Abstract

Any exploration of the relationship between literature and resistance is situated in the all-pervasive—and by now dated—debates between littérature engagée and littérature autonome. Over the past hundred years, the place of Franz Kafka in these debates has been discussed in controversial ways by some of the most important philosophers in a variety of contexts. In her chapter, Vivian Liska experiments with several possible readings of Kafka’s short narrative “Up in the Gallery.” Each one of them lends a different meaning, function, and effect to the hypothetical interruption invoked in Kafka’s story. Starting from diverse meanings of the German word “Halt,” each one of these interpretations takes a different approach to the narrative’s antithetical appearance and reflects on Kafka’s attempt to escape, in and through his literary writing, what he describes as the trap of thinking in dichotomous oppositions. The text aims at serving as a touchstone for a reflection on the potential of literature to intervene in the world and exert resistance in the face of injustice.