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MonkeyNotes-The Trial by Franz Kafka
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PLOT (Structure)

The plot is spread over the protagonist, K.'s arrest and his attempts to extricate himself from an aging, totalitarian bureaucratic system. This is at the conscious surface level. Kafka is also the social chronicler very much like Dickens, commenting in monotonous detail on the Czech legal system - which is symbolic of any organization that is governmental even in democratic countries. The story is also crowded with Dickensonian characters, each with his own identity, but who fall into the system whether they like it or not. A hierarchy of characters, starting from the judge and leading to an isolated painter, is neatly arranged.

At a deeper level, the story deals with the Christian idea of the fallen man and his deep sense of guilt. The nature of the guilt is never told. There is never a trial held in accordance with the dispensation of justice. In the process, Huld, the invalid lawyer assumes the role of the gigantic figure of divinity. But he also has his weakness like "Everyman", a beautiful blending of myth and reality. Without knowing what his guilt is, K. responds as a guilty man. He refuses to submit to the divine will. His end is brought about by the break down of his resistance.


The conclusion is open-ended. Does K. die because death is preferable to survival with a lack of faith? Does he die because he lacks the strength to resist? Or is his ending an allegory? It invites wide reader appeal defying closure. K. is executed at a place, a quarry symbolizing the sacrificial altar. This is reminiscent of primitive tales. The sheen of the warder's sword glimmers in the beginning of the tale, foreboding the grim ending. The plot is filled with metaphor superstitions, legends, allegory and parables. The time in the duration of a year is accurately marked from K.'s thirtieth to his thirty-first birthday. But there is no chronological recording of time in the story. It is the regular change of seasons or periods like afternoon, morning, night. The description is cinematic, with graphic details of spaces and rooms, of the painters attic, the labyrinth of court rooms, the lawyers house, Frau Grubach's rooms and of course the office and the chapel. Changes in light and shade give an artistic effect to the whole tale.

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MonkeyNotes-The Trial by Franz Kafka

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