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Essay On Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis

782 Words4 Pages

Franz Kafka starts his story, The Metamorphosis, by transforming his main character into a vermin, one of the most disgusting and loathsome insects. With Gregor’s transformation, Kafka is exposing a metaphorical view of how life can be shown in a tangible, physical way. Gregor’s metamorphosis consists in his insides coming out. His new state of being reflects his life and his inner thoughts. A cockroach is a tangible representation of how he feels about his life and the relationship with his family.

Gregor is a thoughtful and compassionate person. However, he lives a life he does not enjoy. Gregor hates his job. He thinks, “Oh God, what a strenuous career it is that I’ve chosen! (…) there’s the course of travelling, worries about making train connections, bad and irregular food, contact with different people all the time so that you can never get to know anyone or become friendly with them.” (Kafka 2). He only fulfills it in order to pay off his family’s debt. He is constantly thinking of quitting. However, what keeps his working as a traveling salesman is his loyalty and his sense of obligation to the family. Gregor thinks, “Once I’ve got together the money to pay off the parents’ debt to him (…) I’ll make the big break. In any case, right now I have to get up. My train leaves at five o’clock.” (Kafka 3). Gregor lets his human life life pass him …show more content…

He loathes that as a vermin, he is a burden to his family. Under the couch, Gregor is “(…) in a state of worry and murky hopes, which led to the conclusion that for the time being he would have to keep calm and with patience and the greatest consideration for his family tolerate the troubles which in his present condition he was now forced to cause them.” (Kafka 11). Gregor’s family, on the other side, never accepts his new condition and are not capable of adapting psychologically to the sight of a their son/brother as

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