Essays on Metamorphosis

The Metamorphosis is a novel written by Franz Kafka and was published in 1915. The novel tells a story of a family that struggles with insect transformation of the main character and the breadwinner of the family Gregor Samsa. While the book has different themes,...

The human mind is so active that an individual experiences approximately 70,000 thoughts each day. These thoughts are often conflicting in their nature, as the stream of consciousness does not readily divide thoughts into categories, and thoughts enter and exit the mind freely. The novella...

The Oxford Advanced Learner’s dictionary defines existentialism, in part, as “a philosophical theory that…emphasizes the existence of the individual person… determining their own development through acts of the will.” Existentialist work stresses the importance of the individual often denying the “existence of objective values.” Existentialism...

Metamorphosis begins with Gregor, a travelling salesman, waking up one morning before he has to report to his miserable job, as a beetle. Throughout the short story, Franz Kafka, the author, showcases the many changes that occur from the day Gregor wakes up as a...

Gregor Samsa’s unconscious can be explained through three important symbols prevalent in The Metamorphosis. According to the Freudian theoretical framework, these three symbols are personified in Samsa’s mother, father and sister. For Samsa, his family members represent his id, superego and his ego. Samsa’s sister...

Lu Xun and Kafka’s utilization of the physical body allows for the presentation of personal criticisms towards aspects of modernity and the social, political and economic changes of the movement. Modernity, due to its nature of bringing about change, encourages the development of thoughts and...

Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, in its continuously dissected and heavily studied narrative, details a transformation from man to creature but hides the true meaning of what it means to change form, both in mind and body. From the onset, it is made clear that something...

Choice is inescapable and inevitable to all who exist or have ever existed. When meeting a fork in the road, a decision is always made, even if no action is taken. Utterly paradoxical, even the act of no decision at all is stepping in one...

The nature of existence; and more precisely, the nature of humans and animals is one of selfish survival. In literature, we see this idea through novels such as Heart of Darkness that takes a historical, realistic approach to the concept, and also The Road which...

Both Gregor Samsa from Franz Kafka’s novel The Metamorphosis and Meursault from Albert Camus’ The Stranger struggle to communicate with the people around them. Although Samsa suffers from physical abnormalities while Meursault possesses ideological differences, both characters – through the two authors’ use of imagery...

Whether it be a gender hierarchy or a power system organized by income, human society has frequently fallen back on some form of an unequal power dynamic. Unfortunately, this type of structure can be extremely damaging to those at the bottom of the hierarchy as...

Naguib Mahfouz and Franz Kafka both use setting as an important literary feature in their respective works, Midaq Alley and The Metamorphosis. Mahfouz’s Midaq Alley takes place in the back streets of Cairo, Egypt during the Second World War, specifically in Midaq Alley. The alley...

Franz Kafka’s novella The Metamorphosis is as a disturbing look at the absurdity of life-and is literature at its most unsettling and most introspective. Throughout much of his life, Kafka suffered from insecurity and internal torment. An overweening, aggressive father with highly unattainable expectations exacerbated...

Looking at literature in a general sense, it can be seen that some pieces which use a distorted literary style, instead of the straightforward directness of realism, can, when written effectively, be very useful and highly informative, if for no other reason than the higher...

Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis contains direct biographical references to Kafka and his family’s lives. Gregor’s father’s dishonest actions stem from Kafka’s hatred against own his father for his relentless disapproval of Kafka’s writing. Kafka depicts Gregor as a lonely, insignificant failure, because that is how...

Like death or abandonment, alienation is one of the deepest-rooted fears experienced by human beings. As social creatures, humans have the need to identify themselves as one of a group, whether that group is a family, a culture, or a religion. The experience of alienation...

Dehumanization of the protagonist is a common thematic element in both Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and O’Connor’s “A Late Encounter of the Enemy,” although the various aspects of dehumanization differ between the two works. Dehumanization plays a role in the deaths of both Gregor and General...

In Camus’ The Stranger and Kafka’s Metamorphosis, the protagonist finds himself in an extraordinary situation that challenges his will. In both novels, this initially unsympathetic character struggles to redeem himself. In so doing, his identity develops and his positive qualities become evident. The characters thus...

References to food are a recurring theme in Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. The food that Gregor eats to strengthen his physical body reflects the attention that he receives from his family to satiate his emotional appetite. As the story progresses, the family grows more distant,...

The first chapter of the Metamorphosis is full of meaningful symbols that contribute through the rest of the book. The tone of the text is set in the very beginning and is recurring in the first chapter. The narrator’s human lonesome life is also explained...

In Franz Kafka’s short story, “The Metamorphosis”, the character Gregor Samsa wakes up one morning and finds that he has transformed into a bug. Gregor’s metamorphosis into a bug reveals a lot about his relationship with his family. In regards to his relationship with his...