In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

EMPLOYEES 81
obsession-with the concept of the employee. This fascination probably
results from a number of ambiguities in the employee's role. On the one
hand, employees are allowed to occupy a position of agency, since they
are hired to perform certain tasks and can thus be held responsible
(employees, according to feudal codes, are not supposed to quit their
posts in burning buildings). On the other hand, employees are denied (or
deny themselves) agency because they are not expected to take initiatives
(employees are not supposed to change sides, even in a particularly
opportune situation such as the end of the war in Alsace). The instructions
that K. gives to his two "helpers" in Franz Kafka's Schloss (The
Castle) epitomize the dynamics of this role. K. will ignore the difference
between their names (and thus their respective individuality as "Artur"
and "Jeremias") because such a conflation will make both of them
responsible for any mistake one or the other might commit (and it will
thus transform them into a single subject for any situation where "to
have the agency of a subject" means "to be capable of being accused"):
"I'll call you both Artur. If I tell Artur to go somewhere, you must both
go; if I give Artur something to do, you must both do it. This has the
great disadvantage of making it impossible for me to employ you on
separate jobs, but it has the advantage of making you equally responsible
for anything I tell you to do" (Kafka, 20). In view of the most widespread
gender stereotypes, it is not surprising that the role of the employee
carries a strong connotation of femininity, and that playing this role can
make male characters seem androgynous. [see Male = Female (Gender
Trouble)] Jeremias refers to Artur as "little darling," and invokes his
"tender soul" (195). Barnabas-who, although not an employee of K.,
volunteers to support him whenever he can-really looks like a woman:
"He reminded K. a little of the girl with the infant whom he had seen at
the tanner's. He was clothed nearly all in white; not in silk, of course-he
was in winter clothes like all the others-but the material he was wearing
had the softness and dignity of silk. His face was clear and frank, his
eyes larger than ordinary" (22).
Refusing to walk through Claus's dreams as an "employee," Maria
Capponi protests a male attitude which, out of resentment against her
marriage, makes her responsible for the existence of that marriage and
at the same time contests her right to act as an independent subject. A
similar asymmetry characterizes the role of secretary. Powerful men, such
as John Fredersen, the Master of Metropolis, are surrounded by secre-