From outside one will always triumphantly impress theories upon the world and then fall straight into the ditch one has dug, but only from inside will one keep oneself and the world quiet and true.
— Kafka, The Blue Octavo Notebooks (tr. E. Kaiser and E. Wilkins)
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A sunray of bliss.
— Kafka, The Blue Octavo Notebooks (tr. E. Kaiser and E. Wilkins)
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‘What is it? What is it?’ I exclaimed, still held down in bed by sleep, and stretched my arms upwards. Then I got up, still far from being conscious of the present, and with the feeling that I must thrust aside various people who were in my way, made the necessary gestures, and so at last reached the open window.
— Kafka, The Blue Octavo Notebooks (tr. E. Kaiser and E. Wilkins)
When asked what he did – according to his friend, John Urzidil, Kafka never answered ‘I am a writer’ but always ‘I work for an insurance company’.
— Hugh Haighton, from the Introduction to Janouch’s Conversations with Kafka
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Like K., we alternate between flashes of lucidity and bouts of torpor, sometimes mistaking one for the other, with no one having the authority to correct us.
– Roberto Calasso, K. (tr. G. Brock)
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The murmur, the song that issues audibly from the phone as soon as any receiver is lifted in the village, is the Castle’s only acoustic manifestation. It is indistinct and, moreover, non-linguistic, a music composed of words gone back to their source in pure sonic matter, prior to and stripped of all meaning. The Castle communicates with outside world through a continuous, indecipherable sound.
— Roberto Calasso, K. (tr. G. Brock)
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The invisible has a mocking tendency to present itself as the visible, as if it might be distinguished from everything else, but only under certain circumstances, such as the clearing away of mist. Thus one is persuaded to treat it as the visible – and is immediately punished. But the illusion remains.
— Roberto Calasso, K. (tr. G. Brock)
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It is entirely conceivable that life’s splendor forever lies in wait about each one of us in all its fullness, but veiled from view, deep down, invisible, far off. It is there, though, not hostile, not reluctant, not deaf. If you summon it by the right word, by its right name, it will come. This is the essence of magic, which does not create but summons.
— Kafka, Diaries (tr. M. Greenberg)
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An endless, dreary Sunday afternoon, an afternoon swallowing down whole years, its every hour a year. By turns walked despairingly down empty streets and lay quietly on the couch. Occasionally astonished by the leaden, meaningless clouds almost uninterruptedly drifting by. “You are reserved for a great Monday!” Fine, but Sunday will never end.
— Kafka, Diaries (tr. M. Greenberg)
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It is true I have a small room of my own, but that is not a home, only a place of refuge where I can hide my inner turmoil, only to fall all the more headlong into its clutches.
— Kafka, in G. Janouch, Conversations with Kafka (via here)
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Notes from a Room 