[ SECRET POST #2238 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2238 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 097 secrets from Secret Submission Post #320.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[hwc]

My eye immediately jumped to Metamorphosis and then I spent the next minute glaring at my screen and cusing my ninth grade German teacher who had a hard-on for Kafka.

Goddamn. Kafka.

[mekkio]

I love that book. Broke my heart.

What didn't you like about it? It might give me a new perspective if you told me.

[hwc]

Oh God, if you love it I'm not sure I should tell you, because I have as much a hate-on for all things Kafka as my German teacher had a hard-on.

I think my main beef with it was how fucked up the story is. Like the shit with the rotting apples stuck in his back. I don't mind dark or disturbing stuff, but with Kafka it always feels needlessy OTT to me. It's hard to explain; the story is fucked up, but fucked up in a way that makes me rage rather than give me the creeps.


What is it about the book that you love? That might help me look past my irrational hatred of the story. :)

[mekkio]

Funny, I like the story because it is so messed up. I saw it as a metaphor for someone who was the bread winner for the family, became injured or paralyzed and was now the burden of the family. He went from being human to being a literal pest. That no one wanted him around since he could no longer provide. And in fact, shut him off not only from the rest of the family but society. It was like a reflection on how society saw invalids. How quickly it can go from praising someone to shunning them. How disposable individuals are.

[dethtoll]

I don't particularly enjoy reading Kafka myself, but...

There's an Orson Welles film released in the early 1960s starring Anthony Perkins called The Trial it's heavily based on an unfinished Kafka work. I LOVED that movie, though it fucked me up emotionally for a few days after for much the same reason A Scanner Darkly (film version) did. I recommend it next time you're looking for something depressing.

[(Anonymous)]

I came out of the class where we read Die Verwandtlung (Metamorphosis; being in the original German did not particularly improve it) ranting about how much happier everyone would have been if Kafka had had access to modern psychiatric care: him, because he wouldn't have been so hideously depressed, and me, because he hopefully wouldn't have written that miserable book.

Although I liked it better than Die Besuch der alten Dame. Kafka had emotional issues. Whoever wrote that stupid play was a miserable old misanthrope who hated humanity.

[hwc]

Are you me, anon? This is exactly what I've been saying about Kafka ever since that miserable ninth grade.

Although I liked it better than Die Besuch der alten Dame. Kafka had emotional issues. Whoever wrote that stupid play was a miserable old misanthrope who hated humanity.

Oh, okay, you're not me. There are a couple of Dürrenmatt's plays I really love, including Der Besuch der alten Dame. He's the only German playwright whose works I own. Can I ask what it is about the play that you hate?

[(Anonymous)]

Just the miserable outlook on humanity, I guess. I don't remember very well, just that I found it even more depressing than Metamorphosis. It was at the end of the semester while Metamorphosis was at the beginning, though, so that might partially have been cumulative.

[(Anonymous)]

NA

Spoilers for Besuch der alten Dame

I had exactly the same problem. It was so dark and hopeless. I mean Ill was a terrible person but still the whole concept of your whole home town turning against and killing you in the end is just so freaking terryfing and depressing. It was the same with Metamorphosis and Bahnwärter Thiel. It's just so depressing in the end. Seriously what is with German writers and depressing stories?!

[hwc]

The same teacher that made us read Metamorphosis also made us read Bahnwärter Thiel! I don't think I've read a single German classic that didn't have a depressing ending.

And our German teachers all used to wonder why we didn't like reading the classics in school.

[hwc]

If you ever feel like giving Dürrenmatt another try I'd recommend Romulus der Große. It's not as well known as DBdaD, but it doesn't have that bleak view of humanity. Of Dürrenmatt's works that I have read DBdaD is the worst in that regard, I think, but as a whole I'd say that Dürrenmatt isn't nearly as depressing (and rage-inducing, but that might just be me) as Kafka.

You know, come to think of it, most German ~classics~ are a hell of a lot depressing. I don't think I've read a single one in school that had a happy ending.

[chardmonster]

Have you considered reading it after ninth grade?

There's a decent chance you were too young to really get it.

[hwc]

To be honest, I don't think I can get my hatred of all things Kafka now. It's a kneejerk reaction by now.

And it's not so much about getting it, because I did get most of what mekkio described upthread. As I said, everything about the story and how it is written is messed up, but in a way that completely pissed me off.

I don't know, maybe I will try and read Kafka again these days. Though we did read parts of Das Urteil, I think, in twelfth grade and it only made things worse.

(But I think you're on to something about being too young. In hindsight I don't think that reading Metamorphosis in ninth grade was the best idea our German teacher ever had, especially if she wanted us to appreciate ~proper~ literature. But on the other hand she also thought that we were all stupid dunderheads beyond help and that we wouldn't recognize a good book if it bit us in the ass. I'm kind of sad that I never got to see her reaction to Twilight. It would have been hilarious.)

[(Anonymous)]

Oh god, yes. Kafka. I don't like him. And a lot of people who take it so seriously don't realize that a lot of his writing was not meant to be taken as seriously as they take it.