In the Penal Colony

The setting for the story is an unnamed correctional colony. Internal hints and the island setting point to The Torture Garden by Octave Mirbeau as a possible influence. In this story as in some of Kafkas other works the narrator appears to be unconcerned with or even insensitive to occurrences that one would typically anticipate to be horrifying. In the Prison Colony depicts the last application of a complex torture and execution mechanism that over the course of twelve hours engraves the prisoners punishment in a script on his flesh before allowing him to die. The reader finds out more and more about the machine as the story progresses including its history and initial purpose.