For José Emilio Pacheco, Franz Kafka is "THE writer of the 20th century". The article comments on the text in which the Mexican author most explicitly deals with the Prague writer, "Kafka's centenary entremés" (1983).
It focuses on the motif of the city, key in the work of both. Pacheco's Kafkaesque vision of Mexico City has a transatlantic background: the utter insecurity, "without solid ground under our feet", which has become normal in Western civilization during the 20th century.