The Trial: The Original 1925 Unabridged and Complete - Classic Illustrated Edition
This is a darkly humorous narrative that recounts a bank clerk's entrapment — based on an undisclosed charge — in a maze of nonsensical rules and bureaucratic roadblocks.
Written in 1914 and published posthumously in 1925, Kafka's engrossing parable about the human condition plunges an isolated individual into an impersonal, illogical system. Josef K.'s ordeals raise provocative, ever-relevant issues related to the role of government and the nature of justice.
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Community Reviews
A thorough indictment of legal bureaucracy run amok, and the inaccessibility of the courts to the average person, through the weird twilight-zone lens of Kafka.
A thorough indictment of legal bureaucracy run amok, and the inaccessibility of the courts to the average person, through the weird twilight-zone lens of Kafka.
This book is hard to rate or even review. First of all, we’re dealing with an unfinished work — full of fragments and uncertainties about what Kafka actually intended to do with it.
How can we even be sure that the ending is the ending? Now, I know, this story doesn't need an end, because it is a timeless topic and it's not its purpose to have an end. It only makes you hope that one day, maybe, the system will become fair.
As for the "story" itself :
For me, it felt a bit like Alice in Wonderland, except that here, K. (our “Alice”) quickly gives in to the absurd and lets himself drown in this surreal, dystopian, and nonsensical world.
It also reads almost like a manuscript for a play — and I’m quite sure that was intentional, meant to portray K.’s world as a vast tragicomedy, with every character exaggerated to the point of absurdity. There are a lot of references to the theater (the tenors, going to the theater with his uncle, being in the backstage of the procedural world, etc) that helps confirm my theory.
Going back to my Alice in Wonderland comparison, each person feels like one of those fantastical, unfathomable creatures from another realm, guiding (or misleading) K. through their strange domain.
Nobody felt real, no one because who is the system ? Does it need a face, a body...?
I would not go on and on about what the book is really about, other people did already, and surely better than I would, but being accused and the judged for just existing is something that a lot of people can relate to, and history shows us that we never learn our lessons.
As for the prose :
There are great, philosophical quotes here and there, you should keep in mind. If anything needs to live "rent free" in your head, please choose those phrases.
But one thing is certain: the prose is both heavy and childlike. I’m not sure whether that was intentional or not, but if anyone else had written this way, I’m pretty sure readers would have thrown the book at their face.
How can we even be sure that the ending is the ending? Now, I know, this story doesn't need an end, because it is a timeless topic and it's not its purpose to have an end. It only makes you hope that one day, maybe, the system will become fair.
As for the "story" itself :
For me, it felt a bit like Alice in Wonderland, except that here, K. (our “Alice”) quickly gives in to the absurd and lets himself drown in this surreal, dystopian, and nonsensical world.
It also reads almost like a manuscript for a play — and I’m quite sure that was intentional, meant to portray K.’s world as a vast tragicomedy, with every character exaggerated to the point of absurdity. There are a lot of references to the theater (the tenors, going to the theater with his uncle, being in the backstage of the procedural world, etc) that helps confirm my theory.
Going back to my Alice in Wonderland comparison, each person feels like one of those fantastical, unfathomable creatures from another realm, guiding (or misleading) K. through their strange domain.
Nobody felt real, no one because who is the system ? Does it need a face, a body...?
I would not go on and on about what the book is really about, other people did already, and surely better than I would, but being accused and the judged for just existing is something that a lot of people can relate to, and history shows us that we never learn our lessons.
As for the prose :
There are great, philosophical quotes here and there, you should keep in mind. If anything needs to live "rent free" in your head, please choose those phrases.
But one thing is certain: the prose is both heavy and childlike. I’m not sure whether that was intentional or not, but if anyone else had written this way, I’m pretty sure readers would have thrown the book at their face.
Re-read this for a book club. I liked it because I like pretty much everything Kafka so it was easy to go back and take this novel for a second spin.
I loved the darkness, the futility, the absurdity, the strangeness that is Kafka. If you love Kafka, you will definitely love this book.
I loved the darkness, the futility, the absurdity, the strangeness that is Kafka. If you love Kafka, you will definitely love this book.
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