A children's Kafka seems somewhat…well… errr…Kafkaesque. But, truth be told, children do live in a world where the unexpected is pretty much expected; it's all quite new and not-yet-experienced and it must seem somewhat random and strange. Kafka himself was writing for the preverbal, not-yet-logical, completely experiential child in all of us. So maybe this book makes more sense than one might think at first glance. It's a retelling of some of Kafka's tales, most notably The Metamorphosis, in simple but poetic form accompanied by stark black and white, expressive, and very humorous illustrations. Kafka's eerie, creepy, wondrous but matter-of-fact mood is well conveyed and the language is simultaneously simple and sophisticated. This would make an unusual but highly effective read-aloud and would provoke all kinds of discussion with a child about reality, imagination, nightmares, and perception. It's offbeat, way off the beaten track and startlingly, refreshingly, original. Recommended for ages five and up and for parents who love sharing the darker side of reality.

Read here:
http://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/book/my-first-kafka?A=SearchResult&SearchID=5037916&ObjectID=6193006&ObjectType=35

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All gloom and despair: that's what Franz Kafka is known for with his novels and short stories, and the 20th century literary icon can hardly be said to have written any children's tales in his life. Brooklyn-based writer and video game designer Matthue Roth therefore took it upon himself to adapt Kakfa for children with My First Kafka: Runaways, Rodents, and Giant Bugs, a book made more marvelous by London-based Rohan Daniel Eason's fine macabre black-and-white illustrations. Somehow, Roth and Eason found a way to make Kafka appropriate for kiddo audiences.

Full article here:
http://www.lostateminor.com/2013/07/27/my-first-kafka/

As a member of the Teddy Ruxpin generation, I'm no stranger to strange things to read to your kids¡½or should that be ¡Èstrange things reading to your kids¡É? With that in mind I'm all for Brooklyn-based writer Matthue Roth's new book My First Kafka, which is Kafka¡Äbut, you know, for kids.

Roth adapted three Kafka stories (¡ÈExcursion into the Mountains,¡É ¡ÈThe Metamorphosis,¡É and ¡ÈJosefine the Singer, or The Mouse Folk¡É) for a younger audience. Because, well, maybe it's best that he explain. Here's a brief interview with the author:

Read here:
http://electricliterature.com/blog/2013/07/03/kafka-for-kids/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=kafka-for-kids

One morning Matthue Roth was about to dive into a collection of Franz Kafka's writings when his two young daughters asked him to read them a story. They had a pile of children's books to choose from, but upon seeing the cartoonish Kafka cover (illustrated by comic artist Sammy Harkham), his kids had little interest in their age-appropriate choices. ¡ÈMy older daughter said, no, read us this,¡É Roth recalls. ¡ÈI said, fine, if you insist, and then I dove in without warning them.¡É What could have have been a source of nightmares for weeks turned out to be a total hit. Roth's daughters were mesmerized by Kafka's strange, macabre tales. So much so that it inspired Roth to write My First Kafka: Runaways, Rodents, and Giant Bugs, an illustrated, kid-friendly adaptation of three classic Kafka stories.

Read the full article:
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/08/my-first-kafka/

Matthue Roth has been living in Ditmas Park with his family for three and a half years. The author of Never Mind the Goldbergs, Candy in Action, Losers, and Yom Kippur A Go-Go was inspired to write his latest work, My First Kafka: Runaways, Rodents, and Giant Bugs, after witnessing his daughters' reactions to hearing Franz Kafka's story Jackals and Arabs.

We talked to the slam poet, Cortelyou Library fan, and husband/table busser to The Hester's Itta Werdiger Roth about the incredible response to My First Kafka, what inspired the writing that came before, and the journey to his favorite neighborhood in NYC.

Read the full article here:
http://ditmasparkcorner.com/blog/art-music/matthue-roth-on-legos-all-his-best-plans-the-exception-that-is-ditmas-park

If Gorey and Sendak Had Illustrated Kafka for Kids

Sylvia Plath believed it was never too early to dip children's toes in the vast body of literature. But to plunge straight into Kafka? Why not, which is precisely what Brooklyn-based writer and videogame designer Matthue Roth has done in My First Kafka: Runaways, Rodents, and Giant Bugs (public library) ¡½ a magnificent adaptation of Kafka for kids. With stunning black-and-white illustrations by London-based fine artist Rohan Daniel Eason, this gem falls ¡½ rises, rather ¡½ somewhere between Edward Gorey, Maurice Sendak, and the Graphic Canon series.

Read the full article here on Brain Pickings:
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/07/19/my-first-kafka-roth-eason/

Matthue Roth, author of My First Kafka, was interviewed on the BBC's World Service Radio. You can listen to the whole thing by clicking on this link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p019y6c2

Here is Matthue's account of the interview:

I flew out to the far remote borough of Manhattan yesterday to record an interview for the BBC! They did some really cool things with it. I had a super long conversation with one of their producers, completely without knowing that they'd recorded her 7-year-old listening to (and reacting to) our version of “The Metamorphosis” being read.

Here are the oddest things about it:

a) it was in Manhattan, not London;
b) the person interviewing me was in London, and so I ended up talking to an empty chair in a completely empty room;
c) they asked me a line of questions about what my kids thought of the book, and what other kids thought of it, and then they asked a question about how Kafka's feelings about the Austro-Hungarian Empire led to his feelings of isolation. I didn't really answer that one well. Seriously, interviews make me into a deer in the headlights! Which is really odd to say, itself. I'm not used to, you know, saying “interviews” in the plural. Or being on this side of the gun. Err, the microphone.

But the producer was wonderful and Dan Damon, the host, was incredibly nice and gracious, and asked about my other books even though the interview was over and he didn't have to at all. I didn't see the real TARDIS, but I suppose they could always invite me back one day.

As a child growing up in suburban Connecticut, I was fortunate to have many books, but my favorite by far was a chestnut, leather-bound Encyclopaedia Britannica. I spent hours cross-legged on the carpet flipping through each volume, but I remember only the three things I repeatedly returned to: Sylvia Plath, Nostradamus, and Biafra. I read Plath's entry so many times that twenty years later I can still recite some of it verbatim. ¡ÈHorror of childbirth.¡É Self-mutilation. Oven. It was like a nightmare, and I was enraptured. While my own obsessions might have been particularly gloomy, they were no less monstrous than the adult-sanctioned books I owned. In my tiny library sat such classics as ¡ÈThe BFG,¡É by Roald Dahl, in which a girl is plucked from her bed by an ogre, and ¡ÈScary Stories to Tell in the Dark,¡É a veritable catalogue of grotesqueries accompanied by the most spine-tingling drawings I've ever seen. Another favorite was the sunny-covered ¡ÈD'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths.¡É Though it looked benign, it featured the story of Cronos, who ate and regurgitated his children.

Read the full article:
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/06/kafka-for-kids.html

Jules Verne's Voyages Extraordinaires hold nary a candle to this trip. Cannonball to the moon! Hitchhike on a comet! Pah! Flitcroft and Spencer give us Einstein and interlocutor riding beams of light originating 3,200 light-years from their destination, Earth, on which, when they start out, the Trojan War rages, but which looks just like 2013 when they arrive. As they more-than-rocket onward¡½at the speed of light, you know¡½they discuss stars and atoms, the atom bomb, the big bang and microwaves, dark matter and wimps, gravity, supernovas, black holes, the history of light, quantum mechanics, relativity, space and time, planets, the sun, life, greenhouse gases, and vision, in that order and roping in plenty of subtopics en route. Avoiding confusion and condescension for the entire duration, visual physiologist and eye surgeon Flitcroft proves an ideal informant, packing the dialogue with science and just the right amount of humor to amuse without trivializing by either silliness or shortchanging the subject. An extraordinarily proficient caricaturist, Spencer makes Einstein come alive on the page in gesture and pose, and he does the same for the giants on whose shoulders Einstein says he stood¡½the likes of Newton, Galileo, and Kepler¡½when they are cited. Also, exploiting perspectival effects adroitly, Spencer makes a very verbal book zip along as if it really were astride a photon. Science comics extraordinaire!

¡½ Ray Olson

Read article here:
http://www.booklistonline.com/ProductInfo.aspx?pid=6119482&AspxAutoDetectCookieSupport=1