by Franz Kafka
1907 October: Position with "Assicurazioni General!," Italian insurance company. Family moves to Niklas-Strasse.
1908 Position at the semi-governmental Workers' Accident Insurance Institute (until retirement, July 1922). Close friendship with Max Brod.
Writes "On Mandatory Insurance in the Construction Industry."
1909 Publication of eight prose pieces in Hyperion.
September: At Riva and Brescia with Max and Otto Brod. Writes "The Aeroplanes at Brescia."
1910 Member of circle of intellectuals (Mrs. Berta Fanta).
March: Publication of five prose pieces in Bohemia.
May: Beginning of the Diaries (quarto notebooks; last entry, June 12, 1923).
Yiddish theater company from Eastern Europe performs.
October: Paris, with Max and Otto Brod.
December: Berlin.
1911 January-February: Business trip to Friedland and Reichenberg.
Summer: Zurich, Lugano, Milan, Paris (with Max Brod). Plans to work with Brod on a novel, "Richard and Samuel."
Alone in a sanatorium in Erlenbach near Zurich. Travel diaries.
Writes "Measures to Prevent Accidents [in Factories and Farms]" and "Workers' Accident Insurance and Management."
1911-12 Winter: Yiddish theater company. Friendship with Yiddish actor Isak Löwy; study of Jewish folklore; beginning of a sketch on Löwy.
1911-14 Working on Amerika (main parts written 1911-12).
1912 First studies of Judaism (H. Graetz, M. I. Pines).
February: Gives lecture on the Yiddish language.
July: Weimar (Goethe's town, with Max Brod), then alone in the Harz Mountains (Sanatorium Just). Meets Ernst Rowohlt and Kurt Wolff, joint managers of Rowohlt Verlag.
August 13: Meets Felice Bauer from Berlin, in the house of Max Brod's father in Prague.
August 14: Manuscript of Meditation sent to the publisher.
September 20: Beginning of correspondence with Felice Bauer.
September 22-23: "The Judgment" written.
September-October: Writes "The Stoker" (or "The Man Who Disappeared") which later became first chapter of Amerika.
October 1912 to February 1913: Gap in the diaries.
November: "The Metamorphosis" written.
1913 January: Publication of Meditation.
February 1913 to July 1914: Lacuna in productivity.
Easter: First visit to Felice Bauer in Berlin.
Spring: Publication of The Judgment.
May: Publication of "The Stoker."
September: Journey to Vienna, Venice, Riva. At Riva, friendship with "the Swiss girl."
November: Meeting with Crete Bloch, friend of Felice Bauer. Beginning of correspondence with her. [She becomes mother of his son, who died before reaching the age of seven, and of whom K. never knew.]
1914 Easter: In Berlin.
April: Engagement to Felice Bauer in Berlin.
July 12: Engagement broken.
Summer: "Memoirs of the Kalda Railroad" written. Hellerau, Lübeck, Marienlyst on the Baltic (with Ernst Weiss).
October: "In the Penal Colony" written.
Fall: Begins writing The Trial.
Winter: "Before the Law" (part of The Trial) written.
1915 January: Renewed meeting with Felice Bauer (in Bodenbach).
Continues working on The Trial.
Receives Fontane Prize for "The Stoker."
February: Moves from parents' home into rented rooms: Bilekgasse and Langengasse.
Journey to Hungary with sister Elli.
November: Publication of The Metamorphosis.
December (and January 1916): "The Village Schoolmaster" ["The Giant Mole"] written.
Meets Georg Mordecai Langer.
1916 July: Meeting with Felice Bauer in Marienbad.
August 20: Draws up a list of reasons for and against marriage.
Stories written, later collected in A Country Doctor.
Winter: Bothered by noise, K. moves to remote Alchemists' Lane, Prague.
1917 First half: "The Hunter Gracchus" written.
Learning Hebrew.
Spring: "The Great Wall of China" written.
July: Second engagement to Felice Bauer.
August: Begins coughing blood.
September 4: Diagnosis of tuberculosis. Moves to sister Ottla in Zürau.
September 12: Leave of absence from office.
November 10: Diary entries break off.
End of December: Breaking of second engagement to Felice Bauer.
Fall and winter: Aphorisms written (octavo notebooks).
1918 January to June: Zürau. Reading Kierkegaard.
Spring: Aphorisms continued.
Prague, Turnau.
November: Schelesen. Meets Julie Wohryzek, daughter of a synagogue custodian. A project for "The Society of Poor Workers," an ascetic society.
1919 January 10: Diary entries are resumed.
Schelesen; Spring: Again in Prague.
[Spring: Felice Bauer married.]
Spring: Engagement to Julie Wohryzek (broken November 1919).
May: Publication of In the Penal Colony.
Fall: Publication of A Country Doctor.
November: "Letter to His Father" written.
Winter: "He," collection of aphorisms, written. Schelesen, with Max Brod.
1920 January 1920 to October 15, 1921: Gap in diaries.
Sick leave from Workers' Accident Insurance Institute. Meran.
End of March: Meets Gustav Janouch. Meran.
Meets Milena Jesenská-Pollak, Czech writer (Vienna). Correspondence.
Summer and fall: Prague. Writing stories.
December: Tatra Mountains (Matliary). Meets Robert Klopstock.
1921 October 15: Note in diary that K. had given all his diaries to Milena.
[Kafka's son by Crete Bloch dies in Munich.]
Until September: Tatra Mountains sanatorium; then Prague; Milena.
1921-24 Stories written, collected in A Hunger Artist.
1922 January to September: The Castle written.
February: Prague.
Spring: "A Hunger Artist" written.
May: Last meeting with Milena.
End of June to September: In Planá on the Luschnitz with sister Ottla. Prague.
Summer: "Investigations of a Dog" written.
1923 Prague.
July: In Müritz (with sister Elli); in a vacation camp of the Berlin Jewish People's Home, meets Dora Dymant [Diamant].
Prague, Schelesen (Ottla).
End of September: With Dora Dymant in Berlin-Steglitz; later moves, with Dora, to Grunewaldstrasse.
Attends lectures at the Berlin Academy (Hochschule) for Jewish Studies.
Winter: "The Burrow" written.
K. and Dora move to Berlin-Zehlendorf.
A Hunger Artist sent to publisher.
1924 Spring: "Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk" written.
Brought as a patient from Berlin to Prague.
April 10: To Wiener Wald Sanatorium, Professor Hajek's clinic in Vienna; then sanatorium in Kierling, near Vienna (with Dora Dymant and Robert Klopstock).
June 3: Death in Kierling; burial June 11, in the Jewish cemetery in Prague-Straschnitz.
Publication of A Hunger Artist.
1942 Death of K.'s sister Ottla in Auschwitz. The other two sisters also perished in German concentration camps.
1944 Death of Crete Bloch at the hands of a Nazi soldier.
Death of Milena in a German concentration camp.
1952 August: Death of Dora Dymant in London.
1960 Death of Felice Bauer.
SELECTED WRITINGS ON KAFKA
Adorno, Theodor W. "Aufzeichnungen zu Kafka," Die Neue Rundschau, LXIV (1953).
Anders, Günther. Kafka -- Pro und Contra. Die Prozess-Umerlagen. Munich, 1951.
——-. "Reflections on My Book 'Kafka-Pro und Contra,' " Mosaic (Manitoba), III, No. 4 (1970).
Asher, J. A. "Tur
ning Points in Kafka's Stories," The Modern Language Review, LVII (1962).
Auden, W. H. "K's Quest." In The Kxfka Problem, ed. A. Flores. New York, 1946.
Bauer, Roger. "Kafka à la lumière de la religiosité juive," Dieu vivant, IX (1947).
Baum, Oskar. "Erinnerungen an Franz Kafka," Literarische Welt, IV (1928).
Beck, Evelyn T. Kafka and the Yiddish Theater: Its Impact on His Work, Madison, Wisc., 1971. (Dissertation.)
Benjamin, Walter. "Franz Kafka: On the Tenth Anniversary of His Death" and "Some Reflections on Kafka." In Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn. New York, 1969.
Bense, Max. Die Theorie Kafkas. Cologne and Berlin, 1952.
Bergman, S. Hugo. "Franz Kafka," Orot, VII (1969). In Hebrew.
Binder, Hartmut. Motiv und Gestaltung bei Franz Kafka. Bonn, 1966.
Bin Gurion, Emanuel. "Al Kafka," Moznayim, 1943. In Hebrew.
Blanchot, Maurice. "Kafka." In La Part du feu. Paris, 1949.
——-. "La solitude essentielle," La Nouvelle Revue Française, I (1953).
Borges, Jorge Luis. "Kafka and His Precursors." In Labyrinths. New York, 1964.
Born, Jürgen. "Franz Kafka und seine Kritiker." In Kafka Symposion. Berlin, 1965.
——-. "Kafka's Parable 'Before the Law': Reflections Towards a Positive Interpretation," Mosaic (Manitoba), III, No. 4 (1970).
Braybrooke, Neville. "The Geography of the Soul: St. Teresa and Kafka," The Dalhousie Review, 1959.
Brod, Max. "Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Kafka," Prisma, XI (1947).
——-. Franz Kafkas Glauben und Lehre. Winterthur, 1948.
——-. "Kleist und Kafka," Welt und Wert (Munich), February 1949.
——-. Franz Kafka als wegweisende Gestalt. St. Gallen, 1951.
——-. "Kafka, pro und contra," Neue Schweizer Rundschau (Zurich), May 1952.
Buber, Martin. "Ein Wort über Franz Kafka." In Kampf um Israel. Berlin, 1933.
——-. "Kafka and Judaism." In Kafka: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. R. Gray. Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1962.
Buber-Neumann, Margarethe. Mistress to Kafka: The Life and Death of Milena. London, 1966.
Camus, Albert. "Hope and Absurdity." In The Kafka Problem, ed. A. Flores. New York, 1946.
Carrouges, Michel. Kafka versus Kafka, trans, from the French by Emmet Parker. University, Ala., 1968.
Clive, Geoffrey. "The Breakdown of Romantic Enlightenment: Kafka and Dehumanization." In The Romantic Enlightenment: Ambiguity and Paradox in the Western Mind (1750-1920). New York, 1960.
Cohn, Dorrit. "K. enters The Castle," Euphorion, LXII (1968).
Demetz, Peter. "Kafka in England," German Life and Letters, I (1950-51)
——-. "Kafka, Freud, Husserl: Probleme einer Generation," Zeitschrift für Religions — und Geistesgeschichte, VII (1955).
Dentan, Michel. Humour et Création Littéraire dans l'Oeuvre de Kafka. Geneva and Paris, 1961.
Dietz, Ludwig. "Drucke Franz Kafkas bis 1924." In Kafka Symposion. Berlin, 1965.
Dymant, Dora. "Ich habe Franz Kafka geliebt." Die neue Zeitung, August 18, 1948.
Eisner, Paul. Franz Kafka and Prague. New York, 1950.
Emrich, Wilhelm. "Die poetische Wirklichkeitskritik Franz Kafkas," Orbis Literarum, IV (1956).
——-. Franz Kafka. Frankfurt a. M., 1970.
Even-Arie, Yitzhak. "Kafka ve-Goethe," Molad, 1949-50. In Hebrew.
Fischel, V. "Or hadash al Kafka," Molad, 1954. In Hebrew.
Flores, Angel, ed. The Kafka Problem. New York, 1963.
Fowles, John. "My Recollections of Kafka," Mosaic (Manitoba), III, No. 4 (1970).
Fraiberg, Selma. "Kafka and the Dream." In Modern Literary Criticism, ed. Irving Howe. Boston, 1958.
Friedman, Maurice. Problematic Rebel, rev. ed. Chicago, 1970, passim.
Fromni, Erich. "Kafka's The Trial." In The Forgotten Language. London and New York, 1952.
Fuchs, Rudolf. "Erinnerungen an Franz Kafka." Appendix to Max Brod, Franz Kafka -- eine Biographie. New York, 1946.
Fürst, Norbert. Die offenen Geheimtüren Franz Kafkas. Heidelberg, 1956.
Glatzer, Nahum N. "Franz Kafka and the Tree of Knowledge." In Arguments and Doctrines, ed. A. Cohen. New York, 1970.
Goodman, Paul. Kafka's Prayer. New York, 1947.
Gordon, Caroline. "Notes on Hemingway and Kafka," The Sewmee Review, Spring 1949.
Gray, Ronald. Kafka's Castle. Cambridge, England, 1956.
——-, ed. 'Kafka: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1962.
Greenberg, Clement. "The Jewishness of Franz Kafka," Commentary, XIX (1955).
Greenberg, Martin. The Terror of Art: Kafka and Modern Literature. New York and London, 1968.
Grenzmann, Wilhelm. "Franz Kafka. Auf der Grenze zwischen Nichtsein und Sein." In Dichtung und Glaube. Bonn, 1957.
Gruenter, Rainer. "Kafka in der englischen und amerikanischen Kritik," Das literarische Deutschland, II (1951).
Gunvaldsen, K. M. "Franz Kafka and Psychoanalysis," University of Toronto Quarterly, XXXII (1963).
Gürster, Eugen. "Das Weltbild Franz Kafkas," Hochland, 1951-52.
Haas, Willy. "Prague in 1912," Virginia Quarterly Review, XXIV (1948).
Heldmann, Werner. Die Parabel und die parabolischen Erzählformen bei Franz Kafka. Münster, 1953. (Dissertation.)
Heller, Erich. "The World of Franz Kafka." In The Disinherited Mind. New York, 1959.
——-, and Beng, Joachim. Dichter über ihre Dichtungen: Franz Kafka. Munich, 1969.
Henel, Heinrich. "Kafka's Der Bau, or How to Escape from a Maze." In The Discontinuous Tradition (Stahl Festschrift). Oxford, 1971.
Heselhaus, Clemens. "Kafkas Erzählformen," Deutsche Vierteljahresschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Geistesgeschichte, XXVI (1952).
Hlavácová, J. "Franz Kafkas Beziehungen zu Jicchak Löwy," Judaica Bohemiae, I (1965).
Hodin, J. P. "Memories of Franz Kafka," Horizon, XCVII (1948).
Hoffmann, Leonard R. Melville and Kafka. Stanford, Calif., 1951. (Dissertation.)
Kaiser, Hellmuth. "Franz Kafkas Inferno: Eine psychologische Deutung einer Strafphantasie," Imago, I (1931).
Kazin, Alfred. "Kafka." In The Innermost Leaf: A Selection of Essays, new ed. New York, 1959.
Klingsberg, Ruben. "Milenas Nachruf auf Kafka," Forum, IX (1962).
Klossowski, Pierre. "Kafka Nihiliste," Critique, VII (1948).
Kowal, Michael. Franz Kafka: Problems in Interpretations. New Haven, Conn., 1962. (Dissertation, Yale University.)
Kurzweil, Baruch Benedikt. "Franz Kafka — jüdische Existenz ohne Glauben," Die Neue Rundschau, LXXVII (1966).
Landsberg, Paul L. "Kafka et la métamorphose." In Problèmes du personnalisme. Paris, 1952.
Lee, Marshall, ed. The Trial of Six Designers, with an essay on The Trial by Kenneth Rexroth. Lock Haven, Pa., 1968.
Lerner, Max. "The Human Voyage." In The Kafka Problem, ed. A. Flores. New York, 1946.
Lesser, Simon O. "The Source of Guilt and the Sense of Guilt — Kafka's 'The Trial,' " Modern Fiction Studies, VIII (1962).
Mann, Thomas. "Dem Dichter zu Ehren: Franz Kafka und 'Das Schloss,' " Der Monat, I, No. 8-9 (1949).
Masini, Ferruccio. "Spiritualità ebraica in Franz Kafka," La Rassegna Menstte di Israel, May 1957.
Meyerhof, H. "Franz Kafka in Amerika," Neues Europa, XXIV (1947).
Moked, Gabriel. Iyyunim be-'ha-Metamorfosis' le-Frants Kafka. Tel Aviv, 1956. In Hebrew.
Mueller, William R. "The Theme of Judgment: Franz Kafka's The Trial." In The Prophetic Voices in Modern Fiction. New York, 1959.
Neider, Charles. The Frozen Sea: A Study of Franz Kafka. New York, 1948.
Nemeth, André. Kafka ou le mystère juif. Paris, 1947.
Ong, Walter J. "Kafka's Castle in the West," Thought, XXII (1947).
Parker, Tyler. "Kafka's and Chaplin's 'Amerika,' " The Sewanee Review, 1950.
Pasley, Malcolm [J.M.S.]. "Franz Kafka MSS: Description and Selec
t Inedita," Modern Language Review, LVII (1962).
——-. "Drei literarische Mystifikationen Kafkas." In Kafka Symposion. Berlin, 1965.
——-. "Zur ausseren Gestalt des 'Schloss' Romans." In ibid.
——-, and Wagenbach, Klaus. "Datierung sämtlicher Texte Franz Kafkas." In ibid.
Politzer, Heinz. Franz Kafka, Parable and Paradox. Ithaca, N.Y., 1962.
——-. "Franz Kafka's Languages," Modern Fiction Studies, VIII (1962).
——-. Das Kafka-Buch. Eine innere Biographie in Selbstzeugnissen. Frankfurt a. M., 1966.
Preisner, Rio. "Franz Kafka and the Czechs," Mosaic (Manitoba), III, No. 4 (1970).
Raabe, Paul. "Franz Kafka und Franz Blei." In Kafka Symposion. Berlin, 1965.
Rahv, Philip. "Death of Ivan Ilyich and Joseph K." In Image and Idea, rev. ed. New York, 1957.
——-. "An Introduction to Kafka." In ibid.
Reiss, Hans Siegbert. "Franz Kafka's Conception of Humor," The Modern Language Review, XLIV (1949).
——-. "Recent Kafka Criticism," German Life and Letters, IV (1956).
Rexroth, Kenneth. See Lee, Marshall.
Richter, H. Franz Kafka. Berlin, 1962.
Robert, Marthe. "Zu Franz Kafkas Fragment 'In unserer Synagoge,' " Merkur, II (1948).
——-. "L'humour de Franz Kafka," Revue de la Pensée Juive, 1951.
——-. "Dora Dymants Erinnerungen an Kafka," Merkur, VII (1953).
——-. Kafka. Paris, 1960.
Rochefort, Robert. Kafka, ou l'irréductible espoir. Paris, 1947 (German translation, 1955).
Sarraute, Nathalie. "De Dostoïevski à Kafka," Les Temps Modernes, 1947.
Savage, D. S. "Franz Kafka: Faith and Vocation," The Sewanee Review, Spring 1946.
Schoeps, Hans Joachim. "Theologische Motive in der Dichtung Franz Kafkas," Die Neue Rundschau, LXII (1951).
Seidel, Bruno. "Franz Kafkas Vision des Totalitarismus. Politische Gedanken zu Kafkas Roman 'Das Schloss' und George Orwells Utopie '1984,' " Die Besinnung, I (1951).
Slochover, Harry. "Franz Kafka — Pre-Fascist Exile." In A Franz Kafka Miscellany, 2d ed. New York, 1946.