kafka-24grammata.com-free-e-book.-pdf

"Still not going back to school, I see."
"I'm never going back," I confess.
"A library's a pretty good alternative, then," he says. He turns around to
check the time on the clock behind him, then goes back to his reading.
I head off to the reading room and back to Arabian Nights. Like always, once
I settle down and start flipping pages, I can't stop. The Burton edition has all
the stories I remember reading as a child, but they're longer, with more episodes
and plot twists, and so much more absorbing that it's hard to believe they're the
same. They're full of obscene, violent, sexual, basically outrageous scenes. Like
the genie in the bottle they have this sort of vital, living sense of play, of
freedom, that common sense can't keep bottled up. I love it and can't let go.
Compared to those faceless hordes of people rushing through the train station,
these crazy, preposterous stories of a thousand years ago are, at least to me,
much more real. How that's possible, I don't know. It's pretty weird.
At one o'clock I go out to the garden again, sit on the porch, and eat my
lunch. I'm about halfway done when Oshima comes over and says I have a phone call.
"A phone call?" I say, at a loss for words. "For me?"
"As long as your name's Kafka Tamura."
I blush, get to my feet, and take the cordless phone from him.
It's the girl at the front desk at the hotel, most likely checking to see if
I'm really doing research at the library. She sounds relieved to find out I hadn't
lied to her. "I talked with the manager," she says, "and he said they've never
done this before, but seeing as how you're young and there are special
circumstances, he'll make an exception and let you stay at the rate the YMCA
arranged for you. We're not so busy right now, he said, so we can bend the rules a
bit. He also said that library's supposed to be really nice, so he hopes you'll be
able to take your time and do as much research as you need to."
I breathe a sigh of relief and thank her. I feel a little bad about lying,
but there's not much I can do about it. I've got to bend some rules myself if I
want to survive. I hang up and hand the phone back to Oshima.
"You're the only high school student who comes here, so I figured it must be
for you," he says. "I told her you're here from morning till night, your nose
stuck in a book. Which is true."
"Thanks," I tell him.
"Kafka Tamura?"
"That's my name."
"Kind of strange."
"Well, that's my name," I insist.
"I assume you've read some of Kafka's stories?"
I nod. "The Castle, and The Trial, 'The Metamorphosis,' plus that weird
story about an execution device."
"'In the Penal Colony,'" Oshima says. "I love that story. Only Kafka could
have written that."
"That's my favorite of his short stories."
"No kidding?"
I nod.
"Why's that?"
It takes me a while to gather my thoughts. "I think what Kafka does is give
a purely mechanical explanation of that complex machine in the story, as sort of a
substitute for explaining the situation we're in. What I mean is..." I have to
give it some more thought. "What I mean is, that's his own device for explaining
the kind of lives we lead. Not by talking about our situation, but by talking
about the details of the machine."
"That makes sense," Oshima says and lays a hand on my shoulder, the gesture
natural, and friendly. "I imagine Franz Kafka would agree with you."
He takes the cordless phone and disappears back into the building. I stay on
the veranda for a while, finishing my lunch, drinking my mineral water, watching
the birds in the garden. For all I know they're the same birds from yesterday. The