Study Guide

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Part 2, Chapter 26

By Milan Kundera

Part 2, Chapter 26

So Tereza ended up staying at home with Karenin.
She thought a lot about Dubcek, the leader of her country, and how he was taken away by the Russians and sounded so defeated when he returned. Everyone felt humiliated by his defeat.
But in Zurich Tereza no longer felt shame at her leader's weakness. "She realized that she belonged among the weak, in the camp of the weak, in the country of the weak, and that she had to be faithful to them" (2.26.4).
When she was upset one night, Tomas tried to comfort her. She told him she wanted him to be twenty years older. She meant that she wanted him to be weak like her.

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