[Essay][Literature] Following Kafka (5) Unknown City: Reading "The Dream"

I have never been to Prague. I would like to go someday. But I probably never will.
In his later years, Franz Kafka (1883-1924) left the following words to an acquaintance who was teaching him Hebrew: "Once, while looking down at the Old Town Square from a window, he (Kafka) pointed at the cityscape and said, 'My elementary school was here. The building you see over there was the university, and a little further to the left was my office. My entire life is confined within this small circle.' Saying this, he drew a few small circles with his finger." In fact, because Kafka spent most of his life in a very small area of Prague, when reading biographies, a map of Prague naturally enters one's mind.
The previously discussed "The Trial" does not contain specific place names, with the exception of the fictional "Julius Street," which I believe contributes to its surreal, nightmarish atmosphere. However, it is said that in reality, the details of the Prague of that time are densely reproduced in each scene, and the actual locations can be estimated. For example, near the end of the work, the cathedral where the prison chaplain tells Josef K. the famous parable "Before the Law" is identified by some as St. Vitus Cathedral, famous for its Gothic architecture within Prague Castle on the left bank of the Vltava River after crossing the Charles Bridge. The quarry where K. is killed at the end of the story is identified by some as a quarry that once existed behind the Strahov Monastery, known for its beautiful library, also on the left bank. In other words, "The Trial" is one of the works that rode the wave of the new urban novel of the early 20th century, and it might be said that Prague is to Josef K. what Dublin was to Leopold Bloom and London was to Clarissa Dalloway, albeit as a negative image.

It is a typically Kafkaesque opening: blunt, yet it grips the reader's heart. The short piece "Dream" (1916) was written as an episode within "The Trial," but it was eventually removed and later published as an independent work. The original concept seems to have been that Josef K., having returned to his mother's home, visits his late father's grave and has a dream that night.
It is a very short work that needs no summary. As Josef K. is walking through a cemetery, two men who appear to be gravediggers are setting up a tombstone. A painter wearing a beret and holding a pencil appears and begins to write on the tombstone. He writes "...HERE RESTS" in magnificent letters, leaving only the name of the deceased to be filled in. The painter hesitates for a moment, but then suddenly writes K.'s name in grand gold letters, and K. sinks into the grave, being drawn in deeper and deeper—.
While I think it is a masterpiece that is complete in itself and requires no particular interpretation, if I were to point out something very superficial in relation to "The Trial," it could be said to be a foreshadowing of K.'s execution by the "two men" at the quarry, a kind of precognitive dream. Furthermore, although the protagonist, who is consistently referred to by the anonymous, symbol-like name "Josef K.," potentially hints at the "uniqueness of death" by acquiring a full name through a symbolic death in the dream, the development of the story betrays this; K. simply dies like a dog and never recovers that proper name—.
This cemetery, where "several artificial paths wind along, looking difficult to walk on," was already closed in Kafka's time. It is likely not the Old Jewish Cemetery on the right bank, which is now a tourist attraction, but the New Jewish Cemetery in Strašnice, in the eastern suburbs of Prague. It is where Kafka himself rests. Prague is a mosaic city of three ethnic groups: Czechs, Germans, and Jews. Cemeteries are, needless to say, defined by religious denomination, and the Strašnice cemetery is said to be adjacent to the east of the Christian cemetery, that is, the cemetery for Germans and Czechs. "If, during their lifetime, language separated Germans and German-speaking Jews from Czechs, then after death, the cemetery would separate Germans and Czechs from Jews. For the Jews of Prague, language and the cemetery were nothing more than categories of difference and discrimination" (Yoshihiko Hirano, "Fin-de-Siècle Prague: Kafka and the Artisans of Language").
Kafka lived during the rise of Czech nationalism. In 1897, anti-Semitic riots occurred in Prague, and from 1918 to 1920, the period from the end of World War I to the independence of the Czechoslovak Republic, street violence against Jews intensified, but it could be said that it was generally a peaceful, Indian summer-like era. We know the era of madness that followed immediately after; a pandemic of hate was waiting with its mouth wide open—.

When I was young, the city I wanted to visit most was Saint Petersburg, which was still called Leningrad at the time. I planned a two-week midwinter trip to the Soviet Union via the longed-for Trans-Siberian Railway. At that time, to apply for a visa, it was necessary to submit a desired itinerary to a state-run travel agency in advance, have them arrange accommodation and transportation, and issue a "voucher." The climax of the trip was, of course, Saint Petersburg, and I think I applied for a generous three-day stay. The cafe Pushkin stopped by before his duel, the apartment where Dostoevsky died, the room that became the model for Raskolnikov's boarding house, Sennaya Square where Raskolnikov kissed the earth, and of course, the Hermitage Museum... My dreams expanded. However, the itinerary that came back had been cut to just one day. Moreover, it was quite a grueling schedule, arriving in Saint Petersburg by air late at night and departing early the next morning. I was disappointed, but for some reason, the time cut was reallocated to a stay in the resort town of Yalta. As a result, I visited Chekhov's house every day and spent as many hours as I liked, never tiring of the elegant living room and well-tended garden, just like in his works, so perhaps that was fine in its own way.
With only one day in Saint Petersburg, where should I go? I had decided to visit Dostoevsky's grave. I walked straight down Nevsky Prospect, aiming for the Alexander Nevsky Lavra. The map was perfectly in my head. I arrived at the cemetery with a pounding heart, only to find the entrance door firmly locked. With my shoulders slumped, I walked back the way I came, feeling dejected. I walked along sadly for a while under the surprisingly bright sun, even though it was February, but then I suddenly turned on my heels. This is probably the difference between when I was young and who I am now. Although the Soviet Union was an unruly bureaucratic state, I had learned during my short trip that things could be managed. When I knocked on the door, a grumpy middle-aged woman slowly showed her face. I desperately conveyed, using all the Russian words I knew and gestures, that I had come all the way from Japan to visit Dostoevsky's grave, that I only needed a very short time to pay my respects, and that I had to leave Saint Petersburg tomorrow. The woman nodded broadly without expression, silently jerked her chin, and let me inside—I was happy to see that many flowers had been laid on the grave of the author who should have been treated coldly under the communist regime; people still loved him.

If I could go to Prague for just one day, I would definitely visit Kafka's grave. I keep "Kafka's Prague" (Klaus Wagenbach), a wonderful tourist guide for literary walks that uses plenty of photos from Kafka's time, by my bedside, and on sleepless nights, I flip through the pages, thinking about a city I have never been to and will likely never go to. The description of Kafka's grave says—"Take subway line A. The station is Želivského." I wonder what the Prague Metro is like. It says there are information boards at the station, and one should follow them to head to the cemetery. "There, poems, prayers, and various other offerings are left, turning it into a unique kind of pilgrimage site." It feels like something I might dream about.

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