The Festival of Insignificance (French: La fête de l'insignifiance) is a novel by Milan Kundera.

The themes include "the erotic potential; the link between mother and child; the procreative role of sex; angels...[,] navel gazing...and insignificance.

But then again, that's part of the point: everything ends in Ramon's hymn to insignificance, celebrating the life that doesn't signify anything, the world that is just itself "in all its obviousness, all its innocence, in all its beauty".

And indeed this austere prose – with its elusive ironies, and aura of the 18th century – works beautifully, just as itself, in Linda Asher's translation from the French.

"[3] Alain is strolling down a Paris street, examining women and he comes up with an explanation for their thighs, buttocks, and breasts, he fails to grasp the mystery behind the seductive power of their navel, Around the same time, Alain's recently retired friend, Ramon, is in the Luxembourg Gardens admiring the sculptures.

He recalls an event from his childhood in which he thought he noticed his mother staring at his navel with contempt and pity.

Ramon, who still believes that D'Ardelo is soon to die, tells him that it is important to maintain a good sense of humor and a positive mood, including joking and pranking.

The men feel light-hearted and happy as the children in the park begin to sing "La Marseilles.