Thoughts and Feelings after Reading Franz Kafka’s ‘The Metamorphosis’

• The Metamorphosis

The onlookers go rigid when the train goes past. Franz Kafka writes this in his diary in 1910. He is twenty-seven years old and more than half his life is over. He doesn’t know this, of course, but he has intimations: glimpses forward into the abyss. Suffering as he has his whole life with debilitating migraines, insomnia and crippling self-doubt, he begins the diary after a five month period of being unable to write. I write this very decidedly out of despair over my body and over a future...

• The Metamorphosis

Please use no more than the recommended number of words for you answer to each question. In both cases, the stories are told from a third-person perspective, nevertheless, it only focuses on the protagonist's point of view. In ' The Metamorphosis' there's a limited omniscient narrator who despite being well aware of the circumstances, only tells the story from Gregor's thoughts, feelings, and perception. No other insight is given, readers never know what other characters think or feel as...

• Kafka
• The Metamorphosis

Alienation is the state or experience of being isolated from a group or an activity to which one should belong or in which one should be involved. Alienation is a central theme that Franz Kafka discusses in his story ‘Metamorphosis’ from the beginning all the way to the end when the main character, Gregor, dies alone in his room. Gregor’s guilt, being a work alcoholic, and the rejection from his family feed off the central core of alienation. There seems to be a demand in society where you...

• The Metamorphosis

In the story “The Metamorphosis”, Franz Kafka focuses on the topic of alienation and considers its underlying effect on the human consciousness and self-identity. The alienation Kafka instigates is propagated towards the main character Gregor Samsa, who inevitably transforms into a giant cockroach. The alienation by family relations affects him to the extent that he prioritizes his extensive need to be the family’s provider before his own well-being. This overwhelming need to provide...

• Existentialism
• Kafka
• The Metamorphosis

'I am separated from all things by a hollow space...and I do not even reach to its boundaries” - Kafka‘s diaries. It is no wonder that Kafka felt such a hollowness between himself and everything around him, considering that he existed within a monotonous, traditional, patriarchal and a habitual society. Such anxiety and separation from meaningfulness in life has not only been utilized by Kafka to practice self-reflection within his own stories but has also been a focal point of a variety of...

• The Metamorphosis

In this essay, I will talk about how the main symbolism in The Metamorphosis is shown through the protagonist, Gregor, and his family. In that, we'll explore how his family is symbolic for capitalism, using him one moment, and then disregarding him once he is unable to help them anymore, to him himself, being unable to go out and about, being stuck in his room, ostracized by his work and his own family because of his newly found bug self. The main symbolism, however, ranges anywhere from the...

• Kafka
• Parent-child Relationship
• The Metamorphosis

The masked anxiety in Kafka’s ‘Metamorphosis’ is a rooted trauma from parental alienation which transforms Gregor’s self-image from human to bug. The behaviors in the narrative are mirror images of the author’s life and are reminiscent of his feelings towards his father. This parental alienation experienced during Kafka’s interactions with his father is further demonstrated by Gregor’s parents in the text. The self-neglect Gregor faces while being a dutiful slave-like character who is treated...

• Kafka
• The Metamorphosis

This year, last May, my family and I visited the Czech Republic, specifically the city of Prague. It was an amazing experience, during which we learned very much about it’s past and present history. We admired the beautiful Romanesque architecture, we walked along the famous Charles Bridge, and we were able to watch the amazing astronomical clock and many places more, all of them full of beauty and interest. One day, exploring the Jewish Quarter, we came across one of Franz Kafka’s monuments....

• Conformity
• Kafka
• The Metamorphosis

In ‘The Metamorphosis’, Franz Kafka depicts Gregor Samsa and his acceptance with the the psychological and mental repercussions of an inalterable physical transformation. The local segregation that Gregor faces within his household parallels to the seclusion of the cultural ‘other’, who lies on the outskirts of societal norms. Throughout history, minority groups have been oppressed by dehumanizing stereotypes and stigmas for conditions of religion, race, gender, or sexuality. Gregor throughout...