Photo/Illutration FILE - Czech-born author Milan Kundera looks on in Prague on June 27, 1967. Kundera, whose dissident writings in communist Czechoslovakia transformed him into an exiled satirist of totalitarianism, has died in Paris at the age of 94, Czech media said on July 12. (Jovan Dezort/CTK via AP, file)

There is nothing more human than betrayal.

The works of Milan Kundera (1929-2023) have probably enthralled so many people because they all contain true-to-life language and smack of betrayal.

I thought this upon learning of the death of the famed author from the former Czechoslovakia.

His name first came under the spotlight with “The Joke,” a novel he published in 1967 on the eve of the Prague Spring pro-democracy movement in the middle of the Cold War.

The story revolves around a promising young man who is sent to work in a coal mine because of a joke he wrote in a letter to his girlfriend.

The man wants to know why the contents of a private letter came to the knowledge of the Communist Party authorities.

The girlfriend coldly declares that she has no intention of apologizing to him. Her small betrayal ends up wildly throwing the man’s life off kilter.

The novel probably aroused sympathy because it evoked images of so many people who are at the mercy of history.

People betray their family members and friends. They betray their own intentions and feelings. The author ruthlessly describes such people but also with affection.

“The Unbearable Lightness of Being,” another Kundera novel that was adapted into a film, calls betrayals exciting and even “magnificent.”

In real life, too, Kundera suffered from being labeled a betrayer. He was blamed for “fleeing” when he emigrated to France, and he became an anathema in his home country.

A news report emerged that Kundera had collaborated with the secret police in the past, though the writer denied such allegations. He must have undergone a deep inner struggle.

“On the surface, an intelligible lie; underneath, the unintelligible truth,” so goes a famous Kundera quote.

The author left behind many memorable phrases that continue to puzzle readers and lead them to reflect on the meaning of literature and of works of fiction.

Kundera departed this life on July 11. He was 94.

--The Asahi Shimbun, July 14

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Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a popular daily column that takes up a wide range of topics, including culture, arts and social trends and developments. Written by veteran Asahi Shimbun writers, the column provides useful perspectives on and insights into contemporary Japan and its culture.

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