Walk with Kafka in Prague

The House "Of Three Kings"

Celetná Street 3, Old Town

Dům U Tří králůThe new abode the Kafkas moved into in September of 1896 was located in the two-story house “Of the Three Kings” from the late gothic period in the Celetná Street, which records had already mentioned back in 1365. In the 18th century the façade was done over in the baroque manner and the house assumed its present look. The “pavlače” (roofed in arcade-like balconies on each floor) looking out onto the inside courtyard were added in 1860. The second story apartment with narrow, angular and ancient, but friendly rooms facing right out onto the Thein Church had one undeniable advantage for Franz Kafka: his own room, to the left of the dinning room, simply furnished with a bed and wash basin, night table, bookcase, and wardrobe. Here, Kafka took his first steps in literature, though most of these early works from his school and student days he destroyed.

Dům U Tří králů After many years he still remembered the first erotic adventure which had begun in his room in the Celetná Street. He wrote to Milena Jesenská in 1920: “At that time we lived in the Celetná Street across from a clothing store; in its entrance always stood a young shop girl; upstairs I, slightly older than 20 years, paced up and down in my room occupied with the nerve-torturing memorization of senseless things for my first set of state law exams. It was summer, very hot, yes, probably this time of year, it was completely unbearable. In my pacing I always stopped at the window chewing on disgusting bits of history of Roman law. By making signs to one another we finally came to an agreement. In the evening at 8 o’clock I was to pick her up, but when I went down in the evening another man was already there with her. Well, it didn’t change things that much; I was scared of the whole world, so I was scared of this man, too. If he hadn’t been there, I would still have been scared of him. Although the girl took his arm, she made signs to me that I should walk behind them. Thus we walked to the Archer’s Island, drank a beer there, I at the next table, then walked – I following along – slowly to where the girl lived, somewhere near the Meat Market. There the man said good-bye to her; the girl ran into the house; I waited a while until she reappeared and we went to a hotel on the Narrow Embankment. All that was, even before we got to the hotel, enticing, exciting and disgusting; in the hotel it wasn’t any different. And then when towards morning – the weather was still hot and nice – we walked back home across the Charles Bridge, I was certainly happy, but this happiness was only because I now finally had peace and quiet from my eternally importuning body, above all, however, this happiness was due to the fact that the whole thing hadn’t been even more disgusting and even dirtier. I was together with the girl one more time, I believe, 2 nights later; everything was as good as it was the first time, but since I went off on holiday just afterwards and there on vacation played around with a girl, I couldn’t bear to look at the shop girl in Prague anymore, didn’t exchange one more word with her, she was (from my point of view) my evil enemy, although she actually was a good-natured, friendly girl. From then on she always followed me with her uncomprehending eyes. “

Hermann Kafka In September 1896 the paternal store was also transferred into the house “Of the Three Kings”, now family home and firm were under one roof. The father’s business continued to thrive and its circle of customers expanded and he himself in the meantime had even advance to become an officially appointed and sworn-in expert at the imperial and royal commercial court. Their son, of course, was less interested in that aspect, although his parents still continued to think that he would some day take over the business.

Already in May of 1906 the paternal business was moved a few houses further down the street to the Celetná No. 3; one year later in the summer of 1907 the apartment in the Celetná No. 3 was vacated. Kafka had lived there for eleven years.