Letter to His Father

1919 letter by Franz Kafka to his father

Letter to His Father (German: Brief an den Vater) is the name given to a letter Franz Kafka wrote to his father, Hermann, in November 1919.

History

According to Max Brod, Kafka gave the letter to his mother to deliver to his father but she never did.^[1] The original letter, 45 pages long, was typewritten by Kafka and corrected by hand. Two and a half additional pages were written by hand.^[2]

In 1966, the letter, translated into English by Ernst Kaiser and Eithne Wilkins, was published in a bilingual edition by Schocken Books. It was later included in several Schocken collections of Kafka's works.

A new translation by Hannah and Richard Stokes was published by Oneworld Classics in 2008 under the title Dearest Father.

Extracts from the letter, translated by Sophie Prombaum, are included in A Franz Kafka Miscellany.^[3]

The letter begins as follows: "Dearest Father, You asked me recently why I maintain that I am afraid of you. As usual, I was unable to think of any answer to your question, partly for the very reason that I am afraid of you, and partly because an explanation of the grounds for this fear would mean going into far more details than I could even approximately keep in mind while talking. And if I now try to give you an answer in writing, it will still be very incomplete."^[4]

Editions

Letter to His Father. Bilingual edition. New York City: Schocken Books, 1966.
Dearest Father. (Oneworld Classics, 2008) ISBN 978-1-84749-025-4
Letter to Father. Translated from the German by Karen Reppin. Illustrated with drawings by Franz Kafka and including an afterword on the creation and impact of the text. Vitalis Verlag, Prague 2016. ISBN 978-80-7253-344-2.

The following collections include Kafka's Letter to His Father (Kaiser and Wilkins translation):

Dearest Father. Stories and Other Writings. New York: Schocken Books, 1954.
The Sons. New York: Schocken Books, 1989.

References

^ A friend of a friend, Jerusalem Post
^ "Publisher's Note" Kafka, 127.
^ A Franz Kafka Miscellany: Pre-Facist Exile, New York: Twice a Year Press, 1940, pp. 39-50.
^ Kafka, Franz. Letter to His Father. New York: Schocken Books, 1966. 7.

German Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Brief an den Vater

Franz Kafka (works)

Novels

The Trial
The Castle
Amerika

Short stories

1902–1912	"Shamefaced Lanky and Impure in Heart" "Description of a Struggle" "Wedding Preparations in the Country" "The Judgment" "The Stoker" The Metamorphosis "The Aeroplanes at Brescia"
1914–1917	"In the Penal Colony" "The Village Schoolmaster" "Before the Law" "Blumfeld, an Elderly Bachelor" "A Country Doctor" "The Hunter Gracchus" "The Great Wall of China" "A Message from the Emperor" "A Report to an Academy" "A Dream" "Up in the Gallery" "A Fratricide" "The Next Village" "A Visit to a Mine" "Jackals and Arabs" "The Bridge" "The Bucket Rider" "The New Advocate" "An Old Manuscript" "The Knock at the Manor Gate" "Eleven Sons" "My Neighbor" "A Crossbreed" "The Cares of a Family Man"
1917–1923	"The Refusal" "A Hunger Artist" "Investigations of a Dog" "A Little Woman" "The Burrow" "Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk" "A Common Confusion" "The Truth about Sancho Panza" "The Silence of the Sirens" "Prometheus" "The City Coat of Arms" "Poseidon" "Fellowship" "At Night" "The Problem of Our Laws" "The Conscription of Troops" "The Test" "The Vulture" "The Helmsman" "The Top" "A Little Fable" "Homecoming" "First Sorrow" "The Departure" "Advocates" "The Married Couple" "Give It Up!" "On Parables"