Is it okay for me to begin reading Kafka's works if I'm depressed?

stop being a pussy and start with The Trial

Oh, should probably say I was diagnosed with disorganized Schizophrenia.

Recommended The Trial to my best friend, who is generally an all around happy person, and he told me he found it "weird" and "absurd". Made me realize that you actually have to be a certain level of depressed to get the most out of Kafka's works

Yes

The Trial is too frustrating, too stifling. So is The Castle and Amerika. If Kafka had lived, maybe he would have polished them up a bit - or at least completed them.
Metamorphosis is brilliant, and his stories are excellent: I would recommend A Hunger Artist and In the Penal Colony, if you haven't already read them.

It is weird and absurd

> I was diagnosed with disorganized Schizophrenia
>Now Im happy, life is good

feelsgoodman.

His works are absurd and a bit eery, but a lot more funny than "depressing". At least to me. I've read them in German, maybe the translation changes the tone a bit.

And The Castle was comfy as fuck.

a lot of people find his work hilarious. it's possible that you may be more open to see the humor in something like Kafka or LF Celine if you're depressed or have a more negative mindset.

"I see the humor in Kafka" is one of the most annoying memes in recent memory

It's not a meme nor should it be a surprising insight. His books are more than obviously humourus.

well, I don't see it, but that doesn't mean that other people can't see it. maybe it's even there.

Yeah I saw that 9 minute DFW video on youtube too

Just from the Aphorisms and the letters, there is definitely more to what Kafka wrote than what meets the eye, but it's only humorous in that it subverts your expectations, not in the way that it's supposed to make you laugh
It seems to me that what people describe as the Humor in Kafka is more of a by-product of his world view than what he was aiming at when writing

Can you point out specific examples? Sure, there are some humorous bits here and there, but overall, I can't say it's humorous. The anecdote of the K reading his stuff to an audience and laughing is no more than a fable, it seems.

LOOK AT THE TOP OF HIS HEAD

>Kafka's friend, Max Brod, talked of how Kafka found humour in his dark works - especially the chilling "The Trial", which he thought a hoot, laughing so hard while reading the first chapter aloud, that he repeatedly had to stop to collect himself.

This might come as a shock, but some people on here actually read!

Like I say, it might have gone lost in translation. It's not just specific parts of the plot but his entire wording of things, particularly the dialogue and the way he describes his characters actions and gestures and countenance. The two assistants in the castle are completely comic.
America must be the most light hearted of his works. You easily recognize it as "kafkaesque" but it's not at all sinister.

I found the part in The Trial where there's an anecdote about a judge, IIRC, who for some reason wants to bide time by not meeting any lawyers, yet keeps getting interrupted by them nonetheless, decides to throw them down his stairs because they have to walk up the stairs to go to his room, and there's just a bunch of lawyers trudging up the stairs at various levels and he keeps picking up and launching down the ones who get to the top, and they simply get back up/are caught by other lawyers and keep trying to go up pretty funny.

>"I see the humor in Kafka"
>I find hell, unjust oppression and suffering funny

Yeah, and there are various similar scenarios in all his books.

serious question is Kafka a meme? I read Die Verwandlung and it was shit. Tried starting Amerika and Der Proceß, but couldn't make myself continue reading the trash. I've only ever met pseudnormies who professed to like Kafka irl. What am I missing

>I'm unable to recognize that Kafka portrays these themes in a humorous way without softening their seriousness

Maybe it's just not for you. Doesn't mean you are missing anything and doesn't mean it's shit either.

>ording of things, particularly the dialogue and the way he describes his characters actions and gestures and countenance.

Yea, like an absurd, comical, cartoonish quality, and like an 'eternal' helpless like character looks at the camera and shrugs their shoulders and makes that pressed lip face like 'yep, shit sucks... again... tehehe... the worst just keeps happening.....', and maybe its like one of those 'humor let off depressing tension mechanisms', how like;
Your not laughing like, ha ha thats so funny this innocent person has to go through this shit and will be guilty and have their life ruined, thats so funny; but its... these things are so nonsensical and outrageous and circusy and chaotic, and the character is just flailing about, and there is something primally humorous about the funny movements and faces of that

Exactly. And in contrast to that is his dry and sober prose, presenting it as if these things are entirely normal and mundane, which adds to it as well.

...

t. obviously read a translation

No, it means that guy is pretty stupid and he is missing a lot.

>Your not laughing like, ha ha thats so funny
Sometimes I personally am, Idk about other people.

It has nothing to do with being stupid. People have different tastes in things, I'm sorry if that hurts your elitist heart.

What do you find funny then? Happiness, justice and eternal bliss?

No, you are wrong and I'm pretty sure that guy is stupid.

If it helps you sleep at night.