Franz Kafka (1883-1924)

1
Franz Kafka (1883-1924)

• born to a German speaking, Jewish family in
  Prague
• had a difficult relationship with his father
• graduated with law degree
• worked as clerk for insurance company
• saw himself as weakly timid, hesitant person
• sickly, depressed most of his life
• died of tuberculosis

2
Important works

• Novels
• The Trial (1925)
• The Castle (1926)
• Amerika (1927)
• Stories
• The Judgment (1916)
• In the Penal Colony (1919)
• A Hunger Artist (1922)

3

• A book must be an axe for the frozen sea inside
  us. --Kafka

4
The Metamorphosis (1915)

• Lecture by Vladimir Nabokov
• opening
• interpretations?
• literary metaphorical
• biographical
• psychoanalytical dreams
• marxist alienated labor

5

• Gregors development
• Gregor and his family. Other transformations
• Grete
• Father
• Mother
• The boarders

6
Some motifs

• sleep
• time of day
• movement
• space around Gregor
• the number 3
• doors opening and closing

7

• Gregors death
• the ending
• Kafka on the story
• My little story is finished, but todays
  conclusion doesnt make me happy at all it
  should have been better, no doubt about it
• Great antipathy to Metamorphosis. Unreadable
  ending. Imperfect almost to its very marrow.

8
In groups of three

• Choose one of the characters in the text and
  rewrite the story from his/her perspective.