Introduction Brendan Moran and Carlo Salzani This book on philosophy and Kafka is a beginning. A book on “Philosophy and . . .” is always a beginning, or at least never an end. To an unusual extent, however, Kafka’s writings indicate, sometimes even thematize, that we are not going to finish our efforts to interpret them. In this sense, they could seem unusually philosophical: They are openly resisting conclusive readings. More than most subjects that might be studied, Kafka’s writings recall for us that we can conceivably always return to them and begin again. This book on philoso- phy and Kafka is a beginning, then, and must acknowledge that all its topics remain open for discussion. The book emerged from a group of people interested in writing on the topic, and finding that there had not really been a book on it. The research on Franz Kafka is ever-expanding, and continuously generates interest and new works. “Philosophical” questions and topics are obviously central to Kafka-scholarship, and the literature on the subject abounds, but usually in a dispersed form (jour- nal articles, book chapters), or in book-long studies that focus, however, on particular issues, interpretations, or—as is often the case—on philosophical thinkers such as Heraclitus, Søren Kierkegaard or Friedrich Nietzsche. 1 Alt- hough the majority of the publications on Kafka focus on biographical aspects or on literary interpretation that does not presume to be “philosophical,” a number of book-length studies have indeed appeared in which the question of the rela- tion between philosophy and Kafka is central. Some of them focus, in one way or another, on theoretical or philosophical aspects of Kafka’s work, such as time and history, violence, ethics, and freedom. 2 Other studies confront Kafka’s thought and work with a philosophical tradition, or analyze his work through a perspective such as psychoanalysis, phenomenology, deconstruction, or “post- structuralism.” 3 Other works focus on particular philosophical readings or on particular readings that might be construed as “philosophical,” such as those by Walter Benjamin or Jacques Derrida. 4 Finally, some studies attempt a philo- sophical take on certain aspects of Kafka’s work. 5 The present volume is unique, however, in bringing together a considerable variety of essays that focus on major philosophical readings of, or on philosophical issues present in, Kafka’s writings. More specifically, the novelty of the volume is that it focuses