If you like THIS you'll LOVE THIS

While I can't admit to genuinely liking Milan Kundera's work, I do certainly find it interesting. What is great about this collection published by Faber and Faber is that they all have covers designed by the writer, linking them together as a set visually and giving you a fairly direct impression of the author before you even read the first sentence. His lesser known works, Slowness, Identity, Ignorance and The Farewell Waltz seem to have been omitted from the collection, perhaps for that exact reason, while his essay on the genre of literature, The Art of the Novel, and collection of seven short stories, Laughable Loves, are included. I have just bought The Art of, hoping that it will have something great and profound to say (much like a certain moment of poetic revelation in everyone's favorite Shakespeare adaptation), and will get back to you with a full Kundera post soon (and that Bell Jar one I've been banging on about for months!).

Like the weeks I spent ploughing through Immortality, hiding the embarrassingly 'I'm so freaking existential!' title whenever on public transport, I hope to find a little Aladdin-style Diamond in the Rough amongst so much analytical, self-aware, post-war opinions that really ddoooo ddrrrrraaaggggg onnn fooorreeevvverrrrr (for Immortality?). An example of such Rough Diamonds you might come across is this little pearl (why stop with diamonds??) of wisdom: "A single metphor can give birth to love." See what I mean??! Plus, I did enjoy looking at the cover when in private, like you can now do (as long as you're not reading this on an iphone - quick the guy next to you is craning his neck and frowning! NEW TAB! NEW TAB!!).