Double Kitsch: The Death of the Reader

Winona 2022-01-07 15:54:05

If Kundera is a vicious person, most people would agree with this view. But when it comes to the extent of Kundera's viciousness, I am afraid that it will be difficult to get the same high level of consistency as the previous point of view in terms of being recognized. Mr. Baudrillard is also known for his viciousness, but he is still hard to compare with Kundera in terms of viciousness. Because, at Baudrillard, he was at least willing to curse. Kundera refused.

So, how vicious is he? Try to speculate on him as much as you can. In short, he is more vicious than you can imagine.

Bart speaks of the death of the author, Kundera is the opposite, he announces the death of the reader just before the writing of a book. Bart said that zero writing and the death of the author mean an open reading, announcing the end of the author's monopoly on textual imagery, and symbolizing the disintegration of intellectual violence. Barthes described the reader's misreading of the blooming of the imagery of the text in a complimentary tone, and its contribution to the complexity, variability and creativity of the aesthetics. This is a positive attitude towards misreading that has become a classic.

Let us look at Kundera again. Kundera's work is used to misread, although this is not the author's original intention. Do you think this sentence is contradictory? This sentence can be explained in more detail. For this reason, it is necessary to introduce the concept of "gap". In Heidegger's words, the deepest gap in the world is "the difference between being and being." Kundera's large chapters are used to describe the existence of kitsch, and the readers are just "the existence of kitsch." The author's original intention is about a world of "zero kitsch"---the world of his own as his unique experience. In this way, two gaps have been created. The first level of the gap is the gap between the existence of kitsch and the existence of kitsch, and the second level is the gap between the world of kitsch and the author’s own world.

So how did Kundera announce the death of the reader? His ingenious technique can be described as extremely clever. His operation is to fill the gap at the first level, and to complete it through the reader's forgetting of the difference between the existence of kitsch and the existence of kitsch. The so-called kitsch, in terms of home use, is that people live in mass lies in a way that deviates from the declaration of "live in the truth". Kitsch is accomplished by forgetting the truth, and readers become a purer kitsch from the absurd forgetting of kitsch. At the same time, Kundera kept his own self-world from the kitsch world tightly isolated: Dear readers, I am just a describer. What you see is what I say is the same as "living in the truth". That I have nothing to do. This is his sentence.

"Love in Prague", before he died, Thomas said, I was thinking how happy I am now... At that moment, finally, light and weight disappeared. This moment comes too late, and the movie is far more sensational than the end of the book. I was wondering why Kundera arranged the theme of lightness and weight and arranged the protagonists to die. He should have done it deliberately. In addition, he always likes to write the profession of the hero in his book as a doctor. This is also deliberate. I always think so. Others regarded it as serious reading and teaching, and he played with it happily.

All of this has no place in his heart. Compared with Kafka, Kundera is more embarrassed and free and easy. He has no castle and refuses to judge. On his horizon, nothing is solid and beautiful. He is a silent wanderer and unhappy.

Because after the castle wall was overthrown by him, the exposed wasteland image must have a romantic temperament that disgusted him. Excluding this disgusting part, the truth that can remain is thin. Living in reality is also living in thinness. For this reason, even if a gap is created in kitsch life for one's own fantasy, it will not hesitate.

On the two sides of the gap, life and death, light and heavy, spirit and flesh... and so on, are just two sides of kitsch. The gaps, more gaps, are both strong hearts. Because of these gaps, Kundera is much smoother than Kafka. So many readers, lingering in the gap, are fascinated by the depiction of the two sides of the gap. In fact, this is just kitsch, and it is also the kitsch that readers---the beings of kitsch watch, because they are all related to "living in the truth." That kind of real life has nothing to do.

Kundera did not lie, because what he really wanted to convey---the experience of the self-world like "living in the truth" could hardly be done with words. He shouldn't care how many people are misreading, let alone the physical or mental disability caused by such misreading. If he would care about the consequences, then he would definitely not refuse the trial.

In his blueprint, readers and their misreading behavior are themselves part of kitsch. This is why he is contrary to Barthes's views. In Bart’s view, the life of the text has just begun after the "death of the author", while Kundera believes that this me as a text writer is not the real me. He has no life. As for readers, only when They are alive after the kitsch carnival begins.

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Extended Reading

The Unbearable Lightness of Being quotes

  • Tereza: [referring to her dog] Karenin prefers Mephisto to dogs. She thinks other dogs are silly.

    Tomas: [Mephisto snorts and Tomas inhales the aroma of the food] Ha-ha.

    Pavel: Do you know why I love Mephisto? Because he's very bright, but, at the same time,

    [gesturing for emphasis]

    Pavel: he doesn't know anything! After all, he doesn't know that life is impossible here now. Nothing left here. The church is gone.

    [shrugging]

    Pavel: No place to drink beer now.

    [he drinks his bottle of beer very quickly]

    Pavel: It's good... very good.

    [slurping]

    Pavel: If you ever change your mind, it won't be easy to leave.

  • Tereza: I was forced to love my mother, but not this dog. You know, Tomas... maybe... maybe, I love her more than I love you. Not more. I mean in a better way. I'm not jealous of her. I don't want her to be different. I don't ask her for anything.