Status Updates From El castillo

they deprived him of the chance of winning small, easy victories . . . and the well-justified confidence that he would then derive from them . . . Instead, the authorities allowed K. to go anywhere he liked, although only inside the village, thus indulging him but weakening his position, ruling out any possibility of a struggle, and leaving him living a non-official, unpredictable, troubled, and strange kind of life.

Mr Land Surveyor, I will give you a piece of information to take with you, for whatever you may say and what- ever insults you may offer me, poor old woman that I am, you are Frieda’s future husband. It’s only on that account that I tell you how shockingly ignorant you are of circumstances here, a person’s head fairly spins just listening to you, comparing what you say and think with the situation as it really is.

Bardzo ładny język, chyba rozumiem zamysł. Dawno nie musiałam tak dużo myslec przy czytaniu

She was in search of something and so was he, they tried to get at it almost angrily, ... their embraces and writhing bodies did not bring oblivion but reminded them of their duty to go on searching. Like dogs desperately scraping at the ground, they worked away at one another’s bodies, helplessly disappointed as they tried to retrieve the last of their bliss, sometimes licking each other’s faces with their tongues.

Out in the snow, K. breathed a sigh of relief. The pleasure of being out of doors was so great that it made the difficulty of the path tolerable this time, and if K. had been alone it would have been even better.

Przysięgam, że od godziny trwa jedna rozmowa i dalej nic z niej nie wynikło

There was something cheerful and easygoing in her demeanour which K. hadn’t noticed at all before, and now, improbably, it gained the upper hand as she suddenly bent down to K., smiling and saying: ‘Maybe he’s hidden down here.’ She quickly kissed him and then popped up again, saying regretfully: ‘No, he isn’t here.’