Outside Humanity

An analysis of plot-structures in Kafka's fictional works. Based on the striking recurrence of certain basic structural models in Kafka's plots, the author examines, in a structuralist psychoanalytical approach, the intimate relationship, highlighted by most recent Kafka-research (Hartmut Binder), between Kafka's life and work. Special attention is given, for the first time, to the homoerotic relationship between Kafka and the young Robert Klopstock, and to the effect this relationship had on Kafka's later works.