Kafka, Franz (Franz Kafka). Works, biography, photo

Franz Kafka, whose works are known throughout the world, was a German-speaking author of Jewish origin. Strangely enough, the writer, who is now known throughout the world, during his lifetime did not enjoy popularity and published only a few short stories. Kafka ordered all of his literary legacies to be burned, but his friend Max Brod disobeyed, and only thanks to this world was it possible to find out who such a mysterious writer was and to get acquainted with his works.

Childhood writer

Kafka Franz is a famous German writer of Jewish origin. He was born on July 3, 1883 in one of Prague's ghetto, which at that time was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The writer's father, Herman Kafka, was a Czech-speaking Jew, worked as a salesman in a haberdashery, and his mother, Julia Kafka, spoke more German, as did Franz, who nevertheless knew Czech and French well. In the family, besides him, there were several more children. The two younger brothers of the future writer died in childhood, but he still has three sisters. Little Franz went to school until 1893, and then moved to the gymnasium, which he graduated in 1901, after receiving a certificate of maturity.

Mature years

After graduating from Prague University, Kafka received his doctorate in law. After that, he worked in the insurance department as a simple official. In 1922, Kafka prematurely retired due to illness. However, during his service in public office Kafka remained faithful to his main occupation - literature, which he devoted a lot of time. Due to prolonged tuberculosis, which began after a pulmonary hemorrhage, the writer died on June 3, 1924. Kafka, before his death, asked his friend to burn all the unpublished manuscripts, but he did not listen to it and therefore many of the works of the talented author were published posthumously.

Inner world of Kafka

It is always difficult to talk about a person's feelings, especially if he leads a closed life. Nevertheless, the life of a famous German writer of Jewish origin, there are documented evidence relating not only to his biography, but also his views on life. What was Franz Kafka really like? "Letter to Father", one of the works of the writer, is, for example, an excellent reflection of the author's relationship with his father and a number of childhood memories.

Health

In many ways, the writer's life was influenced by his state of health, with which he constantly had problems. A controversial question is whether his problems were of a psychosomatic nature, but the fact that the diseases plagued the author is undoubtedly. Vegetarian diet and regular gymnastics - that's how he tried to cope with his state of Kafka. Franz used a lot of unpasteurized cow's milk, which could cause chronic tuberculosis.

Personal life

It is believed that Kafka's insolvency on the love front is to some extent due to his relationship with the despotic father, because of which he never managed to become a family man. Nevertheless, in the life of the writer there were women. From 1912 to 1917 he was in a romantic relationship with Felicia Bauer, who lived in Berlin. During this period, they were twice engaged, but both times this did not lead to anything. Kafka and Felicia mainly communicated through correspondence, as a result of which the writer's imagination had a misconception about the girl, which did not correspond to reality. From the surviving correspondence it is clear that they were different people who could not find a common language. After that, Kafka was in a relationship with Julia Vohrycek, but this engagement was soon canceled too. In the early 20-ies the writer began an affair with a journalist and translator of his novels - Milena Esenskaya - who was also married. In 1923, Kafka, along with his muse, Dora Dimant, went to Berlin for several months to retire from the family and devote himself entirely to literature.

Death

After visiting Berlin Kafka again returned to Prague. Gradually, his tuberculosis progressed more and more, giving the writer new problems. This eventually led to the death of Franz in one of the sanatoria near Vienna, which was probably caused by depletion. Constant pains in the throat did not allow him to eat, and at that time intravenous therapy was at the initial stages of development and could not compensate for nutrition by artificial means. The body of the great German author was transported to Prague, where he was buried in the New Jewish Cemetery.

Franz Kafka. Creation

The fate of the works of this writer is very unusual. When Kafka lived, his talent remained unrecognized, and in the press appeared only a few of his short stories, which were not marked by special success. The author became popular after his death and only because his close friend Max Brod disobeyed his will and published novels that Kafka wanted to burn so that no one would ever read them. Otherwise, the world would not know who Kafka is. The novels published by Brod soon began to attract world attention. All published works of the author, except for some letters to Milena Esenskaya, were written in German. To date, they have already been translated into many languages and are known throughout the world.

The story "Transformation"

Franz Kafka in this work fully in his inherent depressive, oppressive manner reflected his views on human relationships. The main hero of the story is Gregor Zamza, a man who once wakes up in the morning, realizes that he has turned into a hideous giant insect. Typical for the author are the circumstances of the transformation. Kafka does not indicate the reasons, does not talk about the events that happened before, the protagonist simply faces the fact that he is now an insect. Surrounding Gregor Zamzy perceive his new look critically. The father closes it in the room, and the sister, who at first is rather warm to him compared to others, periodically comes to feed him. Despite his external changes, Gregor remains the same person, his consciousness and his feelings do not change.

Since he was the breadwinner of the family and virtually all relatives depended on Gregor, who turned out to be disabled after his transformation, the family decided to take lodgers. The new tenants of the house behave shamelessly, and the relatives of the main hero are increasingly critical of him, because now he can not contain them. The sister starts to go less often and less often and gradually the family forgets about the insect, which was once their relative. The story ends with the death of the protagonist, who in fact did not cause his family members practically no emotions. To further emphasize the indifference of the people around him, at the end of the work the author describes how relatives of Gregor Zamza walk carelessly.

Analysis

The manner of writing familiar to the writer was fully reflected in the story "Transformation". Franz Kafka plays the role of solely the narrator, he does not seek to reflect his attitude to the events described. In fact, the story is a dry description of events. Characteristic for the style of the writer is also the main character, who faces an unjust, sometimes absurd fate. This is the drama of a person who is confronted with events with which he is not able to fight. Despite the fantastic nature of the plot, there are also quite realistic details in the story that actually turn the work into a grotesque.

The novel "The Process"

Like many other remarkable works of the author, this work was published after the death of the writer. This is a novel for Kafka, in which not only elements of absurdity, but also fantasy with realism are reflected. Harmoniously intertwining, all this generates a philosophical story, which became a reflection of the author's creative search.

It is not exactly known what principle guided the writer, creating the "Process", but the manuscript was not formed into a full-fledged work, it consisted of a number of disparate chapters. Later they were arranged according to the chronology of events, and in this form the world saw the work that Kafka created.

The "process" narrates about the life of a man named Josef K., who works as a simple employee in a bank. One morning he was arrested by unknown people, without indicating the reason. For a long time he is being watched, but no one takes measures to detain him.

The most surprising thing here is that Josef K. has no idea what he is suspected of, and what he is accused of, since he was not presented with anything. During the whole work, he is forced to try to understand the reason for the arrest. However, he does not succeed even when the accused is sentenced to death and immediately killed with a blow to the heart, "like a dog." The main character, lonely in his struggle, can not achieve the truth.

"Castle"

This is another novel of the writer with a lot of plot elements of absurdity, which Franz Kafka very often used. "Castle" is a work that tells about the life of a certain K. who came to the Village to work as a surveyor. Arriving, he learns that everything here is managed by the Castle, and to get to work or at least get there, he must get permission.

K. tries to get permission in all possible ways, but he can not do anything. As a result, it turns out that the Village does not need a surveyor, and K. offer the post of watchman. The protagonist agrees, because he has no choice. The novel breaks off at the visit of the driver. According to the writer's plan, K. should have stayed here forever, and before his death he would have received a message that his residence in the Village was illegal, but now the Castle allows him to live and work here. But he told his friend that he was stopping work on the novel and did not intend to return to it.

Other works

In addition to the above works, the author also has a lot of less popular ones. For example, there are several collections of short stories, from which Franz Kafka began. "Letters to Milena" is one of the examples of the writer's epistolary lyrics. This collection, which contains letters addressed to one of his beloved - Milena Esinskaya, who was originally just a translator of his works in the Czech language. As a result, a novel by correspondence began between the writer and Milena, which strongly influenced Kafka, but made him even more unhappy than he was before him, after it turned out that their characters were incompatible.

This is not the only collection authored by Kafka. Franz during his life published only his stories, which did not bring him such popularity as novels, recognized posthumously, but they are not less remarkable and valuable from a literary point of view. Therefore, they should also be mentioned. What else did Franz Kafka create? "Labyrinth" is a collection of short stories, which includes a work of the same name and a number of others, the most famous of which is "Studies of one dog."

Style

Absurdity and realism, reality and fantasy ... It would seem that these are all incompatible concepts, but the author can organically bind elements of different styles and genres. Master of the word, a genius who was not recognized in life, and after death became popular all over the world - all this is Kafka. Franz became a symbol of the era, the voice of mankind, preaching loneliness.

Conclusion

His characters are similar: they are faced with problems that can not be solved, and are one on one with destiny.

Tragedy and comicness take the form of grotesque in the fantastic stories of Kafka. He does not want to show a hero or an outstanding person, the writer tells of a person's fear of something higher, to the outside world, which depends only on the circumstances. The main characters of Kafka are people who found themselves in difficult life circumstances, who do not depend on them and can hardly be solved. All this creates their uncertainty, loneliness and fear - all that constantly surrounds people, driving into a state of anxiety.