Abstract
Man lives within a social context he finds himself involved in. He is doomed to choose in spite of the fact that he has had no choice in his coming to the world. Man’s being in the world subjects him to a series of social, political, ideological, and theological challenges that, at the end, induce a major transformation in his essence. This existentialist predicament suffered by modern man makes him stand at the brink of the precipice of nihilism where nothingness lies there enveloping many lived phenomena that may appear rationalist and meaningful. Through the characters and the technique of writing, Kafka’s The Castle embodies this fluctuation between nihilism, with all its implications of the loss of meaning, and the existentialist mode of thought that tries to annihilate nothingness through social and political involvement in spite of the fact that nothingness is believed to be enveloping everything. This paper seeks to investigate this philosophical oscillation both on the level of the text and its technique of writing and of the characters who are deeply involved within the political bureaucracy of the Castle, its ideological maze, and its theological anxiety. The spatio-temporal context K. finds himself involved in is one which asserts one fact that has been verbalized by Nietzsche: Man would rather will nothingness than not will at all.
Highlights
It cannot be said that we are lacking in faith
Man’s being in the world subjects him to a series of social, political, ideological, and theological challenges that, at the end, induce a major transformation in his essence. This existentialist predicament suffered by modern man makes him stand at the brink of the precipice of nihilism where nothingness lies there enveloping many lived phenomena that may appear rationalist and meaningful
The Castle is an embodiment of Kafka’s theological orientation that stands midway between existentialism and nihilism. Kafka delineates in his narrative the modern man’s dilemma and his philosophical fluctuation through characters stuck in a state of bewilderment and confusion
Summary
It cannot be said that we are lacking in faith. Even the simple fact of our life is of a faith-value that can never be exhausted. This concept is closely related to the concept of anxiety and authenticity Because of his awareness of living on his own, the individual must free himself from the various modern social movements – such as utilitarianism and liberalism – that evaluate human existence and performance solely in terms of measurable outcomes. This in turn leads to the concept of freedom which extenuated in the 19th and 20th centuries with the rise of a secular society questioning the existing traditional values. We as readers are totally dependent on this interpretation” (Blunden, 1980)
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