The Unbearable Lightness of Being

In Geneva, Franz finishes his lecture and leaves the university to meet his mistress, a painter. Because he does not make a habit of spending portions of the same day in the beds of two different women, their visit will be purely social. He often takes her with him when he attends lectures, conferences, and symposia in foreign cities, but the two are never physically intimate in Geneva. On this day, he asks his mistress to accompany him to Palermo. She refuses, and he worries that it is a signal of her cooling desire for him, but this is not the case. At her apartment, she removes her clothing and stands before her mirror in her undergarments and a bowler hat. Although initially aroused, he grows uncomfortable and is unsure what to make of her performance. He nervously asks her once again to accompany him to Palermo, and this time she agrees.

When Franz leaves, Sabina contemplates her bowler hat. She remembers the first time it became part of her erotic friendship with Tomáš. Spying it in her flat, he placed it on her head. The two initially found it comic, but they soon became aroused by its incongruity with the rest of her nearly naked body.