Opening Speech at the Emergency Closed Door Meeting of German-Speaking Kafka Scholars
By Grant Munroe

The German-speaking world of Kafka scholars hit out yesterday over a British academic's claims that the writer had a penchant for hard porn.
– The Guardian, Aug 15, 2008

Damen und Herren,

It is a sad day for the German Kafka scholar. In a word, we are found out.

As you well know, for years we have successfully hidden all evidence of Kafka’s shadowy Alterlieben: namely, his insatiable lust for hardcore porno.

Because of James Hawes’ disastrous expose, no longer is Kafka the hermetic prophet, the impossibly meek solicitor who penned existential stories in solitude, in candlelight, under the weight of paternal guilt, impervious to worldly temptation. No, he’s now shown as he was, as we sadly know him to be: a sallow, wheedling company man who spent most nights penning perversities while pausing to spill seed over images of hedgehog-style creatures performing fellatio, or golem-like monsters plucking topless web-footed charwomen.

Truly, there is a crack in the image we have so skillfully built.

Yet what can we do that we haven’t already done? you ask. We must continue our defense, our denials and obfuscations. So much more could be lost.

Here, of course, I refer to the secret collection of 87 smut stories written by Kafka, and the original drafts of his now famous tales, posthumously edited (and often renamed) by Max Brod to eliminate any trace of ass-blasting raunch.

Instead of burning Kafka’s trove of nightmarish wank fantasies (as the author had so famously – and, given the majority of their content, understandably – requested), Brod had the wherewithal to clean, to wipe away, to expose the terrifying beauty between the endless scenes of barely-legal, hardcore, pump-and-grind fuck play. This was Max Brod’s genius, my colleagues. Let it be ours as well.

If you ask why, only think of the public’s reaction if they discover the editorial switch in The Metamorphosis, in which Brod has Gregor Samsa transform into a beetle, instead of (as in Kafka’s original) a pulpous, scuttling vagina. Could Western Civilization cope if it were to learn that The Castle is only the amalgam of non-sex scenes from Kafka’s 1,200-page pornographic epic, K. ist für Kornhole?

I shudder to think.

Let us also consider our own well-being. If the world knows that the mystery of Kafka’s idiosyncratic prose is mostly due to the creative redactions of Max Brod, and not a blend of esoteric Kabbalism and modern mysticism, our entire industry could come crashing down.

I repeat the words of our master: “Truth is indivisible, hence it cannot recognize itself; anyone who wants to recognize it has to be a lie.” We must therefore be the lie, confirming this brilliant aphorism – even if it does include the unfortunate, appended simile, “as only a filthy lithograph may show the pure maid how fulsome and supple her jugs may be.”

To address the best method for cauterizing the wound, we will break into sub-committees, and again into sub-sub-committees, as outlined in your programs. Later, we will reconvene to discuss strategy, propose initiatives, and, of course, carry forth the secret trail to determine the guilt of and never-to-be-named charge against James Hawes (henceforth to known as J.).

Please note that after the trial everyone is invited to stay for champagne and finger sandwiches – as well as a special presentation of Professor Schwaetzer’s one-man stage adaptation of Kafka’s original Scheißegeschichte, “In the Penis Colony”, to be performed on the main stage.

Thank you.

——

Grant Munroe was appointed 27th Gatekeeper of the Fraternal Organization of German-Speaking Kafka Scholars in 2006.

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