Kafka in Love Read Online Free PDF Page A

certain K. had a great deal of profane knowledge, he had learned everything he knew in the bathroom. No detail is trivial, Franz adds, as long as it is accurate.
    On December 11, 1912, he sends Felice
Meditation
, which has just been published. He waits feverishly for her comments, avidly reading the letters he receives from her almost every morning. Nothing, not a word about the book. Days go by. Still nothing. On December 18 he injects a slight nudge: “I am so happy to think that my book is in your possession.” He waits. Still nothing. Felice prattles on about everything except his book. She is not interested in what is best in me, he thinks. Her indifference humiliates him, tortures him. On December 23 he brings the issue into the open: “You have not said anything yet about my book.”
    Felice says nothing, she has not had the curiosity to open it, though she reads voraciously and waxes enthusiastic about dozens of books. Franz finds the names of so many writers in her letters that he is jealous and would like to pick a quarrel with them, all of them. One day she praises Schnitzler to the skies, and Franz is furious. He writes her in the middle of the night. His tone is icy: “I don’t like him at all and don’t hold him in respect. He can never drop low enough in the public’s opinion.”
    On Sunday, December 29, he explodes: “Why don’t you tell me in two words that you don’t like my little book? It would be understandable that you don’t know what to make of it, and I might still hope that it wouldsome day appeal to you. A hesitant opinion on your part would seem quite natural to me, but you have said nothing. Twice you announced something, but then said nothing. You don’t like my book as such, but since I wrote it you must like it all the same—in which case a person gets around to reading it.”
    He spends that Sunday in misery.
    After this humiliating exchange, Franz no longer speaks of his work to Felice, or says very little. Before, he would give her a full daily account, detailed, enthusiastic, and funny. He had hoped for praise, a little admiration. He receives nothing but stinging silence.
    He writes her every day but makes no plans to see her. Instead, he voices vague regrets: “You flew into the elevator, the night we met, instead of whispering in my ear despite the presence of Herr Brod: ‘Come with me to Berlin, leave everything and come.’ ” At times he accuses himself of inertia: “Why, fool that I am, did I stay at the office or at home, instead of jumping on the train with my eyes shut, to open them only when I am near you?”
    Most likely prompted by Felice, he hints at the beginning of December that he might visit Berlin at Christmastime. However, nothing is less certain. The trip starts to seem even more doubtful. “But,” he pleads, “you too,Felice, will have relatives visiting who might bar me from Berlin.”
    In January there is no longer any question of seeing each other. On February 5 he is evasive: “At Easter, would you have an hour free for me on Sunday or on Monday and, if so, do you think it would be a good idea for me to come?”
    Two days later he writes: “Dearest, I don’t want to see your relatives, I am not strong enough for that. So think about it carefully, Felice. Your parents, your father, your brother, and your sister from Dresden will surely be at home, and I can therefore easily imagine that you wouldn’t have the time.”
    Do these seem like the words of a lover? Or a thinly disguised attempt to avoid a meeting that he does not look forward to? He confesses: “You are right, Felice, I have often had to force myself to write you in the last few days.”
    The reason for this change?
    “My American novel. 4 The story I am writing takes place entirely in the United States of America. It is myfirst somewhat longer work after fifteen years of frustrated effort. It must be completed, and so, with your blessing I plan to spend the brief moments I