CHRONOLOGY

1883	Born in Prague, July 3, son of Hermann (1852–1931) and Julie (née Löwy) (1856–1934).
1889–93	Elementary school at Fleischmarkt.
1889, 1890, 1892	Birth of sisters Elli, Valli, Ottla. Two younger brothers died in infancy.
1893–1901	German gymnasium, Prague; friendship with Oskar Pollak. Family resides in Zeltnergasse.
ca. 1899–1900	Reads Spinoza, Darwin, Nietzsche. Friendship with Hugo Bergman.
1899–1903	Early writings (destroyed).
1901–6	Study of German literature, then law at German University, Prague; partly in Munich. Influenced by Alfred Weber’s critical analysis of industrial society.
1902	Vacation in Schelesen and Triesch, with uncle Dr. Siegfried Löwy (the “country doctor”). Met Max Brod; friendship with Felix Weltsch and Oskar Baum.
1903	Working on a novel The Child and the City (lost).
1904–5	“Description of a Struggle.”
	Reads diaries, memoirs, letters: Byron, Grillparzer, Goethe, Eckermann.
1905–6	Summers in Zuckmantel. Love affair with an unnamed woman. Meetings with Oskar Baum, Max Brod, Felix Weltsch.
1906	Works in the law office of Richard Löwy, Prague.
	June: Gets degree of doctor juris at German University, Prague.
	From October: One year’s internship in the law courts.
1907–8	“Wedding Preparations in the Country” (fragments of a novel).
1907	October: Position with “Assicurazioni Generali,” Italian insurance company. Family moves to Niklas-Strasse.
1908	Position at the semi-governmental Workers’ Accident Insurance Institute (until retirement, July 1922). Close friendship with Max Brod.
	Writes “On Mandatory Insurance in the Construction Industry.”
1909	Publication of eight prose pieces in Hyperion.
	September: At Riva and Brescia with Max and Otto Brod. Writes “The Aeroplanes at Brescia.”
1910	Member of circle of intellectuals (Mrs. Berta Fanta).
	March: Publication of five prose pieces in Bohemia.
	May: Beginning of the Diaries (quarto notebooks; last entry, June 12, 1923).
	Yiddish theater company from Eastern Europe performs.
	October: Paris, with Max and Otto Brod.
	December: Berlin.
1911	January–February: Business trip to Friedland and Reichenberg.
	Summer: Zurich, Lugano, Milan, Paris (with Max Brod). Plans to work with Brod on a novel, “Richard and Samuel.”
	Alone in a sanatorium in Erlenbach near Zurich. Travel diaries.
	Writes “Measures to Prevent Accidents [in Factories and Farms]” and “Workers’ Accident Insurance and Management.”
1911–12	Winter: Yiddish theater company. Friendship with Yiddish actor Isak Löwy; study of Jewish folklore; beginning of a sketch on Löwy.
1911–14	Working on Amerika (main parts written 1911–12).
1912	First studies of Judaism (H. Graetz, M. I. Pines).
	February: Gives lecture on the Yiddish language.
	July: Weimar (Goethe’s town, with Max Brod), then alone in the Harz Mountains (Sanatorium Just). Meets Ernst Rowohlt and Kurt Wolff, joint managers of Rowohlt Verlag.
	August 13: Meets Felice Bauer from Berlin, in the house of Max Brod’s father in Prague.
	August 14: Manuscript of Meditation sent to the publisher.
	September 20: Beginning of correspondence with Felice Bauer.
	September 22–23: “The Judgment” written.
	September–October: Writes “The Stoker” (or “The Man Who Disappeared”) which later became first chapter of Amerika.
	October 1912 to February 1913: Gap in the diaries.
	November: “The Metamorphosis” written.
1913	January: Publication of Meditation.
	February 1913 to July 1914: Lacuna in productivity.
	Easter: First visit to Felice Bauer in Berlin.
	Spring: Publication of The Judgment.
	May: Publication of “The Stoker.”
	September: Journey to Vienna, Venice, Riva. At Riva, friendship with “the Swiss girl.”
	November: Meeting with Grete Bloch, friend of Felice Bauer. Beginning of correspondence with her. [She becomes mother of his son, who died before reaching the age of seven, and of whom K. never knew.]
1914	Easter: In Berlin.
	April: Engagement to Felice Bauer in Berlin.
	July 12: Engagement broken.
	Summer: “Memoirs of the Kalda Railroad” written. Hellerau, Lübeck, Marienlyst on the Baltic (with Ernst Weiss).
	October: “In the Penal Colony” written.
	Fall: Begins writing The Trial.
	Winter: “Before the Law” (part of The Trial) written.
1915	January: Renewed meeting with Felice Bauer (in Bodenbach).
	Continues working on The Trial.
	Receives Fontane Prize for “The Stoker.”
	February: Moves from parents’ home into rented rooms: Bilekgasse and Langengasse.
	Journey to Hungary with sister Elli.
	November: Publication of The Metamorphosis.
	December (and January 1916): “The Village Schoolmaster” [“The Giant Mole”] written.
	Meets Georg Mordecai Langer.
1916	July: Meeting with Felice Bauer in Marienbad.
	August 20: Draws up a list of reasons for and against marriage.
	Stories written, later collected in A Country Doctor.
	Winter: Bothered by noise, K. moves to remote Alchemists’ Lane, Prague.
1917	First half: “The Hunter Gracchus” written.
	Learning Hebrew.
	Spring: “The Great Wall of China” written.
	July: Second engagement to Felice Bauer.
	August: Begins coughing blood.
	September 4: Diagnosis of tuberculosis. Moves to sister Ottla in Zürau.
	September 12: Leave of absence from office.
	November 10: Diary entries break off.
	End of December: Breaking of second engagement to Felice Bauer.
	Fall and winter: Aphorisms written (octavo notebooks).
1918	January to June: Zürau. Reading Kierkegaard.
	Spring: Aphorisms continued.
	Prague, Turnau.
	November: Schelesen. Meets Julie Wohryzek, daughter of a synagogue custodian.
	A project for “The Society of Poor Workers,” an ascetic society.
1919	January 10: Diary entries are resumed.
	Schelesen; Spring: Again in Prague.
	[Spring: Felice Bauer married.]
	Spring: Engagement to Julie Wohryzek (broken November 1919).
	May: Publication of In the Penal Colony.
	Fall: Publication of A Country Doctor.
	November: “Letter to His Father” written.
	Winter: “He,” collection of aphorisms, written. Schelesen, with Max Brod.
1920	January 1920 to October 15, 1921: Gap in diaries.
	Sick leave from Workers’ Accident Insurance Institute. Meran.
	End of March: Meets Gustav Janouch. Meran.
	Meets Milena Jesenská-Pollak, Czech writer (Vienna). Correspondence.
	Summer and fall: Prague. Writing stories.
	December: Tatra Mountains (Matliary). Meets Robert Klopstock.
1921	October 15: Note in diary that K. had given all his diaries to Milena.
	[Kafka’s son by Grete Bloch dies in Munich.]
	Until September: Tatra Mountains sanatorium; then Prague; Milena.
1921–24	Stories written, collected in A Hunger Artist.
1922	January to September: The Castle written.
	February: Prague.
	Spring: “A Hunger Artist” written.
	May: Last meeting with Milena.
	End of June to September: In Planá on the Luschnitz with sister Ottla. Prague.
	Summer: “Investigations of a Dog” written.
1923	Prague.
	July: In Müritz (with sister Elli); in a vacation camp of the Berlin Jewish People’s Home, meets Dora Dymant [Diamant].
	Prague, Schelesen (Ottla).
	End of September: With Dora Dymant in Berlin-Steglitz; later moves, with Dora, to Grunewaldstrasse.
	Attends lectures at the Berlin Academy (Hochschule) for Jewish Studies.
	Winter: “The Burrow” written.
	K. and Dora move to Berlin-Zehlendorf.
	A Hunger Artist sent to publisher.
1924	Spring: “Josephine the Singer, or the Mouse Folk” written.
	Brought as a patient from Berlin to Prague.
	April 10: To Wiener Wald Sanatorium, Professor Hajek’s clinic in Vienna; then sanatorium in Kierling, near Vienna (with Dora Dymant and Robert Klopstock).
	June 3: Death in Kierling; burial June 11, in the Jewish cemetery in Prague-Straschnitz.
	Publication of A Hunger Artist.
1942	Death of K.’s sister Ottla in Auschwitz. The other two sisters also perished in German concentration camps.
1944	Death of Grete Bloch at the hands of a Nazi soldier.
	Death of Milena in a German concentration camp.
1952	August: Death of Dora Dymant in London.
1960	Death of Felice Bauer.