How Stephen King Helped Me to Embrace Franz Kafka
I survived Franz Kafka. I sat through weeks of English 501 better described as the Introduction to Literary Studies, while Professor Jesse Cohn tortured me with the ravings of this early twentieth-century, Bohemian, Jewish madman. This guy, Kafka, . . . I mean, really . . . anxiety, fear, and paranoia in the shapes of torture machines, crumbling empires, singing mice, and evolving apes (yeah- just try and put all of that together)- he was just maddening. I felt there was not enough time in the semester, let alone my entire grad school experience, to gain insight into this guy’s inner workings. If you are unfamiliar with Kafka, allow me to give you a brief summary: Recognized as one of the most prominent literary figures of the early twentieth century, the novelist/lawyer/insurance inspector/business owner produced some of the most bizarre, absurd, and fascinatingly surrealistic works of his time.
Yet, I STILL considered using Kafka as the subject for Dr. Cohn’s Secondary Source Synthesis assignment. My Kafka-soaked brain, clearly muddled, thought with mad delirium hey, why not keep this guy around? Sanity be damned!! I eventually changed my mind, but not before reading Bestial Representations of Otherness: Kafka’s Animal Stories. Sounds interesting, right? I won’t discuss every pertinent point of the article, but in reading it, my frozen heart began thawing towards the possibly schizoid, certainly absurd, yet suddenly somewhat understandable Kafka. This quote in particular jumped out at me:
“The grotesque in Kafka is most evocatively expressed in his animal stories. In his use of animal protagonists, Kafka locates an opportunity to explore the tension between human and non-human — the same tension that exists between self and other.”
The “grotesque” in literature refers to the ability to combine humor with terror/the familiar with the unfamiliar in order to create both empathy and disgust amongst readers. The effects can wreak havoc on the human psyche. Yet, as I read the article, a sort of dawning familiarity came over me. It was like I was re-discovering an old friend, a teddy-bear long forgotten and disregarded, yet, still waiting to be snuggled in the late hours of the night. Then, it hit me. Kafka brought back memories of my old, adolescent pal, Stephen King (we didn’t really hang out, I just read a lot of his books).
My first thoughts went to King’s use of animals in his works: Giant rats in The Graveyard Shift, Cats coming back to life in Pet Cemetery, A rabid dog turning on his family in Cujo (even though King was too inebriated to remember writing Cujo — but that’s another story). King’s animals play the roles of antagonists, representing the tension between human and non-human, self versus other, but unlike Kafka’s animals, they don’t have humanistic qualities, except for one: IT.
Ok, yes, the image everyone conjures upon the mentioning of Stephen King’s It is Pennywise the Clown, but keep in mind, in true form It is an enormous, shapeshifting spider. Most often, It transforms into the prey’s deepest fear- a leper, a werewolf, the ghost of a dead boy. As the title of the novel indicates, It is anything the intended prey does NOT want It to be.
The deeper I delved into the Kafka article, the more I paralleled Kafka with King. Like Kafka in the early twentieth century, King dives fully into the grotesque, making the unfamiliar all too familiar, pushing psychological boundaries to the extreme while still managing to find fascination and humor in horror. Similarly, Kafka’s version of the grotesque contains human-like animals that are riddled with fear and anxiety, causing his stories to pervade with intensity. The mole in the burrow constantly worries about an unseen predator invading his home. The ape, captured in the wild, knows the only way to maintain his freedom is to transform himself into a version of his captor. The mouse only remains relevant if she performs on stage. In all cases, the animal protagonists likely reflect Kafka’s own fears and anxieties as a writer and a conflicted individual.
So what about King? He admitted in his memoir to envisioning a part of himself or his life in the characters he has created. In The Shining, he is the ex-school teacher and alcoholic author. In Carrie, he is part of the gang, bullying the “other” girl. In Misery, Annie is booze and alcohol, both controlling and confining him. It was written at the height of King’s struggles with alcohol and substance abuse — highlighting his battle with internal and external monsters. They arrived in all shapes and sizes with the spider representing the ultimate and quintessential grotesque figure, inflicting fear, anxiety and horror onto its victims.
“We lie best when we lie to ourselves.” - Stephen King, It
Through his memoirs, Stephen King revealed the depths of his struggles and anxieties –he spent nearly two decades refusing to admit he had a substance abuse problem. He provided some insight into how all of this transferred to his narratives. This allows us to better connect with him and become more pleasantly freaked out by his characters. As for Kafka, while there are some clues, it is not easy to clearly determine the reasons for his fascination with the grotesque. Yet, through my fond adolescent recollections of Stephen King (why I have fond recollections instead of terrifying nightmares is probably something I should address with a professional), I have found a connection to Kafka. I can look upon him as a European, grandfatherly figure to my old pal and perhaps begin to think fondly of him. If I can find room in my heart for one possibly schizoid, certainly absurd, literary genius, then I can possibly find room for another.
