Kafka VS Hemmingway

For my Short Story module we are looking at the writing styles of Franz Kafka and Ernest Hemmingway. For one task we had to write two short pieces with one writen in a Kafkaesque style and the other in a Hemmingwayesque style. We were given the staring sentences of:


By the way, Jurgen’s lips are never sealed because they always have a giant spliff in between them.

And:

His teenage years had been tranquillised into a one season pharmaceutical mist.  
Here are my two pieces.

Kafkaesque

By the way, Jurgen’s lips are never sealed because they always have a giant spliff in between them. Bulbous and juicy they suck continuously. Always seen through the parting gap are yellowing squares of bone. Awkward and jagged they circle his tongue; that thick pink muscle that laps at their sides. Spliffs endlessly enter and then leave again, leaving behind them that gastric smell. The smoke lingers for minutes, hours, days. Putrid and acidic. It seeps from the gap. Oozes. Streams. If he’d only close his mouth, seal it in. But then, that’s Jurgen for you; his lips will never be sealed, because he always has a giant spliff between them. 

Hemmingwayesque

His teenage years had been tranquillised into a one season pharmaceutical mist.  Joe first started doing drugs when he was 15. He was in a Home. He was sat in his room when another boy came in. His name was Jack. He closed the door behind him.

‘Hey, don’t tell the Keepers, but do you want some?’ Jack said.

He pulled out some weed. Joe did not answer straight away and Jack started to smoke. The smoke began to fill the room and Joe opened his window. This time when Jack offered him the weed Joe did not refuse.

Hours passed and they had run out of weed. Jack lay on Joe’s bed while Joe sat on the floor.

‘You know, it helps a lot.’

‘With what?’

‘The rejection.’

They sat in silence then.

‘Can you get more?’ Joe asked.

‘If you want it.’

‘I do.’

Sitting there Joe knew that drugs were not really the right answer but Jack was sure, so he was sure, too.