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Kafka's Dick
'Alan Bennett is a courageous and gifted no one since Shaw has had the guts to include a finale set in Heaven which resembles some awful publishing party-cum-tea-dance at the Savoy, or mix up so many fundamentally serious ideas about the importance - or lack of it - of art and artists in our gossip-prone, disordered lives with so much engaging theatrical capering.'Time Out
52 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1986
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About the author
Alan Bennett
275 books1,120 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
Alan Bennett is an English author and Tony Award-winning playwright. Bennett's first stage play, Forty Years On, was produced in 1968. Many television, stage and radio plays followed, along with screenplays, short stories, novellas, a large body of non-fictional prose and broadcasting, and many appearances as an actor. Bennett's lugubrious yet expressive voice (which still bears a slight Leeds accent) and the sharp humour and evident humanity of his writing have made his readings of his own work (especially his autobiographical writing) very popular. His readings of the Winnie the Pooh stories are also widely enjoyed.
Alan Bennett is an English author and Tony Award-winning playwright. Bennett's first stage play, Forty Years On, was produced in 1968. Many television, stage and radio plays followed, along with screenplays, short stories, novellas, a large body of non-fictional prose and broadcasting, and many appearances as an actor. Bennett's lugubrious yet expressive voice (which still bears a slight Leeds accent) and the sharp humour and evident humanity of his writing have made his readings of his own work (especially his autobiographical writing) very popular. His readings of the Winnie the Pooh stories are also widely enjoyed.
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
November 22, 2025
Kafka’s Dick is a surreal comedy that uses its unlikely premise—Franz Kafka and Max Brod appearing in suburban Yorkshire decades after their deaths—to probe the uneasy relationship between an artist and his work. Beneath the absurd humor lies a serious examination of whether the private life of a writer should matter more than the literary achievements they leave behind.
Kafka himself is portrayed as bewildered by his posthumous fame, a cruel irony given his insistence that Brod destroy his manuscripts. The play highlights the tension between Kafka’s desire for obscurity and the world’s determination to elevate him as a literary giant.
As Bennett says “The theory these days (or one of them) is that the reader brings as much to the book as the author. So how much more do readers bring who have never managed to get through the book at all? It follows that the books one remembers best are the books one has never read. To be remembered but not read has been the fate of The Trial despite it being the most readable of Kafka’s books. Kafka on the whole is not very readable. But then to be readable does not help a classic. Great books are taken as read, or taken as having been read. If they are read, or read too often and too easily by too many, the likelihood is they are not great books or won’t remain so for long. Read too much they crumble away as nowadays popular mountains are prone to do.”
A central figure in this play is Kafka’s father, who appears as an oppressive authority and a reminder of the suffocating parent child dynamic that shaped Kafka’s inner struggles.
As Bennett notes “There was another emperor nearer at hand, the emperor in the armchair, Kafka’s phrase for his father. Hermann Kafka has had such a consistently bad press that it’s hard not to feel a sneaking sympathy for him as for all the Parents of Art. They never get it right. They bring up a child badly and he turns out a writer, posterity never forgives them – though without that unfortunate upbringing the writer might never have written a word. They bring up a child well and he never does write a word. Do it right and posterity never hears about the parents; do it wrong and posterity never hears about anything else.
‘They fuck you up your Mum and Dad’ and if you’re planning on writing that’s probably a good thing. But if you are planning on writing and they haven’t fucked you up, well, you’ve got nothing to go on, so then they’ve fucked you up good and proper.”
In the play, the father’s presence embodies the weight of familial expectation, and he wields power over Kafka by threatening to reveal his son’s most private secret—namely, the size of his penis.
The surreal collision of Kafka and Brod with the banality of suburban life underscores the absurdity of trying to reconcile the extraordinary with the ordinary. Bennett’s dry wit ensures that the comedy never undermines the seriousness of the questions posed; instead, it sharpens them. The humor becomes a vehicle for intellectual inquiry, allowing audiences to laugh while confronting uncomfortable truths about art, fame, and the ownership of a writer’s legacy.
Bennett’s play entertains, but more importantly, it compels us to reflect on how we treat the lives and works of artists long after they are gone.
Kafka himself is portrayed as bewildered by his posthumous fame, a cruel irony given his insistence that Brod destroy his manuscripts. The play highlights the tension between Kafka’s desire for obscurity and the world’s determination to elevate him as a literary giant.
As Bennett says “The theory these days (or one of them) is that the reader brings as much to the book as the author. So how much more do readers bring who have never managed to get through the book at all? It follows that the books one remembers best are the books one has never read. To be remembered but not read has been the fate of The Trial despite it being the most readable of Kafka’s books. Kafka on the whole is not very readable. But then to be readable does not help a classic. Great books are taken as read, or taken as having been read. If they are read, or read too often and too easily by too many, the likelihood is they are not great books or won’t remain so for long. Read too much they crumble away as nowadays popular mountains are prone to do.”
A central figure in this play is Kafka’s father, who appears as an oppressive authority and a reminder of the suffocating parent child dynamic that shaped Kafka’s inner struggles.
As Bennett notes “There was another emperor nearer at hand, the emperor in the armchair, Kafka’s phrase for his father. Hermann Kafka has had such a consistently bad press that it’s hard not to feel a sneaking sympathy for him as for all the Parents of Art. They never get it right. They bring up a child badly and he turns out a writer, posterity never forgives them – though without that unfortunate upbringing the writer might never have written a word. They bring up a child well and he never does write a word. Do it right and posterity never hears about the parents; do it wrong and posterity never hears about anything else.
‘They fuck you up your Mum and Dad’ and if you’re planning on writing that’s probably a good thing. But if you are planning on writing and they haven’t fucked you up, well, you’ve got nothing to go on, so then they’ve fucked you up good and proper.”
In the play, the father’s presence embodies the weight of familial expectation, and he wields power over Kafka by threatening to reveal his son’s most private secret—namely, the size of his penis.
The surreal collision of Kafka and Brod with the banality of suburban life underscores the absurdity of trying to reconcile the extraordinary with the ordinary. Bennett’s dry wit ensures that the comedy never undermines the seriousness of the questions posed; instead, it sharpens them. The humor becomes a vehicle for intellectual inquiry, allowing audiences to laugh while confronting uncomfortable truths about art, fame, and the ownership of a writer’s legacy.
Bennett’s play entertains, but more importantly, it compels us to reflect on how we treat the lives and works of artists long after they are gone.
January 6, 2022
Well, I like Kafka and I do like dicks, let's make this happen.
June 23, 2019
I love Alan Bennett's plays. They are a mixture of comedy and pathos. This play is no exception...listen to it on CD rather than reading the text.
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November 2, 2022
[ to review at a later date - perhaps even re-read and review at a later date as well, though not urgent ]
October 22, 2013
Insane and hilarious play about the size of Kafka's genitalia and the burning of his manuscripts.
July 18, 2025
Kafka’s Dick by Alan Bennett
Outré, but for all the provocative, somewhat outrageous title, this play has some serious topics, if approached in a jocular manner.
We have plenty of literary, at times psychoanalytical, then psychological references to Fitzgerald, Hitler, Freud, Proust and many more writers and famous figures.
From the start, we listen to a dialogue between Franz Kafka
- Max, I want you to burn all my works
- Franz, you really want to do this
- Yes, it must be done
- All right, burn, baby burn
These are not the words in the play that anyway takes liberties and a light tone in dealing with a serious matter.
Indeed, Max Brod has not respected the wishes of his friend- only friend as we are later told-and that is an important issue in here.
- I keep hearing the same question all over again
- Instead of congratulating me, people keep asking – why didn’t you burn all his manuscripts…?
There is a quandary here, although not a major moral question, if you want my opinion:
- Do you need to obey the last wishes?
- Yes, but when we are dealing with depriving humanity of such precious work, there is no question where the right answer lies
After this initial conversation that verges on the absurd and even touches on the improper, but with the obvious intention to be thought provoking and humorous, we meet other characters:
Sydney is an insurance salesman that has a penchant for literature, but in a shallow form- I guess I can relate to this guy, even if this is somewhat embarrassing, but hey, we share a rather light interest in books…it could have been worse.
He vents his knowledge of quite petty, quiz show information of small value in front of his ignorant wife- Linda:
- Did you know that Hitler and Wittgenstein went to the same school
They move on to discuss other trivia or gossip columns, tabloid material that may or may not be relevant:
- Some psychologists have studied the works of Kafka and arrived to some conclusions, among which they mentioned that he had a small penis- ergo the title?
Scott F. Fitzgerald is then mentioned as having the same small size…it appears that Hemingway was on the subject and Zelda talked about it.
E.M. Forster is also brought in as a subject, with his gay relationship with a (married) policeman that albeit of vulgar interest, may cast a light on some of his works…or may not
A connection is also made between Dostoyevsky, Kafka and…Hitler of all people:
- In Crime and Punishment there is a suspected killer who is a house painter
- Joseph K. is also suspected of a crime committed by…a house painter
- Hitler is again suspected of being a…house painter
Provocation and hilarity are intended by the author and these notes on various authors intrigue me, where I did not know about them.
If Freud wanted to appear bigger, E.M. Forster and Kafka were on the opposite end, with every intention to diminish themselves.
Sydney wrote in his amateur paper something like:
- Kafka related to smaller and smaller beings- ape, turtle, beetle- if he would have carried on like this, we would need a microscope to study his work
In an absurd, bordering on the outré incident the dead Max Brod shows up at Sydney’s door, where he pees on the turtle- the latter occurrence is futile to say the least.
Other than that the play is rather good, if too liberal in the title and some of its initiatives for this conventional, perhaps even reactionary reader.
Proust is compared with Kafka, and albeit praised and rightly placed at the top of the literary establishment, they need to talk about his preference for “boys”.
Bennett is rather interested in homosexuality that appears frequently, in various guises in his works, for a reason.
He knows about this and so many subjects, the author being an erudite and very witty, innovative and creative playwright.
Outré, but for all the provocative, somewhat outrageous title, this play has some serious topics, if approached in a jocular manner.
We have plenty of literary, at times psychoanalytical, then psychological references to Fitzgerald, Hitler, Freud, Proust and many more writers and famous figures.
From the start, we listen to a dialogue between Franz Kafka
- Max, I want you to burn all my works
- Franz, you really want to do this
- Yes, it must be done
- All right, burn, baby burn
These are not the words in the play that anyway takes liberties and a light tone in dealing with a serious matter.
Indeed, Max Brod has not respected the wishes of his friend- only friend as we are later told-and that is an important issue in here.
- I keep hearing the same question all over again
- Instead of congratulating me, people keep asking – why didn’t you burn all his manuscripts…?
There is a quandary here, although not a major moral question, if you want my opinion:
- Do you need to obey the last wishes?
- Yes, but when we are dealing with depriving humanity of such precious work, there is no question where the right answer lies
After this initial conversation that verges on the absurd and even touches on the improper, but with the obvious intention to be thought provoking and humorous, we meet other characters:
Sydney is an insurance salesman that has a penchant for literature, but in a shallow form- I guess I can relate to this guy, even if this is somewhat embarrassing, but hey, we share a rather light interest in books…it could have been worse.
He vents his knowledge of quite petty, quiz show information of small value in front of his ignorant wife- Linda:
- Did you know that Hitler and Wittgenstein went to the same school
They move on to discuss other trivia or gossip columns, tabloid material that may or may not be relevant:
- Some psychologists have studied the works of Kafka and arrived to some conclusions, among which they mentioned that he had a small penis- ergo the title?
Scott F. Fitzgerald is then mentioned as having the same small size…it appears that Hemingway was on the subject and Zelda talked about it.
E.M. Forster is also brought in as a subject, with his gay relationship with a (married) policeman that albeit of vulgar interest, may cast a light on some of his works…or may not
A connection is also made between Dostoyevsky, Kafka and…Hitler of all people:
- In Crime and Punishment there is a suspected killer who is a house painter
- Joseph K. is also suspected of a crime committed by…a house painter
- Hitler is again suspected of being a…house painter
Provocation and hilarity are intended by the author and these notes on various authors intrigue me, where I did not know about them.
If Freud wanted to appear bigger, E.M. Forster and Kafka were on the opposite end, with every intention to diminish themselves.
Sydney wrote in his amateur paper something like:
- Kafka related to smaller and smaller beings- ape, turtle, beetle- if he would have carried on like this, we would need a microscope to study his work
In an absurd, bordering on the outré incident the dead Max Brod shows up at Sydney’s door, where he pees on the turtle- the latter occurrence is futile to say the least.
Other than that the play is rather good, if too liberal in the title and some of its initiatives for this conventional, perhaps even reactionary reader.
Proust is compared with Kafka, and albeit praised and rightly placed at the top of the literary establishment, they need to talk about his preference for “boys”.
Bennett is rather interested in homosexuality that appears frequently, in various guises in his works, for a reason.
He knows about this and so many subjects, the author being an erudite and very witty, innovative and creative playwright.
April 16, 2023
Some sparkling Bennett material here in a play that looks at literary legacy, criticism and reputation. Did Kafka really want his work destroyed ? How would he view his legacy ? If you really understood me, he protests to one critic, you’d realise that I didn’t want to be understood ! Literary reputation, another character wryly observes, is based on those who know your name but haven’t read you.
in looking at some of the famously insecure writer’s ways of relieving himself it asks how far we divorced the artist from their traits we don’t like, a question that feeds sharply into today’s cancel culture wars . When we try to construct an authors life , the play asks, do we want the nuanced and complex whole or a simplified version that we can cope with ?
The titular aspect with concern about small genitals fuelling literary bleakness is a bit tedious but quickly passed over. Like all Bennett, sharp poignant and funny.
in looking at some of the famously insecure writer’s ways of relieving himself it asks how far we divorced the artist from their traits we don’t like, a question that feeds sharply into today’s cancel culture wars . When we try to construct an authors life , the play asks, do we want the nuanced and complex whole or a simplified version that we can cope with ?
The titular aspect with concern about small genitals fuelling literary bleakness is a bit tedious but quickly passed over. Like all Bennett, sharp poignant and funny.
July 28, 2022
This play was awesome, but it probably helped that I’d already read a little bit of Kafka. It has a lot of nods to his ouvre and his style, taking the form of a surreal play with some metamorphoses along the way.
It’s a fantastic play in its own right, but it’s also a pretty touching tribute to Kafka and his work, and one that I’d love to see performed, especially because there are a few scenes in which the actors break the fourth wall. But then, I wouldn’t expect anything less from Bennett. He’s great.
It’s a fantastic play in its own right, but it’s also a pretty touching tribute to Kafka and his work, and one that I’d love to see performed, especially because there are a few scenes in which the actors break the fourth wall. But then, I wouldn’t expect anything less from Bennett. He’s great.
February 11, 2017
Hilarious and quite profound in it's way. As a play, it is subject to misunderstanding. It is not about Kafka, or only secondarily. It is actually about biography, the problem of assessing another's life, especially when that person is an artist. It features Kafka because that man's life is the most extreme modern case of an artist's work being itself extremely enigmatic, but serving to further obscure his life and character rather than reveal it.
April 21, 2023
Zalig theaterstuk, absurd en geestig, met veel schrijfplezier gemaakt, wat besmettelijk werkt.
Over de eeuwige roem van de kunstenaar en de eeuwige last der literaire kritiek. Spitse dialogen, veel zinnige maar speels aangebrachte reflecties over het wezen dat beroemd dus onsterfelijk wil zijn, de mens.
Over de eeuwige roem van de kunstenaar en de eeuwige last der literaire kritiek. Spitse dialogen, veel zinnige maar speels aangebrachte reflecties over het wezen dat beroemd dus onsterfelijk wil zijn, de mens.
April 16, 2023
I'm a fan of Kafka and a big fan of Bennett but couldn't find my way into this, perhaps just me and the day. It didn't cohere. I'll give it a another go sometime.....there are some very amusing moments.
September 27, 2018
Hahahaha! Funny side of Oedipus Rex.
September 10, 2019
Really enjoyed the madness of this play
May 26, 2020
I get it, but I don’t get it. I often feel that way with British humor...
Read
July 5, 2023Kafka: Not a cockroach. You said cockroach. It was a beetle.
Brod: Will you listen to this man. I make him world famous and he quibbles over entomology.
Brod: Will you listen to this man. I make him world famous and he quibbles over entomology.
January 31, 2024
Much less vulgar than expected
April 2, 2025
so interesting to start with; the vibe just got weirder tho and it wasn’t really for me
September 27, 2021
LATEST RE-READ, September 2021.
Gets better every time I read through it, and one of the rare plays I think benefits from reading rather than being performed. Performed, Bennet distracts you with the humor, the audacity, the absurdity. When you take the time to read at your own pace you notice how deep it plumbs into depths like creativity, genius as mythology, and the parasocial relationships critics form with their subjects. (Decades before the idea of parasocial celebrity became a topic du jour.)
Gets better every time I read through it, and one of the rare plays I think benefits from reading rather than being performed. Performed, Bennet distracts you with the humor, the audacity, the absurdity. When you take the time to read at your own pace you notice how deep it plumbs into depths like creativity, genius as mythology, and the parasocial relationships critics form with their subjects. (Decades before the idea of parasocial celebrity became a topic du jour.)
September 23, 2016
There is a slightly stronger hint of acid in this piece than I have found in other Alan Bennett works and it doesn't sit quite as well with me. The stabs at fame are just a little petulant in places and though this may well be appropriate to Kafka's perceived wishes it feels like some of Bennett's exasperations may be getting an airing too.
The double entendre's stemming from the business of the title are just a little forced but having said all that the witty wordplay and underlying warmth do almost buoy this up to a fourth star.
The double entendre's stemming from the business of the title are just a little forced but having said all that the witty wordplay and underlying warmth do almost buoy this up to a fourth star.
March 6, 2014
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Strange and mildly amusing play by Alan Bennett as heard on Radio 4.
PLOT= Great author Franz Kafka, and his friend Max Brod (brilliantly played by Michael Cochrane), are resurrected in the home of Kafka fan Sydney. Things become very complicated, not helped by the appearance of Kafka senior, who seems to pose the answer concerning Franz's little problem...
Strange and mildly amusing play by Alan Bennett as heard on Radio 4.
PLOT= Great author Franz Kafka, and his friend Max Brod (brilliantly played by Michael Cochrane), are resurrected in the home of Kafka fan Sydney. Things become very complicated, not helped by the appearance of Kafka senior, who seems to pose the answer concerning Franz's little problem...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 21, 2015
Not as wonderful as "The Lady in the Van", but definitely a really delightful play.
July 22, 2015
A ridiculous but amusing play, that introduced me to Kafka. A light hearted recording that is cleverly written to incorporate humor into a play about an influential author.
October 17, 2015
Whity, smart and juvenile. A great play, the best play of Bennet's I've read to date.
December 30, 2015
As usual Alan Bennett is witty and thought provoking at the same time
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews