Franz Kafka

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Kafka" redirects here. For other uses, see Kafka (disambiguation).

Franz Kafka
 Kafka in 1923

Born 3 July 1883

Prague, Kingdom of Bohemia, Austria-Hungary

Died 3 June 1924 (aged 40)

Kierling, part of Klosterneuburg, Lower

Austria, Austria

Resting place New Jewish Cemetery, Prague-Žižkov

born with General Austrian citizenship based

Citizenship
on Austro-Hungarian nationality law of 1867
Czechoslovakia (1918–1924)[1][2]

Alma mater German Charles-Ferdinand University, Prague

Occupations Novelist

short story writer

insurance officer

Notable work The Metamorphosis

The Trial

The Judgment

The Castle

Contemplation

A Hunger Artist

Letters to Felice

Style Modernism

Parents Hermann Kafka

Julie Kafka (née Löwy)

Signature

Franz Kafka[a] (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a German-

speaking Bohemian novelist and short-story writer based in Prague, widely
regarded as one of the major figures of 20th-century literature. His work fuses
elements of realism and the fantastic.[4] It typically features isolated protagonists
facing bizarre or surrealistic predicaments and incomprehensible socio-
bureaucratic powers. It has been interpreted as exploring themes
of alienation, existential anxiety, guilt, and absurdity.[5] His best known works
include the short story "The Metamorphosis" and novels The Trial and The Castle.
The term Kafkaesque has entered English to describe absurd situations, like those
depicted in his writing.[6]
Kafka was born into a middle-class German-speaking Czech Jewish family in
Prague, the capital of the Kingdom of Bohemia, then part of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire, today the capital of the Czech Republic.[7] He trained as a lawyer and after
completing his legal education was employed full-time by an insurance company,
forcing him to relegate writing to his spare time. Over the course of his life, Kafka
wrote hundreds of letters to family and close friends, including his father, with
whom he had a strained and formal relationship. He became engaged to several
women but never married. He died in obscurity in 1924 at the age of 40
from tuberculosis.
Kafka was a prolific writer, spending most of his free time writing, often late in the
night. He burned an estimated 90 per cent of his total work due to his persistent
struggles with self-doubt.[8] Much of the remaining 10 per cent is lost or otherwise
unpublished. Few of Kafka's works were published during his lifetime: the story
collections Contemplation and A Country Doctor, and individual stories (such as
"The Metamorphosis") were published in literary magazines but received little
public attention. In his will, Kafka instructed his close friend and literary
executor Max Brod to destroy his unfinished works, including his novels The
Trial, The Castle, and Amerika, but Brod ignored these instructions, and had much
of his work published.
Franz Kafka is among those artists who reached fame only after their deaths: it
was only after 1945 that his work became famous in German-speaking
countries, whose literature it has since greatly influenced, and in the 1960s
elsewhere in the world. Kafka's work has influenced a range of writers, critics,
artists, and philosophers during the 20th and 21st centuries.

Life[edit]
Early life[edit]
His parents, Hermann and Julie Kafka

Franz Kafka's sisters, from the left Valli, Elli, Ottla

Kafka was born near the Old Town Square in Prague, then part of the Austro-
Hungarian Empire. His family were German-speaking middle-class Ashkenazi
Jews. His father, Hermann Kafka (1854–1931), was the fourth child of Jakob
Kafka,[9][10] a shochet or ritual slaughterer in Osek, a Czech village with a large
Jewish population located near Strakonice in southern Bohemia.[11] Hermann
brought the Kafka family to Prague. After working as a travelling sales
representative, he eventually became a fashion retailer who employed up to 15
people and used the image of a jackdaw (kavka in Czech, pronounced and
colloquially written as kafka) as his business logo.[12] Kafka's mother, Julie (1856–
1934), was the daughter of Jakob Löwy, a prosperous retail merchant
in Poděbrady,[13] and was better educated than her husband.[9]
Kafka's parents probably spoke a German influenced by Yiddish that was
sometimes pejoratively called Mauscheldeutsch, but, as German was considered
the vehicle of social mobility, they probably encouraged their children to
speak Standard German.[14] Hermann and Julie had six children, of whom Franz
was the eldest.[15] Franz's two brothers, Georg and Heinrich, died in infancy before
Franz was seven; his three sisters were Gabriele ("Ellie") (1889–
1944), Valerie ("Valli") (1890–1942) and Ottilie ("Ottla") (1892–1943). All three
were murdered in the Holocaust of World War II. Valli was deported to the Łódź
Ghetto in occupied Poland in 1942, but that is the last documentation of her; it is
assumed she did not survive the war. Ottilie was Kafka's favourite sister. [16]
Hermann is described by the biographer Stanley Corngold as a "huge, selfish,
overbearing businessman"[17] and by Franz Kafka as "a true Kafka in strength,
health, appetite, loudness of voice, eloquence, self-satisfaction, worldly
dominance, endurance, presence of mind, [and] knowledge of human nature". [18] On
business days, both parents were absent from the home, with Julie Kafka working
as many as 12 hours each day helping to manage the family business.
Consequently, Kafka's childhood was somewhat lonely, [19] and the children were
reared largely by a series of governesses and servants. Kafka's troubled
relationship with his father is evident in his Brief an den Vater (Letter to His Father)
of more than 100 pages, in which he complains of being profoundly affected by his
father's authoritarian and demanding character; [20] his mother, in contrast, was quiet
and shy.[21] The dominating figure of Kafka's father had a significant influence on
Kafka's writing.[22]
The Kafka family had a servant girl living with them in a cramped apartment.
Franz's room was often cold. In November 1913 the family moved into a bigger
apartment, although Ellie and Valli had married and moved out of the first
apartment. In early August 1914, just after World War I began, the sisters did not
know where their husbands were in the military and moved back in with the family
in this larger apartment. Both Ellie and Valli also had children. Franz at age 31
moved into Valli's former apartment, quiet by contrast, and lived by himself for the
first time.[23]
Education[edit]
From 1889 to 1893, Kafka attended the Deutsche Knabenschule German boys'
elementary school at the Masný trh/Fleischmarkt (meat market), now known as
Masná Street. His Jewish education ended with his bar mitzvah celebration at the
age of 13. Kafka never enjoyed attending the synagogue and went with his father
only on four high holidays a year.[18][24][25]

Kinský Palace where Kafka attended gymnasium and his father owned a shop

After leaving elementary school in 1893, Kafka was admitted to the rigorous
classics-oriented state gymnasium, Altstädter Deutsches Gymnasium, an
academic secondary school at Old Town Square, within the Kinský Palace.
German was the language of instruction, but Kafka also spoke and wrote in Czech.
[26][27]
 He studied the latter at the gymnasium for eight years, achieving good grades.
[28]
 Although Kafka received compliments for his Czech, he never considered
himself fluent in the language, though he spoke German with a Czech accent. [1]
[27]
 He completed his Matura exams in 1901.[29]
Admitted to the Deutsche Karl-Ferdinands-Universität of Prague in 1901, Kafka
began studying chemistry but switched to law after two weeks. [30] Although this field
did not excite him, it offered a range of career possibilities which pleased his father.
In addition, law required a longer course of study, giving Kafka time to take classes
in German studies and art history.[31] He also joined a student club, Lese- und
Redehalle der Deutschen Studenten (Reading and Lecture Hall of the German
students), which organised literary events, readings and other activities. [32] Among
Kafka's friends were the journalist Felix Weltsch, who studied philosophy, the
actor Yitzchak Lowy who came from an orthodox Hasidic Warsaw family, and the
writers Ludwig Winder, Oskar Baum and Franz Werfel.[33]
At the end of his first year of studies, Kafka met Max Brod, a fellow law student
who became a close friend for life.[32] Years later, Brod coined the term Der enge
Prager Kreis ("The Close Prague Circle") to describe the group of writers, which
included Kafka, Felix Weltsch and Brod himself.[34][35] Brod soon noticed that,
although Kafka was shy and seldom spoke, what he said was usually profound.
[36]
 Kafka was an avid reader throughout his life;[37] together he and Brod read
Plato's Protagoras in the original Greek, on Brod's initiative,
and Flaubert's L'éducation sentimentale and La Tentation de St. Antoine (The
Temptation of Saint Anthony) in French, at his own suggestion.[38] Kafka
considered Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Gustav Flaubert, Nikolai Gogol, Franz Grillparzer,
[39]
 and Heinrich von Kleist to be his "true blood brothers".[40] Besides these, he took
an interest in Czech literature[26][27] and was also very fond of the works of Goethe.[41]
[42]
 Kafka was awarded the degree of Doctor of Law on 18 June 1906 [b] and
performed an obligatory year of unpaid service as law clerk for the civil and
criminal courts.[6]
Employment[edit]

Former home of the Worker's Accident Insurance Institute

On 1 November 1907, Kafka was hired at the Assicurazioni Generali, an insurance

company, where he worked for nearly a year. His correspondence during that
period indicates that he was unhappy with a work schedule—from 08:00 until
18:00[49][50]—that made it extremely difficult to concentrate on writing, which was
assuming increasing importance to him. On 15 July 1908, he resigned. Two weeks
later, he found employment more amenable to writing when he joined the Worker's
Accident Insurance Institute for the Kingdom of Bohemia. The job involved
investigating and assessing compensation for personal injury to industrial workers;
accidents such as lost fingers or limbs were commonplace, owing to poor work
safety policies at the time. It was especially true of factories fitted
with machine lathes, drills, planing machines and rotary saws, which were rarely
fitted with safety guards.[51]
The management professor Peter Drucker credits Kafka with developing the first
civilian hard hat while employed at the Worker's Accident Insurance Institute, but
this is not supported by any document from his employer. [52][53] His father often
referred to his son's job as an insurance officer as a Brotberuf, literally "bread job",
a job done only to pay the bills; Kafka often claimed to despise it. Kafka was rapidly
promoted and his duties included processing and investigating compensation
claims, writing reports, and handling appeals from businessmen who thought their
firms had been placed in too high a risk category, which cost them more in
insurance premiums.[54] He would compile and compose the annual report on the
insurance institute for the several years he worked there. The reports were well
received by his superiors.[55] Kafka usually got off work at 2 p.m., so that he had
time to spend on his literary work, to which he was committed. [56] Kafka's father also
expected him to help out at and take over the family fancy goods store.[57] In his
later years, Kafka's illness often prevented him from working at the insurance
bureau and at his writing.
In late 1911, Elli's husband Karl Hermann and Kafka became partners in the
first asbestos factory in Prague, known as Prager Asbestwerke Hermann & Co.,
having used dowry money from Hermann Kafka. Kafka showed a positive attitude
at first, dedicating much of his free time to the business, but he later resented the
encroachment of this work on his writing time. [58] During that period, he also found
interest and entertainment in the performances of Yiddish theatre. After seeing a
Yiddish theatre troupe perform in October 1911, for the next six months Kafka
"immersed himself in Yiddish language and in Yiddish literature". [59] This interest
also served as a starting point for his growing exploration of Judaism. [60] It was at
about this time that Kafka became a vegetarian. [61] Around 1915, Kafka received his
draft notice for military service in World War I, but his employers at the insurance
institute arranged for a deferment because his work was considered essential
government service. He later attempted to join the military but was prevented from
doing so by medical problems associated with tuberculosis,[62] with which he was
diagnosed in 1917.[63] In 1918, the Worker's Accident Insurance Institute put Kafka
on a pension due to his illness, for which there was no cure at the time, and he
spent most of the rest of his life in sanatoriums.[6]
Private life[edit]
Kafka never married. According to Brod, Kafka was "tortured" by sexual desire,
[64]
 and Kafka's biographer Reiner Stach states that his life was full of "incessant
womanising" and that he was filled with a fear of "sexual failure". [65] Kafka visited
brothels for most of his adult life,[66][67][68] and was interested in pornography.[64] In
addition, he had close relationships with several women during his lifetime. On 13
August 1912, Kafka met Felice Bauer, a relative of Brod, who worked in Berlin as a
representative of a dictaphone company. A week after the meeting at Brod's home,
Kafka wrote in his diary:
Miss FB. When I arrived at Brod's on 13 August, she was sitting at the table. I was
not at all curious about who she was, but rather took her for granted at once. Bony,
empty face that wore its emptiness openly. Bare throat. A blouse thrown on.
Looked very domestic in her dress although, as it turned out, she by no means
was. (I alienate myself from her a little by inspecting her so closely ...) Almost
broken nose. Blonde, somewhat straight, unattractive hair, strong chin. As I was
taking my seat I looked at her closely for the first time, by the time I was seated I
already had an unshakeable opinion. [69][70]
Shortly after this meeting, Kafka wrote the story "Das Urteil" ("The Judgment") in
only one night and worked in a productive period on Der Verschollene (The Man
Who Disappeared) and "Die Verwandlung" ("The Metamorphosis"). Kafka and
Felice Bauer communicated mostly through letters over the next five years, met
occasionally, and were engaged twice. [71] Kafka's extant letters to Bauer were
published as Briefe an Felice (Letters to Felice); her letters do not survive.[69][72]
[73]
 According to the biographers Stach and James Hawes, Kafka became engaged
a third time around 1920, to Julie Wohryzek, a poor and uneducated hotel
chambermaid.[71][74] Although the two rented a flat and set a wedding date, the
marriage never took place. During this time, Kafka began a draft of Letter to His
Father, who objected to Julie because of her Zionist beliefs. Before the date of the
intended marriage, he took up with yet another woman. [75] While he needed women
and sex in his life, he had low self-confidence, felt sex was dirty, and was
cripplingly shy—especially about his body.[6]
Stach and Brod state that during the time that Kafka knew Felice Bauer, he had an
affair with a friend of hers, Margarethe "Grete" Bloch, [76] a Jewish woman from
Berlin. Brod says that Bloch gave birth to Kafka's son, although Kafka never knew
about the child. The boy, whose name is not known, was born in 1914 or 1915 and
died in Munich in 1921.[77][78] However, Kafka's biographer Peter-André Alt says that,
while Bloch had a son, Kafka was not the father as the pair were never intimate. [79]
[80]
 Stach points out that there is a great deal of contradictory evidence around the
claim that Kafka was the father.[81]
Kafka was diagnosed with tuberculosis in August 1917 and moved for a few
months to the Bohemian village of Zürau (Siřem in Czech), where his sister Ottla
worked on the farm of her brother-in-law Karl Hermann. He felt comfortable there
and later described this time as perhaps the best period of his life, probably
because he had no responsibilities. He kept diaries and Oktavhefte (octavo). From
the notes in these books, Kafka extracted 109 numbered pieces of text on Zettel,
single pieces of paper in no given order. They were later published as Die Zürauer
Aphorismen oder Betrachtungen über Sünde, Hoffnung, Leid und den wahren
Weg (The Zürau Aphorisms or Reflections on Sin, Hope, Suffering, and the True
Way).[82]
In 1920, Kafka began an intense relationship with Milena Jesenská, a Czech
journalist and writer. His letters to her were later published as Briefe an Milena.
[83]
 During a vacation in July 1923 to Graal-Müritz on the Baltic Sea, Kafka met Dora
Diamant, a 25-year-old kindergarten teacher from an orthodox Jewish family.
Kafka, hoping to escape the influence of his family to concentrate on his writing,
moved briefly to Berlin (September 1923-March 1924) and lived with Diamant. She
became his lover and sparked his interest in the Talmud.[84] He worked on four
stories, including Ein Hungerkünstler (A Hunger Artist),[83] which were published
shortly after his death.
Personality[edit]
Kafka had a lifelong suspicion that people found him mentally and physically
repulsive. However, many of those who met him invariably found him to possess
obvious intelligence and a sense of humour; they also found him handsome,
although of austere appearance.[85][86][87]

Kafka in 1906

Brod compared Kafka to Heinrich von Kleist, noting that both writers had the ability
to describe a situation realistically with precise details. [88] Brod thought Kafka was
one of the most entertaining people he had met; Kafka enjoyed sharing humour
with his friends, but also helped them in difficult situations with good advice.
[89]
 According to Brod, he was a passionate reciter, able to phrase his speech as
though it were music.[90] Brod felt that two of Kafka's most distinguishing traits were
"absolute truthfulness" (absolute Wahrhaftigkeit) and "precise conscientiousness"
(präzise Gewissenhaftigkeit).[91][92] He explored details, the inconspicuous, in depth
and with such love and precision that things surfaced that were unforeseen,
seemingly strange, but absolutely true (nichts als wahr).[93]
Although Kafka showed little interest in exercise as a child, he later developed a
passion for games and physical activity,[37] and was an accomplished rider,
swimmer, and rower.[91] On weekends, he and his friends embarked on long hikes,
often planned by Kafka himself.[94] His other interests included alternative medicine,
modern education systems such as Montessori,[91] and technological novelties such
as airplanes and film.[95] Writing was vitally important to Kafka; he considered it a
"form of prayer".[96] He was highly sensitive to noise and preferred absolute quiet
when writing.[97]
Pérez-Álvarez has claimed that Kafka may have possessed a schizoid personality
disorder.[98] His style, it is claimed, not only in "Die Verwandlung" ("The
Metamorphosis"), but in various other writings, appears to show low to medium-
level schizoid traits, which Pérez-Álvarez claims to have influenced much of his
work.[99] His anguish can be seen in this diary entry from 21 June 1913: [100]
Die ungeheure Welt, die ich im Kopfe habe. Aber wie mich befreien und sie
befreien, ohne zu zerreißen. Und tausendmal lieber zerreißen, als in mir sie
zurückhalten oder begraben. Dazu bin ich ja hier, das ist mir ganz klar. [101]
The tremendous world I have inside my head, but how to free myself and free it
without being torn to pieces. And a thousand times rather be torn to pieces than
retain it in me or bury it. That, indeed, is why I am here, that is quite clear to me. [102]
and in Zürau Aphorism number 50:
Man cannot live without a permanent trust in something indestructible within
himself, though both that indestructible something and his own trust in it may
remain permanently concealed from him. [103]
Alessia Coralli and Antonio Perciaccante of San Giovanni di Dio Hospital have
posited that Kafka may have had borderline personality disorder with co-occurring
psychophysiological insomnia.[104] Joan Lachkar interpreted Die Verwandlung as "a
vivid depiction of the borderline personality" and described the story as "model for
Kafka's own abandonment fears, anxiety, depression, and parasitic dependency
needs. Kafka illuminated the borderline's general confusion of normal and healthy
desires, wishes, and needs with something ugly and disdainful." [105]
Though Kafka never married, he held marriage and children in high esteem. He
had several girlfriends and lovers across his life. [106] He may have suffered from an
eating disorder. Doctor Manfred M. Fichter of the Psychiatric Clinic, University of
Munich, presented "evidence for the hypothesis that the writer Franz Kafka had
suffered from an atypical anorexia nervosa",[107] and that Kafka was not just lonely
and depressed but also "occasionally suicidal". [86] In his 1995 book Franz Kafka, the
Jewish Patient, Sander Gilman investigated "why a Jew might have been
considered 'hypochondriacal' or 'homosexual' and how Kafka incorporates aspects
of these ways of understanding the Jewish male into his own self-image and
writing".[108] Kafka considered suicide at least once, in late 1912. [109]
Political views[edit]
Before World War I,[110] Kafka attended several meetings of the Klub mladých, a
Czech anarchist, anti-militarist, and anti-clerical organization.[111] Hugo Bergmann,
who attended the same elementary and high schools as Kafka, fell out with Kafka
during their last academic year (1900–1901) because "[Kafka's] socialism and
my Zionism were much too strident".[112][113] "Franz became a socialist, I became a
Zionist in 1898. The synthesis of Zionism and socialism did not yet exist".
[113]
 Bergmann claims that Kafka wore a red carnation to school to show his support
for socialism.[113] In one diary entry, Kafka made reference to the influential anarchist
philosopher Peter Kropotkin: "Don't forget Kropotkin!"[114]
During the communist era, the legacy of Kafka's work for Eastern bloc socialism
was hotly debated. Opinions ranged from the notion that he satirised the
bureaucratic bungling of a crumbling Austro-Hungarian Empire, to the belief that he
embodied the rise of socialism.[115] A further key point was Marx's theory of
alienation. While the orthodox position was that Kafka's depictions of alienation
were no longer relevant for a society that had supposedly eliminated alienation, a
1963 conference held in Liblice, Czechoslovakia, on the eightieth anniversary of
his birth, reassessed the importance of Kafka's portrayal of bureaucracy.
[116]
 Whether or not Kafka was a political writer is still an issue of debate. [117]
Judaism and Zionism[edit]
Further information: Franz Kafka and Judaism

Kafka in 1910

Kafka grew up in Prague as a German-speaking Jew. [118] He was deeply fascinated

by the Jews of Eastern Europe, who he thought possessed an intensity of spiritual
life that was absent from Jews in the West. His diary contains many references
to Yiddish writers.[119] Yet he was at times alienated from Judaism and Jewish life.
On 8 January 1914, he wrote in his diary:
Was habe ich mit Juden gemeinsam? Ich habe kaum etwas mit mir gemeinsam
und sollte mich ganz still, zufrieden damit daß ich atmen kann in einen Winkel
stellen.[120] (What have I in common with Jews? I have hardly anything in common
with myself and should stand very quietly in a corner, content that I can breathe.) [121]
[122]

In his adolescent years, Kafka declared himself an atheist.[123]

Hawes suggests that Kafka, though very aware of his own Jewishness, did not
incorporate it into his work, which, according to Hawes, lacks Jewish characters,
scenes or themes.[124][125][126] In the opinion of literary critic Harold Bloom, although
Kafka was uneasy with his Jewish heritage, he was the quintessential Jewish
writer.[127] Lothar Kahn is likewise unequivocal: "The presence of Jewishness in
Kafka's oeuvre is no longer subject to doubt".[128] Pavel Eisner, one of Kafka's first
translators, interprets Der Process (The Trial) as the embodiment of the "triple
dimension of Jewish existence in Prague ... his protagonist Josef K. is
(symbolically) arrested by a German (Rabensteiner), a Czech (Kullich), and a Jew
(Kaminer). He stands for the 'guiltless guilt' that imbues the Jew in the modern
world, although there is no evidence that he himself is a Jew". [129]
In his essay Sadness in Palestine?!, Dan Miron explores Kafka's connection to
Zionism: "It seems that those who claim that there was such a connection and that
Zionism played a central role in his life and literary work, and those who deny the
connection altogether or dismiss its importance, are both wrong. The truth lies in
some very elusive place between these two simplistic poles." [119] Kafka considered
moving to Palestine with Felice Bauer, and later with Dora Diamant. He
studied Hebrew while living in Berlin, hiring a friend of Brod's from Palestine, Pua
Bat-Tovim, to tutor him[119] and attending Rabbi Julius Grünthal[130] and Rabbi Julius
Guttmann's classes in the Berlin Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des
Judentums (College for the Study of Judaism).[131]
Livia Rothkirchen calls Kafka the "symbolic figure of his era". [129] His contemporaries
included numerous Jewish, Czech, and German writers who were sensitive to
Jewish, Czech, and German culture. According to Rothkirchen, "This situation lent
their writings a broad cosmopolitan outlook and a quality of exaltation bordering on
transcendental metaphysical contemplation. An illustrious example is Franz Kafka".
[129]

Towards the end of his life Kafka sent a postcard to his friend Hugo Bergmann in
Tel Aviv, announcing his intention to emigrate to Palestine. Bergmann refused to
host Kafka because he had young children and was afraid that Kafka would infect
them with tuberculosis.[132]

Death[edit]

Franz Kafka's grave in Prague-Žižkov designed by Leopold Ehrmann

Kafka's laryngeal tuberculosis worsened and in March 1924 he returned from

Berlin to Prague,[71] where members of his family, principally his sister Ottla and
Dora Diamant, took care of him. He went to Dr. Hoffmann's sanatorium
in Kierling just outside Vienna for treatment on 10 April,[83] and died there on 3 June
1924. The cause of death seemed to be starvation: the condition of Kafka's throat
made eating too painful for him, and since parenteral nutrition had not yet been
developed, there was no way to feed him. [133][134] Kafka was editing "A Hunger Artist"
on his deathbed, a story whose composition he had begun before his throat closed
to the point that he could not take any nourishment. [135] His body was brought back
to Prague where he was buried on 11 June 1924, in the New Jewish
Cemetery in Prague-Žižkov.[67] Kafka was virtually unknown during his own lifetime,
but he did not consider fame important. He rose to fame rapidly after his death,
[96]
 particularly after World War II. The Kafka tombstone was designed by
architect Leopold Ehrmann.[136]

Works[edit]
Further information: Franz Kafka bibliography

First page of Kafka's Letter to His Father

All of Kafka's published works, except some letters he wrote in Czech to Milena
Jesenská, were written in German. What little was published during his lifetime
attracted scant public attention.
Kafka finished none of his full-length novels and burned around 90 percent of his
work,[137][138] much of it during the period he lived in Berlin with Diamant, who helped
him burn the drafts.[139] In his early years as a writer he was influenced by von Kleist,
whose work he described in a letter to Bauer as frightening and whom he
considered closer than his own family.[140]
Kafka drew and sketched extensively. Until May 2021, only about 40 of his
drawings were known.[141][142] In 2022, Yale University Press published Franz Kafka:
The Drawings.[143]
Stories[edit]
Kafka's earliest published works were eight stories which appeared in 1908 in the
first issue of the literary journal Hyperion under the
title Betrachtung (Contemplation). He wrote the story "Beschreibung eines
Kampfes" ("Description of a Struggle")[c] in 1904; he showed it to Brod in 1905 who
advised him to continue writing and convinced him to submit it to Hyperion. Kafka
published a fragment in 1908[144] and two sections in the spring of 1909, all in
Munich.[145]
In a creative outburst on the night of 22 September 1912, Kafka wrote the story
"Das Urteil" ("The Judgment", literally: "The Verdict") and dedicated it to Felice
Bauer. Brod noted the similarity in names of the main character and his fictional
fiancée, Georg Bendemann and Frieda Brandenfeld, to Franz Kafka and Felice
Bauer.[146] The story is often considered Kafka's breakthrough work. It deals with the
troubled relationship of a son and his dominant father, facing a new situation after
the son's engagement.[147][148] Kafka later described writing it as "a complete opening
of body and soul",[149] a story that "evolved as a true birth, covered with filth and
slime".[150] The story was first published in Leipzig in 1912 and dedicated "to Miss
Felice Bauer", and in subsequent editions "for F." [83]
In 1912, Kafka wrote "Die Verwandlung" ("The Metamorphosis", or "The
Transformation"),[151] published in 1915 in Leipzig. The story begins with a travelling
salesman waking to find himself transformed into an ungeheures Ungeziefer, a
monstrous vermin, Ungeziefer being a general term for unwanted and unclean
pests, especially insects. Critics regard the work as one of the seminal works of
fiction of the 20th century.[152][153][154] The story "In der Strafkolonie" ("In the Penal
Colony"), dealing with an elaborate torture and execution device, was written in
October 1914,[83] revised in 1918, and published in Leipzig during October 1919.
The story "Ein Hungerkünstler" ("A Hunger Artist"), published in the periodical Die
neue Rundschau in 1924, describes a victimized protagonist who experiences a
decline in the appreciation of his strange craft of starving himself for extended
periods.[155] His last story, "Josefine, die Sängerin oder Das Volk der Mäuse"
("Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk"), also deals with the relationship
between an artist and his audience.[156]

Franz Kafka notebook with words in German and Hebrew. From the Collection of the National Library of
Israel.

Novels[edit]
Kafka began his first novel in 1912;[157] its first chapter is the story "Der Heizer"
("The Stoker"). He called the work, which remained unfinished, Der
Verschollene (The Man Who Disappeared or The Missing Man), but when Brod
published it after Kafka's death he named it Amerika.[158] The inspiration for the
novel was the time Kafka spent in the audience of Yiddish theatre the previous
year, bringing him to a new awareness of his heritage, which led to the thought that
an innate appreciation for one's heritage lives deep within each person. [159] More
explicitly humorous and slightly more realistic than most of Kafka's works, the novel
shares the motif of an oppressive and intangible system putting the protagonist
repeatedly in bizarre situations.[160] It uses many details of experiences from his
relatives who had emigrated to America[161] and is the only work for which Kafka
considered an optimistic ending.[162]
In 1914 Kafka began the novel Der Process (The Trial),[145] the story of a man
arrested and prosecuted by a remote, inaccessible authority, with the nature of his
crime revealed neither to him nor to the reader. He did not complete the novel,
although he finished the final chapter. According to Nobel Prize winner and Kafka
scholar Elias Canetti, Felice is central to the plot of Der Process and Kafka said it
was "her story".[163][164] Canetti titled his book on Kafka's letters to Felice Kafka's
Other Trial, in recognition of the relationship between the letters and the novel.
[164]
 Michiko Kakutani notes in a review for The New York Times that Kafka's letters
have the "earmarks of his fiction: the same nervous attention to minute particulars;
the same paranoid awareness of shifting balances of power; the same atmosphere
of emotional suffocation—combined, surprisingly enough, with moments of boyish
ardour and delight."[164]
According to his diary, Kafka was already planning his novel Das Schloss (The
Castle), by 11 June 1914; however, he did not begin writing it until 27 January
1922.[145] The protagonist is the Landvermesser (land surveyor) named K., who
struggles for unknown reasons to gain access to the mysterious authorities of a
castle who govern the village. Kafka's intent was that the castle's authorities notify
K. on his deathbed that his "legal claim to live in the village was not valid, yet,
taking certain auxiliary circumstances into account, he was to be permitted to live
and work there".[165] Dark and at times surreal, the novel is focused
on alienation, bureaucracy, the seemingly endless frustrations of man's attempts to
stand against the system, and the futile and hopeless pursuit of an unattainable
goal. Hartmut M. Rastalsky noted in his thesis: "Like dreams, his texts combine
precise 'realistic' detail with absurdity, careful observation and reasoning on the
part of the protagonists with inexplicable obliviousness and carelessness." [166]
Publishing history[edit]
First edition of Betrachtung, 1912

Kafka's stories were initially published in literary periodicals. His first eight were
printed in 1908 in the first issue of the bi-monthly Hyperion.[167] Franz Blei published
two dialogues in 1909 which became part of "Beschreibung eines Kampfes"
("Description of a Struggle").[167] A fragment of the story "Die Aeroplane in Brescia"
("The Aeroplanes at Brescia"), written on a trip to Italy with Brod, appeared in the
daily Bohemia on 28 September 1909.[167][168] On 27 March 1910, several stories that
later became part of the book Betrachtung were published in the Easter edition
of Bohemia.[167][169] In Leipzig during 1913, Brod and publisher Kurt Wolff included
"Das Urteil. Eine Geschichte von Franz Kafka." ("The Judgment. A Story by Franz
Kafka.") in their literary yearbook for the art poetry Arkadia. In the same year, Wolff
published "Der Heizer" ("The Stoker") in the Jüngste Tag series, where it enjoyed
three printings.[170] The story "Vor dem Gesetz" ("Before the Law") was published in
the 1915 New Year's edition of the independent Jewish weekly Selbstwehr; it was
reprinted in 1919 as part of the story collection Ein Landarzt (A Country Doctor)
and became part of the novel Der Process. Other stories were published in various
publications, including Martin Buber's Der Jude, the paper Prager Tagblatt, and the
periodicals Die neue Rundschau, Genius, and Prager Presse.[167]
Kafka's first published book, Betrachtung (Contemplation, or Meditation), was a
collection of 18 stories written between 1904 and 1912. On a summer trip
to Weimar, Brod initiated a meeting between Kafka and Kurt Wolff; [171] Wolff
published Betrachtung in the Rowohlt Verlag at the end of 1912 (with the year
given as 1913).[172] Kafka dedicated it to Brod, "Für M.B.", and added in the personal
copy given to his friend "So wie es hier schon gedruckt ist, für meinen liebsten Max‍
—‌Franz K." ("As it is already printed here, for my dearest Max"). [173]
Kafka's story "Die Verwandlung" ("The Metamorphosis") was first printed in the
October 1915 issue of Die Weißen Blätter, a monthly edition
of expressionist literature, edited by René Schickele.[172] Another story
collection, Ein Landarzt (A Country Doctor), was published by Kurt Wolff in 1919,
[172]
 dedicated to Kafka's father.[174] Kafka prepared a final collection of four stories for
print, Ein Hungerkünstler (A Hunger Artist), which appeared in 1924 after his death,
in Verlag Die Schmiede. On 20 April 1924, the Berliner Börsen-Courier published
Kafka's essay on Adalbert Stifter.[175]
Max Brod[edit]

First edition of Der Prozess, 1925

Kafka left his work, both published and unpublished, to his friend and literary
executor Max Brod with explicit instructions that it should be destroyed on Kafka's
death; Kafka wrote: "Dearest Max, my last request: Everything I leave behind me ...
in the way of diaries, manuscripts, letters (my own and others'), sketches, and so
on, [is] to be burned unread."[176][177] Brod ignored this request and published the
novels and collected works between 1925 and 1935. Brod defended his action by
claiming that he had told Kafka, "I shall not carry out your wishes", and that "Franz
should have appointed another executor if he had been absolutely determined that
his instructions should stand".[178]
Brod took many of Kafka's papers, which remain unpublished, with him in suitcases
to Palestine when he fled there in 1939.[179] Kafka's last lover, Dora Diamant (later,
Dymant-Lask), also ignored his wishes, secretly keeping 20 notebooks and
35 letters. These were confiscated by the Gestapo in 1933, but scholars continue
to search for them.[180]
As Brod published the bulk of the writings in his possession, [181] Kafka's work began
to attract wider attention and critical acclaim. Brod found it difficult to arrange
Kafka's notebooks in chronological order. One problem was that Kafka often began
writing in different parts of the book; sometimes in the middle, sometimes working
backwards from the end.[182][183] Brod finished many of Kafka's incomplete works for
publication. For example, Kafka left Der Process with unnumbered and incomplete
chapters and Das Schloss with incomplete sentences and ambiguous content;
[183]
 Brod rearranged chapters, copy-edited the text, and changed the
punctuation. Der Process appeared in 1925 in Verlag Die Schmiede. Kurt Wolff
published two other novels, Das Schloss in 1926 and Amerika in 1927. In 1931,
Brod edited a collection of prose and unpublished stories as Beim Bau der
Chinesischen Mauer (The Great Wall of China), including the story of the same
name. The book appeared in the Gustav Kiepenheuer Verlag. Brod's sets are
usually called the "Definitive Editions".[184]
Modern editions[edit]
In 1961 Malcolm Pasley acquired for the Oxford Bodleian Library most of Kafka's
original handwritten works.[185][186] The text for Der Process was later purchased
through auction and is stored at the German Literary Archives in Marbach am
Neckar, Germany.[186][187] Subsequently, Pasley headed a team (including Gerhard
Neumann, Jost Schillemeit and Jürgen Born) which reconstructed the German
novels; S. Fischer Verlag republished them.[188] Pasley was the editor for Das
Schloss, published in 1982, and Der Process (The Trial), published in 1990. Jost
Schillemeit was the editor of Der Verschollene (Amerika) published in 1983. These
are called the "Critical Editions" or the "Fischer Editions". [189]
Unpublished papers[edit]
When Brod died in 1968, he left Kafka's unpublished papers, which are believed to
number in the thousands, to his secretary Esther Hoffe.[190] She released or sold
some, but left most to her daughters, Eva and Ruth, who also refused to release
the papers. A court battle began in 2008 between the sisters and the National
Library of Israel, which claimed these works became the property of the nation of
Israel when Brod emigrated to British Palestine in 1939. Esther Hoffe sold the
original manuscript of Der Process for US$2 million in 1988 to the German Literary
Archive Museum of Modern Literature in Marbach am Neckar.[137][191] A ruling by a Tel
Aviv family court in 2010 held that the papers must be released and a few were,
including a previously unknown story, but the legal battle continued. [192] The Hoffes
claim the papers are their personal property, while the National Library of Israel
argues they are "cultural assets belonging to the Jewish people". [192] The National
Library also suggests that Brod bequeathed the papers to them in his will. [193] The
Tel Aviv Family Court ruled in October 2012, six months after Ruth's death, that the
papers were the property of the National Library. The Israeli Supreme Court upheld
the decision in December 2016.[194]