Today, of course, the body is no longer unfamiliar: we know that the beating in our
chest is the heart and that the nose is the nozzle of a hose sticking out of the body to
"The Unbearable Lightness Of Being" By Milan Kundera 21
take oxygen to the lungs. The face is nothing but an instrument panel registering all the
body mechanisms: digestion, sight, hearing, respiration, thought.
Ever since man has learned to give each part of the body a name, the body has given
him less trouble. He has also learned that the soul is nothing more than the gray matter
of the brain in action. The old duality of body and soul has become shrouded in
scientific terminology, and we can laugh at it as merely an obsolete prejudice.
But just make someone who has fallen in love listen to his stomach rumble, and the
unity of body and soul, that lyrical illusion of the age of science, instantly fades away.
I
am not no so sure as
my friend Milanku about the fact that if you know the inside of your
body better, you feel less feeling of unease. Indeed, it is exactly
the opposite
for a kind
of hypochondriac.
What
really
worries me
about the inside of the
human
body, is that it
is
totally dark (I
think it
was Agustin Fernández Mallo who made me notice that)
except
when you open it. I mean, like a refrigerator. When you see the
beatiful Anatomy pictures whit
plenty
of light, it´s difficult to imagine all that mechanics
that
we have inside working in
complete darkness
