Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Literary Non-News Stories

New Kafka papers to be revealed to the public? I think not.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-10682482

According to the BBC, these documents (part of a long-running feud) will only come under the eye of a "Kafka Specialist" and will not be released to the public.

I don't understand this. Why not make these public? Even Nabokov's manuscripts have been seen in public. Laura has come into the public eye (after 25+ years of debating). I have a Laura manuscript upstairs, in Nabokov's own hand.(*)

They've even discovered Kafka's stash of pornography and made selections of the contents public knowledge.(**) If his choice of porn has literary value, why not let us see the real stuff?

JPC

*Attention possible theives, the "manuscript" of Nabokov's Laura is no real manuscript, it's just a copy of the book, which reproduced the index cards he wrote the text on.

**http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2008/aug/15/kafkasguiltypleasures

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