2019/01/15 by Timo Hannu · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · #Franz Kafka Literary Studies #Memory, History, Trauma, Identity #Walter Benjamin Studies Compilation
paper · doi:10.1093/occmed/kqz018
openalex publication_date 2019/01/15 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
From the cornucopia of the Internet you can find articles claiming that the author Franz Kafka invented the safety helmet. However, no source for this claim has been provided. Franz Kafka (1883–1924), whose place in the literary canon has been secured by the short story Metamorphosis and the novels The Trial and The Castle, also had another occupation from which he could earn a living. He worked as a lawyer at the Worker’s Accident Insurance Institute between 1908 and 1922 in Prague of Bohemia, which before the First World War was a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. His job description included handling risk classification and accident prevention. He wrote reports and letters related to these and other insurance claims, but he also visited work sites. Kafka thought of his job as a means for earning his daily bread (Brotberuf), whereas his true calling was to write fiction. There is a tendency to gather up all the writings of famous writers, to publish them posthumously. This is true for Kafka as well: not only his fictional but also his non-fictional texts have been published (the latter as Amtliche Schriften in German and as The Office Writings in English). Some might find this rather unusual, especially in Kafka’s case, because his directive to his friend and literary executor Max Brod was to destroy all his fictional works after his death. There is no mention in any of Kafka’s occupational writings, of him inventing the safety helmet. Nevertheless, Kafka did suggest several improvements to prevent work accidents. He promoted new safety devices (so called cylindrical safety shafts) in wood-planting machines, where accidents resulting in lost fingers had been common, and suggested preventive measures for agricultural machinery as well. In a report on accident prevention in quarries, he paid much attention to blasting practices and the use of safety goggles. Moreover, in one case, he cautioned about locating canteens in the immediate vicinity of the quarry, where the quarry workers’ usage of alcoholic beverages had been high, because a share of their salary was being paid in alcohol. Some scholars have suggested that Kafka used some of his work experiences in his fiction. His short story In the Penal Colony presents a truly inhuman execution device. Here, power, body and technology appear as mingled as they were in his day job. Or, in other words, is it possible that he processed in it some fatal work accident he had encountered? Similarly, Kafka’s novels The Castle and The Trial reflect the rhetoric and the complex legal procedures of bureaucratic agencies like his own. Franz Kafka was not the inventor of the safety helmet, but it is fascinating to learn about his work against occupational hazards. If fiction is a blend of fact and imagination, it is plausible to assume that his Brotberuf to some extent is mirrored in his literary art, but its influence on his art should not be overemphasized.