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Kafka, Franz

Started by Thomas, December 31, 2017, 12:19:34 PM

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Thomas

Early this month, whilst shopping for Christmas presents for other people, I found a reasonably priced collection of Franz Kafka's works and bought it for myself. I'd not read anything much of Kafka's before, only a few one-paragraph stories, and I'm still yet to read The Trial (1925) and The Castle (1926), but here are some thoughts on the things I have now read (all translated by Michael Hofmann. The stories, not my thoughts):

The Metamorphosis (1915) - The classic, the quintessential, the obvious, I started with this. Initially, I was reading it simply as an enjoyably surreal tale of the unexpected, but soon - having read a bit about the author for context - I began to detect hints of Kafka's socialism, and his sympathy for the overworked poor. Here, the pressures of capitalism are literally dehumanising.

I liked A Country Doctor (1919), which I felt was more allegorical and absurdist than Contemplation (1912). I particularly liked the final story in A Country Doctor, of a former ape giving a talk on his transition to humanity.

Now, since these stories were published, everything slightly strange or dreamlike has been stamped with the KAFKAESQUE brand, but the thing I'm most reminded of is Chris Morris' Blue Jam. Some of the short stories have been like extended prose versions of Blue Jam sketches, with ordinary characters suffering extraordinary circumstances; absurd things happening in mundane settings. The familiar, mundane way the characters react to the absurdity of lizards emerging from a television is very like the way Gregor reacts when he wakes to find himself transformed into a hideous insectoid creature. Despite his numerous waving legs and his clicking mandibles, he's mainly worried about being late for work. The way these starkly absurd scenarios are played straight makes them darkly funny.

The four story collection A Hunger Artist (1924) struck me as especially Jammy, particularly the titular starving showman, lying in his cage at the circus. If you like Blue Jam, I'd recommend trying on some of these short stories.

Any thoughts on Kafka?

bgmnts

I had a similar collection of works I got from a Barnes and Noble in NYC which, unfortunately, got shat on by one of two suspects after a drunken night out. I hadn't got round to reading it.

Fortunately, a few days after one of the suspected literary defecators gave me his copy of Metamorphosis (an act of attrition?) so I have that on the shelf somewhere i'm yet to read.

I've heard it's rather good.

Large Noise

I've read The Metamorphosis and most of the short stories. The Metamorphosis does a good job of making you sympathise with Gregor while retaining a bit of moral ambiguity about the ending. In the Penal Colony put me in mind of this: https://vimeo.com/24804876

Sacked off The Castle about half way through cause I was bored, but maybe it was just cause I was depressed at the time. Might go back to it.

Howj Begg

Kafka is possibly my favourite author. I've read everything except the letters, which I hope to do this year.  As it's NYE I'm not going into much detail now, but I feel that FK is able to empathise with every living thing, from the smallest insect to God itself. His descriptions of everything - human mannerisms and physical stances, corporeal relations between people, streets, angles of vision, stray thoughts, fears which seem to be inherent to object stimuli - are masterful. In fact this is the philosophical point in Kafka I feel; he writes as a - metaphorically blind - narrator, feeling his way along the story, textual movement happening according to sensory engagement. What is seen, felt, thought, heard etc determines the course of the story, in fact these extensive and illuminating descriptions often are the story, rather than any forward momentum. FK discovers the story as he goes along, he has no prejudice as to where it will go, he presents no overarching pre-determined didactic theme or structure. His work is totally honest. I believe this is how he worked ie he didn't plan extensively, he went into trances and allowed automatic writing to dictate the words on the page, and it exhausted him. I think he was an artist to his finger tips. if you read his diaries you will see he is preternaturally sensitive and aware, and is able to think through layers of irony and recursion that most mortals are incapable of feeling. When this applied to himself, as it frequently did, he was paralysed with doubt and self-loathing. When he was able to direct it externally, to an objective surface, he could write. For me, reading FK is akin to reading the most sensitive storyteller ever, who has the qualities of a  learned rabbi, a child, a naturalist, a naive scientist, and the supranormal intelligence of Proust.


QuoteI began to detect hints of Kafka's socialism, and his sympathy for the overworked poor. Here, the pressures of capitalism are literally dehumanising.

America is where this tendency is displayed most prominently.

Twit 2

#4
Good thread!

Thomas, I'd say Kafkaesque is (mis)used to denote a farcical/nightmarish/never-ending existential/bureaucratical situation rather than something strange/dreamlike in general.

I read Kafka when I was 18 so I could seem clever. I must re-read his stuff at some point. I have read his notebooks more recently (due to liking Gyorgy Kurtag's Kafka Fragments) and really liked them. It seemed like a lot of his thought and style is there in the fragments, but hard to compare cos of the gap in time reading him. I remember reading a comic strip type intro to him, Robert Crumb mayhap?

rue the polywhirl

I bought a Kafka book a year or so ago to basically look smart but never got around to reading it. Seems totally Kafkaesque. It had a Pac-Man on the cover. That was the only thing that drew me to it. Me gonna read some now in tribute despite being kafkaesque inebriated.

rue the polywhirl

I screwed up. It was a Henry Miller book I was thinking of. So totally Kafkaesque.

samadriel

QuoteI remember reading a comic strip type intro to him, Robert Crumb mayhap?
That's right, it was Crumb; I quite enjoyed that, although I have yet to read Kafka. One of these days...