Garratt's Blog

In the Shadow of No Towers: Post #5

garratt — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 02:15:07 +0000

I want to address the topics of the presence of the past and the repetition/recurrence of traumatic events and its relation to the Kafkaesque. The depiction of Spiegelman’s head being jackhammered (8) by little Spiegelman is the depiction and summary of how Spiegelman feels. The image of the towers is literally burned into his eyes, and he sees everything through the tint of the demolished towers. His face is littered with black stress lines with tears or sweat streaming down his face. A large crack spreads through his head with a large gaping hole with bits of blood coming out. The reader feels disturbed and even some repulsion from seeing it. The presence of the past and the recurrence of the past can be seen in his glasses with the reflection of the glowing towers. The two themes are quite similar and an argument can be made, I believe, that they are the same. For a recurrence of a traumatic event, the past has to be present! Yet is this Kafkaesque?

I have been dealing with the same problem with my semester project. The play I am analyzing deals with a German soldier returning from WWII and how he can continue living with the burden of all the horrors and death he witnessed. Both Beckmann (the soldier) and Spiegelman suffer from a post-traumatic stress disorder-like symptoms. Yet I have a hard time connecting these experiences to our definition of the Kafkaesque that we derived from the Trial. It seems that Kafka used the presence of the past in the Castle but as I have not read that it is problematic. The other short stories we have read of Kafka have not drawn on these two themes, and while connections can be made between Spiegelman and Kafka they do not share the broad definitions of the Kafkaesque. Rather they share disorienting language (visual and textual) and absurd elements that make little sense (webbed hands and head on lamp shade).

I hate to digress from the journal topic, but I wanted to address the idea that we remember and understand traumatic events through pictures or snapshots rather than linearly. I enjoyed the topic last class, and thought about traumatic events that could rival 9/11 that would invoke similar responses. I was 15 and did not have the conceptual framework to fully process and understand the 9/11 attacks outside of that the terroists were bad people and there was previous contention in the Middle East about oil and Irael. It wasn’t until a few years later that 9/11 was harder to deal with than when it actually happened oddly enough. My traumatic experience for me that I remember in snapshots was when my Dad had a heart attack two years ago. I often find myself thinking of a few images. As I drove over to the hospital, he wasn’t responding to me voice, when they hooked up the heart monitor to him to operate on him. and simply sitting in the waiting room to see the outcome. As my Mom was out of the state at the time, I was the sole person there for my Dad. I will spare some nitty gritty details but I think one gets the idea.

I am not writing about this to make people feel pity or sadness, but it helps me understand Spiegelman better. Often at night, the images of that day force itself into my brain when I don’t want to deal with them, yet I can’t help them doing so. It is exactly like having a jackhammer to the head. You don’t want it to hammer your head, but its inevitable. (Connection to the Kafkaesque: Recurrence of the past is inevitable much like the tragic fate of Kakfa’s characters) I have moved pass that day, but I still carry it with me. I am sure some people in my class have had similar experiences in respect to having a traumatic experience in that order.

In the Shadow of No Towers: Post #4

garratt — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:58:12 +0000

Is the Spiegelman’s work Kafkaesque? Before I directly answer the question, it might be helpful to see how it is different. The Kakfa-like ambiguity is not present. What I mean by Kakfa ambiguity is the hard to picture images Kafka’s words creates. The best example is the courtroom, each reader has their own picture of the courtroom and for the most part are all correct because the descriptors are damn minimal. Obviously, Spiegelman is using a different medium and is not only visual but artistic. His depictions are not ambiguous, but thought provoking, jarring, and bizarre to the point of ambiguity. The reader wonders “Why would Spiegelman use old cartoon characters to depict himself? What use a mouse as a symbol? Why does he put postcards and pictures over comics he drew? The artistic choices Spiegelman makes contains an element of ambiguity or uncertainty that is triggered in the reader’s mind. Secondly, there is no correct way of reading Spiegelman’s pages. The pictures are put together in a convoluted way. Kakfa’s writing despite the order of the chapters being disputed, the reader always goes from left to right on the page reading one word before the other. This is not the case in the SOFNT. One can begin in the center and work out or try to read in the orthodox manner from left to right and continue down the page. Those are some but certainly not all the major differences that I see between the two authors.

I am picking the comic on page 10 with the many boots falling on NYC to see if that picture is Kafkaesque. I will not be addressing the whole book, but the frame itself as a manageable chunk to analyze. The looming unseen danger are the boots which are the second boots to drop. Despite the image showing them, it is symbolic that New York City is waiting for the second shoe of the terrorists to hit them or a shoe of the government. The bottom dialogue box says that the boots are the Republicans swooping in for the “Republican Presidential Convention.” Yet it doesn’t quite work as the people know who would be dropping the show. They simply don’t know when it would drop which adds a sense of looming danger but it is certainly seen. The depiction of the boots show the source of where they come from. One boot has the US government seal on it while the other has a dollar bill sign on it. While there are similarities is not a perfect fit with the definition.

The second aspect is the powerful, controlling, and inaccessible institution. The Republicans were powerful and controlling as they held the power in the US government and I believe the House and Senate as well. The passage of the Patriot Act extended their control over citizens. Yet the comic panel does not accentuate that part of the definition. While the boots could crush all the New Yorkers, they do not look controlling. In fact the only thing they can do is cause wide spread panic and delirium. (Side note: I just found Charlie Brown in the mass of people. He is right next to Hapless Hooligan) The institution seems inaccessible as one cannot figure out where the boots are coming from. There is no building or plane in the sky in which they can be dropped. One doesn’t see Cheney dropping them, yet one would not be surprised if he was, you just don’t know where from.

Lastly, how does the frustrated search for meaning fit in? Or does it? As previously stated, there is a feeling of hysteria and mass commotion as the people run in fear of the boots. While the people don’t seem to be searching for a meaning, there is no over arching grandeur, eye opening, divine, or moderately interesting message to live one’s life.

Topic: Pick one or two elements from one (or both) of these comics. Compare to our definition of the Kafkaesque. Is what you find in No Towers justifiably Kafkaesque? In class, we’ll try to consider how/whether the answer to this question ties into the “presence of the past” and the ability of trauma to be represented in images.

In the Shadow of no Towers: Post #3

garratt — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 12:58:40 +0000

Spiegelman’s political critique is a bitter satire and observation of the American public. Most of us have seen the red/blue map and he uses the slightly more interesting county map of America to see which parts are more liberal or more conservative. He begins to contrasts the two colors in his large frame on 7. The eagles look aggresive, dominating, strong, and vicious and surround the blue peace doves. The does look harmless enough, yet they seem like they will be swallowed up by their red enemies. The supporters of the red eagles are ghoulish and reaper like charachters with bloody scythes and knives. In contrast the supporters of the blue doves are greyed out, small, not imposing, and almost helpless humans. How could the peace and the liberals do anything when their opponents are blood thirsty and savage-like?

The two countries in the US are splitting themselves apart, according to Spiegelman’s frame to the left of the previous one. The flag is ripped into two by the opposing factions and he likens the two groups of living in different “zones.” He admittedly doesn’t travel outside of his safe zone, he notes he doesn’t know anyone that supports the war or doesn’t believe in Evolution. The comic with the flag, in the background between the two mobs looms the country side and the city highlighting the crucial difference between the red and blue. Even in the bottom comic on page 7, he uses the two colors.

When we first look at Spiegelman, he is the one that looks normal and well grounded as George Bush and his gang are upside down and war mongering. Yet as one flips over the book, Spiegelman is the out-of-place character standing in the sky upside down. This reflects that while the reader is to empathize with Spiegelman and his cautious approach, the majority of America or atleast the most influential were “normal” as Spiegelman looks alienated as one flips the book over. Interestingly, one of the people in the war mongering parade was a preacher due to his white frock collar. Spiegelman connects the that America used religion to justify the war as the characters scream ”Redemption” and “pre-emption.”

To address the “presence of the past” issue, on page 8 Spiegelman uses the old style comic format to explain his feelings and comic nature he felt after 9/11. For instance, the title of the comic is “marital blitz” a cheeky title, but the problem is is that he is dealing with serious issues such as his relationship with his wife and over exposure to news around the world about 9/11 and the conspiracy plots. Yet, if one erased the dialogue and followed the pictures themselves, it has a comical mischief to it. With the added dialogue, it portrays someone with “news poisoning” that people still suffer today from with 24 hour news networks. His wife slowly becomes a terrorist in the strip so by the end she has an arab-like beard and a towel over her head how “terrorsts” wear them. The use of the old comic art style was to convey a certain un/reality that is not possible with a more realistic approach. The style accentuates an irrational fear of conspiracy theories and his behavior in response to his wife turning on the radio in the bathroom in the morning.

In the Shadow of No Towers: Post #2

garratt — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 14:15:45 +0000

One thing that struck me was on page 6 with his interaction with the “crazy lady” near Soho. One can tell that Spiegelman is under a lot of stress from the previous page being told to wrap his head in a flag with the comic’s image being wavy and distorted mimicking Spiegelmann’s frame of mind. When the crazy lady accosts him, blaming the Jews for 9/11. His response is apt: “Damn it, lady! If you don’t stop blaming everything on the Jews, people are gonna think you’re crazy.” (6) The line assumes that people do not think she is crazy, which is a bit ironic. After his rightful outburst the woman is drawn as relaxed and clueless which contrasts his previous depictions of her with red, “coked out”, and beady eyes, mangled, yellow teath, a pointed witch nose, and being a crumby Yankees fan. The last picture dissolves that away leaving a sad, poor woman who has little control over her enviornment.

The focal point is the center revealing the crazy woman’s “inner demons” that seem reminiscent of Dante’s Inferno. The colors are neon, bright, aggressive, and obnoxious which are bordered by jagged edges to accentuate anguish. The picture itself contrasts with the rest of the page which is bland, white, and neutral. The images are monster planes with devilish mouths, ghoulish buildings with faces, an arab-like serpent streaming out of the lady’s eye-ball sockets, people falling out of buildings, and a person stabbed in the mouth by a sword. This depiction of the inner demons of the crazy lady do not invoke pity or remorse, but the reader can see that the traumatic events of 9/11 have deeply affected her.

The culmination of the page is a non-sequitur. The final picture has a different art-style than the rest of the page, the colors are faded, dull, and earthy. It is the first time in the page that the Spiegelman is in his Maus form. His wife (?) seems to comfort him, but from a distance or a stark seperation as she is wearing a gas mask that acts as foreboding imagery. The mask invokes the curiosity of the reader as to why she is wearing it. Is it to protect her from dirty bomb attack from terrorists? Is it to symbolically protect her from nightmares that Spiegelmann is enduring. Spiegelman himself is drawn as small, toddler-like, out-of-sorts, and particularly harmless. He is haunted by his surreal dreams of an “arabized” John Ashcroft that maliciously pushes Speigelman out of the window, but the reader cannot hear more of it as his wife interrupts him. Like in real dreams humans have, pieces of reality that often stress or dominate one’s mind appear in dreams. To return back to the crazy lady’s inner demons picture, the skeleton riding the dog-like monstrosity carries a bloody box cutter, which was used by the terrorists in the hijacking.

The theme of page 6 is the “demonic surreal.” The crazy lady and Spiegelman suffer from inner demons despite a difference, and yet both are inextrinsibally linked to 9/11 and share similar experiences.

In the Shadow of No Towers: Post #1

garratt — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 13:25:17 +0000

I am really interested in this work. I admit I was sad when I stopped at panel #4. Unlike the Trial where the world is un/real, Spiegelmann’s rendition of 9/11 is very real as all of us in the class have experienced 9/11 in one form or another. I found myself choked up a bit by the story as I lived relatively near the Pentagon and the D.C. sniper shootings occured literally less than 3 miles away from my school. All of these emotions and conceptions of 9/11 are mixed in with Spiegelmann’s own disbelief of what happened. Why I say they are not un/real is because they actually happened unlike Kafka’s worlds which could happen. Spiegelmann’s accounts cannnot be viewed as biographical reductionism, but are plainly biographical. When I read the panels, I look at the helplnessness and the awkward and inadequate responses by humans in the situation such as the principle or the tourists simply looking on.

The narrator who is Art Spiegelmann has a flood of emotions. Terror due to the questionable situation his daughter is in at the United Nations School located a few blocks away from the Twin Towers. Also, disbelief about people’s reactions to the crisis e.g. the principle at the school stating that students cannot go outside for lunch. The principle’s statement does not address what is happening and fails miserably to calm anyone down. It aggravates people due to its inadequecy. I believe Spiegelmann was simply lost and disoriented as there was no solid ground to hold on to. All the same places looked foreign to him. I believe this is reflected in the layout of the panels themselves. The order is quite hard to follow and disorients the reader giving a similar yet lesser feeling of disorientation.

There are two panels I want to touch on that resonate with Spiegelmann’s anger and his past. It seems that his parents were Holocaust survivors at Auschwitz and told Art that the smoke there was indescibable due to the mix of bones, ovens, and ashe. Yet Spiegelmann connects it to 9/11 which I though was curious. The indescribable smell was the “asbestos, PCBs, lead, andbodyparts…” (3). The mix of the smells created a “witche’s brew”. This connection lets Spiegelmann connect to his past, his heritage in terms of allowing him to understand how he can cope with present situation but also understand to some degree what the Holocaust must have been like.

The second panel is Spiegelmann reflecting about the air quality in Nadja’s school. They never replaced or cleaned the air conditioning system and must still contain all the containaments and deadly particles that were sucked in from when the towers fell. Spiegelmann says he has a propensity for being an alarmist or prone to conspiracy theories in the initial essays but it is hard not to agree with him that the city could have done more. His European propensity to blatant and “in your face” tactics of creating signs with gasmasks on children and going to townhall allienated supporters away from him illuminating some of American’s nature not to protest or cause a stir. He notes that he smokes more than ever now, and is worried that he wont even die of cigarettes because of the air quaility from the fall of the towers.

I forgot the last part that really moved me. Spiegelmann’s concept that he was a “rootless cosmopolitan” was instantly demolished once the planes hit the towers. He knew he had some feelings for the city and its people, but once again he connects to the present situation back to Nazi Germany. He understood now “why some Jews didn’t leave Berlin right after Kristallnacht.” (4) It was as if no matter what attrocities would occur the place for the Jews was Berlin, they had a strong heritage in the place like Spiegelmann’s connection to NYC.

Overall, I really like it and can’t wait to discuss it and keep reading farther into it.

garratt — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 22:19:12 +0000

To find the Kafkaesque in the movie, we must first define it. For this blogpost I will be using the definition from my paper: “The Kafkaesque is the fruitless search for “it” in which one will most likely never find due to seemingly absurd and convoluted obstacles in their way, and that the search itself will generally injure or destroy the seeker.”

At first glance, K. despite some disagreement in class, dies in the movie. The Court has destroyed and crushed K. into submission. Despite in the Adams article that K. does not assist in his death, he certainly does not fight back. He yells, screams, and laughs at them but does not fight them, even if he picked up the dynamite at the end. The explosion of the dynamite creates a mushroom cloud reminiscent of a nuclear bomb clearly alluding to the Cold War, but the explosion would most likely leave little remnants of K. effectively erasing him from history. A similar situation would be if one of the faceless typewriters at the office were to disappear. Nobody would notice and no one would care. Ultimately K. is killed, yet part of the Kafkaesque is a search for “it.”

In this case it is what K. is charged with and a general search for authority in the convoluted Court system. The Tintorelli’s “house” and hiring Hassler are two examples that come to mind. At Tintorelli’s house, the dialogue does concern about K.’s courtcase, but the viewer is oblivious to it because he/she is distracted by the piercing, voyeuristic eyes of the girls. Tintorellie’s references to the girls as “little pussies” and reminding them they did not like his “icepick” stood out as a rather blatant reference to man/child relations of the abnormal kind. While K. searches for what he is charged with he hits the absurd obstacles as in my definition. At Tintorelli’s place, he has to run up a seemingly unending staircase with girls (some deformed) screaming and grabbing at him for really no apparent reason except that he might be getting a portrait of himself. Furthermore, why is the painter living in a “wooden tree house” surrounded by girls? Why is it a part of the court building? Don’t the girls have parents? Shouldn’t they be at school or under formal supervision? The girls provide a unique and absurd obstacle for K.

At Hassler’s mansion, K. along with his uncle seek help for K.’s court case. The viewer is not drawn into the scene feeling he/she will get the answer or a quick solution to K.s problem but rather trying to understand why the mansion looks as it is. The door itself has a sliding insert so Leni can peek out to see the person waiting to enter. Is this mansion a secret hideout for Hassler? The candles are supposed to light up the mansion, but in the spacious area it is futile to hope to see everything. The candles strain to light everything yet all is for nought much like K.’s search for what he is charged with. Hassler himself operates within the court system, but is rather innefectual and K comes to realize this. My favorite shot of the movie is the second scene with Hassler, Bloch, Leni, and K. Bloch is on his knees begging Hassler but he is juxtaposed against K. standing in the background defiant. Bloch is much closer to the camera making his face and upper body as large as all of K! This creates the feeling that K. is insignificant because he has chosen to do away with Hassler. Also he is pictured small as he has distanced himself from the court system in refusing to obey by their rules unlike Bloch. In this instance, the absurd obstacle is Hassler himself. Why have a lawyer who is ineffective at defending you and has a homoerotic attraction to accused peoples? It simply does not make sense.

In conclusion, Welles’s film is Kafkaesque as it portrays K.’s search for what he is charged with as a fruitless search with absurd obstacles in the way which ultimately kills K..

Movie Post #3

garratt — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:08:00 +0000

Wow I just finished the movie and I am totally creeped out by K.s laugh at the end. It was like a cackle of a madman! The Court had finally broken K. and caused him to go literally insane. He really wanted to get the two men to stab him, and he was totally powerless in stopping them, yet somehow he scared them as shown by their faces. K. kept saying “You” really softly at first, yet to say he said it softly is an understatement. It was a gutteral, accusatory “YOU!” Then he screamed it out at them. I am not quite sure what he was doing, but then again he knew he was probably about to die. I’m sure I might not act very rationally if I was in the same situation. The death itself was not personal like in the book. The use of the dynamite I believe was a questionable decision by Welles. What does K.’s death symbolize?

To sort out that question, I go back to when K said to the chaplain, “I am not your son.” Perkins said that with such force and absolute conviction, that I actually felt like he was committed to something. He rejected all the talk and advice of Hassler and anyone associated with the court and told them to metaphorically “to shove it.” With that simple statement, he rejects that he will comply with their system and the institution in general. He began to make a new path for himself. Despite that, the path seems to lead to lunacy and insanity which does not seem to be totally un-called for.

Tintorelli’s scene is absolutely bizarre. I have seen this movie before and this scene is the one I remember the most. Not because what is said, but the girls, the creepy girls! The cinematography and the camera angles are perfect. The shots of the single eye’s peering through the wood slats as if waiting to pounce and devour K. As well, the girls often shift from one eye to the other trying to get a better look at K. K’s says its really hot in the room and begins to feel faint, but to me it is the predatory, carnivorous eyes of the Girls that causes him to feel faint. Tintorelli feels this and takes advantage of the situation almost coaxing him into the bed to do who knows what. It is at this point when K. begins to lose his grip on reality. He runs through the law offices and what seemed like sewers with the girls chasing after him. If I flipped to that scene knowing nothing at all, I would have thought he was running away from mobsters or something more fearsome, but it is Welles’s portrayal that is so convincing that if K. is caught the results will not be good.

K. in the novel seemed much more in control of his sanity during his death and in the chapters before it, while in the movie as stated before it is quite different. Maybe one of the points of the movie is that not only will society (the Court system) will kill you, but it will drive you to the edge and push you over into the abyss of incoherence and logical thought. The world in the movie seems to be a demented, malicious Wonderland intent on destroying K. while in the b book it is merely a confusing and dehumanizing Wonderland that K. ultimately chooses his death rather than live in a world that “doesn’t make sense.”

Observations: The charachters with thick accents like Bloch and the Usher(though he isn’t called the Usher in the movie) are looked down upon. The court system treats the usher as labor and necessary evil to keep around so they can have their way with his wife. He is short, fat, depressed, and overflowing with bitterness. Bloch’s depiction is similar: short, fat, balding, and weak minded. It is as if these two are members of a bygone generation and have to live in a world that has passed them by.

Movie Post #2

garratt — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 02:56:00 +0000

I noticed a few camera techniques and props Welles used in the second third of the movie. I noticed the use of the hanging lamp. The pyrimidal shape is often used in interagations and to me triggers feelings of intimidation. For instance K. had to walk underneath the lamp while the Warder talked to him. It really surved no purpose except to make K. feel out of sorts. The lamp makes its second appearance with scene of the whipper. The lamp is used to throw light and conversely to not throw light on what is happening. When the whipper used the belt to lash the two it hit the light causing a disorienting feeling and one of chaos. It was very unsettling to watch.

Secondly, Welles contrasted loud spaces and quiet spaces. When K. is looking for the courtroom it is very clean, quiet, modern, and desolate. Yet once K. steps into the courtroom, it is quite dusty, packed with people, loud, raucous, and looks slightly unmodern. When he leaves, he closes the giant doors behind him and a sea of calm and isolation comes into the film. A second example is with the whipper. K. enters the stockroom, it is very intimate, gritty, sweaty, humid, and tenseful. At moments especially when they are whipped one hears cries of horror, pain, and desperation. Yet once again, K. escapes the room and all is quiet and everything is in order despite the single door seperation.

Welles’s interpretation of the accused who were waiting was eerie. The people outside were old, decrepid, and had number signs hanging around their neck. It reminded me of the German concentration camps and the people simply waiting to die or be executed by the Nazis. There are the people outside and the ones who sit inside. Welles did not make a distinction between the two, the waiters inside seemed a bit more put together and healthy looking, yet I feel they are one group of people: the accused.

Welles used light as one of his biggest cinemagraphical tools (word?) to express meaning. In the office, shadows are thrust on all the walls and act as a foreshadowing for people who are coming. For instance when K. returns from checking on the warders being flogged, one can see his shadow and gives a sense of distance as it shown on a concrete wall. Furthermore, in Huld’s office there is thunderstorm constantly lighting up his mansion lighting up people’s faces or corners of the building not seen. As well, long shadows are cast throughout the house which are caused by long and imposing beams that serve or don’t serve a purpose. A great shot Welles used was when he (Welles) was walking on the other side of the glass pane smoking a cigar while K. was avoiding him. It gave a sense of emergency that K. had to escape quickly.

Miscelleneous: I really enjoyed when Welles had the smoking rag over his head when he was talking. It gave him a devilish look to him as if he was evil. The place where the accused where sitting inside looked like an abandoned European train station. K.’s “office” is merely a raised block with no walls so everyone can see him. It really isn’t what we think of an office at all.

Movie Post #1

garratt — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 12:15:56 +0000

While watching the first part of the movie it became quite clear to me this was not an exact clone of the book. It could be argued that the movie is faithful adaptation of certain events and the tone of the book. A few examples is K. being woke up the morning and having the same paranoid feeling as he did in the book. I think a nice touch was the ovular shape that held dentist chair in place, but no one could seem to comprehend that at except K. and I think Frau Grubach. While not necessarily in the book it was a worthy addition.

A second thing from the movie is that it began to cement what I already thought of K. and how he acts and lives. His room is totally white and bare! K. would like in a room that resembles a boring, and bland office room. There are nothing on the walls and everything on his dresser is in perfect order. Also, I find the it intersting that they have ceiling very low to give the effect of claustrophobia and paranoa. Perkins does a good job acting and becoming K. because I still hate him. His voice is still whiny, his bodily movements are rather obnoxious, and even his haircut is so bland and unoriginal that it fits perfectly with his uninspiring life. Perkins does not seem to have that awkward streak that K. has in the book. The kiss with Burstner is not an awkward impulsive kiss, but one to me that seems thought out. A quibble as well, K. in the movie found his papers really quickly which did not happen in the book! I found that part fascinating that everything was in the right place and he could not find them. That would be a great movie shot to see all of K’s stuff in order in the drawer and yet see K. not find them.

Despite not being a faithful retelling of the story, Welles does a good job of getting the overall atmosphere and the sense of “huh?” very well. I admit he does make the people a bit overbearing from what I remember but overall very good. I especially loved the scenes at the office with everyone at the office typing away, despite all of them being women I could see Gregor Samsa wasting his life away in that room before his transformation. As well, I though it quite comical juxaposing K.’s cousin on the other side of the window and him not acknowledging her whatsoever, classic K. move.

Overall, I have enjoyed the first part and can’t wait to watch the second.

“Joseph K.!”

garratt — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 15:38:31 +0000

After I read the last two chapters, I couldn’t tell you how depressed I was feeling. The only other time I felt more depressed after reading a book was probably The Stranger. Reflecting upon why I was depressed I am having a bit of trouble coming up with the reasons. I do not feel sorry for K. Why you ask? This might be a new theme but he actually helped and abetted his death!! On page 226, Kafka wrote, “They passed through several steeply rising streets, in which policemen stood or patrolled at intervals; sometimes a good way off, sometimes quite near.” Then a few sentences later “The two gentlemen halted, the policeman seemed to be already opening his mouth, but K. forcibly pulled his companions forward. He kept looking round cautiously to see if the policemen were following .”

Did I just read that part? K. is actually avoiding the police so he can be killed? I know it can be argued that K. doesn’t know he is going to be killed, but he must have some kind of clue that where he is going it is not going to be pleasant. With K. actively avoiding the police and even running away from them, K. turns from a person who was unlucky in being “arrested’ into an accomplice into his own murder and wanting it to occur. I feel very little remorse for him now. He had the chance of getting help from ordinary law and their enforcers but denies it and evades the idea of ordinary law. He simply lost the will to live, and from my perspective, well then you might as well abet in your murder if you don’t want to live.

What was more depressing to me were the people who were “arrested” and actually wanted to be free, away from the chains, and could not. There must be many people like that, maybe the people who were stuck in the law offices stooped over in the musty air. Those are the people that I feel sorry for, or wait…if all them submit themselves to be punished by a system that makes no sense and arbitrarily and absurdly gives power to undeserving people, then I don’t care or feel sorry for any of them. They give the credence and the sense of authority to this “other” court.

The other depressing part that deeply affected me was the seen in the cathedral. The imagery is effective in giving an image and forshadowing K.s death. I just think of K. looking up at the priest, straining his neck to see him, while all the candles are being extinguished by the verger. It is daytime, yet it is pitch black outside. (211) This is also the first time religious imagery is in the book. Prior to this it has be absent. I am not quite sure what Kafka is going for, but religioun comes to the forefront only when death is near.

I want to bring my attention to the parable about the gatekeeper and the man from the country. The man cannot enter the gate because it is not his time yet to enter, but the door is made explicity for him. The man is searching for th Law, yet the gatekeeper tells him it is inside. The man simply waits his whole life outside waiting to be let in. Upon thinking about this story, I think that the man had found the Law. He made himself abide by certain rules laid down by the gatekeeper and waited. Laws are meant to be followed by a group more than 1. It was him and the gatekeeper. The man threw chains on himself not to go in, and therefore found the law. Laws circumscribe what one can and can’t do, and thats what the man did. The man came from the country side, where presumably there were no laws, one can do whatever they want. It is reminscent of the state of nature used by Locke and Hobbes. It is only when one enters into a compact to curtail liberties so one doesn’t get arbitraily killed or things stolen from him. Yet I think Kafka doesn’t view laws and the court systems as a way to protect you but a way to subjugate and ultimately kill you. In the case of the parable, the man waits his whole life waiting for the law, and by him simply limiting his freedoms he has found the Law. In by doing so he kills himself by waiting. K. while not passively killing himself actually aids the process. People who are subject to the law agree to the judgements, but that leaves room for people not to agree to it, yet most people choose chains rather than freedom.

The Priest’s last words to K. were “So why should Iwant anything from you? The Court wants nothing from. It receives you when you come and it dismisses you when you go.”(222) The Law has no power here, it doesn’t demand that K. come at all, but only acknowledges him when he comes, and when K. makes the decision to leave, the court reacts by dismissing him. It is only through consent that K. is killed and subject to the court. That is why I do not feel bad for him, is that he consents to death, when all he had to do was go to the Wald away from the law.