Katharina is one of the protagonists of Kairos. The novel is partly told from her perspective, though it occasionally shifts into that of her romantic interest, Hans. When the novel begins, Katharina is a 19-year-old typesetter for the state publishing company. She has artistic inclinations, but initially pursues a career in commercial design. Hans’s influence causes her to shift to graphic art, and she applies for and receives an internship in stage design before entering art school. The prologue, intermezzo, and epilogue sections find Katharina when she is older, presumably in her forties or fifties because she uses YouTube clips of Hans’s favorite music to commemorate him after he dies. These sections frame the narrative as something Katharina only understands in retrospect, which resonates with the novel’s ideas about memory, identity, and history.

The character of Katharina is defined by her youthful naivety, which she overcomes through growth and maturity over the course of the narrative. Part of her naivety stems from her insulation within East Germany and the Soviet Bloc. When she visits her relatives in West Germany, she experiences the culture shock of life in a capitalist society, which is wholly at odds with the one she has lived with all her life.