I came across this the other day (it's a long read but worth it)
excerpt: A Hunger Artist by Franz Kafka
translated from the German by Kevin Blahut
illustrated by Helena Vlcnovska
from "A Little Woman"
She is a little woman; quite slim by nature, she is tightly bound; I always see her in the same dress, it is made from a yellowish gray fabric that in a certain way resembles the color of wood, and is decorated with tassels or certain buttonlike fringes of the same color; she never wears a hat, her dull blond hair is smooth and not messy, although she wears it very loosely. Although she is tightly bound, she is quite flexible, and she exaggerates this flexibility; she likes to put her hands on her hips, and, surprisingly quickly, turn her upper body sideways with a single movement. I can only reproduce the impression that her hand makes on me by saying that I have never seen a hand in which the fingers are as sharply divided from one another as hers. However, her hand is in no way an anatomical peculiarity; it is a completely normal hand.
This little woman is very unhappy with me, there is always something about me that she finds objectionable, some injustice is always being done to her because of me, I annoy her at every step; if it were possible to divide life up into the smallest possible pieces and judge each piece separately, there is no doubt that every little piece of my life would annoy her. I have often wondered why I annoy her so much; it could be that everything about me contradicts her sense of beauty, her sense of justice, her habits, her traditions, her hopes; such contrary natures exist, but why does she let it cause her so much suffering? There is no relationship between us that would cause her to suffer because of me. She need only decide to view me as a complete stranger - since this is after all what I am and since I would have nothing against such a decision - she need only decide to forget my existence, which I never have and never would force upon her - and all her suffering would obviously be over. In this I take no account of myself or of the fact that her behavior makes me uncomfortable, I ignore this because I recognize that this discomfort is nothing compared to her suffering. Of course I am completely aware that it is not a loving suffering; it has nothing to do with improving me, especially since everything she objects to in me is not of such a nature that it might prevent my success. But my success does not worry her either, what worries her is precisely her personal interest, namely, to take revenge for the torment that I cause her, and to prevent the torment that threatens to come from me in the future. I once tried to show her the best possible way of putting an end to this incessant annoyance, but in so doing I caused such an outburst of rage that I will never repeat the attempt.
It could be said that I share a certain responsibility, even though this woman is a stranger to me and even though the only relationship that exists between us is the annoyance that I cause her, or rather, the annoyance that she allows me to cause her. Apparently she also suffers physically from this annoyance, and this cannot be a matter of indifference to me. Now and then - and lately with increasing frequency - I hear reports that, in the morning, she has appeared pale, without having slept, tormented by headaches and almost incapable of working; she worries her relatives, they search here and there for what might be responsible for her condition, but until now they have found nothing. I alone know; it is the old and always new annoyance. Of course I do not share her relatives' concern; she is strong and tough; whoever is capable of becoming so annoyed is probably also capable of overcoming the consequences of the annoyance; I even suspect that she - at least in part - only presents herself as suffering in order to make the world suspicious of me. She is too proud to state openly how much my existence torments her; she would consider it degrading to appeal to others because of me; she concerns herself with me only because of revulsion, because of an infinite revulsion; to discuss this unseemly affair in public would be too much for her sense of shame. However, because of the constant pressure the affair puts on her, she is also incapable of being completely silent about it. And so, with her feminine cunning, she seeks a middle way; silent, she brings the matter before the judgment of the public only through the outer signs of a clandestine suffering. Perhaps she is hoping that, once the public turns its full gaze upon me, a general public annoyance with me will result, and that, with its great mechanisms of power, the public will condemn me much more quickly and powerfully than her private annoyance, weak by comparison, would be capable of doing; then she will withdraw, sigh, and turn her back on me. However, if this is what she hopes, she is deceiving herself. The public will never have so infinitely much fault to find with me, even if they examine me with their strongest magnifying glass. I am not as useless as she believes me to be; I don't want to brag, and certainly not where this is concerned; however, if I were not considered particularly useful, I would certainly also not be seen as the opposite; I appear this way only to her, to her eyes that practically flash with whiteness; she would not be able to convince anyone else of it. So can I therefore be completely at ease regarding this matter? No, certainly not, for if it becomes known that my behavior actually makes her sick (a few of her protectors - precisely the ones who are most diligent about conveying news of her - are already close to realizing it, or at least act as if they were), and the world comes and asks me why I torment the woman with my incorrigibility and if perhaps I plan to drive her to her grave and when will I finally be reasonable enough and have the simple human decency to stop - if the world were to ask me these questions, I would have a hard time answering. Should I admit that I don't take these signs of illness very seriously, thereby creating the unpleasant impression that, in order to rid myself of this guilt, I cast the blame on others and moreover in such an indelicate manner? And could I perhaps say openly that I would not feel the slightest sympathy even if I believed she were really sick, since the woman is a complete stranger to me and the relationship that exists between us is entirely her creation and is maintained entirely from her side? I do not want to say that I wouldn't be believed; actually people would neither believe nor disbelieve me; they would never get to the point where belief would be discussed; they would simply register the answer I had given regarding a sick, weak woman, and this could not be to my advantage. With this answer as with any other I would run across the stubborn inability of the world not to arrive at the suspicion of a love affair in cases such as this, even though it could not be any clearer that no such relationship exists and that, if one were to exist, it would be more likely to originate from me, since I would be capable of admiring the little woman for the power of her judgment and the tenacity of her deductions if these merits were not constantly being used to punish me. From her side, however, there is not a trace of the possibility of her having a friendly relationship to me; in this she is staunch and true; in this lies my only hope; but even if it would fit into her battle plan to make such a relationship believed, she would not forget herself to the extent where she would do anything of the kind. However, the public, completely obtuse wherever things of this sort are concerned, would cling to their opinion and always decide against me.
translated from the German by Kevin Blahut
illustrated by Helena Vlcnovska
from "A Little Woman"
She is a little woman; quite slim by nature, she is tightly bound; I always see her in the same dress, it is made from a yellowish gray fabric that in a certain way resembles the color of wood, and is decorated with tassels or certain buttonlike fringes of the same color; she never wears a hat, her dull blond hair is smooth and not messy, although she wears it very loosely. Although she is tightly bound, she is quite flexible, and she exaggerates this flexibility; she likes to put her hands on her hips, and, surprisingly quickly, turn her upper body sideways with a single movement. I can only reproduce the impression that her hand makes on me by saying that I have never seen a hand in which the fingers are as sharply divided from one another as hers. However, her hand is in no way an anatomical peculiarity; it is a completely normal hand.
This little woman is very unhappy with me, there is always something about me that she finds objectionable, some injustice is always being done to her because of me, I annoy her at every step; if it were possible to divide life up into the smallest possible pieces and judge each piece separately, there is no doubt that every little piece of my life would annoy her. I have often wondered why I annoy her so much; it could be that everything about me contradicts her sense of beauty, her sense of justice, her habits, her traditions, her hopes; such contrary natures exist, but why does she let it cause her so much suffering? There is no relationship between us that would cause her to suffer because of me. She need only decide to view me as a complete stranger - since this is after all what I am and since I would have nothing against such a decision - she need only decide to forget my existence, which I never have and never would force upon her - and all her suffering would obviously be over. In this I take no account of myself or of the fact that her behavior makes me uncomfortable, I ignore this because I recognize that this discomfort is nothing compared to her suffering. Of course I am completely aware that it is not a loving suffering; it has nothing to do with improving me, especially since everything she objects to in me is not of such a nature that it might prevent my success. But my success does not worry her either, what worries her is precisely her personal interest, namely, to take revenge for the torment that I cause her, and to prevent the torment that threatens to come from me in the future. I once tried to show her the best possible way of putting an end to this incessant annoyance, but in so doing I caused such an outburst of rage that I will never repeat the attempt.
It could be said that I share a certain responsibility, even though this woman is a stranger to me and even though the only relationship that exists between us is the annoyance that I cause her, or rather, the annoyance that she allows me to cause her. Apparently she also suffers physically from this annoyance, and this cannot be a matter of indifference to me. Now and then - and lately with increasing frequency - I hear reports that, in the morning, she has appeared pale, without having slept, tormented by headaches and almost incapable of working; she worries her relatives, they search here and there for what might be responsible for her condition, but until now they have found nothing. I alone know; it is the old and always new annoyance. Of course I do not share her relatives' concern; she is strong and tough; whoever is capable of becoming so annoyed is probably also capable of overcoming the consequences of the annoyance; I even suspect that she - at least in part - only presents herself as suffering in order to make the world suspicious of me. She is too proud to state openly how much my existence torments her; she would consider it degrading to appeal to others because of me; she concerns herself with me only because of revulsion, because of an infinite revulsion; to discuss this unseemly affair in public would be too much for her sense of shame. However, because of the constant pressure the affair puts on her, she is also incapable of being completely silent about it. And so, with her feminine cunning, she seeks a middle way; silent, she brings the matter before the judgment of the public only through the outer signs of a clandestine suffering. Perhaps she is hoping that, once the public turns its full gaze upon me, a general public annoyance with me will result, and that, with its great mechanisms of power, the public will condemn me much more quickly and powerfully than her private annoyance, weak by comparison, would be capable of doing; then she will withdraw, sigh, and turn her back on me. However, if this is what she hopes, she is deceiving herself. The public will never have so infinitely much fault to find with me, even if they examine me with their strongest magnifying glass. I am not as useless as she believes me to be; I don't want to brag, and certainly not where this is concerned; however, if I were not considered particularly useful, I would certainly also not be seen as the opposite; I appear this way only to her, to her eyes that practically flash with whiteness; she would not be able to convince anyone else of it. So can I therefore be completely at ease regarding this matter? No, certainly not, for if it becomes known that my behavior actually makes her sick (a few of her protectors - precisely the ones who are most diligent about conveying news of her - are already close to realizing it, or at least act as if they were), and the world comes and asks me why I torment the woman with my incorrigibility and if perhaps I plan to drive her to her grave and when will I finally be reasonable enough and have the simple human decency to stop - if the world were to ask me these questions, I would have a hard time answering. Should I admit that I don't take these signs of illness very seriously, thereby creating the unpleasant impression that, in order to rid myself of this guilt, I cast the blame on others and moreover in such an indelicate manner? And could I perhaps say openly that I would not feel the slightest sympathy even if I believed she were really sick, since the woman is a complete stranger to me and the relationship that exists between us is entirely her creation and is maintained entirely from her side? I do not want to say that I wouldn't be believed; actually people would neither believe nor disbelieve me; they would never get to the point where belief would be discussed; they would simply register the answer I had given regarding a sick, weak woman, and this could not be to my advantage. With this answer as with any other I would run across the stubborn inability of the world not to arrive at the suspicion of a love affair in cases such as this, even though it could not be any clearer that no such relationship exists and that, if one were to exist, it would be more likely to originate from me, since I would be capable of admiring the little woman for the power of her judgment and the tenacity of her deductions if these merits were not constantly being used to punish me. From her side, however, there is not a trace of the possibility of her having a friendly relationship to me; in this she is staunch and true; in this lies my only hope; but even if it would fit into her battle plan to make such a relationship believed, she would not forget herself to the extent where she would do anything of the kind. However, the public, completely obtuse wherever things of this sort are concerned, would cling to their opinion and always decide against me.