I love your analysis, and I definitely agree that the "stranginest" of this story is a major theme that no one seems to emphasize. Many reviews start by describing the plot as some kind of realistic story, but in fact, the weird internal logic of both Ka and the village, the dream-like state of everything, and the absurdism, as you said, are the main themes in my view.
Thanks for a refreshing analysis and voice, regarding the book I finished this evening, it was truly a marvelous read. Me being interested in philosophy of religion and theology (natural and revealed). This then, from my eyes seen, was the most interesting parts of this story was the trying to make sense of the correspondence between the village and the castle. I did find the book getting heavier and heavier for it's accumulating style of the allegory getting more intricate for every page. Questions that this book really highlighted for me was the metaphysics of transferring of messages, i.e. where precisely can the transfer be located in a chain of inference. Although that is rather epistemological I think I might try to put some thought into making sense of Kafkas depiction of this book and as how it might work with bridging reason and revealed belief in a religious faith as the paradox of bridging the finite and the infinite. On the subject of revealed theology I found the part when K. peeked through a hole in a door at Klamm to be fascinating! This was only the third of his books I read, before this I read Investigations of a dog which really took me by surprise. I could find a lot of serious, to be accounted for, thoughts on epistemology and philosophy of mind in that one! Greetings from Sweden, you just earned yourself a well deserved 800 subs!
Thank you for watching and being our 800th subscriber! I'm happy to see this specific video get some attention. I read this is the depth of winter and it was the perfect book at the perfect time! I really enjoy your interpretation of the very strange and allegorical bureaucratic process of the town trying to communicate with the castle and think it could easily refer to humankind trying to communicate with a form of higher power. Thanks for watching and welcome aboard!
I like to look at Kafka via a literal interpretation and a metaphorical one (Metamorphosis as "gregor is actually a giant cockroach" and "gregor's dead" making it a story about grief, for an example). Seeing what is presented literally, The Castle could be a burocratical hell where nobody actually knows what is happening, cause and effect work in reverse, everyone can only see what has happened, and define a cause for it through their biases, preconceptions and life experiences. While at the start of the book K seems to be more questioning and defying of such way of thinking, by the end he felt much more comfortable with their reversed way of thinking, so I feel that, if the book was complete, it'd walk towards him fitting in even further, until he was eventually accepted into the village. I'm also of the idea that Klamm isn't even real, just an imaginary figure the villagers and castle people worship, and they believe must be out there, otherwise how would the system be running? But at the same time, I wouldn't be surprised if Klamm was real and just wants things to be simple and for K to do his job, as he finds it necessary. Would be a slightly comedical ending to this purgatory, but not fitting for Kafka, so this is probably my bad writing speaking. However, in the same vein as there is worship for Klamm, Frieda is also very worshiped, so I felt the direction it could take was of the parallel between how K is a firm believer in Frieda's holiness, but disrespectful of Klamm's. Pepi to Frieda, K to Klamm, perhaps they were indeed more alike than it seemed. Thinking of it as a metaphor, I feel mostly that it speaks of people waiting for rapture to come. They're all confident that they're right, they're the victims, but someone up there may one day come and save them from the hell that is their life. I don't see it necessarily as religious in nature, but even without a clear faith in God, sometimes we are expecting things to get better, that something will happen, someone with more power will change the status quo, perhaps one could even argue it is about politics, even. Out of all unfinished books I read, I think this is the one I'd wish for its completed edition to exist, if I got a genie in a bottle. (or I could be smart and wish for all incomplete books to have been completed instead and make it better for everyone) I just finished reading it and had to find someone talking about it to hear some differing opinions, sort my own, and write some about it, because it really was interesting to me. Some of the thoughts and realizations I had here were thanks to your commentary, so thank you for the video.
I think this is an incredibly smart way to tackle reading Kafka, in fact, I think it is smart to always look at books in concrete terms as well as abstract metaphors! I have a tendency to enjoy abstract readings more, but sometimes concrete readings reveal so much! Poe's "The Raven" is a great example!
As a SF reader of many many years I recently realised I had not read some important books / authors . Things like Moby dick , The brothers karamazov , Kafkas work to mention but a few so I am now putting at least one major work a month in amongst the SF I usually read. This video was excellent I will definitely be reading some Kafka soon.
Kafka is worth it, and although he is not sci-fi, I feel like his writing has many aspects that pair well with sci-fi! Thanks so much for watching and taking the time to comment!
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I love your analysis, and I definitely agree that the "stranginest" of this story is a major theme that no one seems to emphasize. Many reviews start by describing the plot as some kind of realistic story, but in fact, the weird internal logic of both Ka and the village, the dream-like state of everything, and the absurdism, as you said, are the main themes in my view.
Thank you so much!
Wow !
You are an excellent verbalizer.
It was a joy listening to your comprehensive review .
Subscribed 👍🏼
Thank you so much for the kind words! We're glad to have you!
Thanks for a refreshing analysis and voice, regarding the book I finished this evening, it was truly a marvelous read. Me being interested in philosophy of religion and theology (natural and revealed). This then, from my eyes seen, was the most interesting parts of this story was the trying to make sense of the correspondence between the village and the castle. I did find the book getting heavier and heavier for it's accumulating style of the allegory getting more intricate for every page. Questions that this book really highlighted for me was the metaphysics of transferring of messages, i.e. where precisely can the transfer be located in a chain of inference. Although that is rather epistemological I think I might try to put some thought into making sense of Kafkas depiction of this book and as how it might work with bridging reason and revealed belief in a religious faith as the paradox of bridging the finite and the infinite. On the subject of revealed theology I found the part when K. peeked through a hole in a door at Klamm to be fascinating!
This was only the third of his books I read, before this I read Investigations of a dog which really took me by surprise. I could find a lot of serious, to be accounted for, thoughts on epistemology and philosophy of mind in that one! Greetings from Sweden, you just earned yourself a well deserved 800 subs!
Thank you for watching and being our 800th subscriber! I'm happy to see this specific video get some attention. I read this is the depth of winter and it was the perfect book at the perfect time! I really enjoy your interpretation of the very strange and allegorical bureaucratic process of the town trying to communicate with the castle and think it could easily refer to humankind trying to communicate with a form of higher power. Thanks for watching and welcome aboard!
I like to look at Kafka via a literal interpretation and a metaphorical one (Metamorphosis as "gregor is actually a giant cockroach" and "gregor's dead" making it a story about grief, for an example). Seeing what is presented literally, The Castle could be a burocratical hell where nobody actually knows what is happening, cause and effect work in reverse, everyone can only see what has happened, and define a cause for it through their biases, preconceptions and life experiences. While at the start of the book K seems to be more questioning and defying of such way of thinking, by the end he felt much more comfortable with their reversed way of thinking, so I feel that, if the book was complete, it'd walk towards him fitting in even further, until he was eventually accepted into the village. I'm also of the idea that Klamm isn't even real, just an imaginary figure the villagers and castle people worship, and they believe must be out there, otherwise how would the system be running? But at the same time, I wouldn't be surprised if Klamm was real and just wants things to be simple and for K to do his job, as he finds it necessary. Would be a slightly comedical ending to this purgatory, but not fitting for Kafka, so this is probably my bad writing speaking.
However, in the same vein as there is worship for Klamm, Frieda is also very worshiped, so I felt the direction it could take was of the parallel between how K is a firm believer in Frieda's holiness, but disrespectful of Klamm's. Pepi to Frieda, K to Klamm, perhaps they were indeed more alike than it seemed.
Thinking of it as a metaphor, I feel mostly that it speaks of people waiting for rapture to come. They're all confident that they're right, they're the victims, but someone up there may one day come and save them from the hell that is their life. I don't see it necessarily as religious in nature, but even without a clear faith in God, sometimes we are expecting things to get better, that something will happen, someone with more power will change the status quo, perhaps one could even argue it is about politics, even. Out of all unfinished books I read, I think this is the one I'd wish for its completed edition to exist, if I got a genie in a bottle. (or I could be smart and wish for all incomplete books to have been completed instead and make it better for everyone)
I just finished reading it and had to find someone talking about it to hear some differing opinions, sort my own, and write some about it, because it really was interesting to me. Some of the thoughts and realizations I had here were thanks to your commentary, so thank you for the video.
I think this is an incredibly smart way to tackle reading Kafka, in fact, I think it is smart to always look at books in concrete terms as well as abstract metaphors! I have a tendency to enjoy abstract readings more, but sometimes concrete readings reveal so much! Poe's "The Raven" is a great example!
As a SF reader of many many years I recently realised I had not read some important books / authors . Things like Moby dick , The brothers karamazov , Kafkas work to mention but a few so I am now putting at least one major work a month in amongst the SF I usually read. This video was excellent I will definitely be reading some Kafka soon.
Kafka is worth it, and although he is not sci-fi, I feel like his writing has many aspects that pair well with sci-fi! Thanks so much for watching and taking the time to comment!
I honestly enjoy the castle and america more then the trial .. i dont like to say it but i always have.
Interesting, I've not read Amerika, but I think I liked the Trial a bit more than the Castle.
I loved your review!
Thank you so much!