Is "The Joke" really on us?

Kundera's "The Joke"Continuing my fascination with the Czech author Milan Kundera, I chose to write about another book of his that I’m almost through reading by the name of “The Joke”. Again, Milan Kundera’s wit and political incorrectness is evident, and I can’t help but admire his insight through his shocking revelations. This is Kundera’s first published novel, which introduced him to the world of publishing and literary excellence not just in the Czech sphere, but to a global audience. The story of “The Joke” is one that explores the possibility of history playing “jokes” on us. The story follows the character Ludvik Jahn, who sends his girlfriend a satirical postcard that criticizes Czechoslovakia’s communist regime, and pokes fun at them, which they do not take too lightly, and instead choose to kick him out of the communist party and expel him from his university, while forcing him to join a special army regiment with other so-called “enemies of the political state”. The novel subsequently explores the ripple effect of our actions, and who it can affect and how it can change history. The novel explores concepts in traveling, such as traveling for a greater purpose, or because one is forced to (such as Ludvik’s character).

The story is one that reflects themes we all feel when traveling, such as fascination with the unfamiliar and how exciting, new and fresh it seems, but also with common elements of human behavior, and the illogical emotions we sometimes experience because of it. The book is one that is, as most of Kundera’s work, a literary masterpiece that uses the political situation in the Czech Republic as a story propellant, not as the defining piece of the story. But moreso, it explores the negative sides of human behavior, discussing bitterness and anger (at those who punished him for said “joke”), revenge (he seduces the wife of the leader who led his expulsion), and also the dangers of being so entirely self-absorbed, as Ludvik’s character becomes as time leaves him more and more bitter. The theme that I found most evident however, as the element of the “joke” alludes to, is the fact that sometimes we have to realize that things are not in our control, as much as we like to think otherwise. Ludvik comes to this conclusion about ¾ of the way into the book, realizing in his words, “historical inevitability”. By utilizing this, both as humans, and as travelers (yes, you will sometimes get rained out and not be able to see something), we can come to better terms with it when it does, in fact, happen. 

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