Race through the nights, writing, that’s what I want to do. And rush to my own ruin, or madness, is also what I want, because it is necessarily the predictable next step to what I have foreseen for a long time now.

Race through the nights, writing: that magnificent phrase, phrase that sums Franz Kafka’s life up so well (if and only if one doesn’t forget to include what comes next, 'and rush to my own ruin,')?– is what this book describes.

An entire book about a single night, 22 September 1912, when he wrote The Judgement, his most stunning text. Although that’s not entirely accurate. It’s an entire book about what that night says about Kafka: how did he get there and where did it lead him? And where is all that going to lead us?

So much has been written about Kafka. Dozens of biographies, hundreds of essays, thousands of articles – and yet, this book, which seeks to describe the author’s life from his own point of view rather than ours, was still wanting. Here it is.

Describing Franz Kafka’s life as he experienced it himself. Walk in his shoes. Try to get as close as possible to the reality of his existence. Neither an American-style biography, nor a literary essay, this is a literary biography, written by a writer about a writer.