Czech writer Milan Kundera, author of the famous novel “The Unbearable Lightness of Being”, who lived for more than five decades in Paris, has died at the age of 94.
The Moravian Library, which includes Kundera’s collection, said he died in his Paris apartment yesterday, after a long illness. Kundera won awards for his style of portraying the themes he deals with in his novels, and the way he drew characters that varied between the mundane reality of everyday life and the realm of lofty ideas. Czech Prime Minister Peter Viala said, “Milan Kundera was a writer who touched entire generations of readers on all continents, won international fame, and left distinguished prose work, not outstanding novels.”
Kundera was born in Brno, Czech Republic, and immigrated to France in 1975, after he was persecuted, as part of what was known as the Prague Spring of 1968.
Kundera rarely gave interviews, believing in his opinion that writers should speak through their work, but his relationship with his homeland was often difficult after he left.
Kundera’s first novel, The Joke, was published in 1967. The novel was a scathing portrayal of the ruling Communist regime in Czechoslovakia and the party of which he was still a member.
His most famous work, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” (1984), revolved around the Prague Spring and its aftermath. The novel was turned into a movie starring Daniel Day-Lewis, directed by Philip Kaufman in 1988, and won two Oscars. Kundera obtained the citizenship of the Czech Republic in 2019.
