used to describe a situation that is confusing and frightening, especially one involving complicated official rules and systems that do not seem to make any sense My attempt to get a new passport turned into a Kafkaesque nightmare. From the name of the Czech writer Franz Kafka, whose novels often describe situations like this.
Want to learn more?
Find out which words work together and produce more natural sounding English with the Oxford Collocations Dictionary app.
Check pronunciation: Kafkaesque