As relevant now as when it was originally published, the story of land-surveyor K’s obsessive attempts to reach the Castle brilliantly examines the dilemma of the individual within a depersonalized society and, beyond that, man’s struggle against his fate, his unavailing effort to attain grace. In The Castle and The Trial Kafka created the two masterpieces of twentieth-century symbolic literature. No other writer achieved such haunting ambiguity and emotional precision.

After the English translation of Das Schloss appeared in 1930, it became certain that the German editions from which it had been made did not contain all of the text that Kafka had left in manuscript. Later on, Max Brod [1884-1968] – Kafka’s friend, who was responsible for the preservation and publication of most of Kafka’s work – released for publication additional material and unfinished sections of the book. This edition of The Castle – half again as long over-all as the first American edition – is based on the greatly expanded text of the definitive German edition. It contains an Appendix that includes fragments, variant readings, and material originally deleted by the author.

Willa and Edwin Muir translated the earlier version of The Castle. The new materials have been translated by Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser.