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| Félix Vallotton Woman writing in an interior 1904 oil on panel Museum of Fine Arts, Houston |
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| Harold Gilman Sylvia darning 1917 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| Harold Gilman Portrait of Stanislawa de Karlowska (Mrs Robert Bevan) 1913 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| Ernst Ludwig Kirchner Moonrise - Soldier and Maiden 1905 oil on canvas Museum of Fine Arts, Houston |
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| Lovis Corinth Portrait of Alfred Kuhn 1923 oil on canvas Leopold Museum, Vienna |
"In the critical edition of Kafka's Diaries, we find a series of fragments from 1910 that were largely eliminated from previous German editions. Why? Surely because of their embarrassing repetitiveness, like a broken record. Yet it is precisely this repetitiveness that is their most important trait. There are six of these fragments, ranging in length from fourteen lines to four pages, written in succession. Let's look at the opening of each:
If I think about it, I must say my upbringing in certain respects has done me great harm.
If I think about it, I must say my upbringing in certain respects has done me great harm.
Often I ponder it and then every time I must say my upbringing, in certain ways, has done me great harm.
Often I ponder it, letting my thoughts follow their own course without interfering, and every time, however I view it, I come to the conclusion that my upbringing in certain ways, has done me terrible harm.
Often I ponder it, letting my thoughts follow their own course without interfering, but every time I come to the conclusion that my upbringing has damaged me more than I can understand.
I often ponder it, letting my thoughts follow their own course without interfering, but every time I come to the same conclusion, that I have been more damaged by my upbringing than anyone I know and more than I am able to comprehend."
– from K. by Roberto Calasso, translated by Geoffrey Brock (New York: Knopf, 2005)
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| Thomas Eakins William Rush carving his allegorical figure of the Schuylkill River ca. 1908 oil on canvas Brooklyn Museum |
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| William Peploe Portrait of a young man with long hair ca. 1915 oil on canvas Yale Center for British Art |
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| Joaquín Sorolla Portrait of Miguel de Unamuno ca. 1912 oil on canvas Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao |
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| Juan Gris Portrait of Pablo Picasso 1912 oil on canvas Art Institute of Chicago |
"The strange thing is that when one wakes up in the morning, one generally finds things in the same places they were the previous evening. And yet in sleep and in dreams one finds oneself, at least apparently, in a state fundamentally different from wakefulness, and upon opening one's eyes an infinite presence of mind is required, or rather quickness of wit, in order to catch everything, so to speak, in the same place one left it the evening before." These lines, which are the fundamental chord of The Trial, were crossed out by Kafka (and again one suspects that he crossed out whatever gave too much evidence of the thought behind the text). We encounter them in the opening scene, when Josef K. begins talking with the guards. He recalls then what an unspecified "someone" once told him about the fact that waking is "the riskiest moment." And that unknown person had added: "If you can manage to get through it without being dragged out of place, you can relax for the rest of the day." The Trial is the story of a forced awakening. Josef K. is the one for whom nothing will ever return to its proper place."
– from K. by Roberto Calasso, translated by Geoffrey Brock (New York: Knopf, 2005)
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| Édouard Vuillard Lucy Hessel reading 1913 oil on canvas Jewish Museum, New York |
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| George Bellows Emma in Purple Dress ca. 1920-23 oil on canvas Dallas Art Museum |
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| Egon Schiele Portrait of Paris von Gütersloh 1918 oil on canvas Minneapolis Institute of Art |
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| Egon Schiele The Hermits 1912 oil on canvas Leopold Museum, Vienna |
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| Egon Schiele Mother and Child 1914 drawing, with pigment Leopold Museum, Vienna |