A Labyrinth of Messages from Telephone and Letters:Media Techniques as Political Metaphors in Franz Kafka's The Castle
In his last unfinished novel The Castle,Franz Kafka displays in his surrealistic manner a bureaucratic system which is characteristic of strict hierarchy and rigid inefficacy.The narration of this novel focuses on a communicative network full of paradoxes,where telephone calls and letters as the main forms of media techniques appear in turn and competition,reflecting each other.By writing so,Kafka depicts how the regiment manipulates and controls people and how its anonymity and embodiment come into combination.Media techniques prove to be controlling techniques,and the presentation of media functions leads to an ironic exposition of the power order.This article traces the historical context of the media development and analyzes the disorder of message transition illustrated in The Castle,to examine Franz Kafka's insight into the relationships between media and power as well as his precise expression of them.
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