Many say that the main theme in this novel is to show the extent a modern beurocracy with madness of totalitarianism control our lives and destinies. Perhaps, but there is also a more powerful and obvious issue in this novel, which could have served as a main theme?the vices of human kind. Pride, arrogance, complacency, ignorance, superiority, conceit and independence have always driven people to no good, including Joseph K. (the main protagonist in the novel). In many cases these vices drive people to sin before God, hurt others, or as in this novel, death.
The main theme was masterfully interwoven with the novel?s unique and strange construction. New characters were introduced in each chapter and then suddenly disappeared in the following. They had ambiguous purposes and brought confusing questions before the reader, but everyone were connected with K. These characters often were poor, illiterate, and less successful, and K.
Monument to Franz Kafka by the sculptor Jaroslav R...
English: 3:4 Portrait crop of Franz Kafka
Kafka, Franz: Der Prozeß. Roman. Berlin: Die Schm...always treated them as inferior or used them for his purposes. For example, in the opening chapter when K. is arrested by two guards he is condescending, insolent, always flashes his credentials and big position at the bank. He threatens the guards who are there only following orders and is very superior.
Also there were chapters that came and went, but never really explained anything major, but all, in a subtle way, told us about K.?s character and slowly unscrambled the novel?s theme. In a chapter under the name ?Initial Inquiry?, K was required to attend a hearing preliminary to his trial. If he presented himself well and humbly, it would greatly benefit him later on, but K. was very rude with the magistrate and showed himself as a proud man. K. ridiculed the court and diatribed its actions. And that could strongly be one of the reasons he was...