Castle - World Literature Classics Collection (Complete Translation)

Author: Franz Kafka (Austria)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-04-01
Features: Presented to the readers is such a "strange book": it has only a beginning, no end, filled with descriptions that are bewildering, melancholic, and even somewhat bitter; as if you are imprisoned in a dark and desolate castle, you find yourself puzzling, suffocating, annoyed, struggling, and once you step out of this castle into the bright blue sky, you instantly feel relieved, with an indescribable sense of comfort throughout your body, but at the same time, you cannot help but fall into deep contemplation. The author of this "strange book," namely Franz Kafka, the pioneer of Western modernist literature and an Austrian writer. This is Kafka's most distinctive and important long novel: Surveyor K is assigned to take up a position at a castle, only to be blocked outside the castle gates. Thus, the protagonist K engages in a protracted and tedious seesaw battle with the castle authorities over whether to enter the castle. The castle is located on a small hill right before the eyes, yet it is out of reach; it is so cold, solemn, and majestic, like a giant beast overlooking K; it represents a vast bureaucratic organization, where hierarchies are strict, countless departments and officials exist, yet countless documents are piled up, left unattended for years, never processed. As for this powerful castle, K is helpless, and until the very end, he never enters the castle or meets its authorities. The novel is shrouded in a mysterious, nightmarish atmosphere from beginning to end; it is profound and leaves the reader pondering endlessly.