Content blog: #7

Explain how Kafka's writing contributes to your understanding of the Empire.


Kafka's writing perfectly embodies the frustration many people had with the Empire as well as pointing out everything that was wrong with the Empire in short stories dripping with satire. Kafka actually worked closely within the Empire, nicknaming himself a double agent, working for Bureaucrats by day and an oppressed German-Jew-Writer by night. Kafka's works, such as The Castle and The Trial, were a way for him to express him frustration with the Empire in a city where he felt constantly oppressed, saying that his writing was his 'terrain for liberation'. However, Kafka realizing that even the literary machine was influenced by the Empire, he begged his closest friend to not publish his works after his death and burned most of his works after he finished them during his life. Kafka contributes to my understanding of Empire because he describes the flaws of the Empire from both a commoners perspective, but also as someone who worked within the Empire. Kafka shows the difficulty of trying to get anything done in the Empire through The Castle, and shows how everyone is seemingly on trial by the Empire through The Trial. Kafka is also the perfect example of how people turned to the Gothic in response to Empire.