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The Space of Kafka

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The Space of Kafka the space of Kafka TImothy E.G McDonald School of Architecture McGIll University, Montréal 1\ Th~sis suhmitted lo the Faculty of Gradualc Studies and Researeh in partial fulfillment of the rClJuircmcnts for the dcgrcc of Master of Architecture. ûTlmothy E.G. Mc Donald - Mareh 28, 1994 ABSTRACT The following study investigates the fictional works of an early tw€'ntieth century Czechoslovakian writer named Franz Kafka. "The spacE' of Kafka" is explored primarily through the "identity" of his characteristic monster fig­ ures and the temporally disjun(:tive narratives through which they travel. Monstrosity is qualified here as a principal mode of transla tion through which Kafka engaged the very terms of "identity" which an "individual" faces in the appearance of any "work". The intimations of a monstrous self are probed through Kafka's work in relation to human experience, intentionality, alterity and a "present" which is en-acted specifically as one fonn of the pasto 1hrough Kafka's paradigmatic "monster", "double" and "bachelor" figures, we find l'lot "alternative" orientations of the "self" which contemporary literature and architecture may choose to undertake, but intrinsic re-presentations of the very relation which any self, any author, already is in the appearance of a "work". RÉSUMÉ L'ouvrage qui suit explore l'oeuvre fictive d'un écrivain tch,scoslovaque du début du vingtième siècle: Franz Kafka. "L'espace de Kafka" est essentiellement sondé à travers l"'identité" de ses personnages monstres et les narratifs temporellement disloqués dans lesquels ils évoluent. Monstruosité s'entend ici comme un médian par lequel Kafka er;treprend les termes mêmes de l'''identité'' à laquelle un "individu" fait face dans l'apparence d'une "oeuvre". Les implications d'un soi monstrueux sont scrutées dans l'oeuvre de Kafka en relation avec l'expérience humaine, l'intentionnalité, l'altérité et un "présent" qui se joue en tant que forme du passé. A travers les personnages "monstre", "double" et "célibataire" paradigmatiques de Kafka, on tJ'Ouve non pas les orientations "alternatives" du "soi" que la littérature et l'architecture contemporaines choisissent de soutenir, mais les re-présentations intrinsèques de la relation même qu'Wl mm, un auteur, est déjà dans l'apparence d'une "oeuvre". CONTENTS -ACKNOWLEDGA.fENTS -EPIGRA.PH -INTRODUCTION Chapter 1 Reading Kafka -Experiencing Kafka/Kafka and Experience -"The Trial" and Experience -Self and Intention Chapter 2: Kindred Beings ~~J'--: ~1 • -My th & My th -Metamorphosis & OVid 1 S Veil -Some AsiniJle 'Thoughts Chapter 3 Reading the Bachelor -The Double -Wrltlng and the Bachelor -CONCLUSION -FIGURES -BIBLIOGRAPHY A CKNOWLEDGMENTS l wish to thank Alberto Pérez-Gornez for his advice, inspiration and support in these past challenging years. Marco Frascari, Steve Parcell, Katsuhiko Muramoto, Donald Kunze, and David Leatherbarrow aIl provided invaluable criticism of the work in progress, and deserve special thanks. 1 am grateful to my friends and colleagues who offered enlight­ ening guidance and suggestions throughout the development of Hus work, espedally, Torben Bems, Lily Chi, Terrance Galvin and wi.th added warmth and appreciation, Annette Dudek. l'd also like to thank Susie Spurdens, who has always offered a friendly smile and a hand. And to my fellow students in the History and Theory Program at McGill who provided a rare and unforgettable atmosphere for learning, merci. EPIGRAPH "Before the law stands a do~rkeeper. To this doorkeeper there cornes él man from the country who begs admittance to the Law. But the doorkeeper says that he cannot admit the man at the moment. The man, on reflection, asks if he will be allowed, then, to enter later. "It is possible," answers the doorkeeper, "but not at this moment." Since the door leading to the Law stands open as usuai and the doorkeeper stcps to one side, the man bends down to peer through the entrance. When the doorkeeper sees that, he laughs and says: "If you are 50 strongly tempted, try to get in without my permission. But note that 1 am powerful. And 1 am only the lowest doorkeeper. From hall to hall, keepers stand at every door, one more powerful th an the other. And the sight of the third man is already more than even 1 can stand." These are difficulties which the man from the cOWltry has not expecled ta meet, the Law, he thinks, should be accessible to every man and at aIl times, but when he looks more c10sely at the doorkeeper in his furred robe, with his huge, pointed nose and long thin, Tartar beard, he decides that he had better wait until he gets permission to enter. The doorkeeper gives him a stool and lets him sît down at the si de of the door. There he sits waiting for da ys and years. He makes many attempts to be allowed in and wearies the doorkeeper with his importunity. The doorkeeper often engages him in brief conversation, asking him about his home and about other matters, but the questions are put quite impersonally, as great men put questions, an always conc1ude with the statement that the man cannot be allowed to enter yet. The man, who has equipped himself wîth many things for his journey, parts with aH he has, however valuable, in the hope of bribing the doorkeeper. The doorkeeper accepts it aH, saying, however, as he takes each gift: "1 take this only to keep you from feeling that you have left something undone." During aIl these long years the man watches the doorkeeper almost incessantly. He forgets about the other doorkeepers, and this one seems to him the ont y barrier bEltween himself and the Law. In the first years he curses his evil fate aloud; la ter, as he grows old, he only mutters to himself. He grows childish, and since in his prolonged study of the doorkeeper he has learned to know even the fleas in rus rur collar, he begs the very fleas to help him and to persuade the doorkeeper to change his mind. Finally his eyes grow dim and he does not know whether the world is really darkening around him or whether his eyes are only deceiving. But in the darkness he can now perceive a radiance that streams inextinguishably from the door of the Law. Now his lite is drawing to a close. Before he dies, aIl that he has experienced during the whole time of rus sojourn condenses in his mind into one q'..1estion, which he has never yet put to the doorkeeper. He ,beckons the dOOlkeeper, since he can no longer raise his stiffening body. The doorkeeper has to bend far down to hear him, for the difference in size between them has increased very much to the man's disadvantage. "What do you want to know now?" asks the doorkeeper, "you are insatiable." "Everyone strives to attain the Law," answers the man, "how does it come about, then, that in aH these years no one has come seeking admittance but me?" The doorkeeper perceives that the man is nearing rus end and rus hearing is failing, 50 he bellows in his ear: "No one but you could gain admittance through this door, since this door was intended for you. 1 am now going to shut it." "Before the Law"(Thl' Triai, p.213-215) 2 INTRODUCTION How does one speak of the light which emanates from another's eyes in a dark room? Is it not a harrowing light? Is it not a light which is the farthest thing from light? We search for Its source and only too quickly it eludes us. Language meets with ruses more often than '.nuses. Franz Kafka, however, had a unique muse-icai contract. His is a site where polarities duel incessantly, where the right and left maintain opposite but cqual ground for eternity, and where the faint srnile of an indifferent witness encourages the process. Kafka is smiling, Kafka is laughing, cathartically laughing. And we first ask "why?". We first ask, not Iaugh, but ask. 50 then, why? He laughs again. Certainly nothing malicious, rather more endearing. We remain puzzled. And yet, this is the Franz Kafka who wrote "The Metamorphosis" and "The Cares of a Farnily Man" and T/ze Trial and "A Report to an Academy" and "The Burrow". Certamly such abominations are the farthest things from laughter? And surely a student of architectural history and the ory has better things to discuss than the creatures of a convoluted mind? Convolution? Nothing convolutpd about a man who turns into a monstrous vE'rmin (we are of course dealing with fiction); nothing convoluted about a man who perpetually strives toward finding justice and truth (we are of course aU Christians); nothing convoluted about a rodent articulating the depths of his burrow (metaphors of self-introspection run rampant in literary history; besides, even children can attest to the wonders of talking animaIs). Convoluted or facile? Both and neither. The terms appear to have little to do with anything. And yet, language has little to do with anything if it doesn't have "little to do with anything" to sorne degree. It seems the closer one cornes to saying "little about anything", is the degree to which something is actuaUy being said. And Kafka laughs. 3 There is no shortage of literary criticism regarding the work of Franz Kafka. Familial/Freudian strife, oppressive/modern bureaucracies, circular /Judaic despair are frequented themes. In fact, it seems that readings of whatever slant may be coherently argued and founded in Kafka's work. Indeed, one might even perceive this interpretive pluralisrn as a burlesqued "reality" of Kafka's own fictions.
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