Miscommunication Causes Serious Consequences Leading to Alienation and Discrimination Within a Society

Each individual is like a rain drop on the window; none of them are any more significant than another. There are the occasional droplets which are larger than the rest, the ones with a greater influence than the others. As time goes by, a droplet eventually collides with another, and another, and another...until they form a huge puddle and eventually roll away. The result is a chain reaction: the larger rain drops influence others, serving as catalysts in society. However, droplets alone, are fragile and vulnerable. In Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and Albert Camus’ The Stranger, the significant role of communication is portrayed through two extreme examples. Miscommunication causes serious consequences leading to alienation and discrimination within a society like the lonesome raindrops, aloof and out of the world’s reach.

Meursault, the protagonist in The Stranger, encounters a dilemma different than the anti-hero, Gregor Samsa, from The Metamorphosis does. As the main character transforms from a human being into a dung beetle or “vermin,” it brings forth the question of physical versus emotional transformation. Although Gregor’s metamorphosis helps him discover his status in the household, it disconnects his family from his support. On the other hand, the anti-hero in The Stranger, Meursault, lives his life “indifferent to human affairs” and his actions possess no rational order. His actions are strange to his society, a world that demands reason behind the behavior and motive behind the act.

Gregor does not like his job, his life or the way people treat him, yet he endures the daily unpleasantness because filial piety requires him to play his role. His role as a son demands him to help pay off his parents' debts and to send his sister, Grete, to a conservatorium because she loves music and is able to “play the violin soulfully” (29). In Gregor’s