Metamorphoses

Karolina Watroba

An Economist Best Book of 2024

'A high-spirited, richly informed, and original portrait, a cross between biography, literary analysis and a study in modern canonisation: Karolina Watroba is an inspired guide and her book a pleasure to read.' Marina Warner

'A rich account of what modern readers have made of Kafka' Observer

Franz Kafka was one of the most influential, and enigmatic, writers of the twentieth century. His books, with their mysterious courts and monstrous insects, have had an influential reach across literature, music, art and film. But who, exactly, was Franz Kafka?

Karolina Watroba tells Kafka's story beyond the boundaries of language, time and space, travelling from the Prague of Kafka's birth through the work of contemporary writers in East Asia, whose award-winning novels are in part homages to the great man himself.

Metamorphoses is a non-chronological journey through Kafka's life, drawing together literary scholarship with the responses of his readers through time. It is a both an exploration of Kafka's life and an exciting new way of approaching literary history.