Shoody Something

“I came to realize that there was no power capable of changing the image of my person lodged somewhere in the supreme court of human destinies; that this image (even though it bore no resemblance to me) was much more real than my actual self; that I was its shadow and not it mine; that I had no right to accuse it of bearing no resemblance to me, but rather that it was I who was guilty of the non-resemblance; and that the non-resemblance was my cross, which I could not unload on anyone else, which was mine alone to bear.”
― Milan Kundera, The Joke

“Who was the real me? I can only repeat: I was a man of many faces.

At meetings I was earnest, enthusiastic, and committed; among friends, unconstrained and given to teasing; with Marketa, cynical and fitfully witty; and alone (and thinking of Marketa), unsure of myself and as agitated as a schoolboy.

Was the last face the real one?

No. They were all real: I was not a hypocrite, with one real face and several false ones. I had several faces because I was young and didn’t know who I was or wanted to be. (I was frightened by the differences between one face and the next; none of them seemed to fit me properly, and I groped my way clumsily among them.)”
― Milan Kundera, The Joke

“حياتك مجرد أحداث ، كومة من العناء ، حفنة من المضايقات يا صديقي ، لن تصفو كما تريد ، انها بشكل أو باخر تعني القلق ،القلق الذي ينهشك دائما ، القلق الذي يشعرك بأنك ما زلت على قيدها ، كأنها عبارة عن مسرح ، وأنت واقف على منصته ؛ هناك من ينتظر ظهورك ل يصفق لك ، هناك من لا يريد رؤيتك ؛ وهناك من أخذ يشتمك لأنك لم تمثل الدور الذي يعجبه ، هكذا تبدو ، تريد أن تنهيك ، وانت تريدها أن تستمر ، لذلك الصراع فيما بينكما يبدو طويلا ،لابد أن يربح أحدكما الاخر ، بقاؤكم على هذه الحلبة يجلب المزيد من اللكمات ، ولا تدري كيف تستسلم لها وتواجهها كما تأتي لا كما تتمنى .”
― رشاد حسن, حين رأيت صوتي

“And then I realized how powerless I was to revoke my own joke when throughout my life as a whole I was involved in a joke much more vast (all-embracing for me) and utterly irrevocable.”
― Milan Kundera, The Joke