Life Under A Cruel Star

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Recommended: The Cold War and its impacts in Europe

After World War II the country of Czechoslovakia was suffering at the hands of the decision to accept the US Marshall Plan or submit to the Soviets and become and communist state. The majority of eastern central Europe was threatened into becoming members of the Soviet regime and thus turned into Communist states. At the beginning of the 1950’s after Czechoslovakia had become a fully Communist State, the living situation and daily life had changed for the worse and we can see these effects in the books, The Joke and Life Under a Cruel Star. In Kundera’s book we follow the life of the young man named Jahn and get a glimpse at what life was like in a communist state on both the good and bad sides of the party. Daily life in a communist …show more content…

The emotions he gets from seeing the state of the town and all the monuments reminded him of the harshness and bitterness of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. It was dark, disheveled, and there were no real signs of life or happiness anywhere. Jahn is remembering life from the communist regime 20 years earlier and we can see that his perspective on it has not changed at all. A normal life at that time was being a good member of the Communist Party by doing what you are told and supporting the party in all aspects of your life. When Jahn was young he was studying at university where was also a prominent member of the communist state. We learn the harshness of communist society when he writes a sarcastic joke on a postcard he had sent to his lover at the time, Marketa, who was at a two-week training camp. After the postcard is sent it is intercepted by communist party officials. As I had said before, the members of the party always have party support, so Jahn went to a good friend who was prominent in the party, Zamenek. Instead of helping him, Zamenek, sends him to a labor camp in Ostrava. Jahn has now gone from a normal life in the communist party to one that leads to the bitterness and depression one suffered if they want against the party. This is the example of how the Czechoslovakian people while members of the party, were not free to talk about anything that went against the ideas of the party without harsh consequences. There are many examples of big brother party politics in the other book, Life Under a Cruel Star. For example when the main characters going around in Prague trying to find a place to stay for a night, we see rejection from friends and family simply out of fear that they would be punished for helping someone who went against the party ideas. Even though two very

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