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Sometimes you make up your mind about something without knowing why, and your decision persists by the power of inertia. Every year it gets harder to change.
Milan Kundera
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Milan Kundera
Age: 95
Born: 1929
Born: April 1
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Brünn
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When graves are covered with stones, the dead can no longer get out. But the dead can't go out anyway! What difference does it make whether they're covered with soil or stones?
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The stupidity of people comes from having an answer for everything. The wisdom of the novel comes from having a question for everything.
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Nudity is the uniform of the other side... nudity is a shroud.
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The history of music is mortal, but the idiocy of the guitar is eternal.
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[W]e must never allow the future to collapse under the burden of memory.
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Such are the Splendors and Miseries of memory: it is proud of its ability to keep truthful track of the logical sequence of past events but when it comes to how we experienced them at the time, memory feels no obligation to truth.
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Those who consider the Devil to be a partisan of Evil and angels to be warriors for Good accept the demagogy of the angels. Things are clearly more complicated.
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We go through the present blindfolded... Only later, when the blindfold is removed and we examine the past, do we realize what we've been through and understand what it means.
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Anyone whose goal is 'something higher' must expect someday to suffer vertigo.
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A worker may be the hammer's master, but the hammer still prevails. A tool knows exactly how it is meant to be handled, while the user of the tool can only have an approximate idea.
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...[P]eople who shout joy from the rooftops are often the saddest of all... (p.24)
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