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Article: Franz Kafkas Sprachen: '... in einem Stockwerk des babylonischen Turmes ...'.(Book review)
- Article from:
- The Modern Language Review
- Article date:
- January 1, 2006
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2006 Modern Humanities Research Association. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Franz Kafkas Sprachen: '... in einem Stockwerk des babylonischen Turmes ...' By Marek Nekula. Tubingen: Niemeyer. 2003. xiii+397 pp. 98 [euro]. ISBN 3-484-73061-7.
Many ordinary readers imagine that Kafka, coming from Prague, must have written in Czech. Germanists, tired of correcting this misapprehension, can commit the opposite error by underestimating his familiarity with the Czech language and culture. Marek Nekula, a linguist equally at home in Czech and German, has now provided an exhaustive assessment of Kafka's familiarity with Czech, along with a study of the regional character of his German.
As evidence, Nekula has examined some letters from ...