928 Quotes by Franz Kafka

I can never tear myself open wide enough to people to reveal everything and so frighten them away.

It’s impossible to defend oneself in the absence of goodwill.

It’s characteristic of this judicial system that a man is condemned not only when he’s innocent but also in ignorance.

Written kisses don’t reach their destination, rather they are drunk on the way by the ghosts.

Photography concentrates one’s eye on the superficial. For that reason it obscures the hidden life which glimmers through the outlines of things like a play of light and shade. One can’t catch that even with the sharpest lens.

The relationship to one’s fellow man is the relationship of prayer, the relationship to oneself is the relationship of striving; it is from prayer that one draws the strength for one’s striving.

Torment yourself as little as possible, then you’ll torment me less.

Oh God, I wish you were not on this earth, but entirely within me, or rather that I were not on this earth, but entirely within you; I feel there is one too many of us; the separation into two people is unbearable.

Was he an animal if music could captivate him so?