Mar 18, 2026

Letters to Kafka

A Novel

Christine Estima

Hosted by Hollay Ghadery

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Summary

In this NBN episode, host Hollay Ghadery speaks with Christine Estima about her novel, Letters to Kafka (House of Anansi, 2025).

A sweeping, tragic romance and feminist adventure about translator and resistance fighter Milena Jesenská’s torrid love affair with Franz Kafka. In 1919, Milena Jesenská, a clever and spirited twenty-three-year-old, is trapped in an unhappy marriage to literary critic Ernst Pollak. Since Pollak is unable to support the pair in Vienna’s post-war economy, Jesenská must supplement their income by working as a translator. Having previously met her compatriot Franz Kafka in the literary salons of Prague, she writes to him to ask for permission to translate his story “The Stoker” from German to Czech, becoming Kafka’s first translator. The letter launches an intense and increasingly passionate correspondence. Jesenská is captivated by Kafka’s energy, intensity, and burning ambition to write. Kafka is fascinated by Jesenská’s wit, rebellious spirit, and intelligence. Jesenská and Kafka meet twice for lovers’ trysts, but can such an intense connection endure beyond a fleeting affair? In her remarkable debut novel, Christine Estima weaves little-known facts and fiction into a rich tapestry, powerfully portraying the struggles of a woman forced to choose between the roles of wife, lover, and intellectual.

CHRISTINE ESTIMA is an Arab woman of mixed ethnicity (Lebanese, Syrian, and Portuguese) and the author of the short story collection The Syrian Ladies Benevolent Society. She has written for the New York Times, The Walrus, VICE, the Globe and Mail, Chatelaine, Maisonneuve, the Toronto Star, and the CBC. Her story “Your Hands Are Blessed” was included in Best Canadian Stories 2023. She was shortlisted for the 2018 Allan Slaight Prize for Journalism and a finalist for the 2023 Lee Smith Novel Prize. Christine has a master’s degree from York University and lives in Toronto.

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Hollay Ghadery

Hollay Ghadery is an Iranian-Canadian multi-genre writer living in Ontario on Anishinaabe land. She has her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Guelph. Fuse, her memoir of mixed-race identity and mental health, was released by Guernica Editions in 2021 and won the 2023 Canadian Bookclub Award for Nonfiction/Memoir.

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