Franz Kafka Encyclopedia

Richard T. Gray is Byron W. and Alice L. Lockwood Professor in the Humanities at the University of Washington, where he teaches in the Department of Germanics. His previous books include Constructive Destruction (1987), Stations of the Divided Subject (1995), Approaches to Teaching Kafka's Short Fiction (1995), and About Face (2004).Ruth V. Gross is Head of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures and Professor of German at North Carolina State University. She is the author of PLAN and the Austrian Rebirth (1982), and the editor of Critical Essays on Franz Kafka (1990). She has twice been president of the Kafka Society of America and still sits on its Executive Board and on the Editorial Board of the Society's journal.Rolf J. Goebel is Professor of German at the University of Alabama, Huntsville, where he has been teaching German language and culture since 1982. His previous books include Kritik und Revision (1986), Constructing China (1997), and Benjamin heute (2001).Cayton Koelb is Guy B. Johnson Professor of German and Comparative Literature and Chair of the Department of Germanic Languages at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. His publications include Kafka's Rhetoric (1989) and numerous articles. He has served on the Executive Committee of the Kafka Society of America and the Editorial Board of its journal since 1988 and is a past president of the Society.

• PrefaceAlphabetical List of All EntriesAlphabetical Lists of PoetsAlphabetical List of TopicsList of ContributorsIntroductionA-to-Z EntriesGeneral BibliographyAppendix: Chronological List of PoetsAbout the Editors, Advisors, and ContributorsIndex

Gray and his coauthors offer a wonderfully rich compendium of facts, opinions, explications, and exegeses that cover every conceivable aspect of Kafka's life and writings. Individual articles of varying lengths, by four of the world's leading Kafka scholars, explore in great detail the personages, plots, techniques, and impacts of Kafka's works, and also shed extensive light on his personality, mindset, and approach to the craft of writing. Many of the more substantial articles also provide brief Further Reading lists, most frequently in German or English; these add considerably to the book's research and teaching value. Alphabetical and classed lists of entries (with corresponding English key for terms in German) are also very useful features of this intelligently planned, beautifully executed reference work. An extensive and very up-to-date bibliography of secondary works rounds out this encyclopedia, which is sturdily made and printed on NISO permanent paper standard stock. This indispensable volume will be useful for any library supporting programs in modern European literature, and also appropriate for most large public libraries that have collections of contemporary belles lettres. Highly recommended. Lower-level undergraduates through faculty/researchers.