Prague in early autumn is shining like gold. Bright yellow leaves surround orange-red roofs, emerald spires, and gold-painted window lattices, splashing natural and artificial colors, making people feel like they are in a fairy tale world. Step on the small streets paved with cobblestones in the Middle Ages and admire the shining crystal products; or sit in the open-air coffee house with a thousand-year history and listen to live high-level music performances. The rough heart will become delicate, and the rigid people will also give birth to tenderness. .
Prague, is a living architectural history. Here you can find Romanesque, Gothic, Baroque, Renaissance and other architectural types. With more than 2,000 nationally protected cultural relics, Prague became the first city in the world to be designated as a World Heritage Site. Prague’s contribution to human culture is not only in architecture, but also in the fields of science, literature, and art. Its representatives include Jan Neruda, Einstein, Milan Kundera, and Kafka.
Nietzsche said that when he wanted to express music in one word, he found Vienna; but when he wanted to express mystery in one word, he only thought of Prague.
Franz Kafka (1883-1924), born in a Jewish family in the Old Town of Prague, wrote in German and lived in Prague most of his life. Most of his works are based on Prague’s buildings and streets, adding a bit of mystery to Prague.
Prague Castle is a former royal palace. It is famous for its golden gate, flying buttresses and unique Bohemian-style interior decoration. Just as all the luxury in the world is set off by simplicity, there is a back alley less than one meter wide at the foot of the castle. The alley was built in the 15th century, and the name is very impressive: Golden Lane (Golden Lane). It is said that the alchemists who made gold ornaments for the princes and nobles lived here in the early years, hence the name. After the 19th century, the alleys gradually turned into slums. The 11 colorful cottages here have historical significance. Among them, No. 22 with blue walls and red roofs is Kafka’s former residence, and Kafka’s name is still hung on the wall at the entrance, which makes Golden Alley famous. Now it is a small bookstore and has become a popular place for tourists from all over the world.
When I walked into Cabin 22, it was hard to imagine how Kafka wrote in this low and narrow room, and my heart, which was connected with literati, couldn’t help but ache.
In the old town, I saw the clock tower that appeared in Kafka’s works. The exquisite astronomical clock upstairs, which was handmade more than 500 years ago, has witnessed many changes of honor and disgrace in Prague’s history, and has survived wars, floods and other disasters. It still reports the time accurately. Every hour, the window above the astronomical clock will automatically open, the god of death on the side will start to ring the bell, and the puppets of the twelve disciples of Jesus will appear one by one under the leadership of St. Paul. At that moment, I couldn’t help but have endless associations with life and death, history and reality, secular world and heaven…
The house where Kafka was born was built into a museum two years ago. The museum has collected Kafka’s photos, personal letters, diaries, various certificates, manuscripts and first printed versions… Kafka in the photos is handsome, far from the cynical writer he imagined. The museum does not rigidly list the facts, but uses multimedia, installation art, and interior design art to display cultural relics, creating the unique trance, dream, and helpless atmosphere of Kafka’s works. Here you can experience the absurdity in “The Castle”, the resentment in “The Metamorphosis”, and the persistence in “The Hunger Artist”.
The museum represents every stage of Kafka’s life in the most creative way. On the path paved with gravel, there are photos of his childhood. I seem to follow the sensitive and introverted him through the old city to go to school time and time again; the street scenes of the early 20th century projected on the big screen are blurred in the dim light, as if shaking in the water; in the middle of another exhibition room hangs him Large photographs of four women in their lives. His several love affairs have no results. He always gets cold feet because he is worried that marriage will take away his true love “literature”. Kafka was a civil servant in the daytime and a writer in the night, wandering between reality and dreams, always facing split personality. Inserted on a mound is his death certificate and a photograph of his tombstone, representing the end of a thinker’s life.
Back on the first floor of the museum, through a small window, I saw the water of the Volvata River lying peacefully under the melancholy sky. This is the sky and river that Kafka has seen countless times, and not far away is the mysterious “castle” described by him. Although Kafka’s works are famous all over the world and have been translated into dozens of languages, what happened to him in his hometown is sad. He was once thought of as an eccentric eccentric. The term Kafkarna has become an everyday term meaning “a painful situation” and “wandering in the absurd”. His works were banned by successive Czech governments for 80 years, and finally published for the first time in early 2007, and finally saw the light of day. The Czechs gradually began to be proud of him. Kafka never won honors or awards for his writing. Perhaps Prague has become what he dreamed of, but he never dreamed that his museum will now attract many tourists from all over the world for Prague.
The tears in my eyes at that moment flowed for all the souls who have struggled for literature…
Hemingway’s
Sea Before seeing Hemingway’s former residence, I first saw a large piece of sea.
Drive from Palm Beach, Florida, pass through Miami, and turn onto “the most beautiful cross-sea highway in the world”: U.S. Highway 1. Intoxication and terror go hand in hand. Outside the left window is the azure blue of the Atlantic Ocean, and outside the right window is the azure blue of the Gulf of Mexico. The sun, the sky, and the sea are embracing, and the soft branches of palm trees are blowing… The road is narrow and single-lane, and the altitude in some areas is less than 1 meter. I am worried about strong winds. Jump up and blow yourself down into the ocean.
More than 80 years ago, Hemingway decided to move away from the inland. Was he attracted by the sea?
After passing dozens of reef islands with different scenery, we finally arrived at the ends of the earth: Key West, the southernmost tip of the United States. Key West is only 90 miles away from Cuba, covering an area of about 4 square miles. It has long summer and no winter. There are only 25,000 residents, but there are nearly 20,000 tourists from all over the world every day. Homosexuals are especially happy to gather here and enjoy the “heavenly feeling” of freedom and equality.
Hemingway has been away from Key West for more than 70 years, but seems to be around all the time. His portraits can be seen everywhere on the island, and many people pretend to be him drinking and carousing. The former residence of him and his second wife Palin, No. 907 Baitou Street, is one of the most tourist attractions. The Spanish-style two-story building is painted in cheese color, with dark green roofs and grass-green wooden window panels, which complement each other with tropical and subtropical plants in the garden. There are several pictures of Hemingway hanging on the wall of the living room: handsome boy, talented young man, tough middle-aged man, no wonder he is respected as an idol in every era.
What makes tourists stop most is the study on the second floor of the guest room in the backyard, which is Hemingway’s favorite, and some people even swear that they have seen his ghost wandering here. The study room is full of light. Through the windows, you can see the green palm trees and the towering Key West Lighthouse across the street. Surrounded by half-high bookshelves. Hemingway read the great works of Shakespeare and other famous authors. He also admired the music of Mozart, the paintings of Goya and Chezanler, and drew nourishment from various arts. The deer heads and large fish specimens hanging on the wall are memorials of his adventure career. Hemingway got up at 6 o’clock every morning and wrote in his study until noon. He has a Royal typewriter, but rarely uses it, preferring to write with a pencil because it is easy to revise. It is said that he used 7 pencils a day when he wrote most smoothly. From 1929 to 1939, he wrote novels such as “Death in the Afternoon”, “For Whom the Bell Tolls”, “Green Hills of Africa”, and famous short stories such as “The Snow of Kilimanjaro”. He created “For Whom the Bell Tolls” in 17 months. After the draft was finished, he revised it every day. After the proof version came out, he continued to revise it for 96 hours without leaving the study. With a bundle of pencils, he wrote colorful splendor in the history of literature.
