On Prague and Franz Kafka

The other day I sat down near the Franz Kafka statue in Josefov and people watched. A flock of apathetic tourists was huddled around the statue, listening to an enthusiastic Spanish tour guide. I don't speak Spanish, but words like emocional, padre, and aprensión made it seem like the guide was spilling the dirt on Kafka's personal life and his various anxieties. After that, the tourists took photos and moved on to the next attraction. I thought, "Isn't it strange to become known as 'the dude with emotional problems'?" Sure, he wrote some influential stories, but who reads them? For conversational purposes, all you need to know about Kafka is that in one of his stories someone wakes up as a bug, and that there's plenty of dirty laundry. And Prague's tourism industry (Mr. K was born, lived, and is buried here) doesn't help this simplistic understanding; it relishes in it. Every souvenir shop sells Kafka-related apparel, usually featuring dark figures walking down ominous streets. So here we have a guy with complex thoughts, uncommon creativity, and a weird sense of humor, boiled down to the poster child for alienation. Anyway, Franz, you had strange thoughts all your life? You weren't sure where you belonged? Capitalism has figured it out: it's the souvenir shops.