How we cite our quotes: (Part.Chapter.Paragraph), with the exception of Part V, which runs (Part#. "Short Title". Paragraph). Part V has no numbered chapters—only title headings.
Quote #1
He had needed at all costs to prove to himself that it was not his weakness and poverty that bound him to this woman, but love! And only a truly immense passion could justify an affair with such an ugly girl. (I.13.2)
Mirek seeks out his old love letters to Zdena because he wants to have control of his past. Really, he wants to rewrite history so that it makes better sense to him and everyone else who looks at it. The problem? Zdena is not a pretty woman. Not in the least. So Mirek feels he needs to find a plausible reason for having had an affair with her. And why would a man being pursued by the secret police care about such a tiny detail? Your guess is as good as ours.
Quote #2
...she was the only woman who wasn't annoyed by Karel's love for Marketa. "Your wife should understand that you love her but you're a woman-chaser and your chasing is no threat to her. But no woman understands that. No, there isn't a woman who understands men," she added sadly, as if she herself were a misunderstood man. (II.5.13)
Eva's a special lady. She calls herself a "man-chaser" and feels that all sexual conventions are stupid and meaningless. Her version of love extends only to sensuality and friendship; it has no room for things like commitment and fidelity. Karel benefits immensely from this ideology, as he's a woman-chaser. But for his wife, Marketa, something's gotta give. She actually loves her husband, but she can't take his free-love ideas. It's actually Eva who solves Marketa's problems: she offers affection and intimacy to Marketa, who finds she can bear her husband's philandering very well if she's with somebody who's really into her.
Quote #3
...every love relationship rests on an unwritten agreement unthinkingly concluded by the lovers in the first weeks of their love. They are still in a kind of dream, but at the same time, without knowing it, are drawing up, like uncompromising lawyers, the detailed clauses of their contract. (II.6.11)
Kundera comments on Marketa and Karel's relationship specifically, but he extends the analysis to all lovers. He hypothesizes that lovers fall into roles very early in a relationship and then find themselves having to stick to those roles forever. In this case, Marketa finds herself on the losing side of the bargain. She gets to play the role of loving and wronged wife—it's not something she loves. When Eva comes along, Marketa gets the chance to rewrite that role for herself.
Quote #4
When he was very young, Thomas Mann wrote a naively entrancing story about death: in that story, death is beautiful, as it is beautiful to all those who dream of it when they are very young, when death is still unreal and enchanting, like the bluish voice of distances. (IV.17.2)
While Kundera talks about this fascination or love of death as unpractical and naïve, it's still a thing. Or at least, it is for those poetic types. Mann's version of death as a beautiful woman is hard to resist and easily welcomed. Kundera's and Tamina's experiences with death—because they are practical—make it difficult for them to be "enchanted" by the prospect of ultimate annihilation.
Quote #5
I therefore conclude that her erotic reserve had two motives: to keep the student as long as possible in the enchanted territory of tender timidity and to avoid as long as possible the disgust sure to be inspired in him, as she saw it, by the crude instructions and precautions without which physical love could not take place. (V. "Kristyna".4)
Kristyna has nooo intention of giving in to the student's burning desire for her. Oh, she doesn't mind playing around with him a bit, but she's clearly enjoying the relationship too much to have sex with him. Kundera chalks this up to two factors. One is practical: Kristyna can't get pregnant again, or she may die. But underlying the physical issues is something ideological: she loves the sublime nature of the student's poetical soul. She doesn't want to ruin the "idyll" by bringing base, earthly concerns about sexuality into it. The guy's no mechanic, after all.
Quote #6
One of the customary remedies for misery is love. Because someone loved absolutely cannot be miserable. All his faults are redeemed by love's magical gaze, under which even inept swimming, with the head held high above the surface, can become charming. (V. "Litost?".6)
It's often hard to tell if Kundera is serious or if he's being tongue in cheek. We've got to believe that there's a little sarcasm happening here, especially when we're talking about the student, who suffers from some serious inferiority issues. Still, this is a belief popular among those who love Hallmark cards: love conquers all. No matter what his shortcomings, the student wouldn't have to suffer litost if he could just find that girl who would love him enough to let him think he was superior.
Quote #7
Love's absolute is actually a desire for absolute identity: the woman we love ought to swim as slowly as we do, she ought to have no past of her own to look back on happily. But when the illusion of absolute identity vanishes (the girl looks back happily on her past or swims faster), love becomes a permanent source of the great torment we call litost. (V. "Litost?".7)
And this is what makes litost the sole property of men in Kundera's work. There's something about the pride of his male characters that demands that all of history (whether personal or political) reshape itself to their benefits. We see that with Mirek, Karel, the student, some of the poets, and Jan.
Quote #8
"Joking is the enemy of love and poetry. That's why I tell you yet again, and want you to keep in mind: Boccaccio doesn't understand love. Love can never be laughable. Love has nothing in common with laughter." (V. "Boccaccio's Laughter".17)
All of you potential lovers out there who say you want a partner with a great sense of humor, beware: you're dooming your chances for true love—according to Petrarch, at least. Kundera's Petrarch (who has everything in common with the real Petrarch) takes a super serious view of love: there can be no hilarity in sex or wooing, or the mood will be broken. Everything about love can be cheapened by laughter since we can never know for sure how to interpret it.
Quote #9
She loved him so much it would kill her, she loved him to the point of being afraid to make love with him because if she were to make love with him, she would never be able to live without him, and she would die of grief and desire. (V. "Angels Hover".10)
The love story between Kristyna and the student is marred by an inability to communicate properly. When Kristyna tries to tell her lover about her very real physical issues, he misunderstands. Instead of taking her declaration at face value, the student gets poetical and starts reading between the lines. He interprets her fear of death as metaphorical and runs with it. But Kristyna is not wholly innocent in this, either: she fears "sullying" their love by speaking in practical terms. For her, love is a fragile thing to be handled with kid gloves.
Quote #10
My God, it had been so long since anyone had asked her about anything! It seemed like an eternity! Only her husband had kept asking her questions, because love is a continual interrogation. I don't know of a better definition of love. (VI.5.6)
Love may be "a many splendored thing," but in Kundera's mind, it's also heavy-duty work. Tamina has lived a life of total isolation since the death of her husband, and she doesn't realize the degree of her loneliness until Raphael enters the café and begins to ask her questions. She's taken in by his interest in her—something she hasn't felt from anyone since her husband was alive. It's an irresistible captivation, and one that Kundera says must be part of love. Perhaps because paying attention to someone is a powerful aphrodisiac?