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‘In the Penal Colony’: summary. A man identified only as the Traveller arrives at an island penal colony. He is being shown an execution device, whose purpose and operation are explained to him by a man known as the Officer. There are two other characters: the Soldier and the Condemned.
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The story focuses on the Traveler, who has just arrived in an island penal colony and is encountering its brutal execution machine for the first time. Everything about the functioning of the intricate machine and its purpose and history is told to him by the Officer.
- Franz Kafka
- 1919
The story begins in a penal colony on an unnamed tropical island with no stated nationality. A military Officer shows an apparatus to a man known only as “the Traveler” who was invited by the Commandant to witness an execution.
An explorer arrives in a penal colony, at the invitation of its new commandant, to investigate its organization and report his findings to a commission created by the commandant.
“In the Penal Colony” is the story of a visitor to an unnamed island penal colony and an officer who proudly explains his process of executing men with no trial or even an explanation of charges to those accused.
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This short story is remarkable for its grotesque and vivid yet realistic imagery, as well as its exploration of injustice, the complexities of the penal system, and human nature. A psychoanalytical lens reveals that the convicted man is entirely subjugated as a prisoner.
