2nd Body Paragraph

Due to the corruption of the governing body, K. is forced to attempt to create a defense in order to rid himself of these ridiculous crimes. However, the theme of isolation heavily applies to this situation. K. is forced to take matters into his own hands and eventually defend himself due to lack of effort and focus from the outside world including Huld. K. begins to analyze each aspect so crazily that he believes only he will be able to defend himself in the correct manner. However, in terms of his defense this might have not been the best idea.  “Don’t go into shock at every word… You should be ashamed here in front of my client!... It’s senseless anxiety!” This statement was directed towards Block in front of K. by Huld, K.’s lawyer. It displays how even though K. might think that he is getting a fair defense trial, in reality there is nothing K. or Huld can even do about it. They have been isolated by the court and Block knows this. Block is acknowledging the fact that from what he knows about the courts through experience, it is not a governing body that you would want to mess with. Due to this, K. should become nervous and K. due to his blindness in this situation. Another very interesting aspect of the defense is how he is sent from person to person as everyone is starting to admit that they have no control. For example, he is sent from his uncle to Huld to the court painter. Everyone thinks that someone else will have a greater influence in the court than he will. However, K. neglects these professionals and decides to isolate himself and create his own defense. He shuts everyone out of his trial including his own lawyer. In fact, he does not even acknowledge the lawyer anymore when he starts to go to his house and eventually begins to sleep with his housekeeper instead. This upsets Huld and makes it so that he probably will not want to put a lot of effort into helping K. out. Although some may argue that K. forced himself into a state of isolation in this circumstance, did he really have a choice? No one in society had a fighting chance of changing the outcome of his trial. Due to this, it is the court that forced him into this state.

First 500 words

Franz Kafka’s drive to highlight the corruption of government and lack of professionalism in Russian society is exceptionally portrayed through the characters and situations that occur in "The Trial." The implications of his belief system were cleverly interlaced in the novel to express his dissatisfaction in the unofficial, unethical customs of the modern Russian government. Joseph K.’s arrest was unprofessional; that is something that immediately stood out to the readers and set a precedent for the way the rest of the novel would carry out. The first scenes instantly produced a sense of confusion and question as to why something that is supposed to run in an official, political way was being handled so unethically.

K.’s arrest is inarguably one of the most important scenes in the story. Two clearly inexperienced agents from an undetermined source visit Joseph K. to detain him, however they do not inform him of his charge. From these details it is clear that Franz Kafka intends to make a certain claim about the Russian government, and the scene marks the beginning of what will turn into a comment on that society. The agents that visit K. show no professionalism; by their actions it is reasonable to deduce that they are simply doing their job without knowledge of the situation. Now the reader asks him or herself: Why are unqualified individuals being assigned to official positions that are essential for a successful government?

The first court hearing of the novel is yet another instance in which K’s comment on modern Russian society is blatantly underlined. The fact that the accused is notified of this hearing by telephone is already a sign that the judicial system lacks professionalism. He is given an address, but no time and no specifications. This court hearing is supposed to be something formal; something that is taken seriously by the system. However, this seriousness is entirely eliminated by the way the summoning is conducted the lack of formality is prominent during K.’s arrival to the address he was given. He walks into the building, cannot find the courtroom, and is unable to find someone that can help him get to where he needs to be. After K. finally finds the unkempt, congested courtroom, he gives a speech addressing the unofficial way in which the entire event was conducted. K. is the controversial individual in this unsystematic government that charged him with an unspecified authorization, and in a way he represents Franz Kafka. The author uses the protagonist to transmit his critique of the way the system in Russia functions.  

1st

Many people in society believe that in a time of need others will provide you with necessary aid in order to help in the predicament that one is situated in. This includes a wide range of people from friends to families to lawyers. However, InThe Trial by Franz Kafka, we see that sometimes there is nothing that these people can do. Joseph K. an ordinary business many trying to make a name for himself in society is  arrested for a crime he is unaware he committed. Furthermore, the government refuses to acknowledge his request to inform him what the crime was. This pressure from the oppressive government causes him to be both alienated by society and stubborn to accept anyone’s help.
The governing body that is mainly responsible for alienating K. from society is the court. In the novel, the court represents a society where everyone is forced to conform and adhere to a specific standard. No one can be different and the court does everything in its power to attempt to alienate those who are different. When K. is initially arrested one of the guards points this out. They tell him “you should talk less in general; almost everything you’ve said up to now could have been inferred from your behavior, even if you’d said only a few words, and it wasn’t terribly favorable in any case.” This guard is blatantly telling K. that no matter if he is being truthful or fictitious, the court has a way of turning what he says against him, so it is in K.’s best interest not to act at all. The court sees itself as a body that is never wrong, which allows them to make the “correct” decision regarding every trial. In fact, at one point in the novel K. is told that because the court never sees its accusations as being wrong his life will be contained by this trial for an extended period of time. When K. hears this, he realize that this is not the only one being oppressed by this power hungry governing body but that it is happening to many people in society around him. “What has happened to me is merely a single case and such of no particular consequence, since I don’t take it very seriously, but it is typical of the proceeding being brought against many people. I speak for them, not for myself!” In this quote, K. is showing how a governing body such as the court has way too much power. In fact, they have enough control and influence in society to force K. to act by himself. Every single victim that K. of the people that K. is speaking about is alienated. 

Intro and first body paragraph

In Kafka's novel, The Trial, a phony bureaucracy under an unnamed society of men control and ultimately wear down K. into a completely different person. The idea that social creations like a fake bureaucracy are created to manipulate people ultimately can change who we are at our core existence. In the beginning of the novel, Joseph K. is described as being a self made, hard working, and independent young man with a great deal of potential within himself. Kafka made K. in the beginning of the novel to be perfectly autonomous and perfectly fine with himself. He was described as being happy with himself, until he got arrested for no named reason. After that day, the decline in not only the morale but also the spirit of K. began. 

K.'s transformation into the man he died as started as a completely different person. He did not rely on anyone, only himself. K. was a successful banker in an industry that fed solely on competition, another indicator of the great mental condition that K. was in before his arrest. He was described as being happy with himself, until he got arrested for no named reason. K. even is seen as describing the men who arrested him as "underlings" to him. He viewed the world around him as sub-par to him, and ideal present in some of the most successful people today. In the first chapter, during K.'s arrest, he tries to go above and beyond and try and look into why he is being arrested. He sneaks around and brainstorms ways as to why he would have gotten arrested, without deciding to give up. These ideals are not present in K. after the arrest, he just let's everything sort of play out, even if it's for the worst. K. transforms into a pragmatic person with his arrest. He stops the clawing and scratching that got him to the top of his food chain of his bank, and ultimately allows for his "trial" to overrun and transform him into that pragmatic version of himself. K. is demanding in the first scenes of the novel, and is seen as not wanting to back down from his territory. If he wanted something, he went out and did everything in his power to retrieve that want, something completely different about himself at the end. It's almost as if K. becomes an old man towards the end of the novel. After the day of his arrest, the decline in not only the morale but also the spirit of K. began. 

Intro and First Body Paragraph

Camille Kelleher

In his novel The Trial, Franz Kafka describes Josef K.’s encounter with a hidden totalitarian government and his transformation under the noted government’s pressures and disturbances in his life. The ongoing madness and Josef K.’s personal destruction captures the vulnerability of human institutions like the church, family, and state to human desires and the absurd, an existential idea that gives no meaning in the world besides the one that humans assign to it. Kafka criticizes mankind’s innate, destructive logic to create societal institutions that confines citizens and inevitably leads to the failure of human values and beliefs. These institutions attempt to deceive citizens by hiding life’s chaos and uncertainty, which is highlighted or awakened in the court system.

Throughout the book, Josef K. meets multiple characters who maintain their own different roles in society and possess exclusive knowledge of the court system. Their respective influence in the court system varies by character, but all of their interactions in the court system lead to minimal progress for Josef K.’s trial. All of them have inconsequential effect in Josef K.’s trial because they are subservient to the totalitarian government. Josef K.’s interactions vary with the characters given their role in society. Block the Merchant signifies a citizen who is enslaved to human institutions and causes his own self-destruction because he is attached to ideals that are designed to fail. He is overly conscious about his position in society and interactions with Josef K because he establishes his opinion on artificial human values. When Josef K asks him about his past with lawyers, he replies, “I’ll confide in part, but you have to tell me a secret too, so that we both have something to hold over the other with regard to the lawyer.” His inability to escape the human institutions leads to self-destruction both in his personal life and career. He hired five more lawyers because he doesn’t want to overlook anything that could be valuable to his case and spent everything on his trial to ensure unconquerable success. Titorelli the painter provides a different perspective on the court system. He paints portraits of court officials and gossips about the court with Josef K., but acts like a beggar when he tries to sell his artwork. The manufacturer who suggested Josef K. talk to him says “a person is naturally reluctant to allow himself to be advised by a fellow like that.” Josef K still talks to Titorelli because Titorelli encompass the same characteristics, illusive and ignorant, that judges possess since he personally works with them. During his arrest, Josef K. talks to the inspector who accepts the idea of chaos and the absurd in everyday life. When Josef K. continues to hammer the inspector with primary questions about his case, the inspector replies, “think less about us and what’s going to happen to you, and instead think more about yourself.” This signals the start of Josef K.’s transformation from accepting the human institutions to eventually rejecting them at the end of the book. At the beginning of his novel, K introduces existential themes and describes the potential failure that every citizen faces while adhering to human institutions.

Outline

Thesis: In The Trial, a phony bureaucracy under an unnamed society of men control and ultimately wear down K. into a completely different person. The idea that social creations like a fake bureaucracy are created to manipulate people ultimately can change who we are at our core existence.

Outline: I. Introduction
                 a. Just a regular introduction, my thesis, and a tease of what I'm going to write about in regards to K.'s transformation as a person in The Trial.
II. The man K. was before the arrest
                 a. In the beginning of the novel, K. is described as being self-made, elaborate on that in the paper
                 b. Hardworking
                 c. Persistent in achieving his goals
III. The man K. was after the arrest
                 a. Show how each of the three letters in the previous paragraph are completely changed in K. towards the end of the book:
                          i. K. gets obsessed with his trial, and cannot focus properly on work
                         ii. K. hires someone else to work on his Trial for him, rather than putting in the work to make it right. 
                        iii. K. gets tired of his trial going absolutely nowhere, and finally decides to fire his lawyer, but is so run down by the whole process that he actually does an even worse job, leading to his inevitable death. 
IV. Conclusion
                 a. Brief overview of everything I spoke about
                 b. Current examples of our government and how it can warp our perceptions/actions, and how it can change us completely.

Final Outline

Thesis: Franz Kafka’s drive to highlight the corruption of government and lack of professionalism in Russian society is exceptionally portrayed through the characters and situations that occur in "The Trial." The implications of his belief system were cleverly interlaced in the novel to express his dissatisfaction in the unofficial, unethical customs of the modern Russian government.     I.         Introduction: Thesis, brief summary

   II.         K’s Arrest
                   a.   The Guards
                                    i.     Randomly coming to K.’s house and arresting him
                                    ii.     Unspecified charge
                   b.   Conditions of Arrest
                                    i.     Allowed to go about his daily routine
                                    ii.     Under arrest but not told why
III.        First court hearing
IV.        Importance of Innocence in the trial (Huld)
                 a.   Huld
                                    i.     Admits to Joseph K that the only way to win a trial is through connections
                                    ii.     Innocence means nothing, it is all about who you know or what you can do for the Judges.
                 b.   Titorelli
                                   i.     Because of his paintings he is classified as a “connection.”
                                   ii.     A painter can be more important than innocence in this bureaucracy.
  V.     Totalitarianism; power to the worthy
                a.   Titorelli
                                   i.     Has so much power because of his power
                                   ii.     Not qualified but is able to get what he wants because he has what those in authority want
                                   iii.     Complete abuse of power demonstrated by Titorelli’s character
                b.   Leni
                                  i.     Sleeps with men in order to be secured by the government
                                  ii.     Because of her promiscuity she has some power, not because of qualifications
VI.      K’s Death; comparison between the guards who arrested him and killed him.
               a.   Similarity between the guards who arrested him in the beginning and those who killed him in the end
               b.   Unprofessionalism of these events; parallelism between the two incidences
VII.         Kafka’s analysis on Russian government during that time; indirect critique
               a.   His view on totalitarian government
               b.   Idea that the only way to get anywhere is through connections
               c.    Intelligence, experience, or innocence do not matter.
               d.   All that matters is your name or what you can do for those in charge.
VIII.        Conclusion