Text 1: Critic Park argues that Franz Kafka's fiction must be read autobiographically. The oppressive fathers, bureaucratic mazes, and sudden transformations of his stories, she contends, mirror the crushing dynamics of Kafka's own family and his suffocating clerical work. To strip the work from the life is to lose its emotional core.
Text 2: Critic Singh acknowledges biographical resonances but argues that the autobiographical frame impoverishes Kafka's reach. Generations of readers with no resemblance to Kafka's family or Prague office life have found his fiction precisely articulating their own situations under modern bureaucracy, modern alienation, modern dread. The work's power, Singh contends, lies in escaping its origins, not depending on them.
Based on the texts, how would Singh (Text 2) most likely respond to Park's reading?
- Acheck_circle
She would accept biographical resonances while arguing that universalizing readings reveal more of the work's power.
- B
She would deny that Kafka had a family or worked as a clerk.
- C
She would agree that biography is essential to interpretation.
- D
She would say Kafka's fiction is uninterpretable.
Explanation
Singh accepts biographical roots but argues that the work's power exceeds them. B captures her partial agreement. A is absurd; C contradicts her; D overstates.