Kafka's novel THE CASTLE remained unfinished and was only published after the author's death. His hero is K., a man of indeterminate age and origin who pretends to be a surveyor. K., the stranger, aspires to get a job at the castle, an inscrutable system of regulations, officialdom and opportunism.

The villagers around the castle are part of the system, and they are suspicious of the man who threatens to invade their world. Kafka's vision of a thoroughly corrupt society is a poetically dark anticipation of current dictatorial regimes.

Maxim Didenko, who emigrated from Russia in 2022 and now lives and works in Germany, is directing at the Staatsschauspiel Dresden for the first time.