Writer · 1883 – 1924
Franz Kafka
Key Takeaways
- Kafka wrote The Metamorphosis, The Trial and The Castle.
- His fiction explores alienation, guilt and absurd, faceless authority.
- Most of his work was published only after his death, against his wishes.
- His name gave rise to the word 'Kafkaesque'.
Few writers have a word named after them, but Franz Kafka does: “Kafkaesque.” It describes exactly the world of his fiction — bewildering, oppressive, absurd, where ordinary people are crushed by forces they can neither understand nor escape.
Nightmares of the modern world
Kafka, a German-speaking insurance official in Prague, wrote in his spare hours. In The Metamorphosis, a man wakes transformed into a giant insect; in The Trial, another is arrested and prosecuted for a crime never named; in The Castle, a man strives endlessly to reach an authority that forever recedes. His parables of alienation drew on the psychological depths of Fyodor Dostoevsky and the uncertainties voiced by Friedrich Nietzsche.
Saved from the fire
Kafka published little and asked that his manuscripts be burned at his death. His friend Max Brod disobeyed — and so this writer of the modern era, almost unknown in life, joined James Joyce among the defining voices of 20th-century literature.
Influence
Kafka gave unforgettable form to the anxiety, alienation and helplessness of modern life, his vision so distinctive that his name became an adjective.
Legacy
Once almost unknown, he is now seen as a defining writer of the 20th century, and 'Kafkaesque' is part of everyday speech.
Major Works
- The Metamorphosis
- The Trial
- The Castle
Connections
Frequently Asked Questions
Who was Franz Kafka?
Franz Kafka (1883–1924) was a German-language writer from Prague, author of The Metamorphosis and The Trial, whose work gave us the word 'Kafkaesque'.
What is The Metamorphosis about?
It tells of Gregor Samsa, who wakes one morning transformed into a giant insect, a haunting parable of alienation, family and the loss of human dignity.
Citations & Sources
People Like Franz
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky
91Fyodor Dostoevsky was a Russian novelist whose psychologically penetrating works, including Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov, probe faith, guilt, and freedom and helped shape modern existential thought.
Why An earlier writer of psychological depth and guilt whom Kafka deeply admired.
James Joyce
82James Joyce was an Irish novelist whose experimental masterpiece Ulysses is widely regarded as the greatest novel of the 20th century, and whose innovations in language and stream of consciousness transformed modern literature.
Why A contemporary modernist who, like Kafka, transformed 20th-century fiction.
Friedrich Nietzsche
92Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher whose radical critiques of morality, religion, and truth—including the proclamation that "God is dead" and the ideal of the Übermensch—made him one of the most influential and provocative thinkers of the modern era.
Why A philosopher whose vision of a world without certainties shaped Kafka's outlook.
Marcel Proust
81Marcel Proust was a French novelist whose monumental seven-volume In Search of Lost Time is one of the most celebrated novels of the 20th century, transforming fiction with its exploration of memory, time and consciousness.
Why Also a novelist & writer · Active in the same era
Virginia Woolf
81Virginia Woolf was an English writer, a central figure of literary modernism, whose novels Mrs Dalloway and To the Lighthouse pioneered stream of consciousness, and whose essay A Room of One's Own became a landmark of feminist thought.
Why Also a novelist & writer · Active in the same era
William Faulkner
80William Faulkner was an American novelist whose dense, experimental novels set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County of the Deep South — including The Sound and the Fury — won him the Nobel Prize in Literature and made him one of the most influential writers of the 20th century.
Why Also a novelist & writer · Active in the same era