Quotes by Milan Kundera

“Every situation is of man's making and can only contain what man contains.”

“Certainty. Life's last and kindest gift.”

“They had been talking about his friend Z. when she announced, "If I hadn't met you, I'd certainly have fallen in love with him."Even then, her words had left Tomas in a strange state of melancholy,...”

“For what is love if one loves a woman without knowing her? Just a decision to love? Or even an imitation? The question concerns us all: If, from our childhood on, the examples of love were not ther...”

“We pass through the present with our eyes blindfolded. We are permitted merely to sense and guess at what we are actually experiencing. Only later when the cloth is untied can we glance at the past...”

“People meet in the course of life, they talk together, they discuss, they quarrel, without realizing that they're talking to one another across a distance, each from an observation post standing in...”

“In modern times an idea can be refuted, yes, but not retracted”

“It is a tragicomic fact that our proper upbringing has become an ally of the secret police. (...) The "Tell the truth!" imperative drummed into us so automatically that we feel ashamed of lying eve...”

“whether they knew of didn't know is not the main issue; the main issue is whether a man is innocent because he didn't know. (...) by beating himself on the chest and proclaiming, "My conscience is ...”

“There is a certain part of all of us that lives outside of time. Perhaps we become aware of our age only at exceptional moments and most of the time we are ageless.”

“I was not a hypocrite, with one real face and several false ones. I had several faces because I was young and didn't know who I was or wanted to be.”

“She spoke about it with such emphasis (somewhat affected) that I could see at once that I was hearing the manifesto of her generation. Every generation has its own set of passions, loves, and inter...”

“Youth is a terrible thing: it is a stage trod by children in buskins and fancy costumes mouthing speeches they've memorized and fanatically believe but only half understand”

“Revolution and youth are closely allied. What can a revolution promise to adults? To some it brings disgrace, to others favor. But even that favor is questionable, for it affects only the worse hal...”

“After Chopin's death, Polish patriots cut up his body to take out his heart. They nationalized this poor muscle and buried it in Poland.A dead person is treated either as trash or as a symbol. Eith...”

“The meaning did not precede the dream; the dream preceded the meaning. So the way to read the tale is to let the imagination carry one along. Not, above all, as a rebus to be decoded.”

“Humanity's true moral test, its fundamental testconsists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals.”

“Those who are fascinated by the idea of progress do not suspect that everything moving forward is at the same time bringing the end nearer and that joyous watchwords like "forward" and "farther" ar...”

“People fascinated by the idea of progress never suspect that every step forward is also a step on the way to the end and that behind all the joyous 'onward and upward' slogans lurks the lascivious ...”

“metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love”