Diaries 1914-1923 Author:Franz Kafka This, the second and final volume of the complete 'Diaries', embraces the period of the unique writer's most productive and mature literary activity, the period of 'In the Penal Colony,' 'The Trial,' and 'The Castle.' As the end draws near - the entries break off a year before his death at forty-one in 1924 - the compelling power of Kafka's intr... more »ospection rises to a level rarely reached in world literature. He states his impasse with agonized clarity: "It is indeed a Wandering in the Wilderness that I am undergoing. . ." The diaries are one of the greatest descriptions, in or outside formal literature, of the modern self-consciousness, most lucid in describing the problems it cannot solve. Here is a man whom Hermann Hesse called "the uncrowned king of German prose," speaking the words that he must say to himself before he can speak to others. The Travel Diaries, included in this volume, conclude the major canon of Kafka's writings. This volume is the closing masterpiece of a life rendered triumphant in this record of it.« less