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Title: Kafka: Judaism, Politics, and Literature by Ritchie Robertson ISBN: 0-19-815814-9 Publisher: Clarendon Pr Pub. Date: July, 1987 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $39.95

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Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)

Rating: 5
Summary: A Great Book with an Overly Intimidating Title
Comment: This book gave me a very rare experience:

"The Trial" has been one of my favorite books since high school, and I've read it many times, studied it in college, and kept it by my bed for years. I thought I understood it as well it could be understood. This book by Robertson absolutely floored me by showing me that the usual interpretation-- that Joseph K. is a poor, everyday kind of guy beset on all sides by a creepy court that deliberately and without reason tortures his mind and finally breaks him-- is DEAD WRONG. Robertson has convinced me beyond any doubt that not only is K. guilty, but the Court is trying to save him from himself!

As fantastic as this interpretation might seem, Robertson's evidence is utterly convincing. You must read this book. Once you see Robertson connect the dots-- the clues Kafka leaves for the reader, but which even college professors don't notice-- your understanding of "The Trial" will change forever.

Look at it this way: what if The Court is not any kind of legal, temporal court, but a court of morality? Though we see the book's events through Joseph K.'s eyes, he is a horrible, cruel, self-centered man. Nearly every thought he has, and every word he speaks to anyone else is derogatory, condescending, and plain mean. He sees and treats all women as whores. All men he treats as stupider than himself. Any decent, moral thought he has is immediately driven out of his mind by his arrogance.

AND-- "Der Prozess" is only one of the seven chapters in this revelatory book by Robertson. Anyone who enjoys Kafka's work and wants to understand it better should get a copy of this book. The level of knowledge and analysis is astonishing.

My one beef with this translation is that all the direct quotations from Kafka's works are left in German. If you don't speak German, your use of this book will be somewhat hampered. I know enough German to be able to figure out what paragraph is printed in the Robertson, so that I can find that paragraph in Kafka and read it in translation.