The Metamorphsis

Franz Kafka an artist of his and our time, may even be classified among Picasso. Both artists that were not recognized for their brilliant master pieces until after death. Kafka wrote a few selection of novels, The Metamorphosis was among them. A story that might portray Kafka’s personal life story, about a young man, Gregor who dropped everything, to do the families biddings. Gregor Sama’s everyday life evolved around his family, until one day he awoke a enormous bug. Throughout the novel there are many interpretations that you may observe, alienation from his family, friends, work, and even himself. You can see role reversals, from father to son and mother to daughter. You many even see Christ as Gregor; there are many absurd details with many meanings.

As I read The Metamorphosis, I took notice to many absurd details and took in a meaning to the story. I felt that this story portrayed the true selfishness of a family’s greed and what means they would go, to reach satisfaction. Mr. Sama was the father of Gregor, was greedy and selfish. He had made Gregor “believe that [he] had nothing at all left from the business” (Kafka, 29) and “[he] never told him anything to the contrary” (Kafka, 29). Doing this gave the son, Gregor no choice but to work off the father’s debt, “..almost overnight had changed from a junior clerk into a traveling salesman” (Kafka, 29) in order to completely pay it off. “[Gregor’s] successful efforts were immediately transformed into cash in the form of commissions” (Kafka, 29) toward the families debt. The father withdrew information from Gregor, Mr. Sama had a surplus of money that “..could have further reduced his [own] debt to [Gregor’s] boss” (Kafka,30) . With that money he was able “..to maintain the family for one or, at the most two years..” (Kafka, 30). Gregor knew now that “his father had arranged it” (Kafka 30). The father’s plan was to leech off of the son and not to help him pay off his own debt.

Many authors like to base their characters as someone in their own life, or even as other people, for instance Jesus Christ. I found that within the story there were many absurd details that implied Gregor as Christ. The details that show this was when, Gregor was chosen to become something that he was not for his people, as Christ was. Both had suffered enduring pain for the love of their people. Jesus Christ was pinned to a wooden cross and had a crown of thorns to suffer unbearable pain. Within the story, Gregor had suffered a similar situation, “..a splinter wounded Gregor in the face and some kind of corrosive medicine poured over him” (Kafka, 36) and was “pinned down and surrendered, all his senses fully bewildered” (Kafka, 38). As Christ walked through the town unsupportive townsmen threw rocks and debris as a form of revulsion. Gregor’s father was “throwing one apple after another” at Gregor with hostility and disgust. Gregor died with no loving support of his family, as Christ died with no loving support of his people. Gregor endured the worst pain of all, betrayal from his own flesh and blood.

Throughout the story Gregor was being alienated from everything including himself. For the most part he did not even have his own body, but rather trapped in a unfamiliar creature. His skeleton was no longer within flesh and blood but rather on the outside, “which was hard as armor” (Kafka, 11). He skin was no longer a fair color, his stomach was not as he remembered, “he saw his belly-rounded, brown, partitioned by arch like ridges” (Kafka, 11). He was unable to enjoy his favorite drink, “he didn’t at all like the milk, which was formerly his favorite beverage” (Kafka, 25). His taste in food was much different from what he was familiar to, “a cheese that [before the transformation] [he] would of considered inedible”(Kafka, 26). “He was used to sleeping on his right side” (Kafka, 11) but no longer