![]() ![]() Under the judicial process associated with the machine, the accused is always assumed to be guilty and is not given a chance to defend himself. The Soldier and the Condemned, who is unaware that he has been sentenced to die for failing to get up and salute his superior's door each hour during his night watch, placidly watch from nearby. Everything about the functioning of the intricate machine and its purpose and history is told to him by the Officer. The story focuses on the Traveler, who has just arrived in an island penal colony and is encountering its brutal execution machine for the first time. The Condemned is a man scheduled for execution, the Soldier is responsible for guarding him, the Officer is in charge of the machine that will execute the Condemned, and the Traveler is a European dignitary and visitor. There are only four characters, each named according to his role in the story. As the plot unfolds, the reader learns more and more about the machine, including its origin and original justification. The story is set in an unnamed penal colony and describes the last use of an elaborate torture and execution device that carves the sentence of the condemned prisoner on his skin as he slowly dies over the course of twelve hours. Internal clues and the setting on an island suggest Octave Mirbeau's The Torture Garden as an influence. As in some of Kafka's other writings, the narrator in this story seems detached from, or perhaps numbed by, events that one would normally expect to be registered with horror. " In the Penal Colony" (" In der Strafkolonie") (also translated as " In the Penal Settlement") is a short story by Franz Kafka written in German in October 1914, revised in November 1918, and first published in October 1919.
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