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Literary analysis of the metamorphosis
Literary analysis of the metamorphosis
Portrait of Franz Kafka
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In the novel, The Metamorphosis, the author, Franz Kafka, reflects the opinions and experiences of his life into the story by using Gregor Samsa, a traveling businessman, and other characters like Samsa’s father and mother to show the struggles he had throughout his existence. Kafka shows his beliefs about work and jobs in society by making Gregor share his thoughts on this topic. Another aspect of Gregor’s life that is similar to Kafka’s is their relationships with their families, and especially their fathers. The two character’s strangeness and their health are also two other issues that affect both of their lives.
Kafka dislikes his work and jobs and he reflects that into Gregor Samsa in his novel. Samsa is a hardworking man who works
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With Kafka, he had several diseases and illnesses that plagued his life and made it miserable. Kafka also suffered from several mental issues. One author from Biography.com writes, “Constantly strained and stressed, he suffered from migraines, boils, depression, anxiety and insomnia”. When writing The Metamorphosis Kafka decided to reflect this into Gregor, giving him many health issues that trouble him. For instance, Gregor hurts himself, or gets hurt many times. Some of the times Gregor gets injured are when he is getting out of bed, trying to get under the couch, and when his father throws apples at him.These health issues combined with other lead to Gregor’s death. Kafka writes, “He didn’t eat anything for such a long time... As a matter of a fact, Gregor’s body was completely dry and flat” (Kafka 52). Starvation and dehydration were other key health factors that led ruining Gregor’s life, or in other words, kill him. Kafka made these health injuries a special point to reflect his life into the story. By using Gregor Samsa and other characters in The Metamorphosis, the author, Franz Kafka, incorporates his life and his opinions and beliefs into the novel. He does this with several different views of his including his opinions about work and family. He also shows his opinions about the health of people and how it can affect a person and also about how people’s lives are affected by how unusual they are. While Kafka may not have been trying to put himself into the story, he made a very similar character who has the same thoughts and beliefs as
Throughout The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka shuns Gregor. At first glance, Gregor’s transformation creates the only isolation. As the story evolves, the Samsa family’s segregation begins to play a larger role. Through intuitive actions, each family member isolates themselves. The Samsa’s accommodate the renters generously, in order to win communal approval. Failing the renters positions the Samsa’s lower in society than they previously were. Not only do the Samsa’s isolate themselves, they are also secluded from society. Many instances allow the Samsa’s severance from society to shine through Gregor’s isolation.
Gregor’s life slowly ends due to the betrayal of his his loved ones. He feels bad once his parents betray him and he feels he is an inconvenience. Then his sister is too busy and exhausted for him and he has nobody to help him or bring him food. Lastly, with nobody left Gregor betrays himself by simply allowing himself to die. Betrayal contributes a lot to this book as it is evident in every part of Gregor’s downfall. If Gregor’s family did not betray him, maybe they could have found him help to get better and back to normal. He also could have learned how to cope with his metamorphosis and lived with it everyday, however; Gregor’s family did betray him, and it slowly led him to end his life by starving
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.
“The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka, not only tells the troubling story of Gregor Samsa but of the underlying autobiographical influences of Kafka himself. The first similarity is the unhappiness in both men’s careers, both induced by their strong-willed fathers. In the short story, when Gregor awakes he realizes the problem is not that “he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin” but that he will be unable to do his job, that pays for his parent’s debt (1156). Franz spent his life, unhappy but successful just like Gregor. Franz majored in law to please his father. Both men strived for similar family duties, Gregor to pay off his father’s debt and Franz for a false sense of hope that one day his father would love him (1157; Sulkes).
From the moment we meet Gregor Samsa's father we are shown how short tempered he is. He "came on, hissing like a wild man" when Gregor first exited his room in his new state as a bug. Gregor's father chased after him with a cane and newspaper making a hissing noise that annoyed Gregor. Just this passage here shows how alike Mr. Samsa and Herrman Kafka are. Kafka was...
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.
Metamorphosis, and the theme of change. Kafka's main character, Gregor. Samsa, undergoes many changes and his transformation evokes change in his family. I am a Several metamorphoses take place involving Gregor. First, a physical change occurs when Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous. vermin.
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
Gregor’s family and how they treat him reflects the way that Kafka interacted with his family. The similarities between Kafka’s family and Gregor’s family can be seen in their name. Kafka’s friend remarks, “The hero of the story is called Samsa, it sounds like a cryptogram for Kafka” (Kennedy and Gioia 299). Kafka’s family was middle-class, and his father was a businessman. They had servants and maids just like Gregor’s family. Kafka was the eldest out of six children, and was very close to his sisters. This is seen ...
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.
Gregor Samsa’s outcast status sent him into a short lived life as a “monstrous vermin” (Kafka,7). While his predicament may have appeared avoidable, a life of constant selflessness to the point of severe adult naïveté remains inevitable in Gregor’s case. Kafka’s portrayal of a pitiful young man’s support of his family can produce none other than the childlike thinking of Gregor Samsa.
Kafka's prose emphasizes the economic effects on human relationships, therefore, by analyzing the images of Gregor, we can gain insight into many of the ideas the writer is trying to convey. Within the first few pages of the novella, readers promptly discover the proletariat in the story. Laboring as a traveling salesman, Gregor tries to support his family and pay off his father's debt due to a failed business venture. While lying in bed, he comments on his life as a traveling salesman “Day in, day out-- on the road. I've got the torture of traveling worrying about changing trains, eating miserable food, at all hours.
From the beginning of The Metamorphosis Kafka offers a comical depiction of Gregor’s “squirming legs” (Kafka 13) and a body in which “he could not control” (7). Gregor’s initial reaction to this situation was the fact he was late to his dissatisfying job as a salesman, but Gregor knows that he has to continue his job in order to keep the expectation his family holds upon him to pay of the family’s everlasting debt. When Gregor’s family eventually realizes that Gregor is still lying in his bed, they are confused because they have expectations on Gregor that he will hold the family together by working. They know if Gregor was to quit his job there would be a great catastrophe since he is the glue to keeping their family out of debt. The communication between his family is quickly identified as meager and by talking to each other from the adjacent walls shows their disconnection with each other. Kafka introduces the family as lacking social skills in order to offer the reader to criticize and sympathize for Gregor’s family dynamics. Gregor’s manager makes an appearance quickly after experiencing the dysfunction within the fami...
Using symbols, Kafka illustrates the story which is not just about Gregor’s transformation but it is more than that. The entire Metamorphosis is an allegory about Gregor changing into a vermin, symbolize that he wanted to free himself from his family obligation. “As Gregor Samsa awoke from unsettling dreams one morning, he found himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous vermin” (Kafka 7). He thought his transformation was a dream but he soon realizes that it was reality. Gregor was the source of the income for his family and was employed in a job he did not like. “What a grueling profession I picked! Traveling day in, day out” (Kafka 7). This is ironic because Gregor was forced by his father to choose the alienated career. Mr. Samsa was indebted to his boss; working as a traveling salesman he would have pay off his father debt. Working as traveling salesman made Gregor alienated socially and mentally. The word transformation does not only app...
Although the exact story told in Kafka's The Metamorphosis could not occur outside the realm of fantasy, it represents the very real scenario of a worker being abandoned by his employer and family after becoming unable to work and support them financially. By looking at the novella from a Marxist perspective, we see that the underlying theme of the story is a conflict between proletariat and bourgeoisie. Because economics supercede everything else in capitalistic society, a citizen who is unable to labor and earn wages is quickly abandoned. And, the result of this abandonment is often (as it was in Gregor Samsa's case) death.