Before the Law
You are a man from the country, come to ask for admittance to the Law. The gate stands open. A doorkeeper says: not now. Every choice costs years.
An Imperial Message
A dying Emperor whispers a message meant for you alone. As his messenger you carry it through crowds and palaces without end, then wait at your window for it to arrive.
Save the Poet
You are Cicero. Your old teacher, the Greek poet Archias, is on trial for his citizenship. Eight jurors, one water clock: win the law, then the room.
New here? Start with Before the Law. The games run in any browser, on a laptop, a phone or a classroom board; the text-only versions suit older machines.
How to play
Four things to know
- 1ChooseClick or tap a choice. The number keys 1–4 work too.
- 2Hold to moveHold the mouse button, a finger, or ↑ to walk or to run. Drag to look around.
- 3ListenEvery line is spoken and also shown on screen. Click the text to hurry it.
- 4ReflectAt the end, What happened here shows what you did and asks what it meant.
On a classroom board, press Classroom board in the bar above for larger text and controls, or see the page for teachers.
Why this project
To live a text, not to memorise it
I built these games for one reason. A theme that is memorised stays on the page; a theme that is lived stays in the person. Kafka’s parables are usually taught as a list of ideas: authority, delay, futility, the unreachable. Here the student does not learn those words. They wait at the gate, they run with the message, and the ideas arrive as their own first-hand experience.
- MemorisedThe man from the country waits at the gate until he dies.LivedYou wait. Enter is on the screen the whole time, and still the years go by.
- MemorisedThe Emperor’s message never reaches the one it was meant for.LivedYou carry it yourself, chamber after chamber, and the palace does not end.
- MemorisedKafka’s themes are authority, delay and futility.LivedYou find that nobody stopped you. You stopped yourself.
Why it belongs in this course
The course joins law, language, literature and communication. So does the project.
Law, seen from the other side
Before the Law comes from The Trial, and it is about access to law. Every lawyer will one day stand at that gate as its keeper. The game makes them stand there first as the one kept waiting.
Close reading, done by hand
Each choice on the screen is a sentence of Kafka’s. To play it well, and certainly to build it, every line has to be read slowly enough to act on.
Interpretation without an answer key
The games never say what the parables mean. The reflection page sets out several readings and asks the student to take a position, which is what a statute asks of a lawyer.
Language in more than one form
The text is read, heard in narration, discussed through set questions and answered in writing. An Imperial Message also sets it beside Kafka’s German, with notes on its key words.
Creativity as a method
The course asks students to answer literature by making something of their own. This project is that instruction, taken literally.
Made to be used again
Each reading is one file that opens offline and takes ten to fifteen minutes, with a text-only version for older machines. The next class can play it within a single period.
For teachers
Use it in one class period
A lesson plan, the discussion questions, and notes for running the games on a classroom board or on students’ laptops.