Kafka: Making of an Icon

Co-curated by Professor in German and Ockenden Fellow and Tutor in German, Professor Carolin Duttlinger, the exhibition Kafka: Making of an Icon will feature materials from the archives of the Bodleian Libraries, which hold the majority of Franz Kafka's papers. These include literary notebooks, drawings, diaries, letters, postcards. Notably, the notebooks in the archive include the original manuscripts of The Metamorphosis and two of Kafka’s unfinished novels, Das Schloss (The Castle) and Der Verschollene (America), as well as a number of short stories, glossaries, and photographs.

Outstanding loans will be added to these collections, including, from the National Library of Israel, Kafka drawings and ‘conversation slips’ written by Kafka as he lay unable to speak, dying from TB in 1924, and Andy Warhol’s depiction of Kafka which will be borrowed from a collection in the US.

Using this rich archive, the exhibition not only sets Kafka in the context of his life and times but also shows how his own experiences nourished his imagination. His notebooks show how his travels in Western Europe enabled him to practise descriptive writing, while his readings strengthened his fascination with remote spaces and made him aware of European colonialism.

‘The centenary of Franz Kafka's death is a unique opportunity to celebrate his global legacy while also introducing his texts to a new generation of readers’ says Professor Carolin Duttlinger. ‘We are very excited about the upcoming exhibition, which will tell the story of Kafka life, times and works, including how his manuscripts ended up at the Bodleian Library in Oxford.’

The exhibition is curated by the Co-Directors of the Kafka Research Centre, Oxford, and supported by the Curator of the Kafka Archive at the Bodleian Libraries.

When: 30 May - 27 October 2024

Where: S.T. Lee Gallery, Weston Library, Bodleian Libraries

Curators:

Prof Carolin Duttlinger, Co-Director of the Oxford Kafka Research Centre

Prof Katrin M. Kohl, Co-Director of the Oxford Kafka Research Centre

Prof Barry Murnane, Co-Director of the Oxford Kafka Research Centre

Dr Meindert Peters, Leverhulme Research Fellow at the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages

Dr Karolina Watroba, Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at All Souls College

Supported by: Malgorzata Czepiel, Curator of the Kafka Archive at the Bodleian Libraries