Kafka is cool in the photo on the cover of this book. Cool is a word that today’s teenagers like to use. When I was a teenager, I thought the Kafka in this photo was quite handsome, stern, and cold for a book cover.
I think these three adjectives are quite appropriate when used in Kafka’s writings. Of course, I experienced Kafka through the translator’s writing style. There are only 200 pages in the book, and there are 59 short essays. Some are like prose, some are like poetry, and some are like short novels. The last one, "The Gravekeeper", is a single scene script. For an intelligent reader like me, every chapter is a brain-burning, interesting and brain-burning one.
This book was translated by Dong Ni. I searched for translator Dong Ni on Baidu, but the headline that popped up was about boxing beauty Dong Ni. Well, Tony, I don't know if you were really unknown or if you changed careers later. You wrote in 1986 a thousand-word "Postscript" about Kafka's life, creative background, and writing style. The last sentence was "Limited by the level, omissions and errors are inevitable. I hope readers will criticize and correct me." It seems that, You were indeed young back then and not a famous translator.
But Dong Ni’s translation made me understand the interesting Kafka.
"On the Tram" is less than five hundred words. Kafka said that he was standing on the platform at the end of the tram, wondering why he was there, and then he saw a girl getting ready to get off, "and asked himself: How come she is not surprised at herself?" ?Why did you close your lips tightly and not say a word like this? What on earth is going on?" - This is the end.
"I Want to Be an Indian" is about 100 words, 12 sentences, 11 commas, and 1 period. Arranged line by line, it is a short poem, a short poem that expresses the desire for freedom.
"The True Life of Sancho Panza" is only a few hundred words long. At a glance, you can tell that it is an in-depth introduction to the famous book "Don Quixote".
"Everyday Trivial Things" tells a short story in 600 words, telling us who can't help laughing but crying, "Everyday trivial things can be endured without a little daily courage."
Kafka, is it difficult to understand? No, Kafka is very everyday.
Isn't "Dream" written about our helplessness of not knowing where to start and where to end?
The famous poet and translator Lu Yuan wrote a preface for this "Reading Cards" Fka's Essays. The opening chapter introduces the simple plots of Kafka's six masterpieces: "The Proceedings", "The Castle", "The Missing Person", "The Judgment", "The Hunger Artist", and "The Metamorphosis", and then describes it in some auspicious essays. , you can get to know this unfamiliar writer better, and conduct comprehensive research by connecting Kafka’s life experience, cultural and educational background, social living environment, and the development trend of Western literature at that time, and you can better understand this 41-year-old man. Writer, why do the characters in his writings feel lonely, sad, and desperate? Why do relatives, society, state machinery, and God become alienated, incomprehensible, and threatening? Why do people feel guilty but never know why they are guilty?
I counted the words carefully. This preface by Mr. Luyuan has more than 5,500 words. Think of a well-known old man in the literary world seriously writing a preface of more than 5,000 words of academic research for a translation of a work by an unknown newcomer in the literary world. How rich and selfless the spirit of academic inheritance must be to do this! < /p>
Dong Ni and Lu Yuan must both have very handsome faces. Kafka-like face.