Interesting discovery: Gershom Scholem, Walter Benjamin, and Robert Alter all maintain that Franz Kafka was a writer in the Jewish mystical tradition. Grozinger (Jewish studies, Univ. of Lund) here compares Kafkas writings and the writings of various Kabbalists and Hasidim. Kafkas The Trial and the gatekeeper and court tradition in Jewish mysticism are shown to be from the same ideal, with one important change: Kafka transplanted the lost paradise of the Kabbalists into a European, petty bourgeois milieu. Grozinger compares Kafkas aphorisms and the stories of the Hasidic masters and describes the similarities and the profound differences. He discusses the role of women in Kafkas work and the correspondences to the Jewish concept of Lilith and the Shekinah. This fascinating study is essential for literature and religion collections.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Jan 2015 01:39:36 +0000