by Marek Nekula, University of Regensburg, MSH Visiting Professor

On the occasion of last year's anniversary of one of the most important Czech and Central European authors, Franz Kafka, the MODERNITAS team cordially invites to a lecture by Marek Nekula, one of the leading experts on the work of this original writer.

The lecture addresses the question of whether and how Kafka's texts reflect Prague's public space and its semantics. It is explicitly referred to in Kafka's private texts, especially his letters, but despite the fragment ""Description of a Struggle"", it is not explicitly referred to in Kafka's literary texts. Nevertheless, Kafka's biographical space is used in the interpretation of Kafka's oeuvre and of his texts, both in the theory and history of literature presenting Kafka ""from a Prague perspective"" as well as in the popularisation of Kafka. The aesthetic strategy of Kafka's literary texts, however, seems to be rather deconcretization, which is also true of public space.

Against this backdrop, the second half of the lecture deals with the narrative, visual and cartographic concretization of Prague as Kafka's Prague through the projection of Kafka – of his biography and texts – onto the representations of Prague's public space, as well as through the inscription of his biography and texts into Prague's public space. Using the example of Jaroslav Róna's monument to Franz Kafka from 2003, referring to ""Description of a Struggle"", or David Černý's Franz Kafka's Head from 2014, a variation of the previous „Metalmorphosis“, which establishes a reference to the short story "" Metamorphosis"", we can see how these sculptural adaptations of Kafka's texts become biographically concrete, inscribed in Prague's public space and detached from his texts.

Marek Nekula is a professor specialising in Czech and West Slavic Studies at the University of Regensburg. He concentrates on language interaction and multilingualism (particularly its presence in literature), sociolinguistics, language planning, nationalism, and memory studies. Following his studies in Czech and German Philology in Brno and Jena, he worked as a researcher at the Czechoslovak (subsequently Czech) Academy of Sciences in Prague. He obtained his PhD from Free University Berlin as a DAAD fellow. He lectured and conducted courses at Charles University in Prague, Masaryk University in Brno, Harvard University, and the University of Michigan. He has authored works like "Franz Kafka and His Prague Contexts", "Deutsche und Tschechen: Geschichte - Kultur - Politik" any many others.

Tuesday 8th April 2025, from 2pm until 4pm

Salle de réception
Building DE1 - Level 3 - Room R.3.105
Avenue Antoine Depage 1
1000 Bruxelles

Free entrance

Contact: petra.james@ulb.be