The comfort of loneliness

It's come down to a very pleasant temperature these past few days in Chicago which has provided some very lovely reading conditions.  I do wish I had some kind of balcony or  lounging area with lots of windows to pull in the breeze to lay around in with my books.  Perfect lazing weather.

I liked The Book of Laughter and Forgetting more than I did The Unbearable Lightness of Being probably because I am so fixated on memory, which had a big part in this novel.  I like this:

"We will never remember anything by sitting in one place waiting for the memories to come back to us of their own accord!  Memories are scattered all over the world.  We must travel if we want to find them and flush them from their hiding places!"

If ever there was a reason to travel, what a nice excuse this would be.

I'm a little undecided about Kundera's writing style and whether I like it or not.  His writing is decadent.  The way he layers stories and images reminds me of criticisms and feedback I received on my own writing while at school, but I often feel that he brushes against a poignant idea rather than really hitting it on the mark. I suppose it's nice to be inspired by vague ideas he presents, but it gives me a little bit of an uneasy feeling as if I'm being haunted by its ghost rather than really understanding it.

Sex is also a very prominent topic that Kundera always seems consistent in including.  There is not much sanctity in fidelity...or rather...adultery is accepted and comfortably average.  I'm okay with this, but it really seems to bring awareness to a lonely rift...or...perhaps more accurately, an empty space that's always blindly skirted in one's pursuit of happiness.  Because of that, there's a persistent sadness that hangs over everyone in Kundera's novels.  I guess that's reflective of his "pessimism".

<3:
"He thought about it for weeks afterward.  How could he have said no to a girl he liked?
He was on the other side of the border from her."

My copy of this book had a short interview of Kundera by Philip Roth at the end.  It also had a Dole fruit sticker stuck on the back.  Anyway, in honor of that, I think my next reading project will be by Roth.  Now to decide...Plot Against America, or American Pastoral?