Details

Subject(s)

• Authors, Austrian—20th century—Biography [Browse]
• Jewish authors—Austria—Biography [Browse]
• Kafka, Franz 1883-1924 [Browse]

Series

Jewish lives. [More in this series]

Summary note

Franz Kafka was the poet of his own disorder. Throughout his life he struggled with a pervasive sense of shame and guilt that left traces in his daily existence-in his many letters, in his extensive diaries, and especially in his fiction. This stimulating book investigates some of the sources of Kafka's personal anguish and its complex reflections in his imaginary world. In his query, Saul Friedländer probes major aspects of Kafka's life (family, Judaism, love and sex, writing, illness, and despair) that until now have been skewed by posthumous censorship. Contrary to Kafka's dying request that all his papers be burned, Max Brod, Kafka's closest friend and literary executor, edited and published the author's novels and other works soon after his death in 1924. Friedländer shows that, when reinserted in Kafka's letters and diaries, deleted segments lift the mask of "sainthood" frequently attached to the writer and thus restore previously hidden aspects of his individuality.

Notes

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Bibliographic references

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Language note

English

Contents

• Front matter
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1. The Son
• 2. "The Dark Complexity of Judaism"
• 3. Love, Sex, and Fantasies
• 4. Night Journey
• 5. The Writer and His Worlds
• 6. An Ultimate Quest for Meaning?
• Notes
• Index of Names

Show 9 more Contents items

ISBN

• 1-299-46401-7
• 0-300-19515-X

OCLC

841495441

Doi

• 10.12987/9780300195156

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