Fathers and Writers: Kafka’s “Letter to His Father” and Philip Roth’s Non-Fiction

This essay explores the literary connection between Franz Kafka and Philip Roth. It is focused on Kafka’s 1919 letter to his father, which is understood as the foundation for Roth’s two memoirs, The Facts (1988) and Patrimony (1991). Kafka’s letter charts the enormous influence of parents upon the imagination of their children, establishing the writer’s task as liberation from parents and in his case as a son’s liberation from his father: such liberation then becomes the freedom to write about the father, casting the son’s liberty into doubt. Trading in American rather than European details, The Facts and Patrimony explore exactly this psycho-literary terrain.