Essential Kafka: Rendezvous with “Otherness”: Nine Stories and Three Excerpts by Franz Kafka by Phillip Lundberg (review)

Just as new eras call for their own literary histories and theories, new translations are required as well. Kafka is certainly not under-translated—his texts are available in English translation and countless other languages in print and online. The possible deficiencies of the translations notwithstanding, Kafka has become one of the best-known authors, if not the best known author, of the German language, and students worldwide read and relate to him as if he were a local author. The translations by Edwin and Willa Muir dating from the 1930s and 1940s are still commercially available and widely read. Like the translations of Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser, they are landmarks of Kafka translation.

Indeed, few authors have proven as resilient as Kafka. Generation after generation has derived new meaning from his texts, as is apparent from their impact on international literature, film, and the arts. Retranslations and translations of as yet untranslated works keep appearing and bring to light different aspects of the original works as they absorb insights from Kafka criticism. The differences between translations are oftentimes the result of historical and cultural factors, since translations into English have been produced by authors from Britain, Austria, Ireland, Canada, and the United States. Differences between the editions and text versions that form the basis of the respective translations account for variations as well.

In his postscript, Phillip Lundberg, aware of the impossibility of “translating,” uses the term analogy. He states as his goal “to provide English readers with a better translation: that Kafka’s prose should find a more fitting analogy in modern American English” (297); perhaps, as Benjamin suggested in “The Task of the Translator,” Lundberg aims at identifying the intended effect of the original and producing an echo of it. Indeed, a cursory glance at Lund-berg’s strategies reveals that literalness is not his objective. Often he expands Kafka’s terse prose to fit a more relaxed narrative mode or modifies formulaic and idiomatic phrases that frequently occur in Kafka in such away as to reveal them as clichés. Lunderg’s translation of The Judgment may serve as a case in point to show the transposition of Kafka’s prose into a new framework. Rendering “Es war an einem Sonntagvormittag im schönsten Frühjahr” as “It was on a Sunday, shortly before noon, the most beautiful time in the Spring” (9) modifies not only the original time frame but also the tone and the information about the time of year. Translating the modest “Kaufmann” as “entrepreneur in the wholesale market” (9) and “Freund” as “buddy” further advances the cultural and historical transposition, as do occasional contractions such as “you’ve” and “I’ve” (12). The final sentence “At that moment the bridge shuddered beneath an endless wave of traffic” (22) seems informed by Freudian Kafka interpretations and goes beyond the rather bland “In diesem Augenblick ging über die Brücke ein geradezu unendlicher Verkehr.”

Lundberg is an eloquent spokesman on behalf of his translation. His emphasis on a “better translation” suggests that deficient translations prevent an author’s wider reception. Lundberg’s target readership are speakers of modern American English, and his goal is to provide texts apt to satisfy the average reader, who tends to be discouraged by the “excessive literalness” (300) that Lundberg observes in the Muirs’ translations. In contrast to many contemporary theorists, Lundberg maintains that there is a quality standard for translation and considers “poor translations” to be “a warning sign of a diseased culture” (298). His remarks about the translator’s decision-making process in an effort to provide both originality and fidelity to the original text apply to his translation practice. Lundberg deserves applause for his avoidance of imitating Kafka’s inimitable style. Not only would such an attempt produce, as the translator asserts, a most peculiar prose (299), it would stand in the way of transposing those elements of the original...