Other significant works of his include his first novel, 1967’s ‘The Joke’, a satire of the USSR’s Communism, particularly focusing on propaganda, which led to Kundera being blacklisted in 1968. His final novel, 2014’s ‘The Festival of Insignificance’ was written in French and brought together themes of relationships and existentialism.

In 1975, Kundera went into exile from Czechoslovakia and moved to France. His Czech citizenship was revoked in 1979 and he acquired French citizenship in 1981. Although his Czech citizenship was restored in 2019, Kundera remained adamant that he be considered a “French writer”. From his seventh book 1995’s ‘Slowness’ or ‘La Lenteur’ onwards, his novels were written in French, instead of his native Czech.

Kundera was acclaimed in his lifetime. In 1975, he received the Jerusalem Prize. He received the Austrian State Prize for European Literature in 1987, the Herder Prize in 2000, the Czech State Literature Prize in 2007, the Prix mondial Cino Del Duca in 2009, and was made an honorary citizen of his hometown Brno in 2010. He received the Ovid Prize in 2011 and the Franz Kafka Prize in 2020. He was routinely touted as a contender for the Nobel Prize in Literature.