SOURCE: “The Kafka Problem Compounded: Trial and “Judgment” in Modern Fiction Studies, 1977, pp. 511–29.

[In the following essay, Hobson reviews incorrect translations of “The Judgment” and speculates on its effect on Kafka criticism.]

Franz Kafka is no stranger to college-educated Americans. If they miss him in World Literature classes, they meet him in a psychology, philosophy, or religion course. Recently, literature-in-translation courses offered by foreign language departments have opened new avenues for Kafka into the curriculum and new markets for Kafka-in-translation texts. Witness a complete line of new and provocatively styled Kafka volumes produced by Schocken Books, which appeared on the shelves of paperback bookstores in 1974. It was the use of these editions in a Kafka-in-translation course which sparked the present undertaking. Since German is my native language, I prepared assignments in the original and then in the English text used by the class. When I first noticed discrepancies in the bilingual edition of the “Letter to his Father,” I was genuinely surprised. As bilingual reading progressed, mistranslations began to accumulate. Inevitably, the incorrect English version skewed the students' interpretations, and they had to be corrected. Soon they suspected particularly enigmatic passages as possibly resulting from mistranslation. Learning to distrust the printed page is no doubt beneficial, and students do expect textbooks to be occasionally wrong. But can we, as scholars, justify the existence of such inaccuracies in the translation of a major literary work, a translation which has been unchallenged on campuses and in scholars' studies for nearly forty years?

Unfortunately, the instructor has little choice because, with one exception, only one translation of Kafka's major works is readily available.¹ Most of it was done in the thirties by Edwin and Willa Muir and has been reverently preserved until today. In the novels, for instance, new manuscript material translated by a different author has simply been added to the original English version without regard for possible discrepancies. E. M. Butler, translator of the unfinished chapters of The Trial, has revised the so-called definitive English edition. In the arrest scene, K. still refers to his friend Hasterer as “the lawyer” (p. 12), whereas in the appended chapter Hasterer is a “prosecuting counsel” (p. 239). Kafka writes “Staatsanwalt” both times.² Where changes have been made in later editions, it was done without explanation. K.'s anguished protest, “But I am not guilty. And if it comes to that, how can any man be called guilty?” (p. 210) is a change from “how can any man be guilty?” It is not an improvement, however, for the earlier version more closely reflects Kafka: “Wie kann denn ein Mensch überhaupt schuldig sein” (p. 253). Different translations of some of the shorter texts do exist, but those chosen for the latest edition of the popular bilingual anthology Parables and Paradoxes are not necessarily the most accurate ones (see The Silence of the Sirens in the appended list). With such editorial practices, the number of mistranslations in the current editions is hardly surprising. Some are instances of intranslatable residue and should be annotated. The majority are just plain mistakes, not all as unbelievable as the misreading of Lied (song) for Leid (sorrow) in Amerika (see appended list), but just as indefensible. The situation is intolerable when the mistake leads not to confusion or lack of understanding—some critics argue, as Peter Heller did recently, that we are not supposed to understand Kafka anyway—³ but to misunderstanding and misinterpretation.

So far the profession has not been overly concerned with the problem. A few factual discrepancies have been noted.⁴ There is a brief article critical of the translation of The Castle.⁵ Apart from that, footnotes in more recent studies occasionally correct passages quoted from the standard Translation, and some authors substitute their own translations. The prevailing attitude, however, is still one of apologetic noninvolvement. The struggle of conscience versus piety is appeased “below the line,” an attitude exemplified by Heinz Politzer in the preface to the revised edition of his Kafka monograph.⁶

If this state of things is embarrassing in the classroom, it is worse in Kafka scholarship, where mistranslations of crucial passages have spawned serious misinterpretations. Authors who write in English tend to do one of three things.⁷ Those with a good command of German exhibit healthy skepticism; they either use their own translation or modify the standard version. Recent examples are three book-length studies by James Rolleston, Adrian Jaffe, and Franz Kuna.⁸ Rolleston in particular is critical of the Translation, but even he falls prey to the danger which inaccurate translations hold for the most careful of readers: in a few instances, he quotes the Translation and accepts uncritically its misleading implications (see notes 15 and 16). Jaffe, too, who corrects a few mistranslations, is not immune (see note 27). Kuna's is a special case. Occasionally he suggests improvements, but at least once he substitutes, without comment, his own wrong translation. Sometimes he quotes a mistranslated passage while his comments are obviously based on a correct reading of the German text. More often, his reading conveys the same wrong emphasis created by an error in the Translation.⁹

Critics without a sufficient knowledge of German, such as George Szanto, Maurice Friedman, and Ruth Tiefenbrun,¹⁰ have no choice but to retell the translator's mistakes. They usually base their interpretations not on the individual phrase or word but on the larger narrative structures. Misinterpretations occurring under these circumstances demonstrate to what extent Kafka's meaning has been altered in the Translation. Finally, there is the ultimate fallacy of treating the Translation as if it were an original text. With idiomatic expressions this can lead to astounding results. From Georg's “So you've been lying in wait for me” (p. 62), one critic of “The Judgment,” “using this statement both literally and figuratively,” deduces a latent incestuous relationship between father and son.¹¹ Kafka's verb auflauern (to ambush) says nothing about the position of the ambusher; the reclining position postulated by the critic, however, is hard to imagine. Milder versions of this type of mistake appear in such skeptical critics as Jaffe and even Rolleston (see note 27 and below, page 516). A better translation would not solve the problem, but an annotated English version pointing out the intranslatable residue might warn the reader not to take the text literally.

Surely self-interest alone ought to impel Kafka scholars and teachers to press for a change. This paper is meant to stimulate such pressure and to prod the publisher's conscience. The moment seems propitious. With the cooperation of Schocken Books, the production of a critical Kafka edition in German is now under way.¹² Is it too much to expect a new, critical English edition as well? In the meantime, my purpose is to caution Kafka students to exercise greatest care when working with the standard Translation. To that end, this paper could serve as a provisional list of errata.

An examination of “The Judgment” and The Trial shows to what extent interpretations based on the two versions can differ. Among Kafka's most widely read works these two contain the greatest number of mistranslations. I do not claim that my list of mistakes is exhaustive. If there are more, my argument will be strengthened rather than impaired. Some mistranslations from the other novels will be listed at the end of the paper in order to demonstrate that the problem is not peculiar to the two works studied in detail. Samples from frequently quoted texts published in bilingual editions (The Silence of the Sirens, “Letter to His Father”) bear witness to an amazing level of tolerance exhibited by our profession. Reference to second-generation mistakes as found in English Kafka studies will be made in footnotes throughout.

“The Judgment,” shortest of the major stories, contains (I believe) the greatest number of mistranslations per word of text. Rolleston suggests a possible cause: “Throughout this story [the translator] seems concerned to establish a logical, coherent ‘tone,’ whereas the pregnant neutrality of the language, the abrupt shifts in focus, have a vital part in suggesting the abyss that is about to open up” (p. 151, n. 12). While this would account for the finer points, there are numerous gross errors which a dictionary or an elementary German grammar would have eliminated. Consider the famous opening paragraph—a view of the hero from outside: his person, his situation, his frame of mind:

Es war an einem Sonntagvormittag im schönsten Frühjahr. Georg Bendemann, ein junger Kaufmann, sass in seinem Privatzimmer im ersten Stock eines der niedrigen, leichtgebauten Häuser, die entlang des Flusses in einer langen Reihe, fast nur in der Höhe und Färbung unterschieden, sich hinzogen. Er hatte gerade einen Brief an einen sich im Ausland befindlichen Jugendfreund beendet, verschloss ihn in spielerischer Langsamkeit und sah dann, den Ellbogen auf den Schreibtisch gestutzt, aus dem Fenster auf den Flub, die Brücke und die Anhöhen am anderen Ufer mit ihrem schwachen Grün.

(p. 53)

In the Translation, with corrections in parentheses, this reads:

It was a Sunday morning in the very height (most beautiful time) of spring. G. B., a young merchant, was sitting in his own (private) room on the first (second) floor of one of a long row of small, ramshackle (lightly built, e.g. frame) houses stretching beside the river which were scarcely distinguishable from each other except (different almost only) in height and coloring. He had just finished a letter to an old friend of his who was now living abroad, had put it into its envelope (sealed it) in a slow and dreamy (playful) fashion, and with his elbows (elbow) propped on the writing table was gazing (looking) out of the window at the river, the bridge and the hills on the farther bank with their tender green.

(p. 49)

In the original Georg is a prospering businessman enjoying his leisure, looking out on the world from above, in harmony with the most beautiful time of the year. In the Translation the glory of spring is somewhat diminished, but so is Georg's. No longer does he enjoy a view from the second floor, from his private room which he keeps in addition to the business rooms downstairs. He must be content, rather like the harassed Gregor Samsa, with having a room to himself (does he have a large family then?) in a dilapidated row house. Instead of closing the book on his friend's role in his life (sealing the envelope), unhurriedly savoring his masterful manipulation,¹³ the English Georg's putting the letter slowly in its envelope suggests hesitation accompanied by unspecified wistful or rueful thoughts (dreamy, gazing). Kafka's sah (looked) is the most neutral and emotionally bare of several available vision verbs.

The sealing of the envelope indicates Georg's attitude toward his friend, the topic of the first part of the story; it is also a clue to the relationship between Georg and his father, the topic of the second part. Georg goes to his father's room, the (sealed) letter in his pocket, not to ask his advice, but merely to inform him of a fait accompli: “Before I posted the letter, I wanted to let you know.” Nothing indicates that anything his father might say would prevent him from posting the letter. The father, ignoring the son's unambiguous statement, leads into the confrontation by substituting his own, apparently mistaken view of their relationship: “You've come to me about this in order to consult with me” (p. 55; my translation).

A number of mistranslations in the first part of the story tend to distort Georg's role as interpreter and manipulator of his friend's existence. When he reflects that the friend “nach Russland sich förmlich geflüchtet hatte” (p. 53), the word förmlich (practically) characterizes his statement as the interpretation (= flight) of a fact (= departure). The Translation's “had actually run away to Russia” (p. 49) makes a fact out of Georg's interpretation. The friend's prospect of remaining a bachelor, reported in the neutral phrase richtete sich ein für (settled down to) carries a negative value in the Translation's “was resigning himself to” (p. 50).¹⁴ The imagery in Georg's conclusion upon considering his friend's way of life, that he “had obviously run off the rails” (p. 50), is, as Rolleston observes (p. 46), unjustified in light of the preceding paragraph. However, the imagery is not Kafka's, but the translator's. The problem with the friend, “der sich offenbar verrannt hatte” (p. 53), is, according to Georg, that he is stubborn, pigheaded, someone who would not admit that he is wrong and would resist any attempt to help him.

It is precisely this problem which occupies Georg in the following paragraph.¹⁵ The long argument why he could not and should not try to persuade the friend to come back ends with a hypothesis: if he came back and found he was held down, not by intent, of course, but simply by the facts (“würde hier—natürlich nicht mit Absicht, aber durch die Tatsachen—niedergedrückt” [p. 54]), then everything would be much worse than it is now. Georg's anticipating trouble between the Russian friend and his friends at home (are there any besides Georg?) makes us suspect him as the agent of the allegedly non-malicious repression of the repatriated friend. The Translation's “didn't fit in” (p. 50) for “wurde niedergedrückt” loses most of this unwitting self-betrayal. Who, after all, is to blame when someone does not fit in?

Georg's reason for never having written about his success in business, love, and social status is that he wants to leave undisturbed the friend's image of the home town, “die Vorstellung, die sich der Freund … wohl gemacht und mit welcher er sich abgefunden hatte” (p. 56). Machen is a completely neutral verb; sich abgefunden (resigned himself to) implies that the image is not as good as the friend might wish. Instead of the nostalgic image¹⁶ suggested in the Translation, “the idea of the home town which his friend must have built up to his own content” (p. 52), Georg would like to leave his friend with as unattractive an idea of home as possible. In that morning's letter, Georg finally wrote of his engagement “mit einem Fraülein Frieda Brandenfeld …, einem Mädchen aus einer wohlhabenden Familie, die sich hier erst lange nach Deiner Abwesenheit angesiedelt hat, die Du also kaum kennen dürftest” (p. 57). The antecedent of both relative pronouns die is Familie; the Translation has them refer to the girl: “a Fräulein F. B., a girl from a well-to-do family, who only came to live here a long time after you went away, so that you're hardly likely to know her” (p. 53). If the friend does not know a rich and, therefore, prominent family, this points out (a) the degree to which his separation from home has grown and (b) the contrast between Georg, now so well-connected, and the friend who, as Georg had mentioned earlier, has practically no social contacts. The Translation leads to different conclusions. Szanto, for instance, finds that Georg uses this denial of any possible personal attachment between his friend and his fiancée to justify “dis-inviting” the friend to the wedding (p. 59).

In the second part of the story, mistranslations occur in four passages which contribute important details to the development of the struggle between father and son. At the turning point in the confrontation, Bendemann Sr. jumps up in his bed and, towering above Georg, crushes his son's delusions about himself and his power: “Georg sah zum Schreckbild seines Vaters auf” (Georg looked up at the terrifying image of his father [p. 64]). This image is decisive for the rest of the story: from now on Georg sees his father as a superhuman figure, god-like and terrible, who defeats human strategies by simply ignoring them, against whom thought, speech, and action are of no avail. The Translation, “George stared at the bogey conjured up by his father” (p. 85), is not only wrong, but confusing, since it makes the Russian friend, the subject of the following sentence, into the referent of “the bogey.” The crucial significance of the image is apparent only in the original text, which may explain why most critics working with the English version do not include it in their interpretations.¹⁷

After the father's second harangue from above, Georg remembers, and immediately forgets again, a resolution he had made “vor einer langen Weile” (p. 64) (a long while ago) not “a long time ago” as in the Translation (p. 60). Kafka has created a highly unusual and, therefore, surprising variation of the idiomatic expression vor einer (kleinen) Weile (a [little] while ago). If eine Weile appears long, then the structure of time, one of the foundations of man's world, has disappeared. Moreover, the phrase “a long time ago” creates points of reference for Georg before and outside the present moment. In the German text, the father's assault on the son's world has completely wiped out the past and any possible strength that Georg might draw from it.¹⁸

During the entire confrontation Georg utters only a few words, and they slip out much against his will. Too late does he realize that he should not have said: “You comedian!” (p. 60). He bites his tongue, his eyes rigid: “die Augen erstarrt” (p. 65). The Translation's “his eyes starting in his head” says exactly the opposite. We associate different emotions with different physical reactions: start with fright, but rigid (frozen) with terror. Ever since the terrifying image of the father faced him, Georg's motion, like his power to think and speak, has been arrested. He tries to cross the room, but makes it only half way, then shrinks into a corner where he stays. The rigidity of the eyes is a clue to the father's physiological and paralyzing effect on the son, an effect unbroken by any frantic, startled movement on Georg's part, suggesting an escape reflex, as implied in the Translation. Georg's ability to move returns, in passive form, only when the judgment propels him from the room in a downward fall all the way into the river.

Taunting Georg with his inability to move, the father explains his own overwhelming strength: “Allein hätte ich vielleicht zurückweichen müssen, aber so hat mir die Mutter ihre Kraft abgegeben (but now mother has given me her strength), mit deinem Freund habe ich mich herrlich verbunden (with your friend I have formed a splendid alliance), deine Kundschaft habe ich hier in der Tasche!” (your customers I have here in my pocket [p. 65]). The Translation reads: “All by myself I might have had to give way, but your mother has given me so much of her strength that I've established a fine connection with your friend, and I have your customers here in my pocket!” (p. 61). It makes the mother, who plays a rather marginal role during the story, the decisive cause for the father's strength and the corresponding weakness of the son.¹⁹ In the original, there are three coequal factors. The father uncovers and claims all the allies Georg thought he had, on whom his feeling of power and security rested: the mother, whose death seemed to have made the father weak and senile; the friend, whom Georg thought he had put in his pocket; and the customers, whose increasing loyalty had been the outward proof of Georg's superiority. The original text, with the mother's role thus diminished, may be a disappointment to Freudians. Literary critics should find it esthetically more satisfying for the perfect balance it produces: at the end of the struggle the constellation of the two hostile powers is exactly the reverse of what it was in the beginning.²⁰

In the Trial, several mistranslations bear upon the Court and its procedures. At his arrest, K. tells the inspector that he wants to telephone the Staatsanwalt (prosecuting attorney) Hasterer, his good friend (p. 22). The Translation's “lawyer” (p. 12) is misleading for two reasons. (1) It implies that K. wants legal assistance and must, therefore, feel seriously threatened. K., however, does not really want to telephone Hasterer; when he does get permission, he does not do it. He wants to call the bluff, if it is a practical joke; or, if it is an abuse of authority by some branch of the judiciary, he means to intimidate the perpetrators with his influential connection. (2) If the inspector is amazed at K.'s request to speak to a lawyer, it makes the Court appear highly irregular and a priori prejudiced against the defendant. The novel, however, strives to hold our judgment of K. versus the Court in suspension throughout. If Hasterer is a prosecuting attorney, a part of the State's judiciary system, the inspector's reaction indicates that this Court has nothing to do with the established institutions.

If K. lost his case, his uncle tells him later, the consequences would be very bad: “Das bedeutet, dass du einfach gestrichen wirst” (it means that you will simply be eliminated [p. 119]); in the Translation: “It would mean that you would be absolutely ruined” (p. 97). The implications of gestrichen are all the more sinister as they are undefined; the basic meaning (struck from a list) opens quite a range of serious possibilities. To be “absolutely ruined” financially or socially, especially if stated in the subjunctive, sounds certainly preferable. K.'s chances of avoiding such a fate are not good, if one is to believe the proverb quoted by the uncle: “Einen solchen Prozess haben, heisst ihn schon verloren haben” (Having a case of that kind means having lost it already [p. 119]). The significant difference from the Translation, “Cases of that kind are always lost” (p. 97), lies in the form of the statement. While the English version is a straightforward statement of hopelessness, the original is a paradoxical definition of the concept of hope. As the Huld chapter demonstrates, hope exists only in the form of the denial of hope.

Titorelli describes the three ways of not losing one's case: (1) “wirkliche Freisprechung” (real acquittal), (2) “scheinbare Freisprechung” (apparent acquittal), and (3) “Verschleppung” (indefinite postponement) (p. 184). The Translation says: (1) “definite acquittal,” (2) “ostensible acquittal,” and (3) “indefinite postponement” (p. 152). Apart from the shift in emphasis resulting from the contrastive attributes “definite” and “indefinite” of the first and third alternatives, the choice of the term “definite acquittal” for the first alternative is unfortunate. “Wirkliche Freisprechung” (real acquittal) is the only genuine kind of acquittal there is, but it exists only in theory and in legends. Part of the mind-boggling impact of Titorelli's rational explanation of this absurd concept, “legendary real acquittal,” is lost in the English version. At the close of the interview K. concludes that, while following courses (2) or (3) would prevent his being found guilty, it would also prevent real acquittal (“wirkliche Freisprechung”). The Translation's “actual acquittal” (p. 161) is confusing, since it appears that K. is not referring to course (1), but to some other solution not previously discussed. Moreover, the word actual implies existence in reality, which is exactly the opposite of the “legendary real acquittal.”

Leni's enigmatic words: “Sie hetzen dich” (they are hounding you [p. 244]), in the phone call that reaches K. on his way to the cathedral, are translated as, “They're goading you” (p. 203). The verb is crucial for our reading of K's meeting with the prison chaplain. In the context of the novel, hetzen, with its close associations Hetzjagd (hunt with dogs) and zu Tode hetzen (hound to death), brings to mind the strangely changing goddess of justicervictoryrhunt in Titorelli's painting; in the context of Kafka's work it evokes the aphorism: “The hunting dogs are still romping in the yard, but the prey will not escape them, however much it may be stampeding through the woods even now.”²¹ The word goading has different associations.

Other mistranslations concern the question of K.'s guilt or innocence. His own attitude is reflected in the whipping scene. At the approach of the bank servants he slams the door shut, justifying his refusal to become involved on the grounds of self-protection: “Diese Aufopferung (self-sacrifice) konnte wirklich niemand von K. verlangen. Wenn er das zu tun beabsichtigt hätte …” (If he had intended to do that [p. 109]). K. considers being seen with these people as equivalent to sacrificial suicide, and he decides he will not do that. The Translation, “No one could really demand such a sacrifice from him. If a sacrifice had been needed” (p. 88), diminishes the rigor of this alternative to an act of limited self-denial, from which K. excuses himself on an unspecified, but objective basis.

In planning his defense, K. hopes to be successful if he treats it like a business transaction where the question of guilt simply does not apply: “Vor allem war es, wenn etwas erreicht werden sollte, notwendig, jeden Gedanken an eine mögliche Schuld von vornherein abzulehnen. Es gab keine Schuld. … Zu diesem Zwecke durfte man allerdings nicht mit Gedanken an irgendeine Schuld spielen” (p. 152). The Translation, with corrections, reads: “Above all, if he were to achieve anything, it was essential that he should banish from his mind once and for all the idea of possible guilt. There was no such guilt. (There was no guilt) … The right tactics were to avoid letting one's thoughts stray to one's own possible shortcomings” (One must not toy with thoughts of any kind of guilt [p. 127]). The very words in which K. keeps telling himself that he must forget about possible guilt show how hard it is. Even after the categorical affirmation “There was no guilt,” the thought of guilt creeps back to interfere with his strategy planning, so that he has to forbid himself expressly to toy with it. The Translation's “shortcomings” for the third instance of “guilt,” apart from substituting a different meaning of the word, destroys the cumulative effect of the passage.²²

In the Titorelli chapter, the Translation of K.'s statement, “and in the end, out of nothing at all, an enormous fabric of guilt will be conjured up” (p. 149), implies that any guilt the Court may come up with will be a fabrication without substance, made up out of thin air. “A fabric of lies” is the phrase which immediately comes to mind.²³ Not so in the subtly ambiguous original: “Zum Schluss aber zieht es [the Court] von irgendwoher, wo ursprünglich gar nichts gewesen ist, eine grosse Schuld hervor” (Out of somewhere, where there had been nothing at all originally, they will pull out a great guilt [p. 179]). The association evoked here is the magician who pulls a rabbit out of a hat or Titorelli who, at the end of the talk, pulls a huge pile of paintings out from under the bed on which K. had been sitting unawares. The rabbit, however, is real. Even though the observer does not know how it got into the originally empty (or apparently empty) hat, it is there now.

Mistranslations are especially numerous in the “Uncle” chapter. Two of these, concerning the Court's procedures, were discussed above. The remaining five have to do with K.'s emotional and mental condition, which is far worse according to the Translation than in the original. The uncle, unannounced, squeezes into K.'s office: “K. erschrak bei dem Anblick weniger, als er schon vor längerer Zeit bei der Vorstellung vom Kommen des Onkels erschrocken war” (K. was less frightened at this sight than he had been, quite some time ago, at the idea of his uncle's arrival [p. 112]). In the Translation: “K. was the less alarmed by the arrival of his uncle since for a long time he had been shrinking from it in anticipation” (p. 91). The German refers back to a moment in the not too distant past—vor längerer Zeit is not as long as vor länger Zeit (a long time ago)—when K. had flinched at the thought of his uncle's inevitable arrival. The Translation has him haunted by this frightful prospect for a long time, with the effect of sheer numbness from nervous exhaustion. Small wonder, since in the figure of his uncle it is his past—never mentioned by K. and, therefore, a dark and potentially dangerous abyss—that haunts him: “‘A ghost from the past,’ he was in the habit of calling him” (p. 92). The German K. calls his uncle “das Gespenst vom Lande” (the ghost from the country [p. 112]), a friendly nickname for the slightly bothersome, familiar apparition. The Translation tells us that more than a week ago a bank attendant concluded from K.'s “state of mind” (p. 93) that his case must be going badly. Our impression of extreme mental strain is confirmed by the uncle's angry reproach that K.'s behavior is incompatible with that of “an innocent man … if he's still in his senses” (p. 94). If K., therefore, has a hard time understanding his uncle's argument (“was beginning to follow his uncle's line of thought” [p. 96]), that is hardly surprising. But this is not how Kafka tells it. The clerk draws his conclusions from K.'s “Laune” (mood [p. 115]); the uncle is worried about K.'s physical health (“noch bei Kräften” translates “still in good health” [p. 116]); and K. is following the uncle's argument so well that he feels tempted to agree: “den die Rede des Onkels ein wenig in ihren Gedankengang gezogen hatte” (whom the uncle's talk had drawn a little into its line of thought [p. 118]).

The Cathedral chapter, generally considered to be the heart of the novel, contains several outright mistakes and an indefensible number of objectionable passages, even in the crucial parable “Before the Law.” The man from the country thinks: “Das Gesetz soll doch jedem und immer zugänglich sein” (The Law is supposed to be accessible to everyone and at all times [p. 256]). The modal soll has at least two meanings here: (1) the man's hitherto unquestioned assumption, based on secondhand knowledge (“is said to be”), about the Law's accessibility; (2) the obligation (“ought to”) of the Law to be open. The Translation's “should be accessible” (p. 213) excludes the first meaning. If Kafka had unambiguously intended “should,” the form sollte would have been available.

Over the years, the doorkeeper occasionally stages miniature interrogations of the man (“stellt öfters kleine Verhöre mit ihm an” [p. 256]). The legal term Verhör and the verb ausfragen (ask with the goal of getting complete information) characterize these question-and-answer sessions as semi-official procedures, comparable to K.'s experiences with associates of the Court. The Translation's “brief conversations” (in the parable and in the exegesis [pp. 213 and 217]), where the doorkeeper merely “asks” the man about his home, sound friendly and casual.

The mysteries of the German relative pronoun²⁴ may be responsible for the translation of a passage in the exegesis “den unglücklichen Zufall … der den Türhüter hier aufgestellt hat” (the unfortunate coincidence which placed the doorkeeper here [p. 260]), as “the fate for which he himself is responsible” (p. 217). The corresponding mistake in the parable, “den unglücklichen Zufall” (p. 257), translated as “his evil fate” (p. 214), obscures an important point: the man's idée fixe of blaming all his problems on one particular coincidence, an obsession which in turn makes him blind to all other possible causes and remedies.

Other inaccuracies pale in comparison. Nevertheless, why not add only to the doorkeeper's final words, “this door was intended for you” (p. 215), in order to be closer to the original “nur für dich bestimmt” (p. 257)? Also, is not the doorkeeper granted too much freedom of decision if “er darf sich nicht auswärts entfernen” (p. 262), which clearly states lack of permission, is translated as: “he does not dare go out into the country” (p. 218)? And finally, one can accept the priest's assertion that the doorkeeper's two statements—(1) that he could not grant the man admission now and (2) that this entrance was intended only for the man—do not contradict each other, that the first even points to the second (“die erste Erklärung deutet sogar auf die zweite hin” [p. 258]). Maintaining with the Translation that “the first statement … implies the second” (p. 215) goes too far. This is the basis on which the priest refutes K.'s interpretation that the doorkeeper deceived the man. The reader of the Translation may find it difficult to agree with him.

The narrative passages in this chapter represent symbolically K.'s encounter with a transcendent realm. The Translation misses a few important clues to the nature and role of that realm. It tells of “two plain golden crucifixes” (p. 205) on the canopy of the main pulpit, when Kafka writes of crosses without a crucified figure: “zwei leere, goldene Kreuze” (p. 246). Instead of the vigil light obstructing K.'s pocket torch scrutiny of the altar picture (“Störend schwebte das ewige Licht davor” [p. 246]), in the Translation it is “the light from a permanent oil lamp” (p. 205), intruding into the scene represented on the painting. Despite the priest's having just mounted the pulpit, K. refuses to believe that he will actually give a sermon. If it were so, he thinks, the organ should introduce it. “Aber die Orgel blieb still und blinkte nur schwach aus der Finsternis ihrer grossen Höhe” (but the organ remained silent, only faintly gleaming from the darkness of its great height [p. 249]). The official voice from above refuses to get involved; it responds to K.'s challenging glance only with a barely perceptible signal of its presence. The emphasis is on the unbridgeable distance between the organ hiding in the darkness up there and K. lost in the huge church down below. The implication of the Translation, “But the organ remained silent, its tall pipes looming faintly in the darkness” (p. 207), is different. The tallness of the organ pipes helps visual communication in spite of the darkness, thereby diminishing the impact of the organ's silence.

The encounter between K. and the other world develops into confrontation when the priest calls K. back. To K.'s objection that he came to the cathedral for a business appointment, not summoned by him, the priest replies: “Lass das Nebensächliche.” (Forget about irrelevant things [p. 252]). In the same breath, he wants to know whether K. is carrying a prayer book in his hand. When told it is a sightseeing album, he orders K. to put it down, and K. flings it on the floor violently. All through the probing exploration of the cathedral's world, the album had been K.'s tangible link with his old world, the world which he is now told to reject as irrelevant. The Translation, “That is beside the point” (p. 210), only refers back to K.'s explanation as to why he came to the cathedral; it is not an anticipatory instruction on what to do about such irrelevant things as photo albums.

The final chapter is appropriately called “Ende” (end), not “Schluss” (conclusion). Because of the unfinished state of the novel, it is the end of an only partially existing development, a fact which increases the difficulties of interpretation. It would thus seem particularly important for the Translation to keep as close as possible to Kafka's text. The German reader is immediately struck by the persistent use of “die Herren” (the gentlemen) for K.'s executioners: it occurs twenty-five times within the very short chapter. Only one other word (“Begleiter” [companions]) is used in three places where the context emphasizes the “togetherness” of K. and his two companions.²⁵ The Translation has broken the resulting monotony by ingeniously deploying eight different designations: “men” (7), “companions” (6), and “gentlemen” (5) alternate regularly, while the remainder is taken up by “partner” (2), “warders” (1), “creatures” (1), “escort” (1), “emissaries” (1), and appropriate pronouns (4). Herren is the designation used for male members of a theater ensemble, especially musical theater. In the original the executioners, who remind K. of actors or tenors, never acquire an identity different from their role: they are the part they are acting (in the German idiom: sie fallen nie aus der Rolle). Just as an actor's personality is not judged on the basis of the act he performs, the “gentlemen” are not judged from K.'s subjective viewpoint. Consider the change in perspective and evaluation wrought by the Translation, “I am grateful for the fact that these half-dumb, senseless creatures have been sent” (p. 226), on Kafka's: “diese halbstummen, verständnislosen Herren” (these half-mute gentlemen who don't understand [p. 269]).

More allusions to the theater are lost in the Translation. K. is trying to talk himself into acquiescence: “Soll ich als ein begriffsstütziger Mensch abgehen?” (Should I take my exit as a man who does not learn? [p. 269]). In standard usage the verb abgehen does not mean “to die”; its English equivalent is the stage direction “to exit.” The Translation's “leave this world” (p. 226) locates K.'s exit on a different scene. As K. continues his self-exhortation, he keeps thinking what they will say about him, why they arranged his exit in this way. In German, the indefinite personal pronoun man (one) is the subject of four successive sentences, suggesting that man, the audience who judges K.'s performance, and man, the people who are running the show, may be identical: “Soll man mir nachsagen dürfen … ? Ich will nicht, dass man das sagt. Ich bin dafür dankbar, dass man mir … diese … Herren mitgegeben hat und dass man es mir überlassen hat” (Shall they be allowed to say about me … ? I don't want them to say that. I am grateful that they have sent these gentlemen and that they have left it to me [p. 269]). The Translation, after saying “people” in the first instance, substitutes passive constructions, necessarily eliminating the agents. Stylistically this may be the best solution, but as in the case of the twenty-five “Herren,” perfection of style should have given way to greater literalness.

The Translation also distorts K.'s part in the performance. He does not want to exit as a “begriffsstütziger Mensch” (a person hard of comprehension [analogous to hard of hearing]); in the Translation, “a man who has no common sense” (p. 226). As K. said in the preceding sentence, it would mean that not even the year long trial had been able to teach him better. One thing he surely could not have learned from his trial is common sense. All along he had tried to cope with it by using common sense—which in the opinion of most critics he has amply—but it proved exactly the wrong approach. The model of a “begriffsstütziger Mensch” is the condemned man in the “Penal Colony,” who has to be made to understand with his body.²⁶

At the last moment, although he knows it would have been “his duty,” K. does not kill himself: he admits that he could not completely measure up to the expectation (“vollständig konnte er sich nicht bewähren” [p. 271]) to tell himself what is necessary. The reference to K.'s earlier self-exhortation with the allusion to the judges of his performance is missing in the Translation: “he could not completely rise to the occasion” (p. 228). Instead it appears as if K. himself perceived the scene as an occasion requiring appropriate behavior, thereby embracing his judges' expectations as his own.²⁷ In K.'s view the responsibility for his inability to perform adequately has to lie with whoever is running the show and failed to give him the necessary equipment: “die Verantwortung für diesen letzten Fehler trug der, der ihm den Rest der dazu nötigen Kraft versagt hatte” (the responsibility for this last mistake lay with him who had denied him the remaining strength necessary for doing it [p. 271]). The Translation, “the responsibility for this last failure of his …” (p. 228), has K. rather childishly acknowledge his own failure yet blame it on someone else. The word Fehler (mistake) adds a new aspect to K.'s view of the situation. Something inexplicably went wrong with the arrangements of the performance: it is a Regiefehler (error, oversight on the part of the direction). Who the Regisseur is, how and why exactly the mistake happened remains unknown, as unknown and inexplicable as the mistake which caused the boat of the Hunter Gracchus to miss the right way.

Notes

1. Stanley Corngold's 1972 translation of The Metamorphosis, published in paperback form by Bantam Books.

2. Page references of English Kafka quotes are to the new 1974 printing of Schocken paperback editions, all published in New York: Amerika, trans., Willa and Edwin Muir; The Castle, definitive edition, trans. Willa and Edwin Muir with additional material translated by Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser; Letter to His Father, bilingual edition, trans., Ernst Kaiser and Eithne Wilkins; Parables and Paradoxes, bilingual edition, ed. Nahum N. Glatzer; The Penal Colony (for the text of The Judgment), trans. Willa and Edwin Muir; The Trial, definitive edition, trans. Willa and Edwin Muir, revised and with additional material translated by E. M. Butler. The German text is quoted from Kafka's Gesammelte Werke: Erzählungen, ed. Max Brod (Frankfurt: S. Fischer, 1965), for the text of Das Urteil. Der Prozess, 5th ed. (New York: Schocken, 1946). Emphasis in Kafka quotes, German and English, is mine throughout. English versions of Kafka quotes in parentheses are my own translations or my corrections of the standard Translation.

3. “On Not Understanding Kafka,” German Quarterly, 47 (1974), 373-393.

4. The omission of the time reference seit fünf Tagen (in five days) at the beginning of the fourth chapter of The Trial and the fact that in the German edition of The Castle K. has Weib und Kind (a family) but not in the English version, are frequently mentioned by critics. A similar discrepancy in Amerika (see #3 in the appended list) has so far gone unnoticed.

5. J. M. Ita, “Note on Willa and Edwin Muir's Translation of Kafka's Novel ‘Das Schloss’—‘The Castle,’” Ibadan, 29 (1971), 102-105.

6. Parable and Paradox, 2nd ed. (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1966), p. xii. Malcolm Pasley's protest, in word and deed, against the “false piety to accord greater respect to their [i.e., the translators'] rendering than to the original” has not yet produced an effect upon the book market. See his Franz Kafka, Shorter Works (London: Secker and Warburg, 1973), I, p. xii. At the International Kafka Symposium at Temple University in October, 1974, one speaker made a critical remark about the Muir translations. The audience reacted with a little embarrassed laughter here and there. The subject was not mentioned again.

7. The Spring 1971 issue of Modern Fiction Studies contains a bibliography of Kafka criticism, in English, published from 1960 to 1970. It lists a total of 200 entries.

8. James Rolleston, Kafka's Narrative Theater (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1974); Adrian Jaffe, The Process of Kafka's ‘Trial’ (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1967); Franz Kuna, Franz Kafka: Literature as Corrective Punishment (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1974).

9. Lack of thoroughness may be the main reason for this inconsistency. Other evidence of this is the fact that on the mere 173 pages of text there are at least three factual mistakes, which a brief check ought to have eliminated. (1) E. T. A. Hoffmann's Anselmus in The Golden Pot stumbles over an apple basket, not an egg basket (Kuna, p. 123). (2) Fraülein Bürstner's photographs are hanging in a frame on the wall. Kuna places them on her bedside table and uses this as evidence in his argument on the sexual connotations of the Bürstner episode (p. 121). (3) Klamm's brandy loses its supernatural character when K. drinks it, not when he spills it. It is not, as Kuna presents it, an inexplicable change in smell(p. 155); the brandy tastes differently than it smells.

10. George H. Szanto, Narrative Consciousness: Structure and Perception in the Fiction of Kafka, Beckett, and Robbe-Grillet (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1972); Maurice S. Friedman, Problematic Rebel: Melville, Dostoievsky, Kafka, Camus, 2nd ed. (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1970); Ruth Tiefenbrun, Moment of Torment: An Interpretation of Franz Kafka's Short Stories (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1973).

11. Tiefenbrun, p. 104. It is true that Kafka very often uses language in this literal way, thus creating new ambiguities, but it is the German language. Solomon J. Spiro finds that “the title of ‘The Trial’ is itself a paradox. A trial never really takes place.” (“Verdict—Guilty! A Study of ‘The Trial,’” Twentieth Century Literature, 17 [1971], 171). That could not be said of the German title.

12. Announced by a representative of Schocken Books at the International Kafka Symposium, 1974. See also German Quarterly, 48 (1975), 76, for a report.

13. See Rolleston (pp. 29 and 45) on the important nuances of spielerisch (playful). Tiefenbrun, on the other hand, sees in Georg's putting the letter in the envelope in a “dreamy fashion” the beginning of his “dreamlike state throughout the story,” which makes the Judgment a story of a hypnosis (p. 91).

14. See Rolleston (p. 150, n.6). Friedman retells the error about the resigned bachelor in his own words (p. 340).

15. Like Rolleston (p. 46), Friedman is misled by the Translation into narrowly seeing in Georg's judgment a conclusion from the preceding statement about the friend's bachelorhood, rather than the heading of its own paragraph (p. 340). Tiefenbrun concludes from the “language of Kafka's concrete metaphors” (i.e., “run off the rails”) that the friend is a homosexual (p. 84).

16. Rolleston's comment that Georg “cannot of course know that the friend prefers a nostalgic image of his home town” (p. 47; emphasis mine) reflects the Translation's error.

17. Szanto was the only one among those I checked, and he has great difficulty making sense of the confusing English text (p. 65). The German text contains a classical Freudian situation of the tribal chief's return to power against the usurping son. It is a prototype of the scene in The Metamorphosis where Father Samsa's huge shoes are enough to keep Gregor-the-bug down and running.

18. On the basis of “a long time ago” Szanto concludes that “Georg's great fear of his father … is deep-seated, dating back many years” (p. 65).

19. This is how Szanto (p. 66), Friedman (p. 341), and Tiefenbrun (pp. 99 and 123) take it over. The solution is tempting, since it would strengthen the autobiographical element of the story, if we accept Kafka's view of his mother's role in the Letter to His Father.

20. Kafka's own analysis of the friend's function emphasizes this reversal of equilibrium. See his diary entry for February 11, 1913.

21. Franz Kafka, Wedding Preparations in the Country and Other Posthumous Prose Writings, trans. Kaiser and Wilkins (London: Secker and Warburg, 1954), p. 42.

22. Friedman's reading reflects the different slant created in the Translation. Instead of a K. haunted by relentless thoughts of guilt, Friedman's K. treats himself with “the sort of strengthening of self-confidence through autosuggestion which is regularly preached to the modern businessman as the gospel of success” (p. 353).

23. Friedman quotes the Translation—“‘in the end, out of nothing at all, an enormous fabric of guilt will be conjured up’” as evidence that K. “persists in holding himself ‘completely innocent’” (p. 353).

24. The Muirs have trouble with relative pronouns elsewhere. See the passage on Georg's fiancée in the Judgment and item #5 of The Castle in the appended list.

25. “K. attempted …, difficult though it was at such very close quarters, to see his companions more clearly” (p. 224). “K. … submitted himself to the guidance of his escort” (p. 226). “I didn't mean to stop,’ he said to his companions, shamed by their obliging compliance” (p. 226).

26. The story In the Penal Colony was written during the time that Kafka was working on The Trial. See Malcolm Pasley, “Datierung sämtlicher Texte Franz Kafkas,” Kafka-Symposion, ed. Jurgen Born et al., 2d ed. (Berlin: Wagenbach, 1965), p. 64.

27. Jaffe reads the last chapter as the celebration of a ritual, a solemn occasion, which is unfortunately spoilt by K., who has to be killed like a dog: “While he perceives that he is in the midst of an occasion, he cannot ‘completely rise’ to it” (p. 142).