Kafka in Berlin
Berlin was a lively centre, an up-and-coming metropolis, and, not least, one of Germany’s focal points. Here there was a vast potential audience for Kafka, an interesting market that several of his Prague colleagues had already conquered with considerable success. The German capital also played a significant role in Kafka’s private life: in Berlin he visited theatres on his days off, his fiancée, Felice Bauer, lived there. Many a family drama played out in the Prussian city, such as his official engagement on 30th May 1924, in the presence of his Prague tribe, for example. He even wanted to settle on the Spree, “after the war” when everything would have worked itself out. This wish was fulfilled for a brief time with Dora Diamant.
So I must leave Austria […] first for Germany and then for Berlin, where there are the most opportunities for recuperation. As a journalist, I can both make the best and most immediate use of my literary talents, and earn a halfway adequate living. […] However, I am certain that this free and independent situation in which I will find myself in Berlin (however miserable it may be) will be the only source of happiness I am still capable of.
Franz Kafka, Diaries
