1,075 Quotes by Milan Kundera

The worst thing is not that the world is unfree, but that people have unlearned their liberty.

...people don't respect the morning. An alarm clock violently wakes them up, shatters their sleep like the blow of an ax, and they immediately surrender themselves to deadly haste.

The great European novel started out as entertainment, and every true novelist is nostalgic for it. In fact, the themes of those great entertainments are terribly serious-think of Cervantes!

In the world of highways, a beautiful landscape means: an island of beauty connected by a long line with other islands of beauty.

Beauty has long since disappeared. It has slipped beneath the surface of the noise, the noise of words, sunk deep as Atlantis. The only thing left of it is the word, whose meaning loses clarity from year to year.

Yes, if you're looking for infinity, just close your eyes!

Optimism is the opium of the people.

The rediscovered path, where were left the traces of childhood's lost steps.

The heaviest of burdens is simultaneously an image of life's most intense fullfillment. The heavier the burden, the closer our lives come to the earth, the more real and truthful they become. Conversely, the absolute absence of a burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into new heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant. What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness?