Frank Kafka uses various themes throughout his work in The Metamorphosis. Two that stood out to me were the themes of alienation and social status. I feel as though Kafka uses Gregor’s transformation into a vermin as a metaphor to peek the readers interest and tell a frame narrative about society and class. Kafka uses his work to show his readers the alienation that Gregor feels in his life and the expectations his family, society and work have placed on him.
We dive into the theme of alienation right away when Gregor wakes in the early morning and realizes that he is no longer human but has turned into a giant vermin. Instead of worrying about his current predicament, Gregor is over come with guilt and burden knowing that he can no longer financially provide for his family. Gregor’s life has revolved around working at a job he hates just to pay of his Families debt and provide stability and comfort. Until this day Gregor’s family has shown little to no appreciation for everything that Gregor has done for them. From the
In The Metamorphosis Gregor was a working class man who only concerned himself with working and providing for his family. He had no friends, no life or love interest. Gregor was capital to his boss and his family. Without his labor his boss had no product to sell or money to make and without Gregory money his family would not have had a comfortable lifestyle. Once Gregor transformed into giant vermin he became useless to society and his family. He could no longer provide for his family, which in turn like the bourgeois, began treating him like a worthless nobody by not caring for him when he needed it the most. As per Grete “we can’t go on like this. If you can’t see it, I can. I don’t want to use the name of my brother in front of this monster, so let me just say this: we have tried as much as humanly possible to care for it and to put up with it. I don’t think it can reproach us in the
First and foremost Gregor was betrayed by his own parents who failed to care for him after his transformation. The initial reaction of the parents, especially his father, set the tone for the whole novel. Instead of trying to resolve the issue with a reasonable solution, his father physically abuses him, “when from behind, his father gave him a hard
Franz Kafka’s clear isolation of Gregor underlines the families’ separation from society. In The Metamorphosis, Kafka emphasizes Gregor’s seclusion from his family. However, Gregor’s separation is involuntary unlike the family who isolates themselves by the choices they make. Each family member has characteristics separating them from society. These characteristics become more unraveling than Gregor, displaying the true isolation contained in The Metamorphosis.
Franz Kafka’s beginning of his novel, “The Metamorphosis,” begins with what would seem a climactic moment: “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.” From this point on, the reader is determined to make sense of this transformation. However, the reader later comes to realize that Gregor is actually not an insect, but this metamorphosis into a vermin was purely symbolic. It symbolizes the degrading lifestyle that Gregor leads to support his family. This leads the reader to understand Gregor’s absurd dilemma.
Alienation throughout the metamorphosis is conveyed to the reader time and time again through instances and circumstances subjected upon Gregor. Right from the start we get a sense of this situation as we explore Gregor’s job stasis. He is a traveling salesman. The major problem with this occupation is the fact that he is constantly moving and seeing new faces, making it virtually impossible for him to form lasting relationships (Kafka, 4). Landsberg observes that “This little experience occurs over and over again in the unstable life of a commercial traveler. It is not by chance that Kafka gave his hero this vocation, which like no other tends to render impossible any continuity in life” (Landsberg 125). Gregor is not in one place long enough to make any lasting connections so he absorbed by a state of loneliness. Adding to this is the fact that he is the only one in his family who is working (Kafka 16).So even before his transformation we see our character was alienated in his job field.
Gregor’s relationship with his father shows resemblance to the relationship between Kafka and his father. Kafka, as a child, suffered abuse from his father. Kafka viewed his father as a forceful monster, which resembles Gregor’s father. Gregor wanted nothing more than the love of his family, especially his father, just as Kafka had wanted. His reason for writing “The Metamorphosis” could also relate to the situation which he lived in. He was a Jew raised in Austro-Hungarian Empire, modern day Czech Republic. He was a Jew in an area of the world which Jews were not well accepted. Gregor was described as cockroach, something that Jew were often equated to during this time period. Jews were treated like vermin, they were thought of a creature that was to be rid of. Gregor experienced similar treatment from his family. They discussed leaving or getting rid of Gregor during the story. Experiences of Gregor are similar to those that Jews would have experienced during Kafka’s life. “The Metamorphosis” could also demonstrate the issues that normal people face every day. People face trials and tribulations every day that change their lives dramatically, nobody has ever been transformed into a bug, but it does represent the extreme circumstances that may
Many views of existentialism are exposed in Kafka's Metamorphosis. One of these main views is alienation or estrangement which is demonstrated by Gregor's relationship with his family, his social life, and the way he lives his life after the metamorphosis. Namely, it suggests that man is reduced to an insect by the modern world and his family; human nature is completely self absorbed. Kafka reflects a belief that the more generous and selfless one is, the worse one is treated. This view is in direct conflict with the way things should be; man, specifically Gregor should be treated in accordance to his actions. Gregor should be greatly beloved by his family regardless of his state. This idea is displayed in three separate themes. First, Gregor's family is only concerned with the effect Gregor's change will have on them, specifically the effect it will have on their finances and reputation. They are more than willing to take completely gratuitous advantage of Gregor; he works to pay their debt and they are happy to indulge themselves with luxury. Gregor is the soul employed member of his family and this is their primary interest when Gregor is transformed. Secondly, Gregor is penalized for his efforts to be a good son, and a good worker; his toils are completely taken for granted by his family. The Samsa family is not interested in Gregor beyond their own needs, outsiders are reverentially treated. Thirdly, it is displayed by the positive changes that occur in the Samsa family as Gregor descends into tragedy and insignificance. As Gregor's life becomes more painful, isolated, and worthless the Samsa family becomes more functional and self-reliant.
People want their family to love and support them during times of need, but if they are unable to develop this bond with their family members, they tend to feel alone and depressed. In the novel The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, Kafka describes the theme of alienation and its negative effect on people and their relationships with the people around them. This theme can be shown through Gregor Samsa, the main character in The Metamorphosis. After Gregor’s metamorphosis, or transformation, he is turned from a human being into a giant bug which makes him more and more distant from the people in his life. The alienation that Gregor experiences results in his eventual downfall, which could and would happen to anyone else who becomes estranged from the people around them. Gregor’s alienation and its effect on his relationship with his family can be shown through his lack of willing interaction with his family members due to his inability to communicate to them, the huge burden he puts on the family after his metamorphosis, and his family’s hope to get rid of him because he is not who he was before.
Prior to his metamorphosis, Gregor already resembles a working cockroach, living an automated life under the conditions of exploitation, discouraging his own life for his family’s basic and materialistic needs. This is shown when Gregor’s mother makes her claim: “You know that boy has nothing but work in his head! It almost worries me that he never goes out on his evenings off” (Kafka 95). This establishes the idea of G...
Kafka used the constant setting of the Samsa household to show the true repercussions of the metamorphosis. It is here that Gregor is truly dehumanized. No longer can he stand the taste of what used to be his favorite dish. He is reduced to a vermin who feeds on rotted, decaying food and who finds the presence of fresh food repulsing. The very means by which he sustained himself is not fit for a human, but rather for a dependent beast.
Franz Kafka was not Jewish; Franz Kafka was not Czech, Franz Kafka only identified himself by his own perception of life, and a reality of his own creation. Kafka's family, a prosperous middle class home of economic strivers, embraced the German Jewish circles of Prague, seeking to assimilate with language and Jewish culture. Kafka, in the traditional manner he is remembered, was born into a middle class Czech family in Prague however; he most memorably reflects his personal alienation from cultural and famial identity throughout his literary works. Kafka also strove to identify away from the bonds of economic status and ethnic representation, as he rejected his Jewish heritage, even though his three sisters would die in a German concentration camp.
Gregor Samsa awakes one morning to discover that he has been transformed into a repugnant vermin. One may never know what initiated this makeover, but the simple truth is that Gregor is now a bug, and everyone must learn to live and move on in this strenuous situation. In Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, the characters that interact with Gregor, including his mother, his father, and his sister Grete, must come to terms with his unfortunate metamorphosis, and each does so by reacting in a unique way. Gregor’s family members are constantly strained by this unusual event, and all three of them are pressed to their breaking point.
When comparing Franz Kafka and his personal life to The Metamorphosis it is obvious in more ways than one that he was writing a twisted story of his life. The emotional and physical abuse Gregor goes through are similar to what Kafka went through in real life. They were both abused and neglected by their fathers when they were disappointed with them. Kafka uses Gregor transforming into a bug as a way of exaggerating himself, trying to express his feelings and point of view. When writing, Kafka felt as if he was trapped in his room which he referred to as "the noise headquarters of the apartment". Gregor was an exaggeration of this because he could not leave the house to escape the noises and abuse.
In The Metamorphosis Kafka illustrates a grotesque story of a working salesman, Gregor Samsa, waking up one day to discover that his body resembles a bug. Through jarring, almost unrealistic narration, Kafka opens up the readers to a view of Gregor’s futile and disappointing life as a human bug. By captivating the reader with this imaginary world Kafka is able to introduce the idea that Gregor’s bug body resembles his human life. From the use of improbable symbolism Kafka provokes the reader to believe that Gregor turning into a bug is realistic and more authentic compared to his unauthentic life as a human.
His family used to care about him but after the transformation, they were no longer concerned for him. Every time the family talks about money, Gregor feels guilty and embarrassed because he can no longer provide for them. When he was able to work before, he had brought money home and “They had simply got used to it, both the family and Gregor; the money was gratefully accepted and gladly given, but there was no special uprush of warm feeling” (Kafka Ch 2 pg 6). Now that he can no longer provide, the family had to come up with ways to keep up with finances. Gregor is dehumanized each time his sister Grete walks into the room to look after him because she cannot bear the sight of him so he hides each time. Each day following Gregor’s transformation, the family’s behavior towards him became more cynical and resentful towards him. They do not allow him to leave his room and worry about how they can go on living with him. They think of him as being a creature, losing their view of him as a human being and no longer important. When Grete decided to take his furniture out of his room, Gregor feels he is dehumanized because they are taking away the link to his humanity. When it came to Gregor’s father, Gregor would “run before his father, stopping when he stopped and scuttling forward again when his father made any kind of move.” His father then threw at apple at him which ‘landed right on his back and sank in; Gregor wanted to drag himself forward, as if this startling, incredible pain could be left behind him” (Kafka Ch 2 pg
In 1915, Franz Kafka published the novella The Metamorphosis, a story that questioned the habits of humanity through the frame of a man transformed into an insect. Through this absurd premise, Kafka is metaphorically able to present hatred and prejudice in an insular display—where the reader’s own opinion of Gregor is not judged or shamed, where both Gregor and the family’s actions can be understood. However, the metaphor of Gregor’s metamorphosis is not rigid in its application. It is fluid and unique, and what gives The Metamorphosis its grim, haunting tone. Kafka’s special metaphor not only broadens the limits of literary analogies, but expands on the nature of alienation and antipathy.