Review by Rebecca M. Alvin
At the start of Burhan Sönmez’s novel Lovers of Franz K., we meet Ferdy Kaplan as he is being interrogated by Commissioner Müller at the West Berlin Police Station. Kaplan is accused of killing a young Jewish student and the police are trying to determine the facts surrounding what they think is an antisemitic crime. But as the interview unfolds, we learned that Kaplan’s motives are not based on racial hatred but rather on a literary vendetta of sorts. In fact, the murdered student was not even the target of the crime.
If you’re not that familiar with the life and times of Franz Kafka, you might not know that his dying wish, which he put in writing in several places, was for his friend Max Brod to burn all of his unpublished letters and manuscripts. What happened was not what he requested, and much of the work by Kafka that we know today was supposed to have gone up in flames long ago. So, does that make Brod a hero or a villain?
On the one hand, he’s responsible for disseminating the work of an important writer that we might not know much about otherwise. On the other hand, he betrayed his friend’s dying wish and published works that the writer did not want published, that perhaps were not ready to be published. For Kaplan, this is an unforgivable crime.
Sönmez tells his story almost completely through interrogations in the police station and in the courtroom as well as private conversations with investigators in Kaplan’s prison cell. Interwoven into these dialogues are passages about Kaplan’s childhood friend Amalya, with whom he is in love. The two share a love of Kafka, hence the title of the book, but we’re not sure how much Amalya had to do with the crime committed on Kafka’s behalf.
Sönmez, a Turkish Kurdish author and president of PEN International, gives us an interesting ethical dilemma. This is his first book written in his native Kurdish language, with five previous books written in Turkish. The story is compelling even as it has very little action in it. We are drawn in by the philosophical debate and moral positions of everyone involved, making it a different kind of page-turner. At 133 pages, it’s a quick read but one that will stay with you for a long time after as you think about the characters’ decisions, the responsibility we have toward the dead, and the nature of ownership of works of art and what control we have of our legacy.
Lovers of Franz K. by Burban Sönmez is available online and wherever books are sold, by special order.
