What Is The Main Idea Of The Penal Colony By Kafka

In Kafka’s short story, The Penal Colony, Kafka creates a fascinating set up: an explorer comes to visit an execution in a foreign land. The ways of this execution are violent and unjust in the explorer’s eyes. At the end of the story, the officer who runs the machine ends up putting himself in the machine. I think this decision was made in bad faith by the officer, because of how the officer acts, how he feels about justice, and the outcome of what happened.
In this story, the officer shows how much he has dedicated his life to the care of this machine. The officer put countless hours into making this machine operate correctly. The way the officer excitingly shares about the different parts of the machine illistrates how much he loves it.
The officer notices that the explorer doesn’t seem to think it’s fair that the condemned men get no trial and have to die such a long, painful, humiliating execution. On page 145 it says, “The officer realized that he was in danger of having his exposition of the apparatus held up for a long time; so he went up to the explorer …. And said: ‘This is how the matter stands, I have been appointed judge in this penal colony. … My guiding principle is this: Guilt is never to be doubted.’” The officer is a strong believer in a no trial justice system. He is also the only advocate of the use of the machine. He believes so strongly in this way of justice that he’s alone in his views and doesn’t even care. He continues talks about how there were other supporters in the past, but they decided they would renounce their advocating for this method when the new Commandant came and didn’t like it. The officer, however, didn’t renounce his. He is keeping with his beliefs and is trying to restore things to the way they used to be, where executions by use of the machine were giant events that the whole town watched with awe and appreciation. By carrying such strong views on the importance of the use of the machine, the officer placed himself in a position where he didn’t want to live without that machine and his justice system in order. I think that the officer acted in bad faith by making himself think he
After all, the officer took time to destroy the machine and obviously knew what he was doing, and it was on purpose that he choose to do it. He seemed like he was acting meaningful about it. Plus, making a choice that big suggests thought and purpose behind it. He was making the decision because he told himself he had no other decision. He had to kill himself and destroy the machine because the machine’s era was over, and so was