Table of Contents
Franz Kafka was born on 3rd July 1883 in Prague. His father was an ambitious and bullying shopkeeper and his mother was a wealthy brewer’s daughter. He was their first child and had 3 younger sisters and 2 younger brothers, but two of them died young. Kafka’s sensitive disposition, appearance and literary interests strained his relation with his father. His father’s overbearing and authoritarian personality left its mark on much of Kafka’s writing. Being a German speaker in a predominantly Czech-speaking area and a Jew with little connection to Judaism, Kafka struggled his entire life with a sense of alienation from those around him.
Kafka underwent a strict education that placed great emphasis on the classics. In 1901, he enrolled in Charles University, and constantly switched between chemistry and law as majors. After graduation, he worked for a year in the judicial system before leaving for a job in insurance. He ended up working at Bohemia’s Worker’s Accident Insurance Institute, for the rest of his life.
While at Charles University, Kafka befriended Max Brod, another German-speaking Jew interested in literature. Brod encouraged Kafka’s writing, and together with Felix Weltsch, a journalist, they formed the nucleus of the “Prague Circle,” a group of writers who met to discuss literature. Kafka developed an interest in Yiddish theatre. He was also interested in anarchism and socialism.
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In September 1912, he wrote the short story “The Judgment” in a single sitting, dedicating it to his new love. And over the course of three weeks that autumn, he wrote The Metamorphosis which was published 3 years later. Kafka won the Theodor Fontane Prize, a significant German-language literary award. He also began work on the novel Amerika and published the first chapter in 1913. On June 3, 1924, Franz Kafka starved to death.
Over the course of the 1920s and 30s, Kafka’s works were published and translated. His emphasis on themes like: the absurdity of existence, the alienating experience of modern life and the cruelty of authoritarian power echoed strongly with the public. Today, people use the word Kafkaesque to signify senseless and sinister complexity, and Kafka’s reputation as one of the most important writers of modern times is undiminished.
Plot
The Metamorphosis is a 77-paged novella written by Franz Kafka which was first published in 1915. It tells the story of a salesman Gregor Samsa who wakes one morning to find himself transformed into a huge insect and how he struggles to adjust to this new condition is shown in the rest of the story.
One morning, Gregor Samsa wakes up to find himself transformed into a “monstrous vermin”. He initially considers the transformation to be temporary and ponders the outcomes of this mutation. Due to restricted mobility, he reflects on his job as a traveling salesman. He sees his employer as a despot and would quit his job were he not his family’s sole income.
Shortly, Gregor finds that his office manager, has come to check on him, irritated about his unexcused absence. Gregor attempts to communicate with the manager and his family, but all they can hear from behind the door is inexplicable sounds. Gregor drags himself across the floor and opens the door. The manager, upon seeing him, flees the apartment. His family is horrified and his father drives him back into his room under the threat of violence.
As a result of Gregor’s unexpected condition, the family is deprived of their financial stability. Although his sister Grete shies away from the sight of him, she feeds him food, when they find he can only eat rotten. Gregor begins to accept his new identity and begins crawling on the floor, walls and ceiling. Grete decides to remove some of the furniture to give Gregor more space. Gregor finds this distressing and tries to save his favourite portrait of a woman clad in fur. His mother loses consciousness at the sight of Gregor clinging to the picture. As Grete rushes to assist her mother, Gregor is hurt by a medicine bottle and gets wounded when, upon returning from work, his father tosses apples at him.
Gregor suffers from his injuries for several weeks and takes very little food. He is neglected by his family and his room is used as a storage room. To secure their livelihood, the family takes three tenants into their apartment. The cleaning lady lessens Gregor’s isolation by leaving his door open for him on some evenings. One day, his door is left open when the tenants were home.
Gregor, attracted by Grete’s violin-playing in the living room, crawls out of his room and is spotted by the paying guests, who complain about the apartment’s unhygienic conditions and cancel their tenancy. Grete, tired of taking care of Gregor, tells her parents they must get rid of “it”, or they will all be ruined. Gregor, understanding that he is no longer wanted, dies of starvation before the next sunrise. The relieved and optimistic family ride out to the countryside, and decide to move into a smaller apartment to save money.
Characters
Gregor Samsa :Gregor is the protagonist of the story. He works as a traveling salesman for a living. He wakes up one morning and finds himself transformed into an insect. After the metamorphosis, he is unable to work and is confined to his room for rest of the story. This prompts his family to begin working once again. Gregor is depicted as isolated and gullible character, who often misunderstands the true intentions of others.
Greta Samsa :Greta is Gregor’s younger sister, who becomes his caretaker after his metamorphosis. Initially Greta and Gregor have a close relationship, but this quickly fades. While Greta initially volunteers to feed him, she grows impatient with the burden. She takes care of Gregor but later, gets disgusted by him to the point that she cannot even enter his room and leaves without doing anything if he is in plain sight. To help provide an income for the family after Gregor’s transformation, she starts working as a salesgirl. Greta is the first to suggest getting rid of Gregor, which leads him to commit suicide. At the end of the story, Greta’s parents realize that she has come of age and decide to consider finding her a husband.
Mr. Samsa :Mr. Samsa is Gregor’s father. After the metamorphosis, he is forced to return to work in order to support the family financially. His attitude towards his son is harsh. He regards the transformed Gregor with disgust and fear, and he attacks him on several occasions.
Mrs. Samsa :Mrs. Samsa is Gregor’s mother. Frail and distressed, the mother is torn between her love for Gregor and her horror at Gregor’s new state. She is initially shocked at Gregor’s transformation; however, she wants to enter his room. This proves too much for her, thus giving rise to a conflict between her maternal impulse and sympathy, and her fear and revulsion at Gregor’s new form.
The Charwoman
The Charwoman is an elderly widowed lady who is employed by the Samsa family to help take care of their household duties after their regular maid quits because of Gregor. She is a blunt, honest woman who faces the reality of Gregor’s state without fear or disgust. Apart from Grete and her father, she is the only person who is in close contact with Gregor. She is the one who notices that Gregor has died and disposes of his body.
The office manager
Gregor’s boss. Distrustful and overbearing, the office manager insinuates that Gregor has been doing a poor job at work. He flees in terror upon seeing Gregor.
The boarders
Three temporary boarders in the Samsas’ house. The boarders greatly value order and cleanliness, and thus become horrified when they discover Gregor and vacate the apartment.
Themes
The Absurdity of Life
The novel with an absurd and irrational event, which suggests that the story operates in a random, chaotic universe. The absurd event is Gregor’s discovery of having turned into a giant insect, and owing to it being physically impossible, the metamorphosis has a supernatural significance. The story never explains the cause for Gregor’s transformation. All family members treat the event as a random occurrence. All these elements together give the story an overtone of absurdity.
The responses of the various characters add to this sense of absurdity, specifically because they seem as absurd as Gregor’s transformation itself. The characters are unusually calm and unquestioning. Gregor panics only at the thought of getting in trouble at work, not at the realization that he is physically altered, and he makes no efforts to determine what caused the change or how to fix it. He worries instead about commonplace problems. Gregor’s family feels more ashamed and disgusted than shocked.
The Disconnect Between Mind and Body
Gregor’s transformation alters his outward appearance, but it leaves his mind unchanged, creating a lack of harmony between his mind and body. When he first gets out of his bed after waking, he tries to stand upright, even though his body is not suited to being upright. He also thinks of going to work, despite the fact that he can’t by any means do so, and when Grete leaves him milk, he is surprised to find he doesn’t like it, even though milk was his favourite drink when he was human. He continues to think with a human mind, but because his body is no longer human, he is unable to reconcile these two parts of himself.
As Gregor becomes accustomed to his new body, his mind begins to change in accordance with his physical needs, but he was never able to fully bring his mind and body into harmony. Gregor gradually behaves more like an insect, craving different foods than he did earlier, preferring tight, dark spaces, and enjoying crawling on the walls. The story suggests that our physical lives shape and direct our mental lives, not the other way around. But Gregor’s humanity never disappears entirely, and he feels conflicted as a result. He can be physically comfortable or emotionally comfortable, but not both. His mind and body remain opposed to one another. Gregor, unable to relinquish his humanity, chooses emotional comfort.
The Limits of Sympathy
After Gregor’s metamorphosis, his family members feel sympathy and revulsion toward him. Grete and his mother feel sympathy for Gregor after his change, because they hope that some part of his humanity still remains in spite of his appearance. This leads Grete to assume the role of his caretaker. She tries to discover his ‘new’ taste after the change and fights with his mother over moving the furniture out of Gregor’s room. Even his ignorant father never suggests that they force him out of the house.
Eventually, Gregor’s presence wears down the family members’ sympathy, they find that their sympathy has reached its limit. The main reason is Gregor’s appearance. Grete is so upset and revolted by the way he looks that she cannot stand to be in the room with him, and his mother is horrified when she sees him that she faints. Gregor’s presence is never forgotten in the house, causing the family members to feel uncomfortable. The fact that Gregor cannot communicate his thoughts and feelings to them, makes them see him more as an actual insect. All these factors wane their sympathy, and the family reaches a point where Gregor’s presence is too much to bear. It is Grete, the most sympathetic of the lot, who decides they must get rid of him.
Alienation
The greatest consequence of Gregor’s metamorphosis is the psychological distance it creates between Gregor and those around him. Gregor’s change makes him literally and emotionally separate from his family members and humanity in general. After his transformation he stays in his room with his door closed and has no contact with other people. At most, Grete spends a few minutes in the room with him, and during this time Gregor always hides under the couch and has no interaction with her. He is unable to speak, and consequently, has no way of communicating with other people.
The feeling of estrangement actually preceded his transformation. Shortly after waking and discovering that he has become a bug, Gregor reflects on his life as a traveling salesman, noting how superficial his relationships have become due to his constant traveling. Gregor recalls how his initial pride at being able to support his family faded and how he felt emotionally distant from them as a result. There is also no mention in the story of any close friends or intimate relationships outside his family. The alienation caused by Gregor’s metamorphosis can be viewed as an extension of the alienation he already felt as a person.
Symbols
The Picture of the Woman in Furs
The picture of the woman in furs serves as a symbol of Gregor’s former humanity. Though the reason for his attachment to the picture is not revealed, it is certain that Gregor’s attachment to the piece of art does not stem from its contents. He clings to it in panic when Grete and his mother are clearing out his room because, he sees it as an object from his former life that he can save. The content of the picture is irrelevant. It acts as a reminder that a human lived there and chose that object to frame and display.
The Father’s Uniform
The uniform his father wears to work symbolizes his dignity and Gregor’s pity and respect for him. We see his father from Gregor’s point of view. We learn about the failure of his business and infer his father to be a depressed man whom Gregor appears to feel sorry for but not respect. Gregor’s opinion of his father changes when he sees his father after a short period of separation. It is most evident through Gregor’s description of the father’s uniform, which now, gives the father an air of dignity.
As the story continues, the father again declines and every evening Gregor watches him sleep in his uniform, now dirty and covered with grease spots. As a result, the dignity the uniform conveyed his deteriorating respect in the eyes of his son.
Food
Food represents the way the members of his family feel towards Gregor. It is his sister who feeds him for most of the story. She leaves milk and bread for him, showing sympathy and consideration for him after his transformation. When she sees he hasn’t drank the milk, she tries to discover what he now likes. Eventually, the family loses interest in catering to Gregor. One night, after the boarders have moved in, the charwoman leaves his door open, and he watches as his mother feeds the boarders. This makes him realise that his family members have lost their sympathy for him. His father injures Gregor with an apple and this wound appears to weaken Gregor and contribute to his death.
Setting
For Gregor, the entire story takes place within his family’s apartment. Not once in the novel, does he leave the apartment. After his transformation, his father forces him inside his room and shuts the door. Gregor is left to sit in his room alone and eventually rots away to death inside his room. This setting creates a theme of isolation as Gregor is physically isolated from his family and human society in general. He is either ignored or mistreated by all who interact with him throughout the story.
Gregor’s condition represents the feelings of isolation that an average human can feel at times throughout his life. The location of Gregor’s room in the apartment shows his lack of freedom as he lives right in the middle of his family and does not have his own place to stay.
Gregor’s family initiates relations with the society only after his death. This is the only time where the setting changes to somewhere outside the apartment. As the rest of the family is enjoying outside, Gregor is left dead in his dark room. This shows Gregor’s isolation from the joys of life. Gregor’s family is only happy and lively enough to get outside the apartment and enjoy the world after Gregor’s death. This proves that he was highly isolated even within his own family.
The constant setting of the apartment and Gregor’s bedroom show how Gregor feels oppressed and isolated by society through the treatment he receives by all people, especially his family. In this way, Kafka illustrates the frightening isolation and tremendous oppression of modern human life.
Bibliography
The following works have been referred to, for the completion of this assignment:
- The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
- Gradesaver essays
Starving for attention: Food in Kafka’s Metamorphosis – Chad HeyesAlienation and humanity in Metamorphosis – Timothy Sexton
The following websites have been referred to, for the completion of this assignment:
- Wikipedia
- Sparky notes
- Free book summary
