Kafka and Parables
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Complete Stories by Franz Kafka
The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka Back Cover: "An important book, valuable in itself and absolutely fascinating. The stories are dreamlike, allegorical, symbolic, parabolic, grotesque, ritualistic, nasty, lucent, extremely personal, ghoulishly detached, exquisitely comic. numinous and prophetic." -- New York Times "The Complete Stories is an encyclopedia of our insecurities and our brave attempts to oppose them." -- Anatole Broyard Franz Kafka wrote continuously and furiously throughout his short and intensely lived life, but only allowed a fraction of his work to be published during his lifetime. Shortly before his death at the age of forty, he instructed Max Brod, his friend and literary executor, to burn all his remaining works of fiction. Fortunately, Brod disobeyed. The Complete Stories brings together all of Kafka's stories, from the classic tales such as "The Metamorphosis," "In the Penal Colony" and "The Hunger Artist" to less-known, shorter pieces and fragments Brod released after Kafka's death; with the exception of his three novels, the whole of Kafka's narrative work is included in this volume. The remarkable depth and breadth of his brilliant and probing imagination become even more evident when these stories are seen as a whole. This edition also features a fascinating introduction by John Updike, a chronology of Kafka's life, and a selected bibliography of critical writings about Kafka. Copyright © 1971 by Schocken Books Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Schocken Books Inc., New York. Distributed by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. The foreword by John Updike was originally published in The New Yorker. -
Prayer Or Despair? the Parables of the Friend at Midnight and the Unjust Judge
PRAYER OR DESPAIR? THE PARABLES OF THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT AND THE UNJUST JUDGE By Ronald A. Julian An Integrative Thesis Submitted To The Faculty of Reformed Theological Seminary In Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree Master of Arts THESIS ADVISOR: ________________________________ Dr. Simon Kistemaker RTS/VIRTUAL PRESIDENT ________________________________ Dr. Andrew J. Peterson September 2006 ii CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................................ v LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.................................................................................................. vi Chapter 1. INTRODUCTION......................................................................................................1 2. METHODOLOGY.....................................................................................................3 The Interpretation of Parables............................................................................3 Higher Criticism.................................................................................................4 3. THE PARABLE OF THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT ...............................................8 Background and Context....................................................................................9 Exegetical Details in the Story.........................................................................12 The Meaning of the Parable.............................................................................22 4. THE PARABLE OF -
Of the Castle Chinmaya Lal Thakur Graduate Researcher Depart
Kafka Beyond the Kafkaesque: Reading Laughter in the ‘Dystopia’ of The Castle Chinmaya Lal Thakur Graduate Researcher Department of Creative Arts and English La Trobe University, Melbourne Abstract: Franz Kafka’s fiction has been read as presenting instances of especially deprived subjectivities. Kafka’s protagonists are seen as being alienated from others around them. They are uncritical servants of tyrannical bureaucratic organizations and offer no resistance to the frightening impact of the forces of power, technological surveillance, and domination that constitute the episteme that they inhabit. Their situation, to put it succinctly, is Kafkaesque- defined by the Merriam Webster dictionary as “of, relating to, or suggestive of Franz Kafka or his writings; especially having a nightmarishly complex, bizarre, or illogical quality.” The present paper argues that Kafka adopts an ironical attitude towards his protagonists as they seek to control the accidents and surprises, they encounter in their lives and render them manageable. It reads K.’s meeting with the official Burgel from the Castle in Kafka’s The Castle (1926) as being an instance of an accidental and humorous situation that critiques the metaphysical dualities characterizing human existence - such as freedom and determination- by reflecting ironically on them. This humor is of course humor at the expense of the protagonist, but it is also humoring that points to the (futile) human endeavor of seeking to achieve absolute freedom in the world. The paper, thus, attempts to establish an association between Kafka’s ironical attitude towards K. in The Castle and the critique of the nightmarish, terrifying, and ultimately dystopian aspects of Cartesian modernity that such an attitude leads to. -
The Individual and the «Spiritual» World in Kafka's Novels
Studies in 20th Century Literature Volume 3 Issue 1 Article 3 8-1-1978 The Individual and the «Spiritual» World in Kafka's Novels Ulrich Fülleborn Universitat Erlangen-Niirnberg Follow this and additional works at: https://newprairiepress.org/sttcl Part of the German Literature Commons, and the Modern Literature Commons This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. Recommended Citation Fülleborn, Ulrich (1978) "The Individual and the «Spiritual» World in Kafka's Novels," Studies in 20th Century Literature: Vol. 3: Iss. 1, Article 3. https://doi.org/10.4148/2334-4415.1057 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by New Prairie Press. It has been accepted for inclusion in Studies in 20th Century Literature by an authorized administrator of New Prairie Press. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Individual and the «Spiritual» World in Kafka's Novels Abstract Following an earlier essay by the same author on 'Perspektivismus und Parabolik' in Kafka's shorter prose pieces, this article gives a description of the structure of Kafka's novels in terms of the concepts 'the individual' (cf. Kierkegaard's 'individuals') and 'the spiritual world' (Kafka: «There is no world but the spiritual one»). Joseph K. and the land-surveyor K. become individuals by leaving the world of everyday life and passing over into the incomprehensible spiritual world of trials and a village-castle community, in the same way that Karl Rossmann had passed over into the 'Nature-theatre of Oklahoma' before them. And they remain as individuals, since in this world they struggle to hold their own. -
Laughing with Kafka After Promethean Shame
PROBLEMI INTERNATIONAL,Laughing with vol. Kafka 2, no. 2,after 2018 Promethean © Society for Shame Theoretical Psychoanalysis Laughing with Kafka after Promethean Shame Jean-Michel Rabaté We have learned that Kafka’s main works deploy a fully-fledged political critique whose main weapon is derision.1 This use of laughter to satirize totalitarian regimes has been analyzed under the name of the “political grotesque” by Joseph Vogl. Here is what Vogl writes: From the terror of secret scenes of torture to childish officials, from the filth of the bureaucratic order to atavistic rituals of power runs a track of comedy that forever indicates the absence of reason, the element of the arbitrary in the execution of power and rule. How- ever, the element of the grotesque does not unmask and merely denounce. Rather it refers—as Foucault once pointed out—to the inevitability, the inescapability of precisely the grotesque, ridicu- lous, loony, or abject sides of power. Kafka’s “political grotesque” displays an unsystematic arbitrariness, which belongs to the func- tions of the apparatus itself. […] Kafka’s comedy turns against a diagnosis that conceives of the modernization of political power as 1 This essay is a condensed version of the second part of Kafka L.O.L., forthcoming from Quodlibet in 2018. In the first part, I address laughter in Kaf- ka’s works, showing that it takes its roots in the culture of a “comic grotesque” dominant in Expressionist German culture. Günther Anders’s groundbreaking book on Kafka then highlights the political dimensions of the work while criti- cizing Kafka’s Promethean nihilism. -
The Parables of Jesus: Friendly Subversive Speech
The Parables of Jesus: Friendly Subversive Speech Introduction 4 Tell it Slant Typology and Parables The Four Gospels and Parables Messianic Consciousness Matthew’s Sermon of Parables 1 The Parable of the Sower 13 “Holy Seed” Isaiah’s Open Secret Jesus’ Interpretation Good-Soil Understanding 2 The Parable of the Weeds among the Wheat 22 Mustard Seeds and Yeast Echoes of Asaph Jesus’ Explanation 3 The Parables of the Hidden Treasure, the Pearl, and the Net 32 The Joy of the Gospel The Net New Treasures 4 The Parable of the Good Samaritan 37 Setting the Scene Augustine’s Allegory The Expert Who is my Neighbor? Messianic Edge 5 The Parable of the Friend at Midnight 50 Midnight Request Global Neighbors How Much More! 6 The Parable of the Rich Fool 55 Do We Practice What We Preach? The Meaning of Life All Kinds of Greed The Fool Jesus’ Hierarchy of Needs 7 The Parable of the Faithful Servants and the Exuberant Master 67 The Master is Coming! The Master Serves 8 The Parable of the Faithless Servant and the Furious Master 73 Managerial Responsibilities Managers of the Mysteries of God’s Revelation The Master’s Fury 1 9 The Parable of the Barren Fig Tree 80 Fig Tree Judgment Repentance Productivity 10 The Parable of the Great Banquet 86 The Narrow Door Jesus Will Not Be Managed Tension Around the Table Mundane Excuses The Host 11 The Parable of the Tower Builder and King at War 94 Christ-less Christianity Counting the Cost Who Among You? 12 The Parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin, and the Lost Sons 101 The Compassionate Father Prodigal -
EXISTENTIAL CRISIS in FRANZ Kl~Fkl:T
EXISTENTIAL CRISIS IN FRANZ Kl~FKl:t. Thesis submitted to the University ofNor~b ~'!e:n~al for the award of the Degree of Doctor of Ph.Ho§'Ophy. By Miss Rosy Chamling Department of English University of North Bengal Dist. Darjeeling-7340 13 West Bengal 2010 gt)l.IN'tO rroit<. I • NlVERSITY OF NORTH BENGAL P.O. NORTH BENGAL UNIVERSITY, HEAD Raja Rammohunpur, Dist. Da~eeling, DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH West Bengal, India, PIN- 734013. Phone: (0353) 2776 350 Ref No .................................................... Dated .....?.J..~ ..9 . .7.: ... ............. 20. /.~. TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN This is to certify that Miss Rosy Cham!ing has completed her Research Work on •• Existential Crisis in Franz Kafka". As the thesis bears the marks of originality and analytic thinking, I recommend its submission for evaluation . \i~?~] j' {'f- f ~ . I) t' ( r . ~ . s amanta .) u, o:;.?o"" Supervis~r & Head Dept. of English, NBU .. Contents Page No. Preface ......................................................................................... 1-vn Acknowledgements ...................................................................... viii L1st. ot~A'b o -rev1at1ons . ................................................................... 1x. Chapter- I Introduction................................................... 1 1 Chapter- II The Critical Scene ......................................... 32-52 Chapter- HI Authority and the Individual. ........................ 53-110 Chapter- IV Tragic Humanism in Kafka........................... 111-17 5 Chapter- V Realism -
The Complete Stories
The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka a.b.e-book v3.0 / Notes at the end Back Cover : "An important book, valuable in itself and absolutely fascinating. The stories are dreamlike, allegorical, symbolic, parabolic, grotesque, ritualistic, nasty, lucent, extremely personal, ghoulishly detached, exquisitely comic. numinous and prophetic." -- New York Times "The Complete Stories is an encyclopedia of our insecurities and our brave attempts to oppose them." -- Anatole Broyard Franz Kafka wrote continuously and furiously throughout his short and intensely lived life, but only allowed a fraction of his work to be published during his lifetime. Shortly before his death at the age of forty, he instructed Max Brod, his friend and literary executor, to burn all his remaining works of fiction. Fortunately, Brod disobeyed. Page 1 The Complete Stories brings together all of Kafka's stories, from the classic tales such as "The Metamorphosis," "In the Penal Colony" and "The Hunger Artist" to less-known, shorter pieces and fragments Brod released after Kafka's death; with the exception of his three novels, the whole of Kafka's narrative work is included in this volume. The remarkable depth and breadth of his brilliant and probing imagination become even more evident when these stories are seen as a whole. This edition also features a fascinating introduction by John Updike, a chronology of Kafka's life, and a selected bibliography of critical writings about Kafka. Copyright © 1971 by Schocken Books Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Schocken Books Inc., New York. Distributed by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. -
Franz Kafka - Quotes
Franz Kafka - Quotes It is the thousandth forgetting of a dream dreamt a thousand times and forgotten a thousand times, and who can damn us merely for forgetting for the thousandth time? - Investigations Of A Dog Ours is a lost generation, it may be, but it is more blameless than those earlier generations. - Investigations Of A Dog So long as you have food in your mouth, you have solved all questions for the time being. - Investigations Of A Dog You need not leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. You need not even listen, simply wait, just learn to become quiet, and still, and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked. It has no choice; it will roll in ecstasy at your feet. - Journals My peers, lately, have found companionship through means of intoxication--it makes them sociable. I, however, cannot force myself to use drugs to cheat on my loneliness--it is all that i have--and when the drugs and alcohol dissipate, will be all that my peers have as well. - Journals A book should serve as the ax for the frozen sea within us. - Journals A man of action forced into a state of thought is unhappy until he can get out of it. - Journals Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old. - Journals By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired. - Journals In me, by myself, without human relationship, there are no visible lies. -
Germ 358 Prof Peters Winter 202! KAFKA in TRANSLATION Course Outline and Itinerary
Germ 358 Prof Peters Winter 202! KAFKA IN TRANSLATION Course Outline and Itinerary PREAMBLE The term “Kafkaesque” has entered many languages, and Franz Kafka is widely recognized as perhaps the “classic” author of the perils and pitfalls of modernity. This course will examine many of the texts which helped make Kafka one of the most celebrated and notorious authors of the past century, and which served to refashion literature and all our notions about what literature can and cannot do. This course will look at the novel The Trial, the short stories The Judgement, The Metamorphosis, In the Penal Colony, The Hunger Artist etc., as well as short prose texts and passages from his diaries and letters. Films and other medial adaptations and representations of Kafka’s works will also be part of the course, as will the Kafka criticism of such authors as Gunther Anders, Elias Canetti, and Walter Benjamin. Political, feminist, theological, Judaicist, as well as contemporary “new historicist” and “cultural materialist” approaches to Kafka will also be considered. This course is given in English. FORMAT This course is in a lecture format and in a blend of fixed and flexible presentation. The lectures will be made available in audio format on the day they are scheduled to be given with the possibility for the subsequent submission of questions and comments by the class. The lectures will be recorded and available in their entirety on mycourses. SELF-PRESENTATION (Selbstdarstellung) I do not as a general rule mediatize myself, and for reasons of deeply held religious and philosophical conviction regard the generation of the simulacra of living human presence though Skype or Zoom as idolatrous and highly problematic. -
The Everyday's Fabulous Beyond: Nonsense, Parable, and the Ethics of the Literary in Kafka and Wittgenstein
KAREN ZUMHAGEN-YEKPLÉ The Everyday’s Fabulous Beyond: Nonsense, Parable, and the Ethics of the Literary in Kafka and Wittgenstein Many complain that the words of the wise, time and again, are only para- bles, but inapplicable to daily life, which is all we have. When the wise man says, “Cross over,” he does not mean that one should cross over to the other side, which one could still manage, after all, if the result of going that way made it worth it; he means some sort of fabulous Beyond, some- thing we do not know, which he cannot designate more precisely either, and which therefore cannot help us here at all. All these parables really intend to say is only that the incomprehensible is incomprehensible, and that we knew already. But all that we have to struggle with everyday: that is a different matter. Thereupon someone said: Why all this resistance? If you followed para- bles, you would become parables yourselves and with that free of your daily cares. Another said: “I bet that is also a parable.” The first said: “You have won.” The second said: “But unfortunately only in parable.” The first said: “No, in reality; in parable you have lost.” —Franz Kafka, “On Parables”1 1 My translation. Here is Kafka’s original text: “Von den Gleichnissen” Viele beklagen sich, daß die Worte der Weisen immer wieder nur Gleichnisse seien, aber unver- wendbar im täglichen Leben, und nur dieses allein haben wir. Wenn der Weise sagt: »Gehe hinüber«, so meint er nicht, daß man auf die andere Seite hinübergehen solle, was man immerhin noch leisten könnte, wenn das Ergebnis des Weges wert wäre, sondern er meint irgendein sagenhaftes Drüben, etwas, das wir nicht kennen, das auch von ihm nicht näher zu bezeichnen ist und das uns also hier gar nichts helfen kann. -
Franz Kafka's
Kafka and the Universal Interdisciplinary German Cultural Studies Edited by Irene Kacandes Volume 21 Kafka and the Universal Edited by Arthur Cools and Vivian Liska An electronic version of this book is freely available, thanks to the support of libra- ries working with Knowledge Unlatched. KU is a collaborative initiative designed to make high quality books Open Access. More information about the initiative can be found at www.knowledgeunlatched.org This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License. For details go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. ISBN 978-3-11-045532-8 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-045811-4 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-045743-8 ISSN 1861-8030 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2016 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover image: Franz Kafka, 1917. © akg-images / Archiv K. Wagenbach Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck ♾ Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com Table of Contents Arthur Cools and Vivian Liska Kafka and the Universal: Introduction 1 Section 1: The Ambiguity of the Singular Stanley Corngold The Singular Accident in a Universe of Risk: An Approach to Kafka and the Paradox of the Universal 13 Brendan Moran Philosophy and Ambiguity in Benjamin’s Kafka 43 Søren Rosendal The Logic of the “Swamp World”: Hegel with Kafka on the Contradiction of Freedom 66 Arnaud Villani The Necessary Revision of the Concept of the Universal: Kafka’s “Singularity” 90 Section 2: Before the Law Eli Schonfeld Am-ha’aretz: The Law of the Singular.