Max Brod

Max Brod
Brod in 1914
Born27 May 1884
Died20 December 1968(1968-12-20) (aged 84)
Tel Aviv, Israel
CitizenshipAustria-Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Israel
Alma materGerman Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague
Occupation(s)Author, composer, journalist
Spouse
Elsa Taussig
(m. 1913; died 1942)
Brod (right) with stage directors of the Habima theatre in Tel Aviv, 1942
Max Brod (right) with Paul Ben-Haim and his wife
Brod at the Schiphol airport in the Netherlands, 1965

Max Brod (Hebrew: מקס ברוד; 27 May 1884 – 20 December 1968) was a Bohemian-born Israeli author, composer, and journalist.

Although he was a prolific writer in his own right, he is best remembered as the friend and biographer of writer Franz Kafka. Kafka named Brod as his literary executor, instructing Brod to burn his unpublished work upon his death. Brod refused and had Kafka's works published instead.

In 1939, as the Nazis occupied Prague, he immigrated to Mandatory Palestine, taking with him a suitcase of Kafka's papers, many of them unpublished notes, diaries, and sketches.