Franz Kafka - a guide to his greatest works

"Beginners should start with the short stories before tackling the novels. Be prepared for writing which can be very philosophical, heavily symbolic, and full of strange images. There is often no plot or dramatic tension, but the prose style is truly original.

Kafka's work is also full of black humour; he writes both about and from the point of view of animals; and some of his shorter pieces are in the form of parables, meditations, poetic fragments, and sketches.

Keep in mind that Kafka was one of many great writers who did not win the Nobel Prize for literature - along with Tolstoy, Joseph Conrad, Thomas Hardy, Virginia Woolf, and James Joyce." (list at link)

Online texts:

• The Trial
• Metamorphosis
  

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