• Home
  • About us
  • Contact Us
  • Date/Time
  • Login
  • Subscribe

logo

  • Home
  • Politics
  • Economics & Finance
  • World
  • Arts & Books
  • Life
  • Science
  • Philosophy
  • Subscribe
  • Events
Home
  • Home
  • Blogs
  • Politics
  • Economics & Finance
  • World
  • Arts & Books
  • Life
  • Science
  • Philosophy
  • Subscribe
  • Events
  • Home
  • Magazine

Unbearable slowness

Communism in eastern Europe created a unique literary-philosophical tradition. Lesley Chamberlain surveys this tradition both before and after the collapse of communism. She prefers Ivan Klima to Milan Kundera, but likes Christa Wolf best of all

by Lesley Chamberlain / May 20, 1996 / Leave a comment
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Linkedin
  • Email

Published in May 1996 issue of Prospect Magazine

Two cheers for communism. It gave us some wonderful books. What now? The Czech scientist and poet Miroslav Holub suggests, in the latest British Council volume of New Writing, that things aren’t all bad in the Czech Republic. That’s a characteristically superior view. But the question is why the books written under communism were so good, and stand the test of rereading out of season.

Milan Kundera can’t be ignored, because he has acquired such a reputation worldwide. But he has always seemed restless about that reputation, barely fictionalising bits of his biography to make a fantastic statement about all our lives. His essays about the novel endorse his concern with laughter and the body as a grand tradition from Cervantes and Rabelais. Faber has published some of them in Testaments Betrayed. It is a volume of mixed quality, with the inevitable Czech writer’s essay on Kafka. The literary theory looks second-hand, the literary history self-serving. We should judge him instead on his new novel, Slowness, his first for five years and the first written in French.

Ultra-short and barely a novel, Slowness seems to tell us where a disappointed Kundera (who emigrated to France over 20 years ago) has arrived. The speed-addicted west has already forgotten the fuss it made over communism and has already rendered its dissident heroes redundant. I was reading this confection with difficulty when I heard a child screaming in the street. That says it all. Slowness is a howl of impotence. Its misery is divided among three figures, one of them Kundera by name, another a French alter ego called Vincent, whose erotic life is as clumsy as his intellectual career, and a third, a Czech scientist restored to his profession after 20 years’ manual work. The usual Kunderian psycho-sexual climate, sadistic and unpleasant, predominates, until Vincent fails to copulate beside the hotel pool. Then Kundera’s universe collapses. The Great Chain of Couplings falls mercifully slac…

YOU’VE HIT THE LIMIT

You have now reached your limit of 3 free articles in the last 30 days.
But don’t worry! You can get another 7 articles absolutely free, simply by entering your email address in the box below.

When you register we’ll also send you a free e-book—Writing with punch—which includes some of the finest writing from our archive of 22 years. And we’ll also send you a weekly newsletter with the best new ideas in politics and philosophy of culture, which you can of course unsubscribe from at any time







Prospect may process your personal information for our legitimate business purposes, to provide you with our newsletter, subscription offers and other relevant information.

Click to learn more about these interests and how we use your data. You will be able to object to this processing on the next page and in all our communications.

18126589265c6f45ffe66994.11735762

Go to comments

Related articles

The euro area’s disquieting slowdown
Paul Wallace / November 29, 2018
Will the European Central Bank change its tune?
Winston Churchill defined imperial Britain
Prospect's books of 2018: history
Prospect Team / December 13, 2018
New biographies of Churchill and de Gaulle dominate
Share with friends
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Linkedin
  • Email

Comments

No comments yet

Prospect's free newsletter

The big ideas that are shaping our world—straight to your inbox. PLUS a free e-book and 7 articles of your choosing on the Prospect website.

Prospect may process your personal information for our legitimate business purposes, to provide you with our newsletter, subscription offers and other relevant information. Click here to learn more about these purposes and how we use your data. You will be able to opt-out of further contact on the next page and in all our communications.

This Month's Magazine

Perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus.

Prospect is the leading magazine of ideas. Each month it is packed with the finest writing on politics, culture, economics and ideas. Subscribe today and join the debate.

Subscribe

Most Popular

  • Read
  • Commented

This proposal for breaking the Brexit deadlock deserves serious consideration

Did the SDP really split the left in 1983?

The Duel: Has modern architecture ruined Britain?

Nonsense economics: the rise of modern monetary theory

The invigorating strangeness of Friedrich Nietzsche

The Conservative Party has a problem—it’s no longer conservative

5 Comments

The impact of Brexit on services has not received nearly enough attention

2 Comments

Even if Britain stays in Europe, we need a new constitutional settlement

2 Comments

If May's deal is in flames, Labour should not seek to put out the fire

2 Comments

The naïve optimism of Liam Fox

2 Comments

About this author

Lesley Chamberlain
Lesley Chamberlain's most recent book was The Philosophy Steamer: Lenin and the Exile of the Intelligentsia. http:// www.lesleychamberlai n.co.uk
More by this author

More by Lesley Chamberlain

Dr Roget’s 990 lists
December 20, 2008
The Russian futurist
August 31, 2008
The high life
July 26, 2008

Next Prospect events

  • Details

    Prospect Book Club—Diarmaid MacCulloch

    London, 2019-05-20

  • Details

    Prospect Book Club—Sue Prideaux

    2019-04-15

  • Details

    Prospect Book Club—Andrew Roberts

    2019-03-14

See more events

Sponsored features

  • The future of transport: taking Britain into the fast lane

  • Reforming the pension system to work for the many

  • Putting savers in the driving seat: getting the pensions dashboard right

  • To fix the housing crisis we need fresh thinking

  • Tata Steel UK: Driving innovation for the future of mobility

PrimeTime

The magazine is owned and supported by the Resolution Group, as part of its not-for-profit, public interest activities.

Follow us
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Google+
  • RSS

Editorial

Editor: Tom Clark
Deputy Editor: Steve Bloomfield
Managing Editor (Arts & Books): Sameer Rahim
Head of Digital: Stephanie Boland
Deputy Digital Editor (Political Correspondent): Alex Dean
Creative Director: Mike Turner
Production Editor & Designer: Chris Tilbury
US Writer-at-Large: Sam Tanenhaus

Commercial

Commercial Director: Alex Stevenson
Head of Marketing: Paul Mortimer
Marketing and Circulations Executive: James Hawkins
Programme Coordinator: Oliver James Ward
Head of Advertising Sales: Adam Kinlan 020 3372 2934
Senior Account Manager: Dominic Slonecki 0203 372 2972

  • Home
  • Advertising
  • Contact Us
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
  • Acceptable Use Policy
© Prospect Publishing Limited
×
Login
Login with your subscriber account:
You need a valid subscription to login.
I am
Remember Me


Forgotten password?

Or enter with social networking:
Login to post comments using social media accounts.
  • With Twitter
  • Connect
  • With Google +
×
Register Now

Register today and access any 7 articles on the Prospect’s website for FREE in the next 30 days..
PLUS find out about the big ideas that will shape our world—with Prospect’s FREE newsletter sent to your inbox. We'll even send you our e-book—Writing with punch—with some of the finest writing from the Prospect archive, at no extra cost!

Not Now, Thanks

Prospect may process your personal information for our legitimate business purposes, to provide you with our newsletter, subscription offers and other relevant information.

Click to learn more about these interests and how we use your data. You will be able to object to this processing on the next page and in all our communications.

×
You’ve got full access!

It looks like you are a Prospect subscriber.

Prospect subscribers have full access to all the great content on our website, including our entire archive.

If you do not know your login details, simply close this pop-up and click 'Login' on the black bar at the top of the screen, then click 'Forgotten password?', enter your email address and press 'Submit'. Your password will then be emailed to you.

Thank you for your support of Prospect and we hope that you enjoy everything the site has to offer.

This site uses cookies to improve the user experience. By using this site, you agree that we can set and use these cookies. For more details on the cookies we use and how to manage them, see our Privacy and Cookie Policy.