Den inre processen

Kafka, triangeln, bildningsresan

Abstract

The Inner Process as Utterance. Kafka, the Triangle, the Journey of Bildung

This article examines Franz Kafka’s Der Prozeß in dialogue with Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s as well as Hannah Arendt’s influential readings of it. Sharing Arendt’s view of the telos of Kafka’s novels as dependent on the characterization of the protagonists, Deleuze and Guattari’s description of the Kafka-text as a machine is put into question. Through close readings of especially the first and the final chapter, exploring K.s personal development in relation to the genre of Bildungsroman and the modernistic motif of ’I versus the Other(s)’, the narrative description of the protagonist Josef K. and his inner process is regarded as a device in the realm of the novel as an utterance. What comes to the fore in such a perspective is Der Prozeß as a reader-oriented critique of modern individualism, calling for the importance of reaching out to and caring for others.