“Anyone who cannot come to terms with his life while he is alive needs one hand to ward off a little his despair over his fate... but with his other hand he can note down what he sees among the ruins.”

Franz Kafka was a Czech-German writer of the early 20th century. His surreal, existential works—including *The Metamorphosis* and *The Trial*—explore alienation, bureaucracy, and the absurdity of modern life. The term "Kafkaesque" now describes oppressive, labyrinthine systems.