portrait wouldn't look at all like me! I am not at all the person I look like!"

"You need to have at least one certainty: to remain in control of your own death and o the ability to choose its time and manner. You can put up with a lot of things. You know you can get away from people whenever you want."

"It's incredible that hideous-looking individuals decide to procreate. They probably imagine that the burden of ugliness will be lighter if they share it with their descendants."

"Impelled merely by the desire to perpetuate the species, mankind will end up something itself on this small planet. But the natalist propaganda mill grinds on, and the public is moved to tears by pictures of nursing mothers and infants making faces. It disgusts me. It chills me to think that, along with millions of other enthusiasts, I could be bending over a cradle with a silly smile." 

"Something that always utterly disgusts me about mankind is seeing how its cruelty, its baseness, and its stupidity manage to wear the lyrical mask. She sends you to your death, and she experiences it as a romantic feat of wounded love. And you mount the scaffold because of an ordinary narrow-minded woman, feeling that you are playing a role in a tragedy Shakespeare wrote for you." 

"They wished to take revenge on and torpedo with the repulsiveness of their bodies the glory of female beauty, for they knew that bodies, whether beautiful or ugly, are ultimately all the same and that the ugly overshadow the beautiful as they whisper in men's ears: Look, this is the truth of the body that bewitches you! Look, this big flabby tit is the same thing as the breast you so madly adore." 

"When he is more mature he will find out that things are transient, and he will become aware that beyond one woman's horizon there opens up a horizon of yet more women." 

"Your dirt too, sir, is vanity, and your vanity is dirty." 

A reference to a toothache (Notes from the Underground):
"He cannot sit down. Jealousy is like a raging toothache. One cannot do anything when one is jealous, not even sit down. One can only come and go. Back and forth." 

"[...] it was because of her that their marriage was menaced by a bomb deposited in another woman's belly, by a charge timed to blow everything up in seven months." 

Everyone is death with anxiety- with things that mean the world to them- and in a second don't matter. Like for Ruzena and Jakab- they eventually become indifferent to their world/anxieties.

Kima and Mrs. Klima have a very sick love. They know everything about each other and the relationship is seeping with jealousy and regret, They have lost the connection long ago but don't want to admit it.


Further CONNECTIONS with Dostoevsky:
References Crime and Punishment

"Yes, there was something that brought him close to Raskolnikov: the pointlessness of the murder, its theoretical nature." 

and

"Jakub was amazed that his act was so light, so weightless, amazed that it did not overwhelm him. And he wondered if this lightness was not more terrifying than the Russian character's hysterical feelings." 

"'The police don't have much influence over the infernal powers,' the inspector said."

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He spun around this controversial topic very elegantly. I really liked each person's perspective/incentives towards abortion and pregnancy. Klima had to remove this from his wife's knowledge so wanted an abortion. Ruzena was a "stupid slut" apparently with a "good heart" and used her pregnancy as a way of getting money/fame. The poor girl was very CLOSE to thinking though!  Mrs. Klima is a typical housewife suffering from paranoia and yet beautiful. The Doctor helped Klima because he wanted fame.

Interesting story- of course I take it more of a farce than discussing the topic of abortion seriously. I guess it shows what happens to certain individuals when such a situation presents itself.

Pub: Harper Perennial

The Hours by Michael Cunningham

Yes, I realize this is not a "classic". I am in the habit, currently, of reading borrowed books. It makes them a little more sweet. Anyway I don't regret reading it- it was pretty fascinating. I won't dwelve into the summary because I'm sure tons of people have already done this. Since it's contemporary and all.

"It seems possible (it does not seem impossible) that she's slipped accross an invisible line, the line that has always seperated her from what she preferred to feel, who she would prefer to be."

"You try to hold the moment, justs here, in the kitchen with the flowers. You try to inhabit it, to love it because it's yours and because what waits immediately outside these rooms is the hallway, with its brown tiles and its dim brown lamps that are always lit."

What awaits you is TIME. I feel like this as well. It seems like all these women want to be safe behind the doors. They are scared of what awaits them outside (and of time itself). Mrs. Brown wants to read all day and doesn't want to face her life- family. Virginia as well- as soon as she locks the door she feels free. "She feels briefly, wonderfully alone, with everything ahead of her." (Clarissa). There are endless possibilities behind the closed door of reality.

“She thinks of how much more space a being occupies in life than it does in death; how much illusion of size is contained in gestures Dead, we are revealed in our true dimensions, and they are surprisingly modest." 

“I wanted to create something alive and shocking enough that it could stand beside a morning in somebody’s life. The most ordinary morning. Imagine, trying to do that. What foolishness.”

“When she looks in the medicine- cabinet mirror, she briefly imagines that someone is standing behind her. There is on one, of course; it’s just a trick of the light. For an instant, no more than that, she has imagined some sort of ghost self, a second version of her, standing immediately behind, watching. It’s nothing.”

“She might, at this moment, be nothing but a floating intelligence; not even a brain inside a skull, just a presence that perceives, as a ghost might. Yes, she thinks, this is probably how it must feel to be a ghost. It’s a little like reading, isn’t it- that same sensation of knowing people, settings, situations, without playing any particular part beyond that of the willing observer”

“We live our lives, do whatever we do, and then we sleep- it’s as simple and ordinary as that. A few jump out of windows or drown themselves or take pills; more die by accident; and most of us, the vast majority, are slowly devoured by some disease or, if we’re very fortunate, by time itself. There’s just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we’ve ever imagined, though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) knows these hours will inevitable be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. Still, we cherish the city, the morning; we hope, more than anything, for more.” 

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The hours- basically it refers to time. Richard killed himself because he dreaded all this TIME and he was tired of passing through it. Same as his mother- which is why she walked away from the family, it was unendurable. And yet- I like this- I like that yes we go on living through what is the majority of our life- through dark hours. Ordinary life- where nothing happens. We have parties, we have anxieties, we have sorrows, trifles trifles. They are insignificant. But we get caught up in it all. And we don’t really know ourselves sometimes. But the beauty of life- is that it reminds us WHY we are alive. In just a moment. Because this book focuses on being IN the moment, and being OUT of it. Most of the time we are OUT of the moment, we don’t really know how to cherish it. But when we are in the moment, these hours before us seem to be suspended. And we feel immortal. That is what our life is- a constant strive to feel immortal. To feel as if time itself has stopped. 

Another aspect is that all of these women do not feel themselves. "UNBEING". Which by the way KUNDERA has also used. They seem to be living someone else's life and don't know what to do about it. They feel trapped in their "role". Virginia as well- pretending to be "healthy" and "socially normal". I think Clarissa is the worst one- because she doesn't realize that she's trapped- even though she mentions the apartment and how she doesn't feel at "home" there. And even Sally said that they'll watch each other "fade away", which is super sad. So I tihnk Laura Brown was the smartest one- she just walked away from UNBEING. She didn't want to deal with it and live a lie. While Virginia killed herself. Alternatives. 

One can't RATIONALIZE one's happiness- as much as one tries. It ends up catching up with you in the end. 

 

Possible Explanation on The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

Found this on youtube- such a privilege to hear a lecture without going to class- which was the part I hated most:




NOTES:

The person which changes history is rarely ever prepared for it- it just happens.
Experience- meditation and learning something from them not simply things happening to you.
Not only let time pass but give time to things around you and CARE about them.
Aha so he's jumping around in time! Now the existence of those weird passages make sense.
"The world is mysterious but the world offers us a kind of intimacy that does correspond ultimately to some of our deepest desires."-it's all real.
Can we share being with someone else? It's funny I asked myself the same question and personally I think it will always be limited- what we are able to share.
Objects can become personal and can take on emotions.

The passage about the girls going to the city is very interesting- he's actually talking about the role of women throughout the centuries- and how they've always had to do all the work "both sides of the dialogue" (in a relationship). Not within society specifically but within a relationship- within love.
Love shows us reality.
The Prodigal Son was lacking reality- the love was not real for him.
Love imposes demands on the ones whom you love.
It opens us up to a life in which not all of our questions can be answered but at least can be asked.

---
Interesting lecture- I liked his analysis on women- which I didn't pick up on while reading the book- like many other things. Still don't understand his analysis of his family and the vanishing house. A little bit more clear on what the book is about- basically how to love. And I guess the prodigal son connects with his learning how to love. He was angry that no one understood who he REALLY was- they just loved him blindly. This can easily happen in a relationship- when we love our partner based on an ideal and not the real person within them, and actually not even having an interest- for we love our ideal more. And then he realized that this selfless love is enough to understand him- for love doesn't need to be concrete- it encompasses all. From what I understand- which doesn't mean much- is that love doesn't need to be concrete, because it engulfs every detail of our soul, no matter WHICH detail it is. If that makes any sense. For example- I don't know EXACTLY what I love about you, which detail in your soul and where it is located- such as CONCRETELY what you are feeling- but I love it all anyway, even though I can't put my finger on it exactly. If that makes ANY sense.
I don't know I was struggling with this question as well- and I guess it DOESN'T matter if the person knows exactly the world within me, because their love can reach every part of my soul without them knowing the direction.
 That doesn't make sense does it? I don't know. All I know is that it encompasses the REAL without even our knowledge or know-how. In short: it does it's own thing and it is beyond us.

Impromptu

"I'm a coward, of course. I can never simply boot my lovers down the stairs." 

"You promised to love me." 
"I didn't promise to succeed." 

"Leave her alone! She's going off to write about us. It's time for her nightly regurgitation. 20 pages. The only reason she needs you or me or anybody is to provide characters for her ghastly novels!" 


"Darling, I want to be on your conscience. You destroyed my youth. You buried my springtime in shadows." 

"The horse is a critic!" 

"Someone's got to show you how to breathe!"


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I don't agree with the criticism against her novels, that they are worthless because she just did it for money. I first read her novels without knowing anything about her life- and they truly touched me. The heroins in her novels are cold, and yet they have something deep and good inside. They do not have any more energy to live life and to enjoy it, and yet they want to. 

I view her as an inspiration. As a liberated woman, and above all as a crazy writer.

The Talented Mr. Ripley- Fix the Unfixable

"Don't you just take the past, and put it in a room in the basement, and lock the door and never go in there? That's what I do. "

"Don't you just take the past and put it in a room in a basement and lock the door and never go in there? That's what I do, And then you meet someone special and all you want to do is to toss them the key and say; open up, step inside, but you can't, because it's dark, There's demons and if anybody saw how ugly it is. I keep wanted to do that, fling the door open just let light in and clean everything out. "

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As I was watching this movie, all of a sudden I was reminded by the Picture of Dorian Gray. After Ripley's second murder, it struck me- he's digging his own grave. One could sense the desperation by his actions. He didn't care who he killed next, as long as it fixed the problem. This need to "fix things" through murder reminded me of the things that Dorian did to also get out of the situation. Of course this action was extremely irrational, because people cannot just disappear. I mean, they soon will be missed. And yet, this wasn't thought about by both characters in the moment of panic. Their impulse was to kill, and if that person was eliminated, then the problem would go away. I think for both of them, after the first murder, it was something they just felt they had to do. Murder was the solution.

And just like Dorian, I think Tom is going to end up killing himself after the last scene. There is no possible way he can consciously survive after all that he had done. Dorian couldn't take it because he visually saw what he had become... although both characters started out as very naive. I think Dorian remained naive until the end, even after all the murders. Tom on the other hand seemed to suppress his guilt and succeed in doing so. His personality, or character as one may say, would be harder to break because his soul wasn't so pure. This lack of purity stems from his dejection from reality. He doesn't seem to see things as their happening, but only jumps from one action to the other. He doesn't reflect about his actions at all, because he knows that would be the death of him. Dorian not only reflected on what he had become, but he saw it in front of his eyes, and therefore could not avoid it any longer. But if something is pushed down so hard into the unconscious, it is so easy to live with the growing guilt, until one day the unconscious breaks loose into your entire world. One cannot escape their unconscious forever...it will find a way to make itself known. But once Tom reflects on what he has done, then he will have to kill himself, because after that realization, one cannot physically carry on this life. Guilt does not let one live. Which is why it either leads to suicide or complete denial. Of course that is on the cynical side. Now, if one has murdered and gives into the guilt, and finds a way to make amends not only with the world but with oneself, then one can escape. To accept the guilt and the fault is freedom... something Dorian and Tom did not realize.

Sand or Woolf?

And as I am currently reading Mrs. Dalloway-since in a sudden moment of inspiration I re-watched The Hours and wanted to watch that movie supposedly where Nicole Kidman plays Virginia. I initially didn't post this just so I can talk about the movie (I doubt that I'm a very good film-critic) but really from my "instinct" about Virginia Woolf, Nicole plays her way too cold and crazy. Virginia seems to strike me more "cheery" in her style. She has such a tremendous elegance and class in her writing, that is coupled with sarcasm and a slight sense of humour. It's actually quite enjoyable. Most of the world out there (eh, what does the world know?) seems to think she was some sort of strange maniac. But I find her quite good-natured and sane. She has marvelous observations about the characters she describes, that is so down-to-earth. I mean, the way she weaves the past, and the future at the same time as the present is really something I've never seen before in writing. She seems to play with time. And she does it with such ease! I don't know, she would seem like such an interesting person to chat with over a glass of wine...
Now, George Sand I've admired for a very long time- since I've read her first novel Marianne. She seems to have such strength in her writing, and the way she lived her life. I mean, come on, even Turgenev went to visit her. Just imagine, all the wonderful male contemporaries of her day coming especially to pay her a visit! That must've been such an honor, and just shows how respected she was. Maybe I was influenced by the portrait of her in male clothing, but she strikes me as a very charming, feminine woman with a slight masculine edge. Masculine- as in this wish to make oneself known in a form of a revolution; and yes, even a literary one. She has marvelous concepts, and has made me be less sexist of female authors. (I am female by the way, so I think I have the right). Anyways, not to get off topic- my question is: Who would I rather meet, George Sand or Virginia Woolf? And after reading George Sand, I really wanted to be like her- a woman that isn't really distracted by males, but succeeds to be almost one of them (almost, I say, because she undeniably possesses this female charm in her writing, that gives her novels such an interesting perspective), which of course the male authors lack. Now, Virginia Woolf also has this wonderful sense of knowing people and their desires. But, in my opinion, she has something more- she seems to have this playful attitude and yet the same time being very serious. It's as if she is playing with words and concepts, but in the end everything unites forming something very profound. Her personality is revealed through her humor and sarcasm, which is something very enjoyable.
So-I pick Virginia Woolf. Not only does she keep her femininity, she also invites one to have a casual chat with her- no matter how many hundreds of years in between.

Oh, and let's just go a bit farther with this impossible wish- what would I say to this
incredible woman?

Well, I would ask her why she was so unhappy, and why she couldn't let go of her mind? Because it seems to me that was her problem, (from what I've heard of her)- she was too much in her mind, and therefore, very lonely. Like in her Night and Day. Whether she believes in God- because that would tell me a lot, and if she would pick one thing she wanted most in life what would that be?

To Virginia Woolf, cheers!

So chic with her fur coat

Cashback- concept of time

Another blog chase has led me to this unexpected movie. I read the Only Word's to Play With blog, and I was trying to find the Kubrick and Gogol comparison. I still have no idea what the comparison is. Searching on imdb.com, I looked up Kubrick, and the search came up with Cashback. So, what the hell, I Youtubed, and there it was. Extremely interesting movie, and it actually connects to a couple of the books I've read. White Nights by Dostoevsky comes to mind. Apparently, in Japan, it's appropriately called "Frozen Time". The whole world except me apparently already knew that Oliver Wood is this very attractive/talented actor? I HAVE NEVER HEARD OF HIM...but yes he is rather dashing. Some quotes from the movie:



"I wanted to freeze time. I wanted to savor that moment, to live in that moment for a week. But I couldn't stop it, only slow it. And before I knew it, she was gone."

"Within this frozen world I'm able to walk freely and unnoticed. Nobody would even know that time has stopped. And when it started back up again, the invisible join would be seamless except for a slight shudder. Not unlike the feeling of somebody walking over your grave. "

"Once upon a time, I wanted to know what love was. Love is there if you want it to be. You just have to see that its wrapped in beauty and hidden away in between the seconds of your life. If you don't stop for a minute, you might miss it."
--

This movie was quite a treat, since he reminded me of the nameless character in White Nights. Especially the frozen in time moment. The most memorable quote from that story was the very end, saying that he could live on a moment for a whole lifetime. Freezing time, of course not literally, can make one live in that moment. Until that moment dies to make room a new one. But some people, such as the nameless character, don't ever let go of that moment, and try to cling to it as much as possible- damaging their reality through the process. So, there is a balance between the two. When one deals with time, it is easy to get lost in it, and lose all sense of reality. Bill started hallucinating and staring at objects deep in thought for long periods of time. The nameless character talks about the houses he goes to see everyday, and how he has different connections with perfect strangers off the street. All conversations with Nastenka seem like a dream, nights blurred by mists.
What Bill refers to though in the last quote, I believe, is the fact that we need to slow time down and actually THINK about each second of our lives. If time is just something to be breathed through, and ticking away, then our existence is worthless. We might as well be a plant...We have the privilege of recognizing beauty and therefore we need to step back in awe.
It also reminded me of American Beauty. Especially of the "electricity in the air".

Burnt by the Sun

I found this wonderful movie on a blog by accident. I was in the process of searching for blogs with any Russian-related topics, and there it pops out. Since I was just happening to be chatting with a friend (in another state), she immediately sent me the youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpHsFsvsKS0. And so, instead of studying for our exams like good students would do, we proceeded (as unplanned as this was) to watch the entire movie. Procrastination works wonders. I really enjoyed this movie, except maybe the end. Of course, I don't want to give it away...

There were some hilarious scenes in it, especially with the (large) chested woman asking for the time. And of course let's not forget the spinster...she needs as much attention as she can get. So throughout the whole movie, I'm ashamed to admit (as vulgar as it may sound), my friend and I were basically screaming, "Why didn't they just get it over with and sleep together!? Because, we really condemned the age difference- compared to Dmitri's contrasting youth. We were going to be bitterly disappointed... But of course, it is supposed to depict reality, and most of the time, it does not consist of the ideal course of events. I loved hearing them speak Russian, and see their heritage portrayed through their actions.

It reminded me of a story written by Turgenev I believe. When the former lover comes back home after a long time, and sees how everything has changed... It must be horrible to see the world live on without you, as you are ripped away from anything familiar. And that familiarity will be forever buried in memories and never to live again.
I'm sorry for such a thought, but I guess the ending inspired it.