Franz Kafka: BBC Radio Drama Collection
from archive.org
A BBC Radio collection of works by and/or featuring Franz Kafka.
Franz Kafka is regarded as one of the major fiction writers of the 20th century. He was born to a middle-class German-speaking Jewish family in Prague. His unique body of writing - much of which is incomplete and published posthumously - is considered to be among the most influential in Western literature. Kafka's work fuses elements of realism and the fantastic - and typically features isolated protagonists facing bizarre or surrealistic predicaments and incomprehensible socio-bureaucratic powers. It has been interpreted as exploring themes of alienation, existential anxiety, guilt, and absurdity. His best known works include the novella The Metamorphosis and novels The Trial and The Castle. The term Kafkaesque has entered English to describe absurd situations like those depicted in his writing.
Kafka studied at the University of Prague and during his first year of studies, met Max Brod, who would become his close life-long friend. While at university, they joined student club Leseund Redehalle der Deutschen Studenten, which organized literary events, readings and other activities; this piqued Kafka's interest in literature. Kafka obtained his Law Degree in 1906 was employed full-time by an insurance company, forcing him to relegate writing to his spare time.
Kafka was a prolific writer, spending most of his free time writing, often late into the night. He burned an estimated 90 percent of his total work due to his persistent struggles with self-doubt. During his lifetime, his story collections Contemplation and A Country Doctor, and individual stories, such as his novella The Metamorphosis, were published in literary magazines but received little attention.
He died in obscurity in 1924 at the age of 40 from tuberculosis. In his will, Kafka wrote to friend and literary executor Max Brod: "Dearest Max, my last request: Everything I leave behind me ... in the way of diaries, manuscripts, letters, sketches, and so on, is to be burned unread." Brod overrode Kafka's wishes, believing that Kafka had given these directions to him specifically because Kafka knew he would not honour them - Brod had told him as much. Brod, in fact, would go on to oversee the publication of most of Kafka's work in his possession, which soon began to attract attention and receive high critical regard.
The Trial
On the morning of his thirtieth birthday, Josef K is arrested. But his crime is not revealed. In attempting to establish his innocence, K steps into a nightmarish world of institutional absurdity he can't escape.
The most quintessentially 'Kafkaesque' of Kafka's work, The Trial is a sinister satire, charting one man's descent into self-destruction in the face of a society that has become a machine.
K ..... Iwan Rheon
Franz/Albert ..... Phil Davis
Willem/Magistrate ..... Lee Ross
Mrs Godbee ..... Nina Wadia
Eli?ka/Supervisor ..... Celeste Dring
Edmund ..... Rick Warden
Thrasher ..... Jason Barnett
Dr Huld ..... Adrian Scarborough
Leni ..... Gwyneth Keyworth
Block ..... Mark Heap
Dramatised by Ed Harris
Directed by Anne Isger
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in June 2024
Metamorphosis
Gregor Samsa's life is dominated by routine - the monotony of his busy commute, mindless call centre job and crowded tower block home is steadily taking its toll. Then one morning Gregor awakes to find himself transformed into a giant insect. As he attempts to master life with six legs, his family must also learn to live with his new look.
Gregor ...... Tom Basden
Grete ...... Emma Sidi
Father ...... Kenneth Collard
Mother ...... Felicity Montagu
Pest Controller ...... Tim Key
Juri ...... Simon Ludders
Mr Lazarus ...... Mike Bubbins
Mrs Dawson ...... Alison Belbin
Narrator ...... Peter Marinker
Dramatised by Alan Harris
Directed by James Robinson
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in June 2017
The Castle
In Franz Kafka's mind-warping tale, set in a bureaucratic wonderland, the hapless land-surveyor known only as K answers a summons to work at the mysterious Castle, only to find himself drawn into a labyrinth of terror and absurdity.
K ...............Dominic Rowan
Frieda........... .Sammy T Dobson
Jeremias..........Mark Benton
Artur ............Daniel Weyman
Teacher ..........Stephen Greif
Gardena and Amalia.......Rachel Bavidge
Olga ............Victoria Elliott
Barnabas .........Neil Grainger
Chief Superintendent Jonathan Cullen
Hans ............Dominic Deakin
Dramatised by Ed Harris
Directed by John Taylor
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in May 2015
The Man Who Disappeared
After a mysterious family scandal, the young immigrant Karl Rossman is expelled from his Bohemian home and dispatched to America by his parents. Adrift in this strange new world, Karl is soon swept up in an America that is by turns a land of endless promise and monstrous brutality.
The Man Who Disappeared (also known as Amerika) was Franz Kafka's first attempt at a novel but remained unfinished at the time of his death and only published posthumously. Kafka had never visited America and the fantastical world of his novel is clearly inspired by the myths and fears wrapped up in the country's great economic boom of the early 20th century, particularly the rapid rise of big business and industrialisation.
Karl ..... Divian Ladwa
Narrator ..... Fenella Woolgar
Jacob ..... Karl Johnson
Mr Green ..... Ed Gaughan
Delamarche ..... Charlie Anson
Robinson ..... Ian Dunnett Jnr
Head Cook ..... Jessica Turner
Klara ..... Anna Spearpoint
Dramatised by Ed Harris
Directed by Sasha Yevtushenko
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in June 2024
Short Stories
George Guidall reads a selection of Kafka's short stories including The Penal Colony, Eleven Sons, A Country Doctor, A Report for an Academy, The Judgement and Conversation with the Worshiper.
Kafka's Dick
Set in the 1980s in a Yorkshire suburban dwelling, Kafka aficionado Sydney, and his wife Linda are visited by the long-dead Kafka and his friend Max Brod. Kafka had left instructions to Brod for all his works to be burned - instructions which Brod chose to ignore. As we spend time with the unusual party, it becomes clear that Kafka's wish was for anonymity but also that he had serious issues with his father. When his parent turns up, he is in possession of a very personal secret relating to his son - one which Kafka is terrified he will disclose...
Sydney ..... Richard Griffiths
Linda ..... Alison Steadman
Kafka ..... Nigel Anthony
Brod ..... Michael Cochrane
Hermann ..... Peter Woodthorpe
Written by Alan Bennett
Directed by Gordon House
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in March 1991
Restless Dreams
Restless Dreams takes place during Max Brod's urgent train journey in 1939 from Prague, fleeing the Nazis, as the world stood on the brink of WWII and everything that entailed for Jewish people, nations and borders. In his suitcase are manuscripts, the unpublished works by Franz Kafka - of no contemporary value but inestimable treasures for the future. In his will, Kafka had instructed Brod, his friend and executor, to burn thousands of pages after his death. Brod ignored the instructions. When guards challenge Brod's identity, he decides to hide his treasures - but where? Every carriage he tries becomes more and more surreal. Where is this train actually taking him? Why is there a circus troupe in one carriage, a team of philosophers in the next? And who really are all these people who one minute claim to know him, the next deny ever meeting him? Including his own wife, Elsa.
Max Brod ..... Anton Lesser
Elsa / Ilse ..... Tracy-Ann Oberman
Hanna / Eva / Ottili ..... Annie Cowan
Franz Kafka / Titorelli ..... Henry Goodman
Train Guard / Kasper ..... Guy Rhys
Written by Dan Rebellato
Directed by Polly Thomas
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in June 2024
Franz and Felice
An intimate and mischievously punk telling of Franz Kafka's most significant romantic relationship. Franz and Felice follows the twists and turns of the writer's relationship with Felice Bauer, how events in their relationship burst violently into Kafka's stories and imagination, and how his stories responded. And how everything, real and invented, played out in the shadow of his father, the dark presence always ready to enter from the room next door.
Narrator ..... Anton Lesser
Franz ..... Ashley Margolis
Felice ..... Abigail Weinstock
Ottla ..... Anna Spearpoint
Guide ..... Clare Corbett
Max ..... Ian Dunnett Jnr
Grete ..... Lily Anne Lefkow
Written by Ed Harris
Directed by Sasha Yevtushenko
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in June 2024
Kafka the Musical
The magnetic performance that won David Tennant "Best Actor" at the inaugural BBC Audio Drama Awards for his part as Franz Kafka. Murray Gold's play starts from the suitably Kafkaesque premise that Franz Kafka finds he has to play himself in a musical about his own life. The play - or is it a musical? - introduces Kafka and the audience to some of the key characters in his life, Milena Jesenska, Dora Diamant and Felice Bauer.
Franz Kafka ..... David Tennant
Father ..... David Fleeshman
Mother ..... Joanna Monro
Milena ..... Naomi Frederick
Felice ..... Jessica Raine
Dora ..... Emerald O'Hanrahan
Barman / Singer / Doctor ..... Trevor Allan Davies
Newspaper Seller / Man ..... Brian Bowles
Written by Murray Gold
Directed by Jeremy Mortimer
First broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in April 2011
- Introduction (1.1Mb)
- The Trial (52.3Mb)
- Metamorphosis (52.1Mb)
- The Castle, Episode 1 (52.2Mb)
- The Castle, Episode 2 (50.3Mb)
- The Man Who Disappeared, Episode 1 (52.1Mb)
- The Man Who Disappeared, Episode 2 (52.2Mb)
- In the Penal Colony (43.9Mb)
- Eleven Sons (7.5Mb)
- A Country Doctor (10.1Mb)
- A Report for an Academy (13.5Mb)
- The Judgement (16.8Mb)
- Conversation with the Worshiper (9.9Mb)
- Kafka's Dick (83.1Mb)
- Restless Dreams (52.2Mb)
- Franz and Felice (40.2Mb)
- Kafka the Musical (78Mb)
MP3 files hosted by archive.org.