Milan Kundera And Feminism

Since sexuality and sexual politics account for the most consistently engaged tensions in Milan Kundera's fiction, it is surprising that critical attention to Kundera's work has yet to produce an extensive study that concentrates on the Czech novelist's problematic representations of women. In this study, O'Brien offers two such in-depth considerations: First he tracks the (mis)representations of the female characters; then he explores the promise of reading Kundera from the feminist perspective. Initially, O'Brien takes Kundera to task for representing women from a perspective dominated by either/or, opposition-based frameworks. Instead of dismissing Kundera as sexist, however, O'Brien takes these concerns further, arguing that a feminist-postmodernist approach shows Kundera exposing, not reinforcing, the misrepresentation of women. Using an eclectic perspective that draws on the insights of feminist criticism and deconstruction, the author looks to strong women, such as The Unbearable Lightness of Being's Sabina in order to develop a method of simultaneously appreciating the complicated surfaces and the paradoxical depths of Kundera's work. Considering O'Brien's own cross-purpose and Kundera's famous penchant for ambiguity, the duality of O'Brien's conclusions are appropriate. Milan Kundera & Feminism considers Kundera's contributions to the feminist critique of representation without ignoring the serious difficulties for the feminist reader.

“Far more than a conventional novel. It is a meditation on life, on the erotic, on the nature of men and women and love . . . full of telling details, truths large and small, to which just about every reader will respond.” — People In The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera tells the story of two couples, a young woman in love with a man torn between his love for her and his incorrigible womanizing, and one of his mistresses and her humbly faithful lover. In a world in which lives are shaped by irrevocable choices and by fortuitous events, a world in which everything occurs but once, existence seems to lose its substance, its weight. Hence, we feel "the unbearable lightness of being" not only as the consequence of our pristine actions but also in the public sphere, and the two inevitably intertwine. This magnificent novel is a story of passion and politics, infidelity and ideas, and encompasses the extremes of comedy and tragedy, illuminating all aspects of human existence.

Presents a collection of critical essays about the work of Milan Kundera.

In Milan Kundera’s Fiction: A Critical Approach to Existential Betrayals, Karen von Kunes traces Kundera’s literary aspirations to a single episode in Czechoslovakia in the Stalinist era. This moment attracted international attention when a 1950 police report was released in 2008. Reporters rushed to judgment, accusing Kundera of denouncing Miroslav Dvořáček to the police, resulting in Dvořáček’s immediate arrest and sentencing to hard labor. von Kunes debunks this shocking charge in a systematic way and argues that Kundera reported a suitcase, not a man. She ties Kundera’s dominant themes of sex, betrayal, and political denouncement to the suitcase, a fatal instrument that can lead to paradoxes and unforeseen and catastrophic coincidences for his characters.

New York Times Bestseller "Inspired. . . . Kundera's most brilliantly imagined novel. . . . A book that entrances, beguiles and charms us from first page to last." — Cleveland Plain Dealer Milan Kundera's sixth novel springs from a casual gesture of a woman to her swimming instructor, a gesture that creates a character in the mind of a writer named Kundera. Like Flaubert's Emma or Tolstoy's Anna, Kundera's Agnès becomes an object of fascination, of indefinable longing. From that character springs a novel, a gesture of the imagination that both embodies and articulates Milan Kundera's supreme mastery of the novel and its purpose: to explore thoroughly the great themes of existence.

Julie Stephens confronts the core claims of postmaternal thought and criticises dominant representations of feminism as having forgotten motherhood. She does this through an investigation of oral histories, life narratives, web blogs, and other rich and varied sources. The book highlights the deep cultural anxiety that exists around public expressions of maternalism. It examines why postmaternal thinking has become so influential in recent decades and asks why there has been a growing unease with maternal forms of subjectivity and maternalist perspectives.

A Study Guide for Milan Kundera's "Hitchhiking Game," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.

"MISOGYNIES is a superb and vivid piece of writing, eminently readable, wonderfully fresh." PHYLLIS CHESLER Author of WOMEN AND MADNESS In this collection of stinging essays Joan Smith explores the phenomenon of women-hating in politics, religion, history, literature, and popular culture on both sides of the Atlantic. A fascinating collection from the mind of a scholar, educator, and observer of our society, MISOGYNIES will make readers of both genders wonder more about the excuses for hatred of women we create as a society, why we accept them, and what it means to all of our lives.