The Unhappiness of Being a Single Man

BEFORE THE LAW

BEFORE THE LAW there’s a gatekeeper. A man from the country comes up to this gatekeeper and asks to be admitted to the law. But the gatekeeper says that he can’t let him in right now. The man thinks it over and then asks whether he’ll be allowed to go in later. “It’s possible,” says the gatekeeper, “but not at the moment.” Since the door to the law is open, as always, and since the gatekeeper has stepped to the side, the man bends forward to look through the entrance and see what’s in there. When the gatekeeper notices, he laughs and says, “If you’re that desperate, you could try going in even though I’ve told you not to. But bear in mind: I’m very strong. And I’m only the lowest-ranking gatekeeper. From room to room there are more gatekeepers, each stronger than the last. Just the sight of the third one is more than I can take.” The man from the country hadn’t expected so much difficulty; after all, the law should be available to anyone at any time, he thinks, but as he takes a closer look at the gatekeeper in his fur-lined coat, at his big, pointed nose, his long, thin, black Tartar-like beard, he decides that he’d actually rather wait until he gets permission to go in. The gatekeeper gives him a stool and has him sit down to one side of the door. He sits there for days and years. He makes many attempts to be let in and tires out the gatekeeper with his pleas. The gatekeeper sometimes cross-examines him a little, asking him about where he comes from and many other things besides, but they’re detached questions, of the kind very grand people ask, and in the end he always says that he can’t let the man in yet. The man, who’d outfitted himself with all sorts of things for the journey, uses everything he has, no matter how valuable, to try and bribe the gatekeeper. The gatekeeper accepts it all, but says, “I’m just taking this so you don’t think there’s something you haven’t tried.” Over the course of these many years, the man watches the gatekeeper almost uninterruptedly. He forgets the other gatekeepers and begins to believe that this one is the only obstacle between him and the law. He curses his bad luck, loudly and recklessly for the first few years, then, later, when he gets old, he just grumbles under his breath. He becomes childish and, since he has studied the gatekeeper so long he’s familiar even with the fleas in his fur collar, he begs the fleas to help him change the gatekeeper’s mind. Finally, the light in his eyes grows weak and he doesn’t know whether it’s really getting dark or just that his eyes are tricking him. But in this darkness he can’t miss the splendour that pours inextinguishably out of the door to the law. He doesn’t live much longer. Before he dies, all his experiences from these many years gather in his head to form a question that he’d never asked the gatekeeper before. He waves him closer because he can no longer lift his stiffening body. The gatekeeper has to lean right down to him, since the size difference between them has grown much larger. “What is it you want to know now?” asks the gatekeeper. “You’re insatiable.”

“Everybody wants the law,” says the man, “so why is it that in all this time no one apart from me has asked to be let in?”

The gatekeeper can see that the man is near the end and, to get through to his failing hearing, he shouts at the top of his voice: “No one else could come in this way because this entrance was reserved only for you. I’ll go now and close it.”