Description:

Max Brod's Homelands, Kafka's Patrimony

An author in his own right, Max Brod gets lost in the recent skirmishes over the rightful archival home of his literary remain, the contents of a suitcase rushed out of Czechoslovakia on the eve of Hitler's invasion. The papers include documents in the hand of his friend Franz Kafka. A protracted court case in Tel Aviv relating to the question of this “cultural patrimony” raises questions about the cultural place of these Jewish, German-language writers from Prague. Where did Max Brod and Franz Kafka belong, and who are their legitimate heirs? Framed by the dispute ver the Brod papers, this talk explores the kinds of homeinscribed in Brod's and kafka's writings and their distinct views of cultural legacy.