RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Kafka's uncle: scenes from a world of trust infected by suspicion
JF Medical Humanities
JO J Med Humanit
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Institute of Medical Ethics
SP 85
OP 91
DO 10.1136/mh.26.2.85
VO 26
IS 2
A1 Iain Bamforth
YR 2000
UL http://mh.bmj.com/content/26/2/85.abstract
AB What happens when we heed a call? Few writers have been as suspicious of their vocation as Franz Kafka (1883–1924). His story, A Country Doctor, (1919) ostensibly about a night visit to a patient that goes badly wrong, suggests a modern writer's journey to the heart of his work. There he discovers that trust, like the tradition which might sustain him, is blighted. This essay also examines Kafka's attitude to illness and the medical profession, and his close relationship with his uncle, Siegfried Löwy (1867–1942), a country doctor in Moravia.