Activities

Kafka, Prague, and the First World War

International symposium, St. John's College, Oxford
13-15 September 2010

The First World War, often called the »Urkatastrophe« of the twentieth century, changed Kafka’s life, as it did everybody’s. The famous diary entry for 2 August 1914 - »Germany has declared war on Russia. Went swimming in the afternoon« - gives an impression of detachment which is entirely misleading, as this conference will aim to show.

We envisage the symposium as having three concentric circles: 1) the historical context, recreated with the help of historians of Central Europe; 2) the Prague literary circle and its contacts with Czech-language culture; 3) Kafka and his works, especially those produced in the Alchimistengässchen.

Programme

Monday, 13 September
08.30	Welcome
	I. Historical Context
09.00	Mark Cornwall (Southampton): The Wartime Bohemia of Kafka: the Social and National Crisis
09.30	Johannes Birgfeld (Saarbrücken): Der Erste Weltkrieg im Prager Tagblatt
10.00	Discussion
10.30	Coffee-break
11.00	Andreas Kilcher (Zürich): Zionistischer Kriegsdiskurs
11.30	Eva Edelmann (Zürich): Geschichtstheologische Strategien zionistischer Gegenwartsdeutung in der Prager jüdischen Wochenschrift »Selbstwehr«
12.00	Discussion
12.30	Lunch
	II. Czechs and Germans
14.30	Claire Nolte (Manhattan College, New York): Inter arma silent Musae?: Culture in Wartime Prague
15.00	Rajendra Chitnis (Bristol): Putting »Granny« in a Home: Literary Modernism and the Bohemian Village
15.30	Discussion
16.00	Tea-break
16.30	Peter Zusi (London): States of Shock: Kafka and Richard Weiner
17.00	Ritchie Robertson (Oxford): Max Brod's Novel »Tycho Brahes Weg zu Gott«
17.30	Discussion

Tuesday, 14 September
	III. Kafka’s Writings of the First World War Period
09.30	Reiner Stach (Berlin): Franz Kafka: kriegsgefangen
10.00	Juliane Blank (Saarbrücken): Kafkas Oktavhefte im Kontext des Ersten Weltkrieges. Historische Konkretisierung und Verallgemeinerung in den <Gruftwächter>-Aufzeichnungen
10.30	Discussion
11.00	Coffee-break
11.30	Thomas Anz (Marburg): Motive des Militärischen in Kafkas Erzähltexten seit August 1914
12.00	Bill Dodd (Birmingham): Kafka's »Russian Experience« and Images of War in his Writings from 1912 Onwards
12.30	Discussion
13.00	Lunch
15.00	Tour of College (for speakers only)

Wednesday, 15 September
09.00	Marek Nekula (Regensburg): Kafkas organische Sprache – Umgang mit Sprachen und nationaler Verortung in den Jahren 1914 bis 1918
09.30	Benno Wagner (Siegen): Franz Kafka, Karl Kraus und die Verteidigung der Sprache gegen die Propaganda
10.00	Discussion
10.30	Coffee-break
11.00	Manfred Engel (Saarbrücken): Entwürfe symbolischer Weltordnungen: China und China Revisited. Zum China-Komplex in Kafkas Werk 1917-1920
11.30	Carolin Duttlinger (Oxford): Verantwortung‹: The »Landarzt« Collection and Kafka's Short Prose Writings 1914-18
12.00	Discussion
12.30	Lunch

Convenors

Carolin Duttlinger, Manfred Engel, Katrin Kohl, Ritchie Robertson

Conference venue

New Seminar Room, St. John's College

Accommodation for speakers

St. John's College, St. Giles, Oxford, OX1 3JP (www.sjc.ox.ac.uk)

Conference fee (for guests)

£ 20 (reduced fee for students: £ 10)

Contact

anatole.oudaille-diethardt@sjc.ox.ac.uk