The Trial by Franz Kafka is a novel about Josef K, who is one day suddenly arrested without knowing his crime. Told in third person, it is a piece of absurdist and existentialist fiction remniscient of the realist literature movement that began in the second half of the 19th century. Josef is prosecuted by a seemingly undecipherable authority during his trial and through several hearings, only to be stabbed in the heart and strangled in the end. Like the Metamorphosis, it professes that life is ultimately meaningless and illustrates a world that is inhuman and alienating.
Opening Line: “Someone must have been telling lies about Joseph K., for without having done anything wrong he was arrested one fine morning.”
Favorite Line: “The books we need are of the kind that act upon us like a misfortune, that makes us suffer like the death of someone we love more than ourselves, that make us feel as though we were on the verge of suicide, lost in a forest remote from all human habitation.”
Why I Like It: I read the Metamorphosis long before the class, and throughout my later high school years much enjoyed European literature of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, particularly Russian classics (taking AP Euro only encouraged me to read more of these books). I was also interested in reading Camus and Kafka (and Kierkegaard, but I haven’t gotten to that yet), so the assignment was an opportunity to read another classic I previously did not have the chance to. I like how classics give us a window into other historical eras, writing conventions, and ideologies, especially because a lot of modern young adult literature makes me cringe or feels shallow. The Trial, like many of its other peers, tends to have very long and winding paragraphs, often lasting several pages, and it’s definitely something to get used to.
Read If You Like: The Metamorphosis, Crime and Punishment, law and history