Essay Questions

Why would Tomas keep his mistresses if he really loved Tereza?

To Tomas, loving someone and having sex with someone is two very different and rather opposite things. So even though it kept creating problems between Tereza and him, he never saw any point in putting a stop to this practice of his. One could argue that Tomas was playing a make believe game with himself to justify his infidelities since he could surely see how being in love with Tereza affected his rendezvous (he could not make love to his mistresses without being very drunk) and how keeping them kept driving Tereza to madness. So it would not be too unfair to say that he loved having different women in his life too much to give it up for whatever the reason; not even for Tereza.

What kept Tereza bound to Tomas till the very end?

Tereza is a very passive character in the novel. She is caught up too deep in Tomas’ make believe game and she absolutely forgets to look at her own wishes. She lives for Tomas and tries to make sense of Tomas’ principles those blame her for not taking things lightly. She spends all her life losing her mind and emotions for the sake of Tomas’ love for her. She feels lost without Tomas and has nobody else whom she can reach out for comfort. She constantly keeps blaming herself for her miseries regarding Tomas’ infidelities. Tomas is very good at pretending but one way or the other Tereza could always call his bluff. She waited till the very end when Tomas’ body gave up and he had to take a vacation from his rendezvous. She was too gullible and lonely and she loved Tomas too much to ever think about moving on without him.