The Trial in Never too Late to Read Classics

Dec 03, 2017 Sara rated it liked it

Shelves: classics, literary-fiction, gutenberg-download

In today’s world, which feels so much less clear and more upside down to me than the one I used to know, this book seems more prophetic than science fiction. An exploration of the absolute absurdity and uselessness of life and the total breakdown of any sensible justice system, it makes you shiver a bit. Does it make sense to struggle when there are no answers (in fact, not even questions that can be put to anyone other than yourself)? Seeking to understand what is going on around you, what is b In today’s world, which feels so much less clear and more upside down to me than the one I used to know, this book seems more prophetic than science fiction. An exploration of the absolute absurdity and uselessness of life and the total breakdown of any sensible justice system, it makes you shiver a bit. Does it make sense to struggle when there are no answers (in fact, not even questions that can be put to anyone other than yourself)? Seeking to understand what is going on around you, what is being done to you and what is expected from you is tantamount to insanity, for there are no explanations and no rules that you are allowed to know. There is less justice for those who seek to understand their human predicament, and more leniency for those who just happen to stumble upon the right approach or the right judge. Even the lawyers are clueless, and I don’t even want to try to make sense of how religion fails in this novel.

What, indeed, is K’s crime? It doesn’t matter. He doesn’t know what he has done, we don’t know what he has done, but living, alone, is crime enough. There is nothing to believe in in K’s world. If there are higher-ups, he is never able to reach or understand them, in fact they seem to exist in theory only. The only people he ever meets are lowly officials. If the higher powers do exist, are they of any use to him? I wonder how much of what he is saying about “higher powers” is truly Kafka grappling with the concept of God. Other people seem to believe in them, there are rumors that they have done things, made rulings, but K finds no evidence that they exist. Every person K meets is part of the court system, which must mean he is being judged by humanity itself rather than something outside of humanity.

This book is so psychologically dense and complicated that I am sure I only walked away with a fragment of what Kafka was trying to convey. It certainly serves to humble one when encountering the mind that is needed to produce such a story.

However, and this is a big however for me, I hated reading it. It pushed and pulled and stood still. I didn’t care what happened to K except in that larger sense that he seemed to represent mankind--if it can happen to him, it can happen to you. My second Kafka, and I find him far too challenging to enjoy, but important because he makes you think and will not allow you to look the other way.

If I were rating this on any pleasure grid, it would get 1-star from me. But rated on a meaning grid, it probably deserves 5-stars. I have compromised and given it 3.5.
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