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All too often, this brilliant novel of thwarted love and revenge miscarried has been read for its political implications. Now, a quarter century after The Joke was first published and several years after the collapse of the Soviet-imposed Czechoslovak regime, it becomes easier to put such implications into perspective in favor of valuing the book (and all Kundera 's work) as what it truly is: great, stirring literature that sheds new light on the eternal themes of human existence. The present edition provides English-language readers an important further means toward revaluation of The Joke . For reasons he describes in his Author's Note, Milan Kundera devoted much time to creating (with the assistance of his American publisher-editor) a completely revised translation that reflects his original as closely as any translation possibly can: reflects it in its fidelity not only to the words and syntax but also to the characteristic dictions and tonalities of the novel's narrators. The result is nothing less than the restoration of a classic.

米兰·昆德拉，小说家，出生于捷克斯洛伐克布尔诺；自1975年起，在法国定居。长篇小说《玩笑》、《生活在别处》、《告别圆舞曲》、《笑玩录》、《不能承受的生命之轻》和《不朽》，以及短篇小说集《好笑的爱》，原作以捷克文写成。最近出版的长篇小说《慢》、《身份》和《无知》，还有随笔集《小说的艺术》和《被背叛的遗嘱》，原作以法文写成。《雅克和他的主人》，系作者戏剧代表作。