Drawing upon all your powers of perspicacity give your best analysis

I already told you, the cat doesn't like anal.

>>9143629
Idle vulgarity is a poor excuse for a non-sequitur. It's the furthest thing from clever or funny.

I'm not exactly a Kafka expert, but from what little I've read of him and the text itself, I'd guess an examination of how accumulated experiences narrow one's worldview, providing some relief from an open and complex world where everything is uncertain but at the same time constricting the individual's choices both consciously and unconsciously, with the cat both highlighting that by noting the existence of other options beyond those the mouse perceives and mocking it by immediately making the whole matter moot. Not certain what that futility is meant to represent, though. Could be a suggestion that one only really understands how they're hemmed in at the end of their life and have the benefit or hindsight, or maybe it's more misanthropic, suggesting that whilst your foibles are externally visible, people are more inclined to exploit them than to address them constructively.

>>9143640
Using big words when you don't need to is the furthest thing from intelligent.

>>9143819
Using words when you don't need to is the furthest thing from ooga booga.

>>9143837
using false dichotomies when your don't need to is the furthest thing from a spicy meme.

>>9143640
Posting this stupid fucking thread a second time should be cause for the death penalty.
You're a little weenie, I responded appropriately.
It's boring base level existentialism, hope you get your one page essay done on time.

>>9143800
Interesting that while things are narrow and restricted, the cat is an entirely new concept. The reader can't really help but be be surprised by its appearance. If it represents the end of life, maybe Kafka is suggesting that death/being devoured is a change of direction that brings surprise?

>>9143867
I'm actually the OP of the first thread on this. This is a different guy reposting it. But I'm not opposed because the last one died too soon and we really don't talk about content enough on this board

>>9143869
>the cat's a new concept
someone never watched tom and jerry.
pleb

>>9143867
Got any links for more insightful and complex explorations in a similar vein? I found this one quite interesting, but I'm not stunningly well-read, at least beyond base level concepts and fantasy stuff, so I'd really like the opportunity to look at more thought-provoking things.
>>9143869
Hmm, that sounds somewhat plausible-I think I agree with the premise that the cat is meant to surprise the reader a little, feel a bit out of scope given the prior narration, but I'm unconvinced that it was a statement on death, or at least I don't think it was a very meaningful one if it was. It could be to reinforce the concept that viewpoints restrict understanding as well as being dangerous? So the surprise is meant to reflect the mouse's surprise at its fate, as well as highlight the danger of issues outside our frame of reference.

>>9143867
>examining the intent behind the post rather than the post
>being completely wrong on top of that
Oh, anon...

>>9143800
Can an analysis be longer than the thing analyzed? I think you missed the key point of the story, humor.

>>9143910
I did find it funny! Just figured it might be entertaining to read into it anyway, since I don't consciously do that enough outside of academic stuff. Plus I wanted to see if any discussion would come of it.

>>9143910
Post is shit. I'm not wrong. You're too dumb to reply to me.

>>9143956
>say thing is so
>it isn't so
that's the literal definition of wrong anon

don't care

I guess it's about how you think you're gonna have to get fucked over by something but then something completely different fucks you over even worse than you expected.

>>9143819
>that post
>"big words"
Is this really the state of /lit/ nowadays?

>>9143910
A thorough analysis will often be longer than the analysand, as good minimalist lit should say more than it says.

I think that looking at it metaphorically somewhat precludes the idea that the meaning is about death, since that's what the literal ending is. I took it to be about the death of thought: To continue down one path in the quest for wisdom is inherently dangerous as you don't know where that path leads until you get there - it may end up precluding other ways of thinking. The mouse is so set in his ways that even when he sees the trap, he doesn't consider changing direction. See: Russel, Bertrand. His intellectual life ended when his chosen path didn't pan out, he went straight into the trap. Many who walk the path of wisdom hope to find some fundamental structure, the walls that hold everything together, and so when they begin to see these walls their relief prevents them from seeing the danger. The cat is a different kind of thinker, unafraid of moving wherever he needs to. He reminds me of the skeptics who, despite believing little or nothing, would agree to argue on their opponents' own terms in order to show them the error of their boxed-in modes of thinking. If one is to take an overall message from the story, it might be that uncertainty, scary as it is, isn't as bad as certain failure. That's probably too reductive, though.

>>9144208
Everyone knows where their path leads and they all lead to the same thing, death. The cat isn't some alternative to the mouse, some being that can better navigate reality, rather it is nature itself the process against which we live and eventually fail.

>>9144232

I think an argument could be made that the cat is better at navigating the mouse's reality, even if it isn't a real alternative. Whether you'd go on to argue that this is because it's easier to observe the flaws in a worldview externally or because the mouse's worldview was particularly flawed in any way is on you, of course.

>>9143626
The story is about how we distance ourselves from death emotionally and logically. Once we see it looming so nearly it is only our memories that will give us life, tough impossible, before we are snatched up by the proverbial cat. An unexpected non sequitur.

>>9144232
I think you're getting a bit ahead of yourself. Clearly we're not interpreting the story the same way even at a symbolic level. I think if you work from the terms I set out, that it is about the intellectual journey and the quest for wisdom, that my conclusions hold. The end of a path in this view is either a complete or satisfactory understanding of the world, or an intellectual death precluding any further seeking of the former. Certainly the intellectual life is ultimately bound up with our physical bodies, and we will certainly die at some point. But that death won't be from a failure to successfully navigate the plane of potential ideas, it will be from a failure of our physical bodies. I would say that falls outside of the purview of the metaphor.

lol your only choice is death free will is an illusion

Fucking hack.

Post it in German, the simplicity of the translation suggests I might be able to read it.

>>9144282
>>9144261
The first one is more accurate, the second is reasonable and an interpretation thus weaker

>>9143629
HILARIOUS

>>9144306
They're the exact same interpretation, I just didn't fluff mine up with high-schooler prose.

>>9144313
Any implied specificity is a different interpretation

>>9144322
Not at all.

>>9144330
I was hoping the word different we could agree upon, if our interpretations are so similar.

File: tom-and-jerry-cartoon.jpg (86KB, 760x570px) Image search: [Google]

86KB, 760x570px

>>9143626
I think he is just talking about a cats and mice and the crazy shit that they get down to.

>>9143626
it has no "meaning" Kafka did not weave literary labyrinths
The story is about being a prisoner
The mouse says it was glad seeing walls to the right and left meaning it is running into a corner
The cat says you only need to change your direction but this will lead to another corner eventually
The cat eats it anyway because it is in control of the mouse

>>9144372
When I say meaning I mean not hidden meaning that needs to be pieced together
He's expressing the same angst that every high schooler feels just in a much more profound sounding way

>>9144372
>>9144393
Why was the mouse-prisoner glad to be running into a corner?
Why does the cat tell him to change direction if it will just lead to another corner?

File: 175.jpg (17KB, 300x100px) Image search: [Google]

17KB, 300x100px

>>9144065
>Is this really the state of /lit/ nowadays?
Tragedy + Time = Comedy

It might be amusing in a few years. When the board is finally dead.

>>9144372
>"it has no meaning"
>interprets its meaning

>>9143626
>babby's first existentialism
>"weighty"

laughinggirls.jpg

by the time you learn that what you did was wrong, it's too late

>>9145851
what does that story have to do with existentialism? aren't all stories about human experience? I thought existentialism was a philosophical distinction

>>9144441
Familiarity

File: Kafka-freud1.jpg (143KB, 750x476px) Image search: [Google]

143KB, 750x476px

>>9143626
"change your direction" : go back to where you came from
back to your mom's pussy
that's what the cat said before eating the mouse
that's what the pussy said before eating the mouse