Kafka’s stories suggest meanings which are accessible only after several readings. If their endings, or lack of endings, seem to make sense at all, they will do so immediately and not in unequivocal language. The reason for this is that the stories offer a wide variety of possible meanings without […]
Read more Critical Essays Kafka and ExistentialismCritical Essays Kafka — A Religious” Writer?”
To know Kafka is to grapple with this problem: was Kafka primarily a “religious” writer? The answer seems to depend on the views one brings to the reading of his stories rather than on even the best analyses. Because so much of Kafka’s world remains ultimately inaccessible to us, any […]
Read more Critical Essays Kafka — A Religious” Writer?”Critical Essays Kafka’s Jewish Influence
Prague was steeped in the atmosphere of Jewish learning and writing until the social and political turmoil of the collapsing Austrian Empire put an end to its traditional character. The first Jews had come to Prague in the tenth century, and the earliest written document about what the city looked […]
Read more Critical Essays Kafka’s Jewish InfluenceCritical Essays Understanding Kafka
A major problem confronting readers of Kafka’s short stories is to find a way through the increasingly dense thicket of interpretations. Among the many approaches one encounters is that of the autobiographical approach. This interpretation claims that Kafka’s works are little more than reflections of his lifelong tension between bachelorhood […]
Read more Critical Essays Understanding KafkaCritical Essays Composition and Reception of The Trial
Almost simultaneously with “In the Penal Colony,” Kafka began to write The Trial in the summer of 1914, a date which has unfortunately convinced many people that the novel is primarily a work foreshadowing political terror. Of course, he was painfully aware of the interconnections between World War I and […]
Read more Critical Essays Composition and Reception of The TrialCritical Essays Structure and Order of Chapters in The Trial
As we follow K.’s stumbling through the story, we get the distinct feeling that there is not much of a development he goes through. Not even Huld, for instance, with all his insight and connections, knows whether K.’s case has ever gotten off the ground. There is no “way,” or, […]
Read more Critical Essays Structure and Order of Chapters in The TrialCritical Essays The Neurotic Element in Kafka’s Art
In 1917, Kafka learned about his tubercular condition, which appeared in one night with heavy bleeding. When it happened it did not only scare him, but also relieved him of chronic insomnia. Surprising though this aspect of relief may be on first glance, it becomes understandable when we consider that […]
Read more Critical Essays The Neurotic Element in Kafka’s ArtCritical Essays On K.’S Guilt, the Court, and the Law
Certainly The Trial has many layers of meaning which not even the most “scientific” analysis can decode, be it psychoanalytically or, more recently, linguistically oriented. The probably inevitable result of the novel’s multi-level makeup is that certain components are stressed while others are not. Yet it seems that, in spite […]
Read more Critical Essays On K.’S Guilt, the Court, and the LawSummary and Analysis Chapter 10
Summary The significance of this chapter, like that of Chapter 1, lies in its chronological explicity. Not only do the two black-frocked men pick up K., also dressed in black, at 9 A.M. — the warders arrested K. (also both in black) before 9 A.M. — but this chapter also […]
Read more Summary and Analysis Chapter 10Summary and Analysis Chapter 9
Summary The Bank picks K. as a guide for an Italian visitor because he speaks the language and is knowledgeable about art. As far as the structure of the novel goes, Kafka uses this connection to demonstrate one more time how utterly inseparable K.’s world of the Bank is from […]
Read more Summary and Analysis Chapter 9