Identity

• Kundera's slight novel is deceptively French in feel... We were then pleasantly surprised: there is a story, and it is rather well presented -- and the usual thoughtful Kundera asides can also be found... The tale is a light and slight one, gently exploring the issue of identity with a Kunderian spin. It is a small book... for what it sets out to do we found it perfectly satisfactory -- a comforting, engaging short read that prods one to think.

• Who could escape Milan Kundera?... That lightness, the elegant, gallant, seemingly carefree quality into which Kundera weaves his sometimes highly complex messages and thought games—that is Kundera's greatest strength, and Identity is no exception... In this back-and-forth it becomes clear how completely one surrenders to Kundera, devouring the book from cover to cover, loving and suffering along, breathlessly experiencing it... It takes Kundera to make love burningly palpable once more.

• Yet despite all these earmarks of the typical Kundera novel, "Identity" remains the most compact and integrated of his recent fictions... One clue is that by writing in a form that goes against one's expectations, Kundera has forced the reader to take nothing at face value... As with the lovers' perceptions of each other in this arresting, slightly frightening story of ideas in opposition, everything depends on a slippery notion of identity that can change from one paragraph to the next.

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