Explanation of the book
Section: Translated Novels
There, too, in the main square stood a church, the greater part of which was surrounded by an old cemetery, which in turn was surrounded by a high wall, which few young men had ever managed to climb, and even K. had not succeeded. It was not curiosity that drove them to do so; the cemetery no longer held any secrets for them. They had entered it several times before through its iron gate, but they had sought to conquer it from above the high, smooth wall. One day before noon—the still, empty square was flooded with sunlight—K. surprisingly succeeded, at a spot where he had failed several times before, in climbing it on the first try, with a small flag between his teeth. The stones were still falling from beneath him as he climbed the wall, stuck the flag in a crack, and the wind spread the cloth. He looked down and around him and over his shoulder at the horizon, and then at the crosses planted in the ground; no one here and now was bigger than he.