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The Complete Stories Of Franz Kafka
''The Complete Stories of Franz Kafka'' is a compilation of all of Franz Kafka, Kafka's short stories. With the exception of three novels (''The Trial'', ''The Castle (novel), The Castle'' and ''Amerika (Kafka novel), Amerika''), this collection includes all of his narrative work. The book was originally edited by Nahum Norbert Glatzer, Nahum N. Glatzer and published by Schocken Books in 1971. It was reprinted in 1995 with an introduction by John Updike. The collection includes all the works published during Kafka's lifetime, with the exception of ''The Stoker'' which is usually incorporated as the first chapter of his unfinished novel ''Amerika''. Some of the stories included in the book are fragmented or in various states of incompletion. Most of the stories are translated by Willa Muir, Willa and Edwin Muir, with occasional translations by James Stern (writer), Tania and James Stern. Several fables, parables and philosophical pieces are not included in this collection, as they ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edwin Muir
Edwin Muir CBE (15 May 1887 – 3 January 1959) was a Scottish poet, novelist and translator. Born on a farm in Deerness, a parish of Orkney, Scotland, he is remembered for his deeply felt and vivid poetry written in plain language and with few stylistic preoccupations. Biography Muir was born at the farm of Folly in Deerness, the same parish in which his mother was born. The family then moved to the Wyre, Orkney, island of Wyre, followed by a return to the Mainland, Orkney. In 1901, when he was 14, his father lost his farm, and the family moved to Glasgow. In his autobiography he wrote, "I'm an Orcadians, Orkneyman, a good Scandinavian". His parents and two brothers died within a few years. As a young man he worked in unpleasant jobs in factories and offices, including working in a factory that turned bones into charcoal. "He suffered psychologically in a most destructive way, although perhaps the poet of later years benefitted from these experiences as much as from his Or ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Description Of A Struggle
"Description of a Struggle" () is a short story by Franz Kafka. It contains the dialogues "Conversation with the Supplicant" ("Gespräch mit dem Beter") and "Conversation with the Drunk" ("Gespräch mit dem Betrunkenen"). Origins "Description of a Struggle" is one of Kafka's earliest stories that was not destroyed and is usually the earliest included in collections of his work. (His oldest surviving work of fiction is " Shamefaced Lanky and Impure in Heart", which he wrote a few years earlier and which only survived because it was included in a letter to his friend Oskar Pollak.) Kafka began the story in 1904 at the age of 20 and worked on it on and off until 1909. It is also notable for being the story that Kafka first showed to his friend Max Brod and which convinced Brod that Kafka should further pursue his writing. Brod liked the story so much that he mentioned Kafka as an example of "the high level reached by oday'sGerman literature" in a theatre review of his, this before ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Hunger Artist
"A Hunger Artist" (German: "Ein Hungerkünstler") is a short story by Franz Kafka first published in ''Neue Rundschau, Die neue Rundschau'' in 1922. The story was also included in the collection ''A Hunger Artist (collection), A Hunger Artist'' (''Ein Hungerkünstler''), the last book Kafka prepared for publication, which was printed by ''Verlag Die Schmiede'' shortly after his death. The protagonist, a hunger artist who experiences the decline in appreciation of his craft, is typically Kafkaesque: an individual marginalized and victimized by society at large. "A Hunger Artist" explores themes such as death, art, isolation, asceticism, spiritual poverty, futility, personal failure and the corruption of human relationships. The title of the story has also been translated as "A Fasting Artist" and "A Starvation Artist". Plot "A Hunger Artist" is told retrospectively through third-person narration. The narrator looks back several decades from "today" to a time when the public marv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Refusal
"The Refusal" (German: "Die Abweisung"), also known as "Unser Städtchen liegt …", is a short story by Franz Kafka. Written in the autumn of 1920, it was not published in Kafka's lifetime. Overview The story of "Die Abweisung" involves the narration of a young boy living in a small town that is fairly distanced from its capital. The boy reflects on how the town's inhabitants humbly submit to orders issued by the capital and are led by the tax-collector, a man with the rank of colonel. The boy goes into great detail describing the soldiers that uphold the tax-collectors law, and how they appear inhuman to the public and seem unable to speak their language. In times of crisis, the town always appeals to the colonel for government aid, and if it is anything serious, it is always refused. The final paragraph describes the narrator's observation that it is due to this situation that '...young people roughly between seventeen and twenty,' begin to feel discontent and find revolutionar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Report To An Academy
"A Report to an Academy" (German: "Ein Bericht für eine Akademie") is a short story by Franz Kafka, written and published in 1917. In the story, an ape named Red Peter, who has learned to behave like a human, presents to an academy the story of how he effected his transformation. The story was first published by Martin Buber in the German monthly '' Der Jude'', along with another of Kafka's stories, " Jackals and Arabs" ("Schakale und Araber"). The story appeared again in a 1919 collection titled '' Ein Landarzt'' (''A Country Doctor''). Plot The narrator, speaking before a scientific conference, describes his former life as an ape. His story begins in a West African jungle, in which a hunting expedition shoots and captures him. Caged on a ship for his voyage to Europe, he finds himself for the first time without the freedom to move as he will. Needing to escape from this situation, he studies the habits of the crew, and imitates them with surprising ease; he reports encountering p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Great Wall Of China (Kafka)
"The Great Wall of China" (German: "Beim Bau der Chinesischen Mauer", literally "At the Construction of the Great Wall of China") is a short story by Franz Kafka. While written in 1917, it was not published until 1930, seven years after his death. Its first publication occurred in '' Der Morgen'', a German literary magazine. A year later, Max Brod included it in ''Beim Bau der Chinesischen Mauer'', the first posthumous collection of short stories by Franz Kafka. Contained within the story is a parable that was separately published as "A Message from the Emperor" ("Eine kaiserliche Botschaft") in 1919 in the collection '' Ein Landarzt'' (''A Country Doctor''). Some sub-themes of the story include why the wall was built piecemeal (in small sections in many different places), the relationship of the Chinese with the past and the present and the emperor's imperceptible presence. The story is told in the first person by an older man from a southern province. The first English translat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Hunter Gracchus
"The Hunter Gracchus" (German: "Der Jäger Gracchus") is a short story by Franz Kafka. The story presents a boat carrying the long-dead Hunter Gracchus as it arrives at a port. The mayor of Riva meets Gracchus, who gives him an account of his death while hunting, and explains that he is destined to wander aimlessly and eternally over the seas. An additional fragment presents an extended dialogue between Gracchus and an unnamed interviewer, presumably the same mayor. Written in the first half of 1917, the story was published posthumously in ''Beim Bau der Chinesischen Mauer'' (Berlin, 1931). The first English translation, by Willa and Edwin Muir, was published by Martin Secker in London in 1933. It also appeared in '' The Great Wall of China. Stories and Reflections'' (New York: Schocken Books, 1946). The story and the fragment both appear in '' The Complete Stories''. In a diary entry for April 6, 1917, Kafka describes a strange boat standing at port, which he is told belongs to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Country Doctor (short Story)
"A Country Doctor" (German: "Ein Landarzt") is a short story written in 1917 by Franz Kafka. It was first published in the collection of short stories of the same title. In the story, a country doctor makes an emergency visit to a sick patient on a winter night. The doctor faces absurd, surreal predicaments that pull him along and finally doom him. Plot The plot follows a country doctor's hapless struggle to attend a sick young boy on a snowy winter's night. A series of surreal events occurs in the process, including the appearance of a mysterious groom (stablehand) in a pig shed. It begins with the doctor having to urgently attend a sick patient in a village ten miles away, but his only horse died the night before, so his maid Rosa goes off to find another. She returns empty-handed — "Of course, who is now going to lend her his horse for such a journey?" — and the doctor expresses his frustration by kicking the door of what he thinks is his empty pig shed. A mysterious ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Warden Of The Tomb
''The Warden of the Tomb'' (''Der Gruftwächter'') is an expressionist play by Franz Kafka. Written in the winter of 1916–1917, it was published for the first time in ''Description of a Struggle''. Characters Speaking roles: The Prince Leo, The Chamberlain, The Servant, The Warden, The Steward, The Princess Non-speaking roles: The Duke Friedrich, The Countess Isabella, The granddaughter. Plot summary The story could be said to start ''in medias res A narrative work beginning ''in medias res'' (, "into the middle of things") opens in the chronological middle of the plot, rather than at the beginning (cf. '' ab ovo'', '' ab initio''). Often, exposition is initially bypassed, instead filled i ...'', that is, in the middle of an action. Apparently there has been a conversation between the Prince and the Chamberlain, who does not agree to the Prince's proposal. We soon learn that the Prince wants to place a guard in the tomb of his ancestors, this in addition to the warden in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Village Schoolmaster (The Giant Mole)
"The Village Schoolmaster" or "The Giant Mole" ("Der Dorfschullehrer" or "Der Riesenmaulwurf") is an unfinished short story by Franz Kafka. The story, written in December 1914 and the beginning of 1915, was not published in Kafka's lifetime. It first appeared in ''Beim Bau der Chinesischen Mauer'' (Berlin, 1931). The first English translation by Willa and Edwin Muir was published by Martin Secker in London in 1933. It appeared in '' The Great Wall of China. Stories and Reflections'' (New York: Schocken Books, 1946). "The Village Schoolmaster" was also translated by Malcolm Pasley and published by Martin Secker & Warburg in 1973 and by Penguin Books in 1991. Plot introduction The narrator discusses the phenomenon of a giant mole in a far village, and the attempt of the village schoolmaster to bring its existence to the public attention, only to become an object of derision to the scientific community. Without knowing the schoolmaster, the narrator tries to defend him and his honest ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
In The Penal Colony
"In the Penal Colony" ("") (also translated as "In the Penal Settlement") is a short story by Franz Kafka written in German in October 1914, revised in November 1918, and first published in October 1919. As in some of Kafka's other writings, the narrator in this story seems detached from, or perhaps numbed by, events that one would normally expect to be registered with horror. Internal clues and the setting on an island suggest Octave Mirbeau's '' The Torture Garden'' as an influence. The story is set in an unnamed penal colony and describes the last use of an elaborate torture and execution device that carves the commandment that the condemned prisoner has transgressed on his skin as he slowly dies over the course of twelve hours. As the plot unfolds, the reader learns more and more about the machine, including its origin and original justification. Plot outline Characters There are only four characters, each named according to his role in the story. The Condemned is a man sched ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
