All set to begin his new employment, K., a land surveyor, arrives at a rural inn in search of rest and shelter from the snow outside. When he claims to have been summoned by the Castle, the governing authority for this particular village, he is directed to contact its officials. But the latter quickly designate his appointment erroneous and recede into their general obscurity, turning impossible all his subsequent attempts at a dialogue with them.

As he seeks alternative employment, only to lose it soon after, K. discovers the perils of an inscrutable bureaucracy, with the villagers? delusional praise and justification for an irrational system where they have no access to its decision-makers.