The sufferings of the world

I’m delighted to say that I’ve just been asked to contribute to a collection of responses to Kafka, to be published next year by Italy’s Institute of Germanic Studies.  Right now, as women and children are abducted by supine, mendacious or incompetent governments and teenagers are gunned down by self-appointed vigilantes, Kafka seems more than usually apposite.

You can hold yourself back from the sufferings of the world, that is something you are free to do and it accords with your nature, but perhaps this very holding back is the one suffering you could avoid.