Investigations of a Dog E-Book

Kafka Franz

• Herausgeber: Paperless
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Investigations of a Dog

Leseprobe

Investigations of a Dog

Investigations of a DogCopyright

Investigations of a Dog

How my life has changed and how it has essentially not changed at all! When I think back and recall the times in which I was still living in the midst of my dog years, was taking part in everything concerned with being a dog amongst dogs, I find that upon closer retrospection, though, that something had never been right there, that a small crack had been there, a slight discomfort would affect me in the middle of the mosthonourablefestive events, indeed, sometimes even within trusted circles, no, not sometimes, but rather quite often, the mere look of one of my dear fellow dogs, the mere look, somehow seen anew, would make me embarrassed, shocked, helpless, yes, despaired. I attempted to soothe myself in some way, friends whom I trusted helped me, and calmer times followed—times in which surprises were not missing, but rather were taken with serenity, were integrated into life with serenity, perhaps made me sad and tired, but otherwise allowed me to carry on as a bit of a cold, reserved, fearful, calculating, but all in all proper dog. How could I have reached old age without these breaks for recovery, for which I now delight in, how could I have pushed through to the calmness, with which I observe the horror of my youth and am able to bear the horror of old age, how could I have come to the consequences of moving out of my, as I admit, unhappy, or, to express myself more precisely, not very happy system and of nearly entirely living according to it. Withdrawn, lonesome, preoccupied with only my hopeless, yetindispensiblelittle investigations is how I live, I have not, however, lost sight of my people from this distance, often messages come to me and I give word here and there. Others treat me withrepsect, do not understand my way of life, but do not hold it against me, and even the young dogs that I sometimes see walk by in the distance, a new generation, whose childhood I can barely vaguely recall, do not fail to greet me reverentially.

One may not disregard that I, despite my oddness, which is completely obvious, am far from being anything unique. Dogdom is indeed, when I consider—and I have the time and desire and ability to do so—, simply wonderfullyorganised. Aside from us dogs, there are many types of creatures all around, poor, small, mute, beings limited to only certain cries, many of us dogs study them, have given them names, try to help them, to rear them, ennoble them andsoforth. I do not care about them if they are not trying to bother me, I confuse them,Ilook past them. One is too striking, though, for me to have been able to miss it, how little they, as compared namely to us dogs, stick together, how strangely and silently and with a certain animosity they go past one another, how only the most similar of interests could superficially connect them and how even born of this interest often hatred and fighting arises. We dogs, though! One might certainly say that we all formally live in one single heap, all ofus,we otherwise differentiate through theinnummerableand profound differences that have arisen over the course of time. All in a heap! It pushes us towards one another and nothing can hinder us to suffice this pushing, all our laws and institutions, the few that I still know and the many that I have forgotten, lead back to the yearning for the greatest happiness we are capable of, warm togetherness.And now the contrary.No creature, to my knowledge, lives as distantly scattered as we dogs, none has so many, not clearlydetermineableclasses, types, activities. We, whom we wish to keep together,—and we always manage in spite of everything in exuberant moments—precisely we live separated far from one another, in curious, oftenincomprehesibleoccupations to our fellow dogs, abiding by rules that are not in dogdom; yes, rather against dogdom even. What difficult things those are, things one would rather not touch—I understand this point of view, understand it better than my own—, and yet they are things that I have completely and entirely succumbed to.Why do I not do it as the others do, live peacefully with my people and accept whateverdistrubsthe peace silently, neglect it as a small error in a large calculation, and alwaysremianfacing towards happy ties, not towards that, which, of course is oftenirresistable, but tears us out of our circles.