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The Mystical Life of Franz Kafka by June O. Leavitt Pdf
June O. Leavitt offers a fascinating examination of the mystical in Franz Kafka's life and writings, showing that Kafka's understanding of the occult was not only a product of his own clairvoyant experiences but of the age in which he lived.
DIV 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. /div
From the acclaimed author of The Jew in the Lotus comes an "engrossing and wonderful book" (The Washington Times) about the unexpected connections between Franz Kafka and Hasidic master Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav—and the significant role played by the imagination in the Jewish spiritual experience. Rodger Kamenetz has long been fascinated by the mystical tales of the Hasidic master Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav. And for many years he has taught a course in Prague on Franz Kafka. The more he thought about their lives and writings, the more aware he became of unexpected connections between them. Kafka was a secular artist fascinated by Jewish mysticism, and Rabbi Nachman was a religious mystic who used storytelling to reach out to secular Jews. Both men died close to age forty of tuberculosis. Both invented new forms of storytelling that explore the search for meaning in an illogical, unjust world. Both gained prominence with the posthumous publication of their writing. And both left strict instructions at the end of their lives that their unpublished books be burnt. Kamenetz takes his ideas on the road, traveling to Kafka’s birthplace in Prague and participating in the pilgrimage to Uman, the burial site of Rabbi Nachman visited by thousands of Jews every Jewish new year. He discusses the hallucinatory intensity of their visions and offers a rich analysis of Nachman’s and Kafka’s major works, revealing uncanny similarities in the inner lives of these two troubled and beloved figures, whose creative and religious struggles have much to teach us about the Jewish spiritual experience.
A comprehensive and interpretative biography of Franz Kafka that is both a monumental work of scholarship and a vivid, lively evocation of Kafka's world.
Out of the massive research for an authoritative 1,500-page biography emerges this wunderkammer of 99 delightfully odd facts about Kafka In the course of compiling his highly acclaimed three-volume biography of Kafka, while foraying to libraries and archives from Prague to Israel, Reiner Stach made one astounding discovery after another: unexpected photographs, inconsistencies in handwritten texts, excerpts from letters, and testimonies from Kafka’s contemporaries that shed surprising light on his personality and his writing. Is that Kafka? presents the crystal granules of the real Kafka: he couldn’t lie, but he tried to cheat on his high-school exams; bitten by the fitness fad, he avidly followed the regime of a Danish exercise guru; he drew beautifully; he loved beer; he read biographies voraciously; he made the most beautiful presents, especially for children; odd things made him cry or made him furious; he adored slapstick. Every discovery by Stach turns on its head the stereotypical version of the tortured neurotic—and as each one chips away at the monolithic dark Kafka, the keynote, of all things, becomes laughter. For Is that Kafka? Stach has assembled 99 of his most exciting discoveries, culling the choicest, most entertaining bits, and adding his knowledge-able commentaries. Illustrated with dozens of previously unknown images, this volume is a singular literary pleasure.
The aftermath of Franz Kafka’s love affair with Dora Diamant is legend: refusing to honor his instructions to destroy his work when he died, Diamant saved Kafka’s writings and letters that were in her possession. These were later taken by the Nazis and are still being sought today. Her importance for Kafka’s literary legacy makes their all-too-brief relationship even more intriguing. Set over the course of his last year, The Glory of Life is compelling fictional re-imagining of this fragile, tender romance. In July 1923, Kafka is convalescing by the Baltic Sea when he meets Diamant and they fall in love. He is forty years old and dying of tuberculosis; she is twenty-five and seems to him the essence of life. After a tentative first meeting, the indecisive Kafka moves with Diamant to Berlin, a city in the throes of political upheaval, rising anti-Semitism, and the turmoil of Weimar-era hyperinflation. As his tuberculosis advances, they are forced to leave the city for the Kierling Sanatorium near Vienna, a move that threatens the paradise they have created. The first of Kumpfmüller’s novels to appear in English after his acclaimed The Adventures of a Bed Salesman, The Glory of Life is a meticulously researched and poignant portrait of one of the most enduring authors in world literature. Beautifully crafted, this book is an evocative rumination on the power of love and friendship.
In The Penal Colony by Franz Kafka ("In der Strafkolonie") (also translated as "In the Penal Settlement") is a short story by Franz Kafka written in German in October 1914, revised in November 1918, and first published in October 1919. As in some of Kafka's other writings, the narrator in this story seems detached from, or perhaps numbed by, events that one would normally expect to be registered with horror. Internal clues and the setting on an island suggest Octave Mirbeau's The Torture Garden as an influence. Synopsis: The story focuses on the Traveler, who has just arrived in an island penal colony and is encountering its brutal execution machine for the first time. Everything about the functioning of the intricate machine and its purpose and history is told to him by the Officer. The Soldier and the Condemned, who is unaware that he has been sentenced to die for failing to get up and salute his superior's door each hour during his night watch, placidly watch from nearby. Under the judicial process associated with the machine, the accused is always assumed to be guilty and is not given a chance to defend himself. As punishment, the law the man has broken is inscribed progressively deeper on his body over a period of 12 hours as he slowly dies from his wounds. During their final six hours in the machine, the accused become still and appear to experience a religious epiphany. The machine was designed by the colony's previous Commandant, of whom the Officer is a devoted supporter. He carries its blueprints with him and is the only person who can decipher them, not allowing anyone else to handle them. Eventually, it becomes clear that the machine has fallen out of favor since the death of the previous Commandant and the appointment of a successor. The Officer is nostalgic regarding the torture device and the values that were initially associated with it, recalling the crowds that used to attend each execution. Now, he is the last outspoken proponent of the machine, but he strongly believes in its form of justice and the infallibility of the previous Commandant.
The Life and Times of Franz Kafka by Golgotha Press Pdf
The founder of Kafkaesque literature, Franz Kafka is one of the most influencial writers who ever lived. But who was he really? Find out here in this short biography.
Author : June O. Leavitt Publisher : University Press of America Page : 182 pages File Size : 51,6 Mb Release : 2007 Category : Language Arts & Disciplines ISBN : 076183673X
In this pioneering scholarly work on occult symbols in literature, the reader is offered a vivid look into how W.B. Yeats, T.S. Eliot, and Franz Kafka--three masters of symbolic expression--utilized Tarot cards in their poetry and prose. Focusing on the Tarot's ancient associations with divine knowledge, its pictorial representation of both the Jewish and Christian Cabala, and the Tarot's more recent pedestrian affiliation with the occult, June Leavitt skillfully demonstrates how Yeats, Eliot, and Kafka align themselves in their uniquely individual ways with the Tarot symbols' mapping of reality. Paying close attention to the mystical nuances of the Tarot, Ms. Leavitt shows how Tarot symbols allow for radically new readings of the texts in which they are situated, and play a transformative role in the three writers' search for God. This search remained indecisive for Kafka, resulted in Eliot's conversion to Anglo-Catholicism, and went hand in hand with Yeats' passion for pagan gods and angels. Visit the author's website at http: //www.spiritualityteaching.com.
In Stanley Corngold’s view, the themes and strategies of Kafka’s fiction are generated by a tension between his concern for writing and his growing sense of its arbitrary character. Analyzing Kafka’s work in light of "the necessity of form," which is also a merely formal necessity, Corngold uncovers the fundamental paradox of Kafka’s art and life. The first section of the book shows how Kafka’s rhetoric may be understood as the daring project of a man compelled to live his life as literature. In the central part of the book, Corngold reflects on the place of Kafka within the modern tradition, discussing such influential precursors of Cervantes, Flaubert, and Nietzsche, whose works display a comparable narrative disruption. Kafka’s distinctive narrative strategies, Corngold points out, demand interpretation at the same time they resist it. Critics of Kafka, he says, must be aware that their approaches are guided by the principles that Kafka’s fiction identifies, dramatizes, and rejects.
From George Fabian, the author of the transformative biography of Karl Marx, comes this story of Franz Kafka, the enigmatic star of the literary Pantheon. As he traverses this well-mapped territory, Fabian draws on new evidence and familiarity with Kafka's world centered on Prague to explore dark corners of this gentle writer's life, identify explosive impulses he grappled with, and trace their impact on his literary production. The core of the story conveys the background and real-life motivation behind such intriguing gems of modern literature as The Metamorphosis, The Trial, and The Castle. Also introduced is Kafka's secret love affair that spiced his major texts and may have not yet played itself out: The direct descendants of this affirmed bachelor may be living among us. Whether absorbed by Kafka's mystique or miffed by it, may you find this biography insightful and stimulating enough to visit his writings again.
Part of the Legend Classics series It's only because of their stupidity that they're able to be so sure of themselves. A novel of such ambiguity will inevitably lend itself to a diversity of interpretation, but in The Trial you can at least be sure to find every element of storytelling now defined as Kafkaesque. Josef K., our protagonist, is unexpectedly arrested on the morning of his thirtieth birthday. The agents who arrest him are unidentified, the agency they work for is unspecified, and the crime for which he has been accused is unknown. When he is released, shortly after, he is told to await further instruction. So begins the manic and emotionless trial of a man beholden to the whims of an unknown force, and his painstaking attempts to find a way out of this existential maze. The Trial brings into focus the absurdity of life, our universal fear of judgement, and one ultimate question: how much of this endless maze will you explore before you accept the fate life has bestowed upon you? The Legend Classics series: Around the World in Eighty Days The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn The Importance of Being Earnest Alice's Adventures in Wonderland The Metamorphosis The Railway Children The Hound of the Baskervilles Frankenstein Wuthering Heights Three Men in a Boat The Time Machine Little Women Anne of Green Gables The Jungle Book The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Stories Dracula A Study in Scarlet Leaves of Grass The Secret Garden The War of the Worlds A Christmas Carol Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde Heart of Darkness The Scarlet Letter This Side of Paradise Oliver Twist The Picture of Dorian Gray Treasure Island The Turn of the Screw The Adventures of Tom Sawyer Emma The Trial A Selection of Short Stories by Edgar Allan Poe Grimm Fairy Tales
In Old Worlds, New Mirrors Moshe Idel turns his gaze on figures as diverse as Walter Benjamin and Jacques Derrida, Franz Kafka and Franz Rosenzweig, Arnaldo Momigliano and Paul Celan, Abraham Heschel and George Steiner to reflect on their relationships to Judaism in a cosmopolitan, mostly European, context.
