Franz Kafka

But it is useless to go over old things. Where would it end, if one were never to stop defending all one’s old wretched mistakes and apologizing for them. So let me only say this, Werfel, which you yourself must know: If what was involved here was only an ordinary dislike, then it might possibly have been easier to formulate and moreover might have been so unimportant that I might well have been able to keep it to myself. But it was a horror, and justifying that is difficult: One seems stubborn and tough and cross­grained, where one is only unhappy. You are surely one of the leaders of this generation, which is not meant as flattery and cannot serve as flattery of anyone, for many a man can lead this society, so lost in its bogs. Hence you are not only a leader but something more (you yourself have said something similar in the fine introduction to Brand’s posthumous works, fine right down to the phrase ‘joyous will to deception’) and one follows your course with burning suspense. And now this play. lt may have every possible merit, from the theatrical to the highest, but it is a retreat from leadership; there is not even leadership there, rather a betrayal of the generation, a glossing over, a trivializing, and therefore a cheapening of their sufferings. – But now I am prattling on, as I did before, am incapable of thinking out and expressing the crux of the matter. Let it be so. Were it not that my sympathy with you, my deeply selfish sympathy with you, is so great, I would not even be prattling. – And now the invitation; in written form, it assumes an even realer and more magnificent appearance. Obstacles are my illness, the doctor (he definitely rules out Semmering once again, though he is not so definite about Venice in the early spring), and I suppose money too (I would have to manage on a thousand crowns a month). But these are not the chief obstacles. Between lying stretched out on my Prague bed and strolling erect in the Piazza San Marco, the distance is so great that only imagination can barely span it. But these are only generalizations. Beyond that, to imagine that for example I might go to dinner with other people in Venice (I can only eat alone) – even the imagination is staggered. But nonetheless I cling to the invitation, and thank you for it many times. Perhaps I will see you in January. Farewell [...]” (translation). Provenance: auctioned at Stargardt in 1999 (sale 671, 30 March, lot 222), and again in 2001 (sale 675, 13 Nov., lot 226). Last in the Collections Aristophile. ¶ Published (with departures from the original) in Briefe (ed. Max Brod), S. Fischer 1958, pp. 424 f. English translation published in: Letters to Friends, Family, and Editor (NY, Schocken Books, 1977)..

These were eventually collected and published as Letters to Felice. Lasting from September 1912 to October 1917, Kafka’s correspondence with Bauer overlapped with his writing The Metamorphosis, In the Penal Colony, and the beginning of his work on The Trial. He first asked for her hand in marriage shortly before the postmark date of this envelope, in a meandering letter of over twenty pages long that took him days to compose. Then, in a letter written from June 21st to 23rd, he explained that he feared she would be unhappy with him as a husband, especially if she could not tolerate his intense writing schedule. In a different letter, dated to June 23rd alone, Kafka expressed disgust with members of his family. One of these—both lending exceptional insight into Kafka's complex mind and his personal relationships—must have been the letter sent in this envelope. Despite two engagements during their period of correspondence, Kafka and Bauer would never marry. Few of Kafka's works were published during his lifetime, and he passed away in obscurity from tuberculosis at age 40. His autograph is thus exceptionally rare and of the utmost desirability..

Münzer. So let me know. I have received a message today from Dr. Hermann, but a very brief and unclear one, mentioning a slight flu; I shall visit him tomorrow. How high is the fever? Indeed, I had already answered your letter when Miss Irene called here yesterday. The fever made the whole matter even less important than it had been already; the answer lies with me" (transl.). - Irene Bugsch, the daughter of Aladár (Alexander) Bugsch, one of the owners of the Matliary Sanitarium, belonged to Franz Kafka's circle of friends (which also included her sister Margarete and Robert Klopstock) during his half-year stay (18 December 1920 to ca. 26 August 1921) in the Tatra mountains. Then 26 years old, she applied at the Dresden Academy of Arts, an endeavor in which she received support from Kafka. The connection to Egmont Münzer (1865-1924), professor at the University of Prague since 1907, has been mediated through Kafka's cousin Robert (1881-1922), who was related to Münzer through his wife. Otto Hermann was one of the physicians whom Kafka consulted in Prague..

Wunder über Wunder und von Ihnen heraufgezaubert. Ich wärme mich daran in diesem traurigen Winter"..