I have always thought that using the adjective "Kafkaesque" in casual conversation was

[smirkymonkey]

pretentious and cliche. However, I think there is no better term to describe what we are going through right now. I can think of no better way to describe the surreal feeling of dissociation that I feel during these times.

http://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/29/nyregion/the-essence-of-kafkaesque.html?pagewanted=all

"SO just what does this adjective "Kafkaesque" mean? And why does Frederick R. Karl, author of an exhaustive critical biography of Franz Kafka, believe that the word is as misused as it is used?

Kafka is the only 20th-century literary figure whose name "has entered the language in a way no other writer's has," Mr. Karl says. But "what I'm against is someone going to catch a bus and finding that all the buses have stopped running and saying that's Kafkaesque. That's not."

"What's Kafkaesque," he said in an interview in his Manhattan apartment, "is when you enter a surreal world in which all your control patterns, all your plans, the whole way in which you have configured your own behavior, begins to fall to pieces, when you find yourself against a force that does not lend itself to the way you perceive the world.

"You don't give up, you don't lie down and die. What you do is struggle against this with all of your equipment, with whatever you have. But of course you don't stand a chance. That's Kafkaesque."

Does anybody else relate to this?

[immoderate]

1. When I saw that word, it went right through my heart.

--imm

[smirkymonkey]

3. I just couldn't think of a better word to describe what was going on right now.

Sometimes I feel like I am going insane. Have you ever read "The Trial"? This brings up similar feelings for me.

[immoderate]

5. I know I view the world as something I have to step back from.

--imm

[Demit]

2. Whenever I heard people use the term they were using it appropriately,

so, no, I didn't think it was pretentious and cliche.

[smirkymonkey]

4. I know, I think it can be used incorrectly, but this is not one of those times.

It is absolutely appropriate for what is going on right now I think. In fact, I can't think of a better word. For anyone who has ever read Kafka, I think they would absolutely know what I mean.