We just finished watching the last episode of the TV series Lost, which completed its sixth and final season last spring. When we began watching the series on Netflix I was also reading Franz Kafka's The Castle, an early-20th century existentialist novel. Kafka's story revolves around the central character, K. (whose name remains only an initial throughout the novel), who is trying to get to the Castle on the hill in the center of the town. Four-hundred-plus pages are spent on various and sundry permutations of K. trying to navigate the political, social, and legal systems of the village and at every turn experiencing frustration. The novel ends with K. lost in the confusing, self-contradictory tangles of relationships within the town, never even approaching within sight of the Castle nor vindicated in his hope of joining the Castle's employ.
The parallels between Lost and The Castle are stunning. At every turn in the six seasons of narrative, the viewer of Lost discovers that what she thinks are the reasons behind events and choices are not the real reasons. Something previously hidden, and now only partially revealed, comes into play. Part of the allure of Lost for this viewer was the tantalizing possibility--like the one a reader feels for K.--that in the end what cannot possibly make sense will at last sound reasonable. Over six seasons, the layers of plot, setting, and character development reach mystical proportions, building the expectations of viewers to a dizzying pitch.
The Castle and Lost conclude their stories on opposite poles of the same narrative spectrum. K. never gets to the castle; the plot drops off almost mid-sentence. The passengers of Oceanic flight 815 discover that they're all dead (the viewer sort of knows this for at least the last two seasons), which is as good as ending your novel mid-sentence. Despite an attempt to make sense of it all by the only character who is confirmed dead from the beginning (Jack's father, Christian Shepherd--ha!), the attempt does not hold water. There are too many loose ends for the last episode to fulfill its calling as denouement.
The Castle and Lost could not be more different in the tone of their lost-ness. Kafka wrote in one of the most depressing eras of Continental philosophy, and was working out that depression in an almost-biographical novel. The lostness of K. is a reflection of the conclusion that all authority, purpose, and motivation are an impenetrable fog from which human existence cannot emerge. Meaninglessness is disconnectedness, and hope is obscured by a blinding blizzard.
Lost concludes that the nonsensical propositions upon which the plot is based will ultimately leave the characters happy. Like all narratives written by and for American popular culture, this one ends with a warm golden light in which we're all bathing together--all, that is, except those whose contracts with ABC ended before the final season. The last scene is really a thinly veiled replacement for the "farewell" episodes of long-standing sitcoms that finally break down the fourth wall, a time in which the actors celebrate how fun it was to work together. It doesn't matter what happened over the six seasons of Lost; it was just good to be together.
Two ends of the same spectrum may be two sides of the same coin: depending on your assertions about it, meaninglessness can be heaven or hell. An American reader getting through Kafka is existential hell. Not only does the plot never go anywhere, it doesn't end happily, or at all. The same viewer watching Lost might find heaven in the process: meaningless entertainment with a warm fuzzy finish.
Of course these categories only apply for one who accepts the premise of both Kafka and Lost that it's all meaningless. If one takes a philosophical stance for meaning, then Kafka may be worthwhile only for passing a philosophy course and Lost only for passing the time.
~emrys
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