This terrifying tale of Joseph K, a respectable functionary in a bank who is suddenly arrested and must defend his innocence against a charge about which he can get no information, is the origin of the adjective `Kafkaesque`. K is never told what he is on trial for, and when he says he is innocent, he is immediately asked `innocent of what`? Is he perhaps on trial for his innocence? Could he have freed himself from the proceedings by confessing his guilt as a human being? The Trial describes a nightmare vision of the excesses of modern bureaucracy wedded to the mad agendas of totalitarian regimes.