A Report to an Academy

"A Report to an Academy" ("Ein Bericht für eine Akademie") is a short story by Franz Kafka, written and published in 1917. In the story, an ape who has learned to behave like a human presents to an academy the story of how he effected his transformation. The story was first published by Martin Buber in the German monthly "Der Jude", along with another of Kafka's stories, "Jackals and Arabs" ("Schakale und Araber"). The story appeared again in a 1919 collection titled "A Country Doctor" ("Ein Landarzt").

Plot

The narrator, speaking before a scientific conference, describes his former life as an ape. His story begins in a West African jungle, in which a hunting expedition shoots and captures him. Caged on a ship for his voyage to Europe, he finds himself for the first time without the freedom to move as he will. Needing to escape from this situation, he studies the habits of the crew, and imitates them with surprising ease; he reports encountering particular difficulty only in learning to drink alcohol. Throughout the story, the narrator reiterates that he learned his human behavior not out of any desire to be human, but only to provide himself with a means of escape from his cage.

Upon arriving in Europe, the ape realizes that he is faced with a choice between "the Zoological Garden or the Music Hall," and devotes himself to becoming human enough to become an able performer. He accomplishes this, with the help of many teachers, and reports to the academy that his transformation is so complete that he can no longer properly describe his emotions and experiences as an ape. In concluding, the ape expresses a degree of satisfaction with his lot. [cite web|url=http://www.mala.bc.ca/~johnstoi/kafka/reportforacademy.htm|title=A Report to an Academy|last=Kafka|first=Franz|authorlink=Franz Kafka|accessdate=2006-05-27 Translated by Ian Johnston.]

Analysis

Walter Herbert Sokel has suggested that the story speaks to a conflict "between internal and external continuity in the ape's existence". [Sokel, Walter Herbert. "The Myth of Power and the Self: Essays on Franz Kafka". 2002, page 169.] The preservation of the life of the protagonist is dependent upon his casting off memory and identity; only by achieving the end of that internal identity could actual biological life be maintained. Thus, for the ape, "identity is performance"; "It is not a static essence, a given, but a constantly reenacted self-representation." [Sokel, Walter Herbert. "The Myth of Power and the Self: Essays on Franz Kafka". 2002, page 283.]

The motif of the changeability of identity may have ramifications in the context of Zionism and the Jewish diaspora, as "A Report to an Academy" first appeared in a Zionist magazine. Nicholas Murray briefly suggests in his 2004 biography of Kafka that the story is a satirization of Jews' assimilation into Western culture. [cite book|last=Murray|first=Nicholas|year=2004|title=Kafka|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven|id=ISBN 0-300-10631-9]

The story's references to the protagonist's "apish past" ("affisches Vorleben") have led some literary theorists to associate the story with evolutionary theory. [Martens, Lorna. "Shadow Lines: Austrian Literature from Freud to Kafka". 1991, page 263.]

In J.M. Coetzee's novel Elizabeth Costello, the title character gives a central place to "A Report to an Academy" in her speech about vegetarianism and animal rights. She also suggests that Kafka may have been influenced by German psychologist Wolfgang Köhler's "The Mentality of Apes", also published in 1917. [cite book|last=Coetzee|first= John Maxwell|authorlink=John Maxwell Coetzee|year=2003|title=Elizabeth Costello|publisher=Penguin Books|location=New York|id=ISBN 0-14-200481-2]

References