Franz Kafka Quotes

I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy.
Franz Kafka
One must not cheat anybody not even the world of one's triumph.
Franz Kafka
No sooner is it a little calmer with me than it is almost too calm as though I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy
Franz Kafka
Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.
Franz Kafka
Nothing, nothing, the whole long day, nothing.
Franz Kafka
But what now if all the peace, the comfort, the contentment were to come to a horrible end?
Franz Kafka
Don't be too hasty, don't take somebody else's opinion without testing it.
Franz Kafka
I see, these books are probably law books, and it is an essential part of the justice dispensed here that you should be condemned not only in innocence but also in ignorance.
Franz Kafka
I believe that we should only read those books that bite and sting us. If a book does not rouse us with a blow then why read it?
Franz Kafka
I am a very unhappy human being and you, dearest, simply had to be summoned to create an equilibrium for all this misery.
Franz Kafka
People label themselves with all sorts of adjectives. I can only pronounce myself as 'nauseatingly miserable beyond repair'.
Franz Kafka
He had probably been thrown out of a wine shop, and it hadn't quite dawned on him yet.
Franz Kafka
Every new discovery is assumed at once into the sum total of knowledge, and with that ceases in a sense to be a discovery; it dissolves into the whole and disappears, and one must have a trained scientific eye even to recognize it after that.
Franz Kafka
Intrusive, thoughtless people!" said K. as he turned back into the room. The supervisor may have agreed with him, at least K. thought that was what he saw from the corner of his eye. But it was just as possible that he had not even been listening as he had his hand pressed firmly down on the table and seemed to be comparing the length of his fingers.
Franz Kafka
I am so miserable, there are so many questions, I can see no way out and am so wretched and feeble that I could lie forever on the sofa and keep opening and closing my eyes without knowing the difference.
Franz Kafka
One idiot is one idiot. Two idiots are two idiots. Ten thousand idiots are a political party.
Franz Kafka
It's impossible to defend oneself in the absence of goodwill
Franz Kafka
It occurs to me that I really can't remember your face in any precise detail. Only the way you walked away through the tables in the café, your figure, your dress, that I still see.
Franz Kafka
Since there was nothing at all I was certain of, since I needed to be provided at every instant with a new confirmation of my existence, since nothing was in my very own, undoubted, sole possession, determined unequivocally only by me — in sober truth a disinherited son — naturally I became unsure even of the thing nearest to me, my own body.
Franz Kafka
Idleness is the beginning of all vice, the crown of all virtues.
Franz Kafka
Am I to leave this world as a man who shies away from all conclusions?
Franz Kafka
The books we need are of the kind that act upon us like a misfortune,that makes us suffer like the death of someone we love more than ourselves, that make us feel as though we were on the verge of suicide,lost in a forest remote from all human habitation
Franz Kafka
Herr Kafka, essen Sie keine Eier." (As one and only piece of dialog K recalls from his meeting with Rudolf Steiner - "Mr. Kafka don't eat eggs.
Franz Kafka
A man might find for a moment that he was unable to work, but that's exactly the right time to remember his past accomplishments and to consider that later on, when the obstacles has been removed, he's bound to work all the harder and more efficiently.
Franz Kafka
My guiding principle is this: Guilt is never to be doubted.
Franz Kafka
As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.
Franz Kafka
All right then, I’ll be mad at you on this score, which incidentally is no great misfortune, as things balance out quite well if there’s a little anger for you lurking in one corner of my heart.
Franz Kafka
Guilt is never to be doubted.
Franz Kafka
One hears a great many things, true, but can gather nothing definite.
Franz Kafka
Incidentally, it’s easy to write prescriptions, but difficult to come to an understanding with people.
Franz Kafka
Other opportunities arise from time to time that almost don't accord with the overall situation, opportunities whereby a word, a glance, a sigh of trust may achieve more than a lifetime of exhausting endeavour.
Franz Kafka
In front of the law there is a doorkeeper. A man from the countryside comes up to the door and asks for entry. But the doorkeeper says he can't let him in to the law right now. The man thinks about this, and then he asks if he'll be able to go in later on. "That's possible," says the doorkeeper, "but not now". The gateway to the law is open as it always is, and the doorkeeper has stepped to one side, so the man bends over to try and see in. When the doorkeeper notices this he laughs and says, "If you're tempted give it a try, try and go in even though I say you can't. Careful though: I'm powerful. And I'm only the lowliest of all the doormen. But there’s a doorkeeper for each of the rooms and each of them is more powerful than the last. It's more than I can stand just to look at the third one.
Franz Kafka
Could K. represent the congregation all by himself? What if he had been a stranger merely visiting the church? That was more or less his position.
Franz Kafka
I felt so weak and unhappy that I buried my face in the ground: I could not bear the strain of seeing around me the things of the earth. I felt convinced that every movement and every thought was forced, and that one had to be on one's guard against them.
Franz Kafka
If I could drown in sleep as I drown in fear I would be no longer alive.
Franz Kafka
People who walk across dark bridges, past saints,with dim, small lights.Clouds which move across gray skiespast churcheswith towers darkened in the dusk.One who leans against granite railinggazing into the evening waters,His hands resting on old stones.
Franz Kafka
All human errors are impatience, a premature breaking off of methodical procedure, an apparent fencing-in of what is apparently at issue.
Franz Kafka
You once said that you would like to sit beside me while I write. Listen, in that case I could not write at all. For writing means revealing oneself to excess; that utmost of self-revelation and surrender, in which a human being, when involved with others, would feel he was losing himself, and from which, therefore, he will always shrink as long as he is in his right mind-- for everyone wants to live as long as he is alive-- even the degree of self-revelation and surrender is not enough for writing.Writing that springs from the surface of existence-- when there is no other way and deeper wells have dried up-- is nothing, and collapses the moment a truer emotion makes the surface shake. That is why one can never be alone enough when one writes, why there can never be enough silence around one when one writes, why even night is not night enough.
Franz Kafka
Isolation is a way to know ourselves.
Franz Kafka
Life is hard, the earth stubborn, science rich in knowledge but poor in practical results.
Franz Kafka
I look a girl in the eye and it was a very long love story with thunder and kisses and lightning. I live fast.
Franz Kafka
Atlas was permitted the opinion that he was at liberty, if he wished, to drop the Earth and creep away; but this opinion was all that he was permitted.
Franz Kafka
In our folk nobody has any experience of youth, there’s barely even any time for being a toddler. The children simply don’t have any time in which they might be children........Indeed... there’s simply no way that we would be able to provide our children with a viable childhood, one that is real. Naturally, there are consequences. There’s a certain ever present, not to be liquidated childishness that permeates our folk; We often act in ways that are totally and utterly ridiculous and, indeed, precisely like children we do things that are crazy, letting loose with our assets in a manner that is bereft of all rationality, prodigious in our celebrations, partaking in a light-headed frivolousness that is divorced from all sensibility, and often enough all simply for the sake of some small token of fun, so much do we love having our small amusements. But our folk isn’t only childish, to a certain extent we also age prematurely, childhood and old age mix themselves differently with us than by others. We don’t have any youth, we jump right away into maturity and, then, we remain grown-ups for too long and as a consequence to this there’s a broad shadow of a certain tiredness and a sort of hopelessness that colours our essential nature, a nature that as a whole is otherwise so tenacious and permeated by hope, strong hope. This, no doubt, this is related to why we’re so disinclined toward music—we’re too old for music, so much excitement, so much passion doesn’t sit well with our heaviness;
Franz Kafka
You have given me a gift such as I never even dreamt of finding in this life.
Franz Kafka
But all remains unchanged.
Franz Kafka
She is so distinct to me, it's as though I had run my hands all over her.
Franz Kafka
The existence of the writer is an argument against the existence of the soul, for the soul has obviously taken flight from the real ego, but not improved itself, only become a writer.
Franz Kafka
What I write is different from what I say, what I say is different from what I think, what I think is different from what I ought to think and so it goes further into the deepest darkness.
Franz Kafka
The Expulsion from Paradise is eternal in its principal aspect: this makes it irrevocable, and our living in this world inevitable, but the eternal nature of the process has the effect that not only could we remain forever in Paradise, but that we are currently there, whether we know it or not.
Franz Kafka
Even if no salvation should come, I want to be worthy of it at every moment.
Franz Kafka
It is only because of their stupidity that they are able to be so sure of themselves.
Franz Kafka
Did he really want this warm room of his, so comfortably fitted with old family furniture, to be transformed into a cave, in which, no doubt, he would be free to crawl about unimpeded in all directions, but only at the price of rapidly and completely forgetting his human past at the same time?
Franz Kafka
You misinterpret everything, even the silence.
Franz Kafka
If you have food in your jaws you have solved all questions for the time being.
Franz Kafka
One tells as few lies as possible only by telling as few lies as possible and not by having the least possible opportunity to do so.
Franz Kafka
Oh well, memories, said I. Yes, even remembering in itself is sad, yet how much more its object! Don't let yourself in for things like that, it's not for you and not for me. It only weakens one's present position without strengthening the former one - nothing is more obvious - quite apart from the fact that the former one doesn't need strengthening.
Franz Kafka
sleep is the most innocent creature there is and a sleepless manthe most guilty.
Franz Kafka
He has the feeling that merely by being alive he is blocking his own way. From this sense of hindrance, in turn, he deduces the proof that he is alive.
Franz Kafka
German is my mother tongue and as such more natural to me, but I consider Czech much more affectionate, which is why your letter removes several uncertainties; I see you more clearly, the movements of your body, your hands, so quick, so resolute, it’s almost like a meeting.
Franz Kafka
Fear of night. Fear of not night.
Franz Kafka