In the Penal Colony
by Franz Kafka
The story takes place in an unnamed penal colony. Interior clues and the situation on the island testify to the impact of Octave Mirbeau's "The Garden of Torture". As with some of Kafka's other works, the narrator in this story seems disconnected, or perhaps numb, from events that are normally expected to be recorded in fear. The penal colony describes the latest use of a sophisticated torture and execution device that cuts the sentence of a convicted prisoner on its skin according to a scenario before allowing him to die within twelve hours. As the plot unfolds, the reader learns more and more about the machine, including its origin and original logic.
