TONY O’BRIEN

 

Kafka on everything

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tony O’Brien was born in Dunedin in 1953 and has lived in Auckland since 1978. His short stories have been published in the Western LeaderTakaheJAAM, and Glottis, and the online journals CarveSummerset ReviewMississippi ReviewEspresso FictionConverselyFiction WarehousestorySouthSouthern Ocean ReviewEclectica and Word Riot. He has stories in the print anthology At Home (Random House2005) and Best New Zealand Fiction Volume 2 (Random House2005). Other stories have been produced for radio and adapted for film. Tony works as a mental health nurse and lectures in mental health nursing at the University of Auckland. 

‘Kafka on everything’ was written following a visit to Prague in 2005. There is a huge Kafka industry there, and he was fortunate to be able to see an exhibition originally curated by the Barcelona Museum. The most telling exhibit was the Kafka family tree, which more or less ended about 1940.