Franz Kafka
(1883–1924)

Born into a middle-class Jewish family in Prague, Bohemia (now the Czech Republic), Franz Kafka has come to symbolize the alienation of modern humans in a hostile world. Kafka went to German schools and earned a doctorate in law from Ferdinand-Karls University in Prague. By day, Kafka worked as a specialist in accident prevention and workplace safety at the Worker's Accident Insurance Institution, and by night he wrote. He published several works during his lifetime, including "The Metamorphosis" (1915), "The Judgment" (1913), "In the Penal Colony" (1919), and "The Hunger Artist" (1924).

Kafka died of tuberculosis in Kierling, Kosterneuburg, Austria. Kafka had requested that his manuscripts be destroyed after his death. However, his good friend Max Brod disregarded his wishes and edited and published much of Kafka's work. The best known of the posthumous works are three novels: The Trial (1925), The Castle (1926), and Amerika (1927).

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