Das Schloss is an unfinished novel by Franz Kafka, published posthumously in Munich. Kafka began work on the novel on January 22, 1922, the day he arrived at the Spindleruv Mlin resort. The first chapters of the novel were written in the first person and later forwarded by the author. Kafka told his friend Max Broad that the hero of the novel K. would remain in the Village to death, and, being near death, would receive a message from the Castle that he had previously been in the Village illegally.