This is an odd novel... set in the early 20th century and involving a young man who has a position in a bank, and who becomes embroiled in a legal case against him.

I'm not quite sure that the story has held up in the ensuing 100 years since it was published posthumously, and seeing that it was never finishes by the author (the final several dozen pages in this edition is dedicated to an attempt to tease out some of the unfinished chapters and changes that were discovered among the authors property after his death. ( )

Not what it seems...... ( )

'correct understanding of a matter and a misunderstanding of
the same matter are not mutually exclusive'.

This was maybe a bit too dense to take on a vacation. The subject matter isn't light. It's dense heavy with customs and language. It's also odd. I didn't understand all the situations or the tones of every conversation (and there were many) but I did get the basic idea. It was interesting but would have been better if I had been in a better frame of mind.

The end was shocking and not where I saw this heading. ( )

For reasons I am struggling to properly articulate, I appreciated ‘The Trial’ quite a lot more than [b:The Castle|333538|The Castle|Franz Kafka|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1331696371s/333538.jpg|17778410]. The latter was rather a struggle, whereas I found this engrossing. The narrators in each are similar: young bewildered men, often pompous, sometimes sympathetic, not very polite, especially to women. The structure is also much the same: a man struggles to pursue a vaguely articulated aim while worried and exhausted, constantly encountering new people who explain tangentially relevant matters to him, while an abstract concept looms above him in a portentous and threatening manner. ‘The Trial’ feels less dreamlike and provides more closure than [b:The Castle|333538|The Castle|Franz Kafka|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1331696371s/333538.jpg|17778410], although that might be because the edition of the latter I read included multiple endings. Perhaps the conceptions of the Law and the Courts made for a more effective adversary/threat/nemesis? It could also be that I am in a more Kafka-appropriate mood now than I was last May.

In this more receptive frame of mind, the exceptional and unique qualities of Kafka’s writing were very evident to me. Sections that stood out included this passage on the claustrophobic inertia that prevents institutional change:

For the lawyers - and even the most junior could see to an extent what conditions were like - never dreamt of initiating or carrying out improvements to the court system, whereas - and this was very revealing - almost every defendant, even the most simple-minded, would begin to think about improvements as soon as he became involved in a case, and would often waste time and energy that could have been used more profitably in other ways. The only proper approach was to come to terms with existing conditions. Even if - which, however, was nothing but superstitious nonsense - one would have at best achieved something for the benefit of future clients, at the expense though of doing oneself irreparable harm through attracting the attention of the ever-vengeful officials. Never draw attention to yourself! Keep quiet, however much it goes against the grain! Try to understand that this great legal organism remained, as it were, in a state of delicate balance, and that if anyone attempted to make any alteration in his own area, he was liable to cut away the ground from under his own feet and come crushing down, while the great organism itself easily compensated for the slight disturbance in some other part of its machinery - after all, everything is connected - remained unchanged, unless, which was indeed highly probable, it became even more resolute, more vigilant, more severe, more malevolent.

The most striking and beautiful part of the novel was the scene in the church, however, and that is too long to quote. The story told by priest and his discussion with K. will definitely stay with me. There is no-one like Kafka for conveying the terrible helplessness of an individual confronting an institution or system. As Zadie Smith’s introduction says, there are endless ways to interpret his writing. I quite like ‘The Trial’ as a parable on the near-impossibility of opposing capitalism from within - and there is no escaping it. ( )

Book 71
The Trial.
Franz Kafka.
I just read that Kafka used to laugh out loud when he wrote this. I don't remember laughing which might mean I hadn't quite got it but in the mid 80's when I read it I enjoyed it anyway. (Although I enjoyed crime and punishment much more... )
8/10
10/100 books that changed the world. ( )