Unbearable heaviness of reading
Musings on reading the Unbearable Lightness of Being
‘Anything else?’ asked mother, inches away from confirming the book orders,
‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being.’ Answered I. Those words had left my mouth without identifying themselves, now that they were thrown in the air, they sounded unbelievably foreign. I was sure that I read about that book in one of the literary magazines, but I was completely unaware of my own longing towards it.
And that is our story, how me and ‘unbearable lightness of being’ found each other. I am not a voracious reader, but I like to think that I am. So whenever weekends came, I hopped to the library with an empty bag and walked back drearily eyes buries in one of my library books. I pick each of my books with great care, I never learnt not to judge a book by its covers, as I removed one book from the shelves and flipped it around in my hands, it had an indefinite amount of time to impress me with whatever it had on its surface until I decided to put it down. Like choosing a lover, I was precarious around the pages, tried in my best abilities to silently observe the wooing. But as it is with many other relationships in life the most handsomely chosen ones failed to fall in love with me, I realized through time that the pages had to call unto me, and I respond and begin the vertigo into another great love of my life with a nonchalant heart. That was the case with the ‘Unbearable Lightness of Being’, I rather would like to think that the book had found me than me discovering it, in fact us discovering each other would be the most amorous setting.
I have not got to the end of this love, but I affirmed the existence of this affection this day, as I rolled my eyes off the page signaling the end of part two, let out an inaudible from the well of souls in the way the two parts of the story I had met so far so nonchalantly tied it the stream of its words with a subtle motif. Love would be a rather vague way to put it. Love is merely a base of this novel, everything else that stretches out from it, dangles down to it, covers it, adorns it, swirls around the air revolving it is what makes me unable to take my eyes off from the page. It is like a maze made unintentionally, the words and unutterable sentiments uttered through them made a trail full of hidden meanings, each bend was not meant to be, but after a while, after the trail had found style in its bends, corners, turns and hills, some kind of hidden truth of life that was non-existent, to begin with is reached. I was struggling to understand what the book was trying to make me feel, but to feel was merely an instrument of what this book was capable of doing. I was led on by a link of words, rolled names and terms yet to grow up into themes and motifs softly around my eyes and passed them on. I remember reading Tomas’ narrative, upon he distresses, love, burden and stories while feeling unbearably detached from it. It was a story, it was an account, it was to be over as soon as I shut the covers of the book. But as the pages turned the words ceased to be interesting but natural, like a heartbeat. Pages flew by without identifying each action with my consciousness. That is how I journeyed through the second part of the novel, Tereza’s account. For some reason, it took longer for me to recall her name, for that brief second I searched through my head for her name an epiphany hit me that the reason why my mouth struggled to locate Tereza was that I was reading merely that chapter of the book when I read it. The persona ceased to become what the author had penned it to be, just as children grow out or grow back in their given name, I realized as I read the second part I was mostly reflecting my own persona into Teresa. Then, the words on the paper began to mean very little.
