The episode of Banaka pointing to his chest and crying out of existential anguish reminds me of a line from Goethe's West-East Divan: "Is one man alive when others are alive?" Deep within Goethe's query lies the secret of the writer's creed. By writing books, the individual becomes a universe {we speak of the universe of Balzac, the universe of Chekhov, the universe of Kafka, do we not?}. And since the principal quality of a universe is its uniqueness, the existence of another universe constitutes a threat to its very essence.
( Milan Kundera )
[ The Book of Laughter and ]
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