Combined Shakespeare and US Government - The Castle - Essay Sample

Introduction

Franz Kafka’s Castle is based on a struggle which portrayed dialogues, observations, and a string of episodes in which the ambition of the protagonist named K is halted by hidden powers (Azizmohammadi, 2012). The struggle, which merges symbolic action, revolves around the Castle as a place, authority, symbol, goal, and K's fate. The novel dramatizes an individual’s self-discovery in the diabolic world, which Kafka has pictured as the world of the Castle itself. This novel is surrounded with frustration and a sense of being lost outside the Castle with no way in and no way to be heard on sight (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). The protagonist's feelings of inadequacy and disaffection from the village processes certainly result in more frustration when he can do nothing to transform his life. K certainly begins to get frustrated when he arrives in the Village and tries to fulfill employment as a land surveyor. Nothing seems to be successful according to the many rules and procedures of the Village (Azizmohammadi, 2012). He finds out every approval goes on from an official called Klemm. However, it appears that no one in time understands the activities in the Castle or who the officials are because of an air of secrecy and strangeness (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). Actually, the Castle is like the US government because they both reveal bureaucracy, power, and authority.

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The architecture of the novel is established around three significant figures: - the Castle, the Village, and K, the land surveyor (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). The mythical Castle in the novel turns out to be a miserable collection of rustic houses when seen at close quarters. Given the avalanche of symbolic, theological, and allegorical interpretations, caution is required to interpret this Castle (Azizmohammadi, 2012). Possibly, it symbolizes an earthly human authority. In the novel, Castle embodies power, state, and authority against the common people represented by the Village. The power of the Castle is inaccessible, haughty, arbitrary, and distant, and it rules the Village via a network of bureaucrats whose behavior is rude, inscrutable, and meaningless (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013).

In the same way, the US government exerts authority and power on its rule. Authority identifies the political legitimacy which grants and justifies the rights of the ruler to exercise the power of government (Park & Joaquin, 2012). Power identifies the capacity to achieve an authorized goal, either by obedience or compliance. The government of the US, therefore, has the authority to exercise its power on the citizens. However, although the aspects of power and authority are present in both the novel and the US government, the difference is that the US government has given its citizens a sovereign power (Carpenter & Krause, 2015). That is, power lies within the citizens.

It follows Abraham Lincoln’s ideology that the government is of the people, by the people, and for the people. Bearing in mind Lincoln’s ideology, the US is a democratic government, implying that all the citizens have equal rights of participating in political matters. This is contrary to the novel, whereby the officials evoke despotism in their rule. That is to say, Castle embodies power, state, and authority, which are common people represented by the Village (Carpenter & Krause, 2015). Also, the power of the Castle is inaccessible, arrogant, arbitrary, and distant, and it rules the Village via a network of bureaucrats whose behavior is rude, inscrutable, and meaningless. Simply put, aspects of power and authority are evident in both the Castle and the US government, but how the officials in the novel handle power and authority are different from how the US government does it.

Another aspect that exists in both the novel and the US government is bureaucracy. Park and Joaquin (2012) defined a bureaucracy as a particular unit of the government established to attain specific objectives authorized by the legislative body. In the US, the federal bureaucracy is the cornerstone of the US government that carry out the policy and work on the finer details if the bills passed by the congress (Park & Joaquin, 2012). It consists of executive departments (such as Department of the treasury), executive agencies (Federal Bureau of Investigation), Independent Regulatory Commissions (Federal Election Commission), and Government Corporations (United States Postal Service) (Park & Joaquin, 2012). They collectively work to administer the law. As noted, the power of the Castle is inaccessible, haughty, arbitrary, and distant, and it rules the Village through a network of bureaucrats whose behavior is rude, inscrutable, and meaningless (Carpenter & Krause, 2015). For the case of the US government, the bureaucrats work to administer the law meaning their behaviors are lawful, honest, and meaningful.

The peak of bureaucratic estrangement in the novel is attained when the mayor describes the official apparatus as an autonomous machine that succeeds without human intervention (Park & Joaquin, 2012). It looks like the administrative apparatus could not bear the tension and wear that for many years. So, Kafka presents a bureaucratic system as a reified where individual relations become an independent object. This theme outlines the whole novel with several missteps taken by officials, such as with K being assigned to a position he never asked and the fact that all the villagers blindly respect all the leaders and the Castle (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). The strange way the Village is ruled irritates K, and it alienates him. Other than being a stranger in the town, K is someone without a name. He is identified by an initial. It appears that Kafka deliberately does this to show how bureaucracy sees people as unimportant, although the novel seems an exaggerated critique (Azizmohammadi, 2012).

The setting, form, and content of the Castle call to mind medieval romance and quest narratives (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). The Village dwells on the Castle land, and the Castle governs the Village as in feudal times, although the level of its power in the Village is an open question. Otherwise, the setting is ambiguous while the main representatives as characterized as officials, as with a new government bureaucracy (Azizmohammadi, 2012). The medieval elements of the novel form a world in which authority and hierarchy are taken for granted, as indeed all the villagers assume the Castle's authority with the possible exception of Amalia (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). K also takes the Castle for granted, although he sometimes questions its justice. Furthermore, K is profoundly attached to the Village and obsessed with the Castle, suggesting that the novel reflects a government in which divine hierarchy structures human relations.

The Castle and the Village have a definite hierarchy, but the precise nature of the Castle's authority remains obscure (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). Importantly, the boundary between the Castle and the Village is difficult to define. The hermeneutic challenge posed by the Castle is the last evaluation of an ethical issue. The Castle incarcerates a system of social differences justified as divine. Traditionally, the hierarchical difference between a castle and its Village served to prevent class conflict (Azizmohammadi, 2012). The power of a castle and the ruling class allowed it to enforce the law upon the Village.

Moreover, the prominent leaders of the aristocracy served as external mediators and cult figures that facilitated an imaginative devotional relationship with the villagers (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). All these relationships are demonstrated in the novel. The officials satirize the nobility of a ruling class, whether political or priestly (Azizmohammadi, 2012). However, the Village seems to operate more or less in a medieval way until K arrives and introduces a wild card into the game. He questions the divinity of the Castle and enters into a conflict with the officials (Yari & Afrougheh, 2013). By doing so, he threatens to erode the diversity that unites the Village.

Conclusion

Overall, the Castle is like the US government because they both reveal the aspects of bureaucracy, power, and authority. However, the difference between them is how the elements of power, authority, and bureaucracy are applied. In the US government, the sovereign power lies within the people, and bureaucracy is the foundation of the US government. In the novel, there is no democracy. Instead, people are ruled by totalitarianism.

Annotated Bibliography

Azizmohammadi, F. (2012). A Psychological Analysis of Franz Kafka's The Castle. Journal of Basic and Applied Scientific Research, 2 (3), 2243-2248. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.1047.3749&rep=rep1&type=pdf

This article reveals the major themes that occur in Franz Kafka’s novel, the Castle. Themes such as authority and power are evident in this piece. According to the article, the novel is based on a struggle which portrayed dialogues, observations, and a string of episodes in which hidden powers halt the ambition of the protagonist named K. The struggle, which merges symbolic action, revolves around the Castle as a place, authority, symbol, goal and K's fate.

Carpenter, D., & Krause, G. A. (2015). Transactional authority and bureaucratic politics. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 25 (1), 5-25. https://academic.oup.com/jpart/article-abstract/25/1/5/887243

According to Carpenter & Krause (2015), Bureaucratic politics, coupled with the paradigm of the new institutionalism, are based on principle authority rooted in the formal mechanisms that are devised and selected by politicians. In the US, bureaucratic politics is significant in government operations. Without bureaucracy, the US government may fail to run smoothly.

Park, S. M., & Joaquin, M. E. (2012). Of alternating waves and shifting shores: The configuration of reform values in the US federal bureaucracy. International Review of Administrative Sciences, 78 (3), 514-536. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0020852312442659

This article suggests that the reforms of the US federal government come in waves, normally accompanied by values that rotate between normative and rational conceptions of public administration and service. This alternating idea shows the significance of time in weighing the effect of current reforms when past reforms have accumulated from the past. Time is a crucial variable in implementing reforms. Bureaucrats must consider it to examine whether reform values have taken hold.

Yari, A., & Afrougheh, S. (2013). Franz Kafka’s The Castle: A Foucauldian Reading. International Journal of Literature and Arts, 1 (3), 63-67. doi: 10.11648/j.ijla.20130103.18

This article identifies the element of power in Kafka's Castle throughout the idea of oppression, hierarchy, knowledge, and resistance. The article suggests the novel exhibits unsuccessful attempts of a man to overcome the impact of industrialism and its domination of human life. According to (Yari & Afrougheh (2013), the Castle is a societal network that shows the characters to empower a capitalist society.