What do you think?
Rate this book
Franz Kafka: The Collection
Content : Unhappiness The Judgment Before the Law The Metamorphosis A Report to an Academy Jackals and Arabs A Country Doctor In the Penal Colony A Hunger Artist The Trial The Castle Amerika A Little Fable The Great Wall of China The Hunter Gracchus The Burrow
- GenresClassics
982 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 1, 2018
53 people are currently reading
45 people want to read
About the author
Franz Kafka
3,316 books38.2k followersPrague-born writer Franz Kafka wrote in German, and his stories, such as "
The Metamorphosis
" (1916), and posthumously published novels, including
The Trial
(1925), concern troubled individuals in a nightmarishly impersonal world.
Jewish middle-class family of this major fiction writer of the 20th century spoke German. People consider his unique body of much incomplete writing, mainly published posthumously, among the most influential in European literature.
His stories include "The Metamorphosis" (1912) and " In the Penal Colony " (1914), whereas his posthumous novels include The Trial (1925), The Castle (1926) and Amerika (1927).
Despite first language, Kafka also spoke fluent Czech. Later, Kafka acquired some knowledge of the French language and culture from Flaubert, one of his favorite authors.
Kafka first studied chemistry at the Charles-Ferdinand University of Prague but after two weeks switched to law. This study offered a range of career possibilities, which pleased his father, and required a longer course of study that gave Kafka time to take classes in German studies and art history. At the university, he joined a student club, named Lese- und Redehalle der Deutschen Studenten, which organized literary events, readings, and other activities. In the end of his first year of studies, he met Max Brod, a close friend of his throughout his life, together with the journalist Felix Weltsch, who also studied law. Kafka obtained the degree of doctor of law on 18 June 1906 and performed an obligatory year of unpaid service as law clerk for the civil and criminal courts.
Writing of Kafka attracted little attention before his death. During his lifetime, he published only a few short stories and never finished any of his novels except the very short "The Metamorphosis." Kafka wrote to Max Brod, his friend and literary executor: "Dearest Max, my last request: Everything I leave behind me ... in the way of diaries, manuscripts, letters (my own and others'), sketches, and so on, [is] to be burned unread." Brod told Kafka that he intended not to honor these wishes, but Kafka, so knowing, nevertheless consequently gave these directions specifically to Brod, who, so reasoning, overrode these wishes. Brod in fact oversaw the publication of most of work of Kafka in his possession; these works quickly began to attract attention and high critical regard.
Max Brod encountered significant difficulty in compiling notebooks of Kafka into any chronological order as Kafka started writing in the middle of notebooks, from the last towards the first, et cetera.
Kafka wrote all his published works in German except several letters in Czech to Milena Jesenská.
Jewish middle-class family of this major fiction writer of the 20th century spoke German. People consider his unique body of much incomplete writing, mainly published posthumously, among the most influential in European literature.
His stories include "The Metamorphosis" (1912) and " In the Penal Colony " (1914), whereas his posthumous novels include The Trial (1925), The Castle (1926) and Amerika (1927).
Despite first language, Kafka also spoke fluent Czech. Later, Kafka acquired some knowledge of the French language and culture from Flaubert, one of his favorite authors.
Kafka first studied chemistry at the Charles-Ferdinand University of Prague but after two weeks switched to law. This study offered a range of career possibilities, which pleased his father, and required a longer course of study that gave Kafka time to take classes in German studies and art history. At the university, he joined a student club, named Lese- und Redehalle der Deutschen Studenten, which organized literary events, readings, and other activities. In the end of his first year of studies, he met Max Brod, a close friend of his throughout his life, together with the journalist Felix Weltsch, who also studied law. Kafka obtained the degree of doctor of law on 18 June 1906 and performed an obligatory year of unpaid service as law clerk for the civil and criminal courts.
Writing of Kafka attracted little attention before his death. During his lifetime, he published only a few short stories and never finished any of his novels except the very short "The Metamorphosis." Kafka wrote to Max Brod, his friend and literary executor: "Dearest Max, my last request: Everything I leave behind me ... in the way of diaries, manuscripts, letters (my own and others'), sketches, and so on, [is] to be burned unread." Brod told Kafka that he intended not to honor these wishes, but Kafka, so knowing, nevertheless consequently gave these directions specifically to Brod, who, so reasoning, overrode these wishes. Brod in fact oversaw the publication of most of work of Kafka in his possession; these works quickly began to attract attention and high critical regard.
Max Brod encountered significant difficulty in compiling notebooks of Kafka into any chronological order as Kafka started writing in the middle of notebooks, from the last towards the first, et cetera.
Kafka wrote all his published works in German except several letters in Czech to Milena Jesenská.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
February 19, 2021
This Kindle edition gets four stars for the rather lousy preparation for Kindle, particularly of The Castle and also of Amerika. It's hard to work out how some of the grammatical and typographical errors were accomplished. Surely some really devious algorithms were involved? The content itself is five star literature.
So, before the Coen brothers, there was Franz Kafka.
As a big Kafka fan since youth I've read all these stories before. Reading Kafka at an impressionable age can forever change how one sees the world. Getting a Kindle version of the 'greatest hits' seemed like a no-brainer. Of course the indisputable masterpieces are The Trial and Metamorphosis which are profound studies in the alienation of the Self within society, and arguably the first existentialist novel(la)s. The Trial also served to set the pattern for the modern welfare state in its more begrudging manifestations. The other two major novels, The Castle and Amerika are strange shaggy dog stories, neither properly completed, because after all where could they possibly end? No one is going to end up living happily ever after. The Castle is the story of the confident, maybe arrogant individual being ground down by impenetrable bureaucracy while Amerika is more the story of the irredeemably naïve individual trapped in a cycle of exploitation by just about everyone he encounters. As such it has echoes of Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. Both are subtle comedies with no outright laughter. Of the other short stories the most significant to my mind are In the Penal Colony and The Burrow. In the Penal Colony is another study in Kafka's obsession with human systems of law taken to absurdist conclusions. It is actually quietly harrowing reading and it is surprising that a horror movie has yet to be based on it, at least as far as I know. The Burrow is a delicious reflection on the mounting paranoia of the isolated individual against enemies that seem to be everywhere and nowhere. Part of what makes The Burrow so remarkable is that it exploits our capacity for anthropomorphisation it make a compelling story that is told from the first person perspective of someone who is both a small burrowing rodent and a philosophically reflective human being.
So, before the Coen brothers, there was Franz Kafka.
As a big Kafka fan since youth I've read all these stories before. Reading Kafka at an impressionable age can forever change how one sees the world. Getting a Kindle version of the 'greatest hits' seemed like a no-brainer. Of course the indisputable masterpieces are The Trial and Metamorphosis which are profound studies in the alienation of the Self within society, and arguably the first existentialist novel(la)s. The Trial also served to set the pattern for the modern welfare state in its more begrudging manifestations. The other two major novels, The Castle and Amerika are strange shaggy dog stories, neither properly completed, because after all where could they possibly end? No one is going to end up living happily ever after. The Castle is the story of the confident, maybe arrogant individual being ground down by impenetrable bureaucracy while Amerika is more the story of the irredeemably naïve individual trapped in a cycle of exploitation by just about everyone he encounters. As such it has echoes of Dostoyevsky's The Idiot. Both are subtle comedies with no outright laughter. Of the other short stories the most significant to my mind are In the Penal Colony and The Burrow. In the Penal Colony is another study in Kafka's obsession with human systems of law taken to absurdist conclusions. It is actually quietly harrowing reading and it is surprising that a horror movie has yet to be based on it, at least as far as I know. The Burrow is a delicious reflection on the mounting paranoia of the isolated individual against enemies that seem to be everywhere and nowhere. Part of what makes The Burrow so remarkable is that it exploits our capacity for anthropomorphisation it make a compelling story that is told from the first person perspective of someone who is both a small burrowing rodent and a philosophically reflective human being.
Displaying 1 of 1 review