FRANZLATIONS

Hugh Thomas and I have been trading versions of rewrites of short pieces and parables by Kafka. Kafka's originals have a haunting intensity and resonance that is captivating. We're not necessary trying to recreate this, but rather to write some pieces in the spirit of Kafka and/or exploring his structures. I don't think that we know what we're going to do with these, but I find the exploration of new tones and structures absorbing.


KAFKA ORIGINAL:

Everyone carries a room about inside him. This fact can even be proved by means of the sense of hearing. If someone walks fast and one pricks up one’s ears and listens, say in the night, when everything around is quiet, one hears, for instance, the rattling of a mirror not quite firmly fastened to the wall.

THREE BARWIN KAFKLATIONS:

Everyone carries an inside inside of them. Sometimes when one has business to attend to, one leaves this inside, small and whimpering behind the front door. It upsets the hatstand, worries the shoes. It grows wispy and sad like outside.

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Everyone carries a car full of clowns inside them. If one listens, say in winter, when everything around is quiet, one hears the small toes of the clowns curling in their big shoes, and the weak toot of the car’s horn, inside one’s self not quite firmly fastened to the ground but floating, floating up into the funny sky.

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Everyone carries a heart about inside them. When they see a broken child, a small telephone, or something happy, they begin to use it. Sometimes, say at night, when everything around is quiet, the heart begins to work on its own, like a mirror with no one in front of it.