Einstein in Kafkaland: How Albert Fell Down the Rabbit Hole and Came Up with the Universe

Einstein in Kafkaland: How Albert Fell Down the Rabbit Hole and Came Up with the Universe by Ken Krimstein

Based on the title alone, I wanted to love this graphic novel. Tying together Einstein and Kafka had a lot of potential. They both had lived in Prague around the same time. They were both Jews that revolutionized their fields despite spending times working in tedious jobs (insurance salesman or patent clerk.) The graphic novel didn't quite live up to its potential. It focussed on Einstein and how he further developed his theory of relativity while on sojourn in Prague in 1911. The area was part of the Austria-Hungarian empire at the time. There was an intellectual climate in place. Einstein had various foils that would help him refine his theories. He also had family challenges - they would much rather be back in Zurich. The book buts a lot of these things together, but does not quite deliver. It is a few isolated life vignettes that don't come together to form a complete narrative, nor completely show development of relativity. Kafka is there, but in a bit role. There is also the ghost of Euclid and a narrator skeleton. The illustration style is also a bit surrealistic. It just doesn't quite make it.

The Metamorphosis

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

The narrator of this audiobook, Ralph Cosham, would often narrate under the pseudonym Geoffrey Howard.

Gregor woke up one day and discovered he was a bug. It was just a "oh, I'm a bug and not human". He is slow getting out the door. His family and even his manager try to come and get him out. Later they learn that he is a bug. His sister is the only one that regularly attends to him. Others protect him but generally avoid him. He was a primary earner in the house, so his "bugification" creates some stress. Eventually, he fades from view. They clean out human furniture from his room to make it more comfortable. They send him food, but he rarely eats. His room gradually becomes a junk room. His family takes on tenants to make ends meet. Eventually, while his sister is playing violin, Gregor goes out to listen. This freaks out the tenants (who are neat freaks.) Gregor shortly after decides to give up on life and dies. The family acknowledges his passing and opts for some privacy from the tenants. Then they go on with their lives. They are somewhat relieved that they don't have to tend for him anymore. They can now move to a smaller apartment and live financially well with their new work.

This can be seen as part of a struggle of caring for somebody that has challenges. They may have changed to be different. At first you see them as who they are. Gradually they become more of a burden. Eventually, there is a relief when you no longer need to care for them anymore. There may be a hope they can return to how they were, but an exit is a more likely outcome.

Telling this story primarily from Gregor's view helps emphasize the changes that are made. He was not killed, he just gave up. He was capable of thought and realized his change. However, he could not do anything about it. He gradually adopted more and more to the life of a bug. Eventually he stopped eating and stopped living. The world and his family was not capable of giving him a life that he felt worth living. He couldn't provide it for himself either.

Gregor's sister was the one that had cared for him. She also played violin in a way that pleased Gregor, but not the tenants. The family barely noticed her until Gregor's pasing. Only then did they realize she had blossomed into a woman. The first thing they thought to do then was to marry her to somebody. Is this good or bad? Is it another form of control or more freedom?

Four Stories by Kafka

On his deathbead, Kafka implored his friend, Max Brod, to burn all of his incomplete manuscripts. Alas, he failed to do so, and thus preserved many of his unfinished novels. Unfortunately, the quality of these pales in comparison to his stories.

In this collection, all the stories were published or prepared for publication during Kafka's lifetime. They, like the Metamorphosis are well done, coherent works. The posthumous novels (The Castle, Amerika and The Trial) all have their moments, but are just not as good as his "completed" works.

The four stories in this collection have the Kafka touch of having a bit of "absurdity" in the realm of commonality.

"A Hunger Artist"(1922)  tells the story of an artist that performs fasting feets. He is upset that he must stop after 40 days, but is resigned to his lot. Suddenly, the market for hunger artists dies off and he is relegated to a cage in the circus. He eventually completes a record fast, but nobody notices.

"A Report to a Academy" (1917)  is told in the first person by an ape who "became human". He realized that by adopting man's vices he can be seen as a man and achieve greater freedom.

"A Country Doctor" (1918) is about a doctor who's horse dies. A groom appears in the pigsty with horses that bring him instantly to a boys house. There the people treat a doctor as a near-religious figure expecting him either to cause the boy to live or be killed himself. He escapes, but the horses are now in no hurry.

"A Little Woman" (1924) is the story of a relationship that may exist or may not.

A multitude of meanings could be read in to each of the stories. However, the beauty is that they can also be taken at face value as a fun, enjoyable story.

The Castle

As in Kafka's Trial, the protaganist here is a "Mr. K". However, the Mr. K here is very different person. However, like the other Mr. K, this guy struggles against a crazy bureaucracy. Everybody else in the village accepts the ludicrous behavior of the bureaucracy as normal. The officials of the Castle seem to have no purpose other than being officials. Crossing them is a huge taboo. (The story is told of one family who's daughter dared refuse the advances of an official. The family was ostracized by the village and cut out of pretty much all economic life.)

Kafka takes bureaucratic inertia and stupidity to the extreme. Regular people are in a position of subservience to the officials. The official behavior is governed by a number of rules that people are expected to know and follow. These rules exist for the convenience of the officials. Failure to understand these "rules" is seen as a great offense by society.

The narrative is a little disjointed. You get the feeling there is a reason why Kafka wanted the book burned. It doesn't seem like he finished.

The trial

In the trial, Josef K. is arrested, but given no information about what is crime is, or how he should be defended. It is all a very Kafka-eque scenario. (And that is very fitting, since it is written by Kafka.)

The accused wakes up one day to find a couple guards in his house. They tell him he is arrested, and proceed to eat is breakfast. They can't tell him why he is arrested (as they are only guards). They restrict some of his basic activities. However, he is allowed to go on to work and later continue with the rest of his life.

Everybody seems to know about his trial, but to him it is bizarre. The court is nothing like the legal system he knows. It all takes place in a slum neighborhood, and nobody seems to be able to tell him why he is there.

In spite of this being some odd situation that is totally foreign to him, most of his friends and acquaintances seem to know about the trial and feel it is a bad thing for him.

As in Kafka's Metamorphosis, things are absurd, yet normal at the same time. The crime, trial and bizarre court system seem to be way outside the realm of normalcy, yet they are accepted by those around. People who work for the "strange" court system do so even though they have to put up with strange things. However, they don't see any other way.

Other strange events and coincidences seem to happen on the way. Taken on their own, each event could be seen as slightly unusually but still possible in a normal world. Taken together, it is all absurd.

The Trial was never finished in Kafka's lifetime. He had requested that it be burned, but his friend, and later teams of scholars worked to publish and "restore" it. Alas, the approach shows. Some sections seem to be thrown in there without really helping the story. (There are also sections dumped off at the end in an appendix.) While the story is good, don't scholars have better things to do than fabricate a story from something that the author didn't see worthy?

Amerika

Amerika was written by Kafka, yet it comes across as much more traditional style. A young man gets in to trouble in Europe and is sent off to America. He luckily runs in to a relative, and is able to get a good position. Then he alienates the relative and heads west to attempt to make it on his own. America is the land of opportunity.