70 pages deep so far, and still clueless. What am I missing?
Firstly, keep in mind that it is unfinished.
Secondly, I like to read Kafka more like a poet than a novelist. Just read the novel and think if you've ever found yourself in a situation resembling those that the protagonist is going through.
Thirdly, the whole book creates astounding imagery and mistery. That castle up high, K and his gf sleeping in a school, those girls at the inn.
>>7375714
I think of some parts as somehow humorous despite depicting a soulless world.
If the pantagruelic paragraphs don't bother you, then just keep reading.
The plot isn't really going anywhere in a conventional way -among other things, as the previous anon stated, the novel is unfinished- but it will make sense in its own fashion.
Don't think of it as some kind of straighforward mistery or similar bullshit and enjoy every chapter.
>>7375714
>mistery
ruh-ruh-ruh-retard
>>7375714
What a fine setting for a fit of despair, if only it were by accident instead of design.
Where it's going? It's Kafka, it's not going anywhere.
>>7375714
>and still clueless.
That the point. Kafka's novels are all about "lol you'll never know" because it's like what modern life is like or something.
>>7375714
just keep going. that's a good book and a good translation. consider that it's a play on inaccessibility as a metaphor for certain kinds of life stuff we think we need to understand uhhh stuff. the thing with kafka's works is that it's vague enough to mean one thing for you and something else for someone else. but I think inaccessibility is the common thread.
>>7375714
Is this your first Kafka?
I know a lot of people have an issue with the fact that Kafka's work is unfinished, but I would argue that it serves its purpose more successfully unfinished. You know that feeling when you get to an end of a complex book, where everything gets wrapped up so nicely? That feeling, for me at least, is a mixture of satisfaction that things worked out in a way that I get the opportunity to pass a judgement on, and also sadness that they didn't work out a variety of other ways. It's great that in Kafka nothing ends, because his stories generally wouldn't benefit from a conclusion. I mean at the end of The Trial, we have a conclusion but there is still something missing. When you get to the end of The Castle, nothing will have ended, so if you only read to have a nice tidy package, then you'll be disappointed. But how could it actually end?
>>7375714
K. dies at the end.
OP here, yeah you could say this is my first Kafka, though I've read The Metamorphosis back in highschool and I remember liking it.
Well I get it that the novel is purposely aimless and ambiguous, I guess I'm just not feeling this mysterious atmosphere you say it creates. Really, all I'm seeing is a frustrating absurd plot, with not much character development either.
I reckon it's a literary style you could compare with dark ambient music - it's not meant to go anywhere and develop, it's all about absorbing a certain mood. Guess this one's just not my cup of tea. Is the rest of Kafka's work in the same spirit?
>>7376540
I got about halfway through The Castle before I gave it up. The Trial is a much better work that captures what I think to be a similar atmosphere.
On a related note, I read The Metamorphosis for the first time a few days ago and I don't understand how its called the quintessential kafka? I mean its short and fun but it hardly conveyed the same despair or insignificance beneath an immense bureaucracy as The Trial or Castle did.
It goes nowhere, that's the whole point
>>7376540
You're just not a very good reader to be honest.
There's lots of stuff concerning discourse analysis (think of the letter and how it's constantly re-interpreted in different ways, how the slightest of signs somehow gives way to a flood of meanings), disciplinary systems identification (think how K. is immediately interpellated into the castle community and treated AS a land surveyor despite him really being no one...K. is an entity that at first doesn't function within the Castle legal order and has to be brought into it in increasingly strained ways), the possibility of overwhelming non-intentionality in seemingly human, planned systems, etc..
Plus, K. just wants to fucking sleep. Think about that intently and how something so banal underlies this whole system of phenomena and intrigue.
>>7375714
Read kafka like if there were some nigger narrator saying those words as if it were your life
also kafka is just irony, alphaness/game and woman desu
>mfw this thread
Anyway, besides all the retardation posted in this thread i'd recommend you to put aside The Castle for now, OP, and switch to The Trial. The Castle is not exactly accessible, especially not as your first Kafka-novel. Now, because this thread triggered me i will quote some moments of 10/10 retardation.
>Just read the novel and think if you've ever found yourself in a situation resembling those that the protagonist is going through.
>That the point. Kafka's novels are all about "lol you'll never know" because it's like what modern life is like or something.
>consider that it's a play on inaccessibility as a metaphor for certain kinds of life stuff we think we need to understand uhhh stuff. the thing with kafka's works is that it's vague enough to mean one thing for you and something else for someone else.(winner)
>with not much character development either.
>it's not meant to go anywhere and develop, it's all about absorbing a certain mood.
>Read kafka like if there were some nigger narrator saying those words as if it were your life
>also kafka is just irony, alphaness/game and woman desu
>>7377069
Here is an example of a reasonable post, probably of someone having gone through his work on University and if not, even more so appreciated.
Probably one of the worst threads in /lit/ history. All these people misreading Kafka.
>>7377069
/thread
What translation is pic related?
>>7377133
This clearly isn't the end of the thread, if people wanted to have intelligent discourse about this novel there's much more to say than this. But clearly it's a failure of interpretation to say that Kafka defies interpretation.
>>7377126
are you triggered because i can read kafka and have fun while doing it because ignorance is bliss?
it must be hard to have so much knowledge on something that can't be really appreciated by others
i'm 200 pages in and i still don't know what the fuck it's supposed to be about.
i thought it has to do with religion. guess not
