6. To Oskar Pollak in Prague
Prague, 4 February 1902, Tuesday
When I was walking with you on Saturday, it became clear to me what we need. Yet I’m writing only today, for such things must lie and stretch out. When we speak with each other: the words are hard, one walks over them as over bad pavement. The finest things get clumsy feet and we can’t help it. We’re almost in each other’s way, I bump into you and you—I don’t dare, and you—. When we come to things that are not exactly street stones or “Kunstwart”, we suddenly see ourselves clad in costumes and masks, making angular gestures (I especially, yes), and then we suddenly grow sad and tired. Have you ever been as tired with anyone as with me, you often grow truly ill. Then comes my pity and I can’t do anything or say anything and bring out forced, ridiculous words, which you would get from anyone who might come along and better, then I fall silent and you fall silent and you grow tired and I grow tired and everything is a stupid despondency and it isn’t worth it to lift one’s hand. But neither of us wants to say it to the other out of shame or fear or—you see, we fear each other, or I—.
I do understand, when one stands for years in front of an ugly wall and it refuses to crumble even a little, one grows tired. Yes but it fears for itself, for the garden (if there is one), but you grow angry, get a headache, are at a loss.
You must have noticed, whenever we see each other after a long time, we are disappointed, morose, until we’ve grown accustomed to the moroseness. We have to hold up words to cover the yawning.
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I’ve started to worry that you won’t understand this whole letter, what does it want? Without flourishes and veils and warts: When we speak with each other, we are hindered by things we want to say but can’t say in that way, instead expressing them in ways that make us misunderstand each other, even fail to hear each other, even laugh at each other (I say: the honey is sweet, but I say it softly or stupidly or poorly phrased and you say: The weather is nice today. That’s already a bad turn in the conversation); since we constantly try and never succeed, we grow tired, dissatisfied, hard-mouthed. If we tried to write it, we would be lighter than when we speak with each other,—we could speak entirely without shame about street stones and “Kunstwart”, for the better things would remain secure. That’s what this letter wants. Is this brought on by jealousy?
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I couldn’t know that you would read the last page too and so I’ve scribbled down this peculiar part, even though it doesn’t belong to the letter.
We’ve been speaking with each other for three years; by now in some things one can’t tell the difference between mine and yours. I often wouldn’t be able to say what comes from me or from you and perhaps it will be the same for you.
Now I am wonderfully glad that you’re spending time with the girl. For your sake; I’m indifferent to her. But you often talk with her, not just for the sake of talking. Then it might happen, you’re walking with her somewhere here or there or in Rostok and I’m sitting at my desk at home. You’re talking with her and in the middle of a sentence someone jumps up and makes a bow. It is I with my unhewn words and quadrangular facial expressions. It lasts only a moment before you continue talking. I sit at my desk at home and yawn. I’ve already experienced this. Wouldn’t we then part from each other? Isn’t it strange? Are we enemies? I’m very fond of you.
“Kunstwart”: The magazine Der Kunstwart. Halbmonatsschau über Dichtung, Theater, Musik, bildende und angewandte Künste (The Guardian of Art: Bimonthly Review of Literature, Theater, Music, Fine and Applied Arts), published since 1887 and edited by Ferdinand Avenarius. Kafka probably became familiar with the magazine during his final Gymnasium years through Oskar Pollak and subscribed to it until around mid-1904.
Rostok: Czech: Roztoky. An excursion and villa destination located about 12 kilometers north of Prague. In the summer of 1900, the Kafka family spent their vacation there at the home of Postmaster Kohn. See also Kafka’s album entry for Kohn’s daughter Selma.
Oskar Pollak: (b. Prague, 5 September 1883–d. Austrian-Italian front on the Isonzo, 11 June 1915) Oskar Pollak was a classmate of Kafka’s at the Altstädter Gymnasium. After completing his secondary education, he initially pursued studies in chemistry, later switching to philosophy and archeology, and ultimately to art history at Charles University. At the beginning of his studies, he joined the Lese- und Redehalle der deutschen Studenten (Reading and Lecture Hall of German Students), as did Kafka, whose closest friend he was during these early university years. In the summer semester of 1903 and in the winter semester of 1903–1904, Pollak served as art correspondent for the literary section of the organization. When he took a position as a private tutor at Oberstudenetz Castle at Zdiretz (Ždírec nad Doubravou) in the fall of 1903, Kafka succeeded him in this role. Pollak earned his doctorate in 1907 with a dissertation on the Baroque sculptors Johann and Ferdinand Maximilian Brokoff. That same year, he married Hedwig Eisner in Prague. Pollak authored numerous studies on art history, focusing primarily on the Renaissance and Baroque periods. From 1910 to 1913, he worked first as an assistant and, after completing his postdoctoral qualification, as a lecturer in art history at the University of Vienna. When he was offered the position of art history secretary at the Austrian Historical Institute in Rome, Pollak left Vienna and moved to Italy with his wife. With the outbreak of the First World War, Pollak volunteered for military service. He died on June 11, 1915, on the Austrian-Italian front during the early Battles of the Isonzo in Friuli.
English Translation Copyright © 2024 Ross Benjamin
This translation is based on Franz Kafka: Briefe. Kommentierte Ausgabe. Herausgegeben von Hans-Gerd Koch © S. Fischer Verlag GmbH, Frankfurt am Main 1999.