Kafka

 Fontana Modern Masters, 1974, softcover, 154 pages, condition: very good.

Heller's commentary on Kafka contains a lengthy analysis of 'The Trial ' and 'The Castle'. It analyzes at great length Kafka's off- and- on twice- broken engagement relationship with Felice Bauer. It focuses on the theme of guilt, 'the guilt that lies in being an individual'. And elaborates the ambiguities and inner conflicts which make up the Kafka world. It also analyzes Kafka's 'Letter to his Father'

Franz Kafka was an Austrian-Czech novelist and writer from Prague. He is widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature; he wrote in German. His work fuses elements of realism and the fantastic. It typically features isolated protagonists facing bizarre or surrealistic predicaments and incomprehensible socio-bureaucratic powers. It has been interpreted as exploring themes of alienation, existential anxiety, guilt, and absurdity. His best known works include the novella The Metamorphosis and the novels The Trial and The Castle. The term Kafkaesque has entered English to describe absurd situations like those depicted in his writing.

The editor,  Frank Kermode, was a British literary critic best known for his 1967 work The Sense of an Ending: Studies in the Theory of Fiction and for his extensive book-reviewing and editing. He was the Lord Northcliffe Professor of Modern English Literature at University College London and the King Edward VII Professor of English Literature at Cambridge University. Kermode was known for many works of criticism, and also as editor of the popular Fontana Modern Masters series of introductions to modern thinkers. He was a regular contributor to the London Review of Books and The New York Review of Books.