This is a collection of seven short stories by Milan Kundera, the Czech novelist, that first appeared in Czechoslovakia in , during the thaw in the communist dictatorship known as the Prague Spring β but was then banned after the Russian invasion of August reasserted communist censorship and oppression.
All the stories are about love β more crudely, about sex β and about the ridiculous misunderstandings and ludicrous behaviour it provokes in people. A young man and his girlfriend are driving out of town to a holiday in the country. They start bickering. She needs to stop for a pee so he pulls into a gas station.
She finishes and walks a way down the road, and when he pulls out of the gas station onto the road, she puts out her hand and pretends to hitch-hike. He pulls over and adopts the character of a driver offering a lift to a pretty young woman, and she slips into the character of an innocent young woman being picked up by a strange man.
And for the rest of the story they both play these roles but the point of the story is the way they both quickly find them tiring and constraining. To cut to the chase, they end up at some restaurant and hotel where, through a string of casual comments, the game develops into her playing a cheap hooker and he being her bored client. This excites both of them and they hurry up to the bedroom.
She surprises herself because β once liberated from her usual constraint and good manners by the role playing β she becomes foul mouthed and foul-acting, really playing the part of an experienced whore and, to her amazement, having a fierce and deep erotic experience.
