The Shadow of Chez

Two things are apparent when you visit Prague. One, the homeless are very patient and can endure great physical pain – it’s common to see a person kneeling upon the hard cobblestone street, head bowed, their elbows on the ground, and their hands cupped in the air. It is very difficult to pass them by without feeling pangs of sympathy for these poor people. Two, Kafka is much revered. Everything from bookstores and hotels to coffee shops are named after Franz Kafka. Souvenirs of him and his works are everywhere.

While there in the winter of 2003 I wondered if Kafka, the son of a middle-class business man, could have imagined his writings and name would become so entwined in the Czech Republic capital. I also wondered if he really did want his friend and literary executor, Max Brod, to burn all his writings after his death. He received very little acclaim during his lifetime. Was the request a result of frustration? Or because he knew Brod would not obey the demand,?

Whatever the reason, it probably is best that Brod didn’t follow his friend’s demand. Kafka has undeniably left his imprint on literature. His form and style have its own name, Kafkaesque – meaning, “marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity”. The Kafka Prize is awarded each year to a book for its “humanistic, existential, and timeless character, its generally human validity and its ability to hand over a testimony about our times.” Philip Roth was the first to win this prize in 2001.

The Castle was Kafka’s last novel. He died in 1924, of tuberculosis, leaving the novel unfinished. Whether he intended to actually finish the novel is open to debate. Kafka wrote to Brod in 1922 saying he had decided to give up on the novel.  Prior to his death Kafka told Brod and their friends about the story’s ending. I will not recount the proposed ending here. Though, given the definite ending he had in mind and his desire to tell his friends about it, I believe that if he had the time he would have finished it. According to Thomas Mann, in the “Homage” to the 1954 ‘definitive edition’, “The Castle is not complete, but probably not more than one chapter is missing”.

As it stands we are left with the unfinished version. As it also stands, The Castle was my first novel for the 25 in 2010 book read. I had previously read The Trial, as well as many of Kafka’s short stories. I felt this to be a natural starting point, as Kafka is a writer I highly enjoy. I started on January 2nd. I figured if I read 20 pages a day, then I would be able to finish the 280 page novel in 14 days. The reality of it was this: on my busy days I read nothing. And on my free days I read more. Until finally, I read the last 80 pages today.

I did keep a journal as I read. I won’t be recounting the entries here, but I will give you my overall feelings from those entries. The thing I like about Kafka’s stories are the situations. I love reading about logical people in illogical settings. His characters seem placed in a waking dream. The circumstances and obstacles are so foggy that they are logically unfathomable.

K., the main character, comes to a village to work as a land-surveyor, after allegedly being summoned by The Castle. His position, and right to be in the village, is promptly denied by the castle. The novel follows K.’s attempts to make contact with Klamm, The Castle’s official, and rectify the situation. Throughout the story K. fights endless bureaucracy, tries to understand the arbitrary rules and regulations, and tries to cope with two assistants, whom are more of a hindrance than a help.

While I enjoyed the novel, and am glad I read it, I did find myself suffering through it towards the end. From the half way point onward the narrative turns slow and creeping, as if I was having to traverse through a sludgy bog. Much of the latter half is spent in long, tendriling conversations between characters. Paragraphs go on for pages. The plot advances very little and much of what is learned are character’s backgrounds and speculations on motives.

There are two reasons of for why this story shifts like this. One, the first half of the story had originally been written in first person. Kafka decided to change the perspective later, thus replacing all the “I’s” with “K.’s”. The second half he wrote from a purely third person perspective. Two, stylistically, Kafka could be using the format in the second half to further illustrate K.’s frustratingly slow, almost negligible, progress. Near the end of the story K. falls asleep for 12 hours out of sheer fatigue, after enduring the conversations and interactions of the previous 48 hours. By the time I had reached this point, I wanted to sleep too. I was desperate for some sort of resolution, some sign that things would soon be straightened.

Resolution does not come, for K. or myself. we are both destined to stumble through this seemingly illogical world. I’m happy to be finished it. I don’t think I could have willingly endured any more stagnation. I often wondered throughout the story, why K. decided to stay. As a land-surveyor you would think he could go anywhere else and get better treatment. I like to think I would have just left. But then how many of us stay in jobs, or situations, we hate? They eat us up inside, but we refrain from moving on.

Perhaps this is what makes Kafka’s stories so believable, despite their situational illogicalness. Kafka’s stories, like The Trial, At The Penal Colony, and Metamorphosis, have a poignancy. Sure the situations are unlikely, but given that we are viewing things through a rational person, much like ourselves, we can believe it. Things may be odd, but there is a larger point.

What’s the larger point to The Castle? I don’t want to go into the symbolism, theological and otherwise, motifs, and themes. But, this is the main point: if you are contracted to do some work for a place you’ve never been before, bring your paperwork. Things would have been so much easier had K. just had the right forms. That’s not The Castle’s fault, so why should everyone else suffer as a result?

Anyway, that’s it. Now on to the Next book: Something Happened, by Joseph Heller.