Lost Kafka writings resurface, trapped in trial
JERUSALEM (AP) — It seems almost Kafkaesque: Ten safety deposit boxes of never-published writings by Franz Kafka, their exact contents unknown, are trapped in courts and bureaucracy, much like one of the nightmarish visions created by the author himself.
The papers, retrieved from bank vaults where they have sat untouched and unread for decades, could shed new light on one of literature’s darkest figures.
In the past week, the pages have been pulled from safety deposit boxes in Tel Aviv and Zurich, Switzerland, on the order of an Israeli court over the objections of two elderly women who claim to have inherited them from their mother.
“Kafka could easily have written a story like this, where you try to do something and it all goes wrong and everything remains unresolved,” said Sara Loeb, a Tel Aviv-based author of two books about the writer. “It’s really a case of life imitating art.”
Literary experts in both cities are sifting through the boxes, and the contents are expected to be of priceless literary and monetary value. What exactly is there remains unknown, but the papers include handwritten manuscripts, letters and various literary works by the famed Jewish writer, said Meir Heller, an attorney for the Israeli National Library, which also claims ownership of the trove.
Loeb says the cache could include endings to some of Kafka’s major works, many of which remained unfinished in his lifetime.
“We could find out about his methods, his style, how his art was created, how he built a text,” she said.
Kafka, a Prague native who wrote in German, was one of the most influential writers of the 20th century, known for his surreal tales of everyman protagonists crushed by mysterious authorities or twisted by unknown shames. His works have become classics, like “The Metamorphosis,” in which a salesman wakes up transformed into a giant insect, and “The Trial,” where a bank clerk is put through an excruciating trial without ever being told the charges against him.
But the newly emerged writings won’t see the light of day until the Israeli court unravels the tangled question of the collection’s rightful owner.
The case boils down to the interpretation of the will of Max Brod, Kafka’s longtime friend and publisher. Kafka bequeathed his writings to Brod shortly before his own death from tuberculosis in 1924, instructing his friend to burn everything unread.
Brod ignored Kafka’s wishes and published most of what was in his possession, including the novels “The Trial,” ”The Castle” and “Amerika.”
But Brod, who smuggled some of the manuscripts to pre-state Israel when he fled the Nazis in 1938, didn’t publish everything. Upon his death in 1968, Brod left his personal secretary, Esther Hoffe, in charge of his literary estate and instructed her to transfer the Kafka papers to an academic institution.
Instead, for the next four decades, Hoffe kept the papers in her Tel Aviv apartment and in safety deposit boxes in Tel Aviv and Zurich banks.
She sold some of the items for hefty sums. In 1988, for instance, Hoffe auctioned off the original manuscript of “The Trial” at Sotheby’s in London. It went for $1.8 million to the German Literature Archive in Marbach, north of Stuttgart.
When Hoffe died three years ago at age 101, she left the collection to her two daughters, Eva Hoffe and Ruth Wiesler, both Holocaust survivors like herself.
But the Israeli National Library has long claimed the papers, saying Brod intended for the collection to end up in its hands. It filed an injunction against the execution of Hoffe’s will.
“As long as Esther Hoffe was alive, she was responsible, she could still say, ‘I am handling it,'” said Heller, the library’s lawyer. “The late Mrs. Hoffe did not do what the late Mr. Brod asked her to do and deposit the documents in the national library. … The will was not honored, it was desecrated.”
Oded Hacohen, a lawyer for Eva Hoffe, said Brod’s will gave the collection to her mother as a gift and gave her the right to bequeath it to the Israel National Museum or any institution of her choosing, in Israel or abroad, under whatever conditions she decides. He cited a 1974 Tel Aviv District Court ruling backing that interpretation and quoting Brod’s will.
That means, he said, Eva Hoffe inherited the documents legally and is free to do with them as she pleases, including selling them to the German Literature Archive, which has been negotiating with her to buy the remaining Kafka and Brod papers.
“Esther Hoffe dedicated her life to publishing Brod’s works. … Brod wrote in his will that her family should enjoy the profits,” Hacohen said.
Heller retorts that the will only refers to royalties, not ownership, and didn’t give Esther Hoffe the right to hand the collection to her heirs. He argued in court that since she failed to pick an archive to receive the documents, the court should do so. Heller contended in court that the Israeli National Library was Brod’s first preference, saying he had evidence Brod wrote a later will bequeathing his literary estate directly to it.
The Tel Aviv Family Court ordered the collection opened a year ago, saying it wants to know what is there before deciding who owns it. That ruling won’t come until experts are done inspecting the papers, which could take several weeks.
“The library does not intend to give up the cultural assets that legally belong to it and thus to the Israeli and Jewish people,” said David Blumberg, chairman of the Israel National Library, which is a nonprofit and non-governmental body.
Ulrich von Buelow, the director of manuscripts at the German Literary Archive, said Brod and Esther Hoffe had frequent discussions with the archive over placing the material there.
“We are interested in having the manuscripts because we have so many others, also from Brod, and so many letters that would complement them,” von Buelow said.
Whatever they contain, the piles of handwritten material will keep historians and researchers busy for years, Heller said.
Aside from previously unknown versions of Kafka’s work, the trove could give more insight on Kafka’s personal life, including his relationship with his lover, Dora Diamant. It may include papers that Kafka gave to Diamant but were stolen by the German Gestapo from her Berlin apartment in 1933, later obtained by Brod after World War II.
Loeb suspected that Brod kept many of the documents away from the public for fear their publication could compromise his friend’s legacy.
“Kafka was very critical. He was not an easy man,” she said. “Maybe Brod was worried that this could ruin his image.”
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Moscow accuses US of kidnapping pilot
MOSCOW (AP) — The Russian Foreign Ministry accused the U.S. on Wednesday of “kidnapping” a Russian pilot in the West African country of Liberia several weeks ago for alleged drug smuggling.
Konstantin Yaroshenko, 41, was arrested in Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, in late May — by U.S. agents, Russian officials said — and then extradited to New York.
He was charged with smuggling “thousand-kilogram quantities of cocaine” throughout South America, Africa and Europe, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said in a statement Wednesday.
DEA spokeswoman Dawn Dearden said Yaroshenko was apprehended May 28 by Liberian authorities, who turned him over to the DEA two days later under an arrest warrant issued by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
“While he was in DEA custody, the DEA followed the rules of law and the Geneva Convention regulations regarding treatment of a defendant,” the DEA’s statement said.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry sharply condemned Yaroshenko’s arrest and extradition.
“We’re talking about a kidnapping of a Russian national from a third country,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said Wednesday in a statement on its website. “The actions of U.S. special services in the forcible and secret relocation of our national from Monrovia to New York could only been seen as open lawlessness.”
Asked about the case at a news briefing, U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said that, with regard to specifics, he would defer to the Justice Department or the DEA.
Crowley said that, upon his arrival in New York, Yaroshenko was given access to a Russian consulate official.
Yaroshenko’s lawyer, Alexander Bozhenko, was quoted Wednesday by RIA news agency as saying that the way Yaroshenko was arrested violated the law, and that Yaroshenko was kept tied up in a hotel room, naked and without water, for two days before his extradition.
Yaroshenko’s U.S. lawyer, Sam Schmidt, said Wednesday that it was his “understanding was he was not treated well” in Liberia after his arrest. His client is “doing OK” physically now that he is in the U.S. prison system, he added.
He said Yaroshenko was not extradited but instead was expelled by the Liberian government just before he was taken into custody by Liberian authorities and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and brought to New York.
“Somehow from this existing expulsion order, the DEA took custody of him without notifying the Russian embassy or consulate or anyone else,” Schmidt said.
Charges filed by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan allege Yaroshenko was “an aircraft pilot and aviation transport expert” who transported thousands of kilograms of cocaine throughout South America, Africa and Europe. Prosecutors declined comment Wednesday.
Schmidt said, “Obviously, nothing was actually done by my client.”
RIA quoted Yaroshenko’s wife, Viktoria, as saying that her husband had been working as a pilot in various African countries for 10 years. She said he visited Liberia in May for talks with potential employers, RIA said.
A Russian diplomat accused U.S. agents of “framing” Yaroshenko.
“They needed any pilot, any airline to frame,” Russia’s general consul in New York, Andrey Yushmanov, said in televised remarks.
Russia’s NTV played a telephone interview with a man who identified himself as Yaroshenko and claimed that he had been was arrested illegally and tortured.
In recent years, drug cartels have used West Africa as a major transit point for shipment of vast quantities of cocaine to Europe and the U.S.
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2 bodies found in foreclosed Reno home that burned
RENO, Nev. (AP) — Police in Reno, Nev., say two people who were found dead in a home that burned had heavily fortified the house after its foreclosure, apparently anticipating the sheriff’s deputies who came to evict them.
The deputies who showed up Tuesday morning heard gunshots when they announced themselves, then noticed the house was on fire and took cover. Neighbors reported hearing gunshots or small explosions as the fire grew.
The victims are believed to be an 83-year-old woman and her 46-year-old son who lived in the house for decades. It was sold at auction earlier this month.
Authorities don’t yet know the cause of death.
Police Lt. Robert Nuttall said Wednesday that no weapons were found. He says the windows had been boarded up and the front door was barricaded with cases of ceramic tiles.
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EMT with ‘fireman’s key’ accused of NY sex attacks
NEW YORK (AP) — A city emergency medical technician who had special access via a universal “fireman’s key” has been arrested on rape and other charges in the armed sexual assaults of five women and girls since 2001, police said Wednesday.
Angus Pascall, 33, was arrested Tuesday in Brooklyn after a victim provided police with the license plate number of a car he was driving. The name of his attorney was not immediately available.
The 20-year-old victim told investigators that an assailant forced her into a car at gunpoint on Monday afternoon and raped her. Earlier this month, an 11-year-old girl was attacked by a man with a gun in an elevator.
Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said Pascall used the fireman’s key — which can access subway grates and elevators — to control the elevator.
Pascall also was linked to the rape of a 22-year-old at gunpoint in her home in 2001, police said. In the remaining two incidents in 2009, a 19-year-old was attacked in an elevator and a 14-year-old was assaulted behind an apartment building.
Police said three victims had picked the suspect out of lineups. The results of DNA testing were pending.
Pascall, who has worked for the Fire Department for more than five years, has been suspended without pay, department spokesman Jim Long said.
All the alleged attacks occurred while Pascall was off-duty.
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‘Barefoot Bandit’ returns to Washington state
SEATTLE (AP) — The alleged “Barefoot Bandit” is back in Washington state, where authorities say he started a multistate crime spree.
Colton Harris-Moore arrived Wednesday afternoon from Miami on a U.S. Marshals plane and was promptly transferred to a federal detention facility in SeaTac, Wash., according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
U.S. Attorney’s Office spokeswoman Emily Langlie said Harris-Moore is scheduled to make his initial court appearance Thursday in front of Magistrate Judge Brian Tsuchida. At the hearing, he will be advised of the charge against him and possible penalties.
Harris-Moore was arrested in the Bahamas a week after he reportedly crash-landed there in a plane stolen July 4 from an Indiana airport. He made initial court appearances in Florida last week.
He faces a federal charge in the crash-landing of a plane stolen from Idaho last year.
Harris-Moore has allegedly committed a series of crimes, including stealing planes and boats, across the nation. Police say he began his spree in his hometown of Camano Island in Washington state.
Messages to one of his two attorneys — John Henry Browne — were not immediately returned.
—-Contact The Daily Reveille’s news staff at [email protected].