The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera tells the story of a young woman in love with a man torn between his love for her and his incorrigible womanizing and one of his mistresses and her humbly faithful lover. it is novel about two women, two men, a dog, and their lives in the 1968 Prague Spring period of Czechoslovak history.

The tale begins on a philosophical note, discussing Friedrich Nietzsche’s concept of eternal recurrence. If, as Nietzsche believed, everything in life happens an infinite number of times, causing the *“heaviest of burdens,” then a personal life in which everything happens only once loses its “weight” and significance—hence the “the unbearable lightness of being.”

This magnificent novel juxtaposes geographically distant places, brilliant and playful reflections, and a variety of styles, to take its place as perhaps the major achievement of one of the world’s truly great writers. Upon its initial publication in English and French the novel enjoyed international popularity, especially after the release of the acclaimed 1988 film adaptation.

That movie was directed by Philip Kaufman and starred Daniel Day-Lewis (Tomas), Juliette Binoche (Tereza).