As presented by Franz Kafka, Karl Rossmann's life has a pattern of confinement. Kafka takes great pains to show us that Karl's reactions to nearly every instance of confinement neatly stems from one formative incident: Johanna Brummer's seduction of Karl. That one scandal seemingly affects how Karl reacts to every other attempt to confine him, who and what he allows to box him in, and his acceptance and/or rejection of that imprisonment.
             Johanna is noticeably physical with Karl: she "[leads] him into her room," takes off his clothes, "[lays] him on her bed," and nearly chokes him in her frenzied passion. Karl himself in no way advances the action. In fact, he barely seems conscious of what's happening around him: "his eyes [see] nothing," he can't respond when she asks him to speak, and she can "not bring him to" listen to her breast. Johanna is in control of Karl in every way, and most notably in the physical realm. Karl is uncooperative, but allows the seduction to happen nonetheless. And Johanna's passionate actions are effective in that she essentially gets what she wants out of Karl.
             Suddenly, what had been harmless objects and structures turn against Karl and participate in his confinement: Johanna "would shut the kitchen door after Karl entered, and keep hold of the door-handle until he had to beg to be let out." Thus, his own "kitchen" and "door-handle" have become pawns in Johanna's ploy to cage Karl. On the day of the seduction, Johanna confines Karl to her room by locking her door. What had seemed to Karl nothing more than an inanimate object when he had passed by her door before is now his enemy (Kafka 29). What should have been a pleasurable experience for Karl-that is, having sex-causes "tears [to run] down his cheeks" (Kafka 30). Kafka juxtaposes the sexual pleasure with the hopeless panic of being trapped, even within the span of four words: "[Karl] was seized with a terrible feeling of yearning"-"terrible" corre...