12/4/2023 0 Comments Kafka writerHe studied Hebrew while living in Berlin, hiring a friend of Brod’s from Palestine to tutor him and attending Rabbi Julius Grünthal’s and Rabbi Julius Guttmann’s classes in the Berlin Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums (College for the Study of Judaism). The ideas of “father” and “family” permeate the fabric of many of Kafka’s texts, either directly as in Das Urteil or Die Verwandlung or more abstractly as in the cases of his two novels The Trial and The Castle (which remained unpublished during his lifetime). See his Brief and den Vater to get a feel for the relationship between the thin, intellectual, and awkward Franz, and the robust, loud, and military corporal father. Kafka’s relationship to his father dominates all discussions of both his life and his work. His first published work came in 1907, and he continued to publish throughout the next seventeen years, but most of his works were published posthumously by Max Brod. He is known to have started writing at an early age, but all of his earliest attempts were later destroyed. In 1918, the Worker’s Accident Insurance Institute put Kafka on a pension due to his illness, for which there was no cure at the time, and he spent most of the rest of his life in sanatoriums.Īlthough he spoke and wrote Czech fluently throughout his life, his literary work was all completed in German. He later attempted to join the military but was prevented from doing so by medical problems associated with tuberculosis, with which he was diagnosed in 1917. In his adolescent years, Kafka declared himself an atheist.Īround 1915, Kafka received his draft notice for military service in World War I, but his employers at the insurance institute arranged for a deferment because his work was considered essential government service. What have I in common with Jews? I have hardly anything in common with myself and should stand very quietly in a corner, content that I can breathe. On January 8, 1914, he wrote in his diary: Yet he was at times alienated from Judaism and Jewish life. His diary is full of references to Yiddish writers. He was deeply fascinated by the Jews of Eastern Europe, who he thought possessed an intensity of spiritual life that was absent from Jews in the West. His diaries contain continuing accounts of his restlessness and sleeplessness, as he would work all night writing, only to return to the office for the next day of work, thoroughly exhausted.Īfter seeing a Yiddish theatre troupe perform in October 1911, Kafka “immersed himself in Yiddish language and in Yiddish literature.” This interest also served as a starting point for his growing exploration of Judaism. Kafka’s job at the Worker’s Accident Insurance provided him with a steady income and “regular” office hours, so that he could dedicate his evenings to writing. He initially gained employment at a private insurance firm Assicurazioni Generali and then with the Arbeiter-Unfall-Versicherungs-Anstalt für das Königreichs Böhmen in Prague. He finished his Doctor of Law degree in Prague, studying at the German language University ( Die deutsche Universität) there. At the end of his first year of studies, Kafka met Max Brod, a fellow law student who became a close friend for life. Kafka studied law at the Deutsche Karl-Ferdinands-Universität of Prague starting in 1901. The official ruling language of the empire was German, so Franz attended German grammar school ( Volksschule am Fleischmarkt), and later the German Gymnasium ( Altstädter Deutsches Gymnasium). His father was a self-made middle class Jewish merchant, who raised his children in the hope of assimilating them into the mainstream society of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The oldest, he had three surviving younger sisters. Franz Kafka was born in Prague on July 3, 1883, the son of Hermann and Julie Kafka.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |