Kafka’s Other Prague: Writings from the Czechoslovak Republic

233 Pages·2018·4.234 MB·English

by  Anne Jamison

Kafka’s Other Prague

Kafka’s Other Prague
Writings from the Czechoslovak Republic
Anne Jamison
northwestern university press
evanston, illinois
Northwestern University Press
www.nupress.northwestern.edu
Copyright © 2018 by Northwestern University Press.
Published 2018. All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Jamison, Anne Elizabeth, 1969– author.
Title: Kafka’s other Prague : writings from the Czechoslovak Republic / Anne
Jamison.
Description: Evanston, Illinois : Northwestern University Press, 2018. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018004075| ISBN 9780810137202 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN
9780810137219 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780810137226 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Kafka, Franz, 1883–1924—Criticism and interpretation. | Kafka,
Franz, 1883–1924—Knowledge—Czech language. | Kafka, Franz, 1883–
1924—Homes and haunts—Czech Republic—Prague. | Prague (Czech
Republic)—Intellectual life—20th century.
Classification: LCC PT2621.A26 Z7468 2018 | DDC 833.912—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018004075
for Mirek

Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 3
Chapter 1
Kafka and Czech: Away from “Minor Literature” 27
Chapter 2
Kafka and the Czech Press 43
Chapter 3
Language Territories 61
Chapter 4
“Is There a Castle Here?” An Architecture of Disappearing Lines 77
Chapter 5
Reading Klam(m) 105
Chapter 6
F:M (The Correspondence with Jesenská) 113
Chapter 7
“Official Decisions Are as Shy as Young Girls”: Gender in The Castle 131
Chapter 8
Of Mice and Music 159
Conclusion 191
Notes 195
Index 217

Acknowledgments
Different stages of my research for this book have spanned many years and
benefitted from the help of more people than I can acknowledge here. The
book owes its single greatest debt to Stanley Corngold for years of careful
reading and decades of conversation about Kafka. From this project’s earliest
stages, I am grateful for the very patient guidance of the late Peter Kussi, the
more stringent but no less generous help of the late Karel Brušák, and the
insights and experience of the late Eduard Goldstücker and František Kaut-
man. I owe David Short everything I know about vowel shifts, vestiges of the
dual, shrikes, and meadow saffron. Robert Pynsent had a unique influence
on my understanding of Czech history and literature, not least because of the
unusual seminars he convened on Czech literature at the School of Slavonic
and East European Studies at the University of London. David Chirico and
Tim Beasley- Murray have been at different times generous and exciting
interlocutors, as were Jindřich Tomán and members of the Czech Studies
Workshop. Peter Steiner taught me a great deal about the Prague School.
Marjorie Perloff has been generous with her time and support. I owe ancient
and last- minute debts to my spolužák for life, Alex Zucker. Kevin Power is
in his own category of influence—i n a lot of ways, but also in terms of his
intellectual and editorial help in shaping my manuscript.
At Princeton University, my work received generous support from the
Graduate School, the Department of Comparative Literature, and the Coun-
cil for European Studies. Earlier drafts of two chapters here benefited from
the guidance of Claudia Brodsky and Michael Wood. The University of
Utah has supported my work through a Faculty Fellowship, numerous inter-
national travel grants, a Faculty Research Award, and a fellowship at the
Tanner Humanities Center. My friends and colleagues in the English depart-
ment have been uniformly generous and supportive of my comparative work,
for which I am eternally grateful. In particular on this project, Vincent Cheng
and Howard Horowitz have been valuable readers, Scott Black an important
interlocutor on the novel, and Barry Weller as always a tireless editor and
supportive chair as well as a dear friend. Nancy Roche and Jace Brittain
also provided timely assistance, as did Stuart Culver, Andrew Franta, Cynthia
Stark, and Elizabeth Swanstrom.
Many of the materials this study has relied upon were provided to me
by archivists and other staff: in Prague at the Národní Knihovna, the Ústav
pro českou literaturu, the Památník národního písemnictví, the newspaper
ix