Abstract
This chapter examines Kafka’s last major novel, The Castle. I contend that the relationship between K. and Klamm represents the split in the posttraumatic individual in the postmodern age. This is a condition in which the self is split and human beings find themselves in an impossible inner struggle toward a single goal—destruction of the self—because they are unable to tolerate their own presence in the world.
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Notes
- 1.
Kafka apparently began writing The Castle in January 1922, in a second wave of creativity (the first was in 1914) at a snowy vacation resort. Kafka admits that he was in a condition that was nothing less than a world war: a sense of impossible persecution with increasing self-accusations, in an extremely precarious emotional and physical state, a sense of threat that became more and more substantial from day to day. He continued writing the novel at the home of his favorite sister Ottla in the village of Planá, where he apparently wrote the last nine chapters of the novel. During that period he had at least four serious nervous breakdowns. In March of 1922 he read the first chapter to Max Brod. Evidently he continued writing the book through August of 1922. According to Brod, the novel was meant to end with K.’s death. Immediately after that an emissary from the castle would arrive to give the message to K. that he could remain in the village.
- 2.
In the case of Kafka, it is impossible to separate his autobiographical writing from his literary writing, “for it is through writing that I keep a hold on life” (Kafka 1974, p. 138), and he further adds: “I have no literary interests, but am made of literature, I am nothing else, and cannot be anything else” (p. 304).
- 3.
This is a recurring motif in Kafka’s writing: “What is it that makes you all behave as though you were real? Are you trying to make me believe I’m unreal?” (Kafka 1971b, p. 61).
- 4.
We can understand this from K.’s dialogue with Pepi, the chambermaid who replaced Frieda for four days while she went to live with K.
Bibliography
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Ataria, Y. (2017). K.’s Fatalistic World. In: The Structural Trauma of Western Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53228-8_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53228-8_7
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