Project: Patient Kafka
A study in the history of medicine by Harald Salfellner
Given the flood of interpretations that has persisted worldwide for decades (“Kafka and Never Ending”) – a trend that has spared not even the most exotic topics – it is quite astonishing that Kafka’s life and work have so far been scarcely researched, interpreted or appreciated by historians of medicine. The focus here is not on the literary demigod, but on the suffering, mortal human being. This FKI project on the health and medical aspects of Kafka’s life also examines the numerous facets of medical practice in the decades around 1900. In addition to the doctors in his life, the patient’s history is of particular interest, as it speaks to us through 3,400 printed pages of diaries, 1,500 letters and several thousand publications of explanatory literature. The biographical references to Kafka, arguably one of the most extensively and best-documented figures of the early 20th century, promise deep insights into the everyday history of medicine of that era, ranging from the sanatorium movement and naturopathy to the then-emerging field of psychoanalysis. A field that has so far been insufficiently researched is the biographical study of the doctors with whom Kafka came into contact, from Siegmund Kohn and Ernst Fröhlich to Friedl Pick.
A treatment room at the Clinic for Laryngeal and Nasal Diseases, which opened in 1911 at Lazarettgasse 14 in Vienna’s 9th district. Described by its founder, Ottokar von Chiari, as “the most beautiful and largest laryngological clinic in the world”, it was taken over in 1919 by Professor Markus Hajek, who also treated Franz Kafka there in 1924.
A treatment room at the Clinic for Laryngeal and Nasal Diseases, which opened in 1911 at Lazarettgasse 14 in Vienna’s 9th district. Described by its founder, Ottokar von Chiari, as “the most beautiful and largest laryngological clinic in the world”, it was taken over in 1919 by Professor Markus Hajek, who also treated Franz Kafka there in 1924.
A photograph of a treatment room at the Clinic for Laryngeal and Nasal Diseases, which opened in 1911 at Lazarettgasse 14 in Vienna’s 9th district. This clinic, described by its founder Ottokar von Chiari as “the most beautiful and largest laryngological clinic in the world”, was taken over by Professor Markus Hajek in 1919. Franz Kafka was admitted to this clinic as an in-patient in April 1924. Professor Hajek's therapeutic measures included, amongst other things, menthol injections into the larynx.
