Kafka’s The Judgement
- 30. März
- 2 Min. Lesezeit
Kafka penned his key work The Judgement on a single, legendary September night in 1912 – “like a genuine birth, covered with mess and slime”. Kafka had dedicated The Judgement to Felice Bauer, and her initials match those of Frieda Brandenfeld, the fiancée in the story. The story of the young businessman George Bendemann was the first in a succession of completed works and the surety of style Kafka had now achieved would serve as his standard for all his subsequent texts. The story was published in the poetry yearbook Arkadia in 1913; three years later, it was published as a separate volume by Kurt Wolff in Leipzig.
The Johann-Gottfried-Herder Society hosted an author reading in the mirror room at the Hotel Archduke Stephen on 4 December 1912, directed by Willy Haas. First on the programme were poems by Franz Werfel and Otto Pick, followed by Max Brod and Oskar Baum giving tasters of their skill. Kafka, still barely known in literary circles, was to provide the grand finale. In a little less than half an hour, he read his story The Judgement.
Seine Sprache ist kristallklar, und an der Oberfläche merkt man gleichsam kein anderes Bestreben, als richtig, deutlich, dem Gegenstand angemessen zu sein. Und doch ziehen Träume, Visionen von unermeßlicher Tiefe unter dem heiteren Spiegel dieses reinen Sprachbaches. Man blickt hinein und ist gebannt von Schönheit und Eigenart.
Max Brod
The way the maid walked down the hall for the first time, as I wrote down the last sentence. [...] This is the only way anything can be written, only in such a context, with such complete opening up of body and soul.
Franz Kafka, Diary
