Also, “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka, a fat black bug on its cover. The video’s creator is 25-year-old Margarita Mouka — @aquariuscat444 on TikTok, where she frequently posts about Kafka, integrating his work, his likeness and his life story into her online persona of romantic intellectualism. “Franz Kafka becomes an unlikely HEARTTHROB on TikTok — where Gen Zers are swooning over the Czech novelist nearly 100 YEARS after his death,” ran a Daily Mail headline. On BookTok, where a flashed book jacket conveys a glimmer of a user’s inner life, a classic text can leave a durable impression. It plays like a deep cut, reaching back through time to ground a TikToker’s content in a more enduring human experience.

---

Persons: Ottessa Moshfegh, Sylvia Plath, Franz Kafka, Margarita Mouka —, Kafka, “ Franz Kafka, Zers, ”, Harry Styles Organizations: Daily Mail, The, Austro Locations: TikTok, Czech, Hungarian