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WD_232/ 2006
(  Satoshi Kinoshita )
| Series: | Works on paper: Drawings 3 | | Medium: | oilstick on paper | | Size (inches): | 75.6 x 39.8 (overall) | | Size (mm): | 1920 x 1020 (overall) | | Catalog #: | WD_0232 | | Description: | Signed, date and copyright in pencil on the reverse/ three sheets.
Youth is happy because it has the ability to see beauty. Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.
-Franz Kafka/ www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/f/franz_kafka.html
"The Metamorphosis" (1916) by Franz Kafka.
Section 1 : Summary
Gregor Samsa awakes one morning to find that he has been inexplicably transformed into a giant insect. He is not dreaming; he is clearly still in his own bedroom in his family's apartment, in his own bed. He is lying on his back and can see his numerous legs squirming uselessly in the air. Initially, he is unable to get out of bed.
Gregor's thoughts turn to his strenuous and thankless job as a traveling salesman for a company that is suspicious and over-vigilant toward its sales force. Gregor would have quit long ago, but his parents are in deep financial debt to his boss, so for the family's sake he continues. A quick glance at the alarm clock tells Gregor that he has slept late and missed his train. If he rushes he might still be able to catch the 7 a.m. train, but even this won't spare him a tongue-lashing from his boss. He considers calling in sick, which he has never done, but suspects that his boss would then send a health-insurance doctor to check on him.
Concerned, Gregor's parents and his sister Grete soon begin to knock on his door. In an altered voice, with brief and deliberate phrases, he tries to reassure them. He expends a quarter of an hour struggling with his air-beating limbs and unfamiliar body in an attempt to get out of bed. When Gregor, rocking back and forth, is on the verge of teetering off the bed and landing on his sturdy (he hopes) back, the doorbell rings. It is the chief clerk of the company come to see why he didn't leave by the early train. Gregor swings off the bed and onto the floor, banging his head in the process.
Gregor's parents detain the chief clerk while imploring Gregor to open the locked door to his room. Gregor is still able to manage simple stalling phrases. At last, the chief clerk becomes impatient. In front of Gregor's parents, the functionary sets into a critical and demoralizing speech, even maliciously insinuating that perhaps Gregor is hiding in his room because of some unethical activity involving cash receipts. Gregor excitedly replies with a stream of words, pleading illness, offering assurances that he will make the eight o'clock train, and asking the man to spare his parents. While he speaks he maneuvers himself up against his wardrobe and is able, with considerable difficulty, to draw himself upright. He wants to open the door and then gauge the seriousness of his situation from the reaction of those outside.
His family and the chief clerk become alarmed. They have not understood a word of his fevered reply. In fact, they do not recognize it as human speech. His mother sends Grete for the doctor; his father sends the maid for a locksmith. Gregor remains calm. He feels reassured by the efforts being made on his behalf. Leaning against the door, his jaws struggle with the key. He manages at last to open the door and peer out. Gregor's mother faints, his father begins to weep, and the chief clerk can only muster a startled "Oh!"
From his room's threshold, Gregor tries to placate the clerk and defend himself against earlier accusations. But the man is slowly making his way to the door. Thinking the chief clerk still angry with him, Gregor makes a move to intercept the man and further plead his case. His movement frightens his mother and sends the chief clerk fleeing down the stairwell, screaming at full volume. Gregor's father springs into action, grabbing a stick and a newspaper and herding Gregor back into his bedroom with prods and fierce hisses. Gregor injures himself badly trying to fit back through the doorway. The door is slammed shut behind him, and all goes quiet.
Commentary:
One reason this novella has become so well-known and inspired so many interpretations is that it does not show its hand. It begins with a ridiculous but resonant proclamation--that a man is now a large insect--and does not look back, with no nods or winks or unambiguous signs as to how we should proceed. The narrative itself is clear and straightforward. The descriptions of the insect are somewhat hazy with regard to true entomology, but the descriptions of Gregor's physical tribulations as an insect are detailed and realistic--if such a thing can be said of a two- or three-foot-long bug. What are we to make of this? The transformation is a fait accompli and, within the context of the story, there is no going back to question its cause.
Although Gregor wakes up as an insect in outward, physical form, some of his more internal elements undergo a more gradual metamorphosis. But soon, his human voice disappears and his preferences grow more insect-like. With time he masters the coordination of his new body. He thinks less and crawls on walls and ceilings. But his consideration for his family's feelings seldom wavers.
A note on the insect: It has been variously translated as a cockroach, a stag beetle, a dung beetle, and a centipede. The latter, of course, is not an insect at all. But does a cockroach have the "numerous legs" that "flicker" before Gregor's eyes? Only if "numerous" means six. Does a cockroach have a neck that it can turn to give one last look behind it, as Gregor does later? It's more likely that the bug is not a specific bug, and its exact identity is immaterial to the tale. Kafka himself asked that the insect not be depicted on the cover of the book in 1915; this, he felt sure, would spoil the story.
Section 2 : Summary
Gregor awakes from a deep sleep to find that a basin of milk has been left for him. He tries to drink it but discovers that milk, which was his favorite beverage, is no longer palatable. The family spends the evening silently in the parlor. Gregor feels a twinge of pride for having provided his family with this quiet life in a fine apartment and begins to worry whether it will all end for them now. Then Gregor, feeling unsettled beneath the high ceilings of his room, spends the night squeezed under the couch.
The next morning, Grete opens the door and, spying him beneath the sofa, immediately shuts it with a cry. She fortifies herself and tiptoes into the room to retrieve the basin of milk. Noticing that it has not been drunk, she removes it and returns with a wide selection of both fresh and fetid foods. When she leaves, Gregor gratefully gorges himself on the foods that appeal to his new state. Grete notes his preferences, and this routine of bringing and removing food while Gregor hides under the couch becomes the norm.
In these early stages, Gregor listens at the keyhole whenever his family discusses anything. In this way, he learns that their financial situation is slightly better than he thought. Still, money must soon be earned. His mother is asthmatic, and his father hasn't worked for the five years since the collapse of his company. Gregor's secret wish is for Grete to continue her violin studies at a conservatory, but this she cannot do if she becomes the breadwinner of the family. Gregor is overcome by shame.
Grete, despite the kindnesses she shows her brother, is unable to bear looking at him. To make things easier on her, Gregor manages to drape a blanket over the couch so that no part of him remains visible while she is in the room fulfilling her duties. Gregor's father restrains his mother from seeing him at first. At last she demands to be allowed to see her son. One day, Grete and her mother enter to remove some of the larger furniture. Grete has noticed the tracks left by Gregor's sticky feet as he crawls over the walls and ceiling of his room, and she sees that his movements would be much less hindered if his bureau, desk, and other furniture were removed. Gregor's mother feels that removing the furniture might send Gregor a message that the family has given up all hope of "an improvement," and that the absence of furniture will disturb him when he "comes back to us." Grete prevails, though, and the two women begin to remove the furniture.
When much of the furniture is gone and the women are out of the room, Gregor dashes out from beneath the sofa and looks for something to preserve. He crawls up the wall and clings to the face of a picture he loves. Gregor's mother collapses in shock when she catches sight of him. Grete threatens Gregor and then rushes out of the room to fetch medicine for their mother. Gregor follows, wanting to help, but he only succeeds in startling Grete. She rushes back to administer to the mother and slams the door behind her, shutting Gregor out of his room. Nervous and worried, he scurries all over the floor, walls, and ceiling of the parlor, eventually collapsing of exhaustion on the middle of the table. Gregor's father comes home, and though Gregor attempts to pacify him, the old man, standing erect and self-assured from working again, chases his unfortunate son around the room. At last the father begins to pelt Gregor with apples. One penetrates Gregor's back, producing excruciating pain. As he blacks out, Gregor sees his mother rush screaming from his room and beg his father to spare his life.
Commentary:
Particularly in this section of the story, commentators intent on biographical explanation have read into Gregor's father a portrait of Kafka's own somewhat boorish parent, with whom the author had a complicated and fairly destructive relationship. The fusillade of fruit is an uncontrollable, instinctive reaction to the presence of his transformed son. The father is no thinker, no philosopher, and no great spirit either. He does not understand the unrecognizable son and cannot really hope to. His assault of apples is a pathetic rage of incomprehension, almost pitiable--but nonetheless lethal, easily penetrating the son's armor. Remorse follows, no doubt, for there are no more attacks, but the damage has been done. In this reading, of course, the monstrous insect is Kafka himself.
Section 3 : Summary
Gregor is reduced to invalidity by his wound (no one has the nerve to remove the apple from his back), but he is no longer treated as an enemy. With Grete working at a store, his father at a bank, and his mother sewing piecework and doing much of the housework (the servant has been let go), no one has much time or energy to worry about Gregor. Grete still leaves food for him, but takes no notice whether he eats it or not. No one cleans his room anymore. An old cleaning woman who comes to help with the cleaning has taken to looking in on Gregor, addressing him as "dung beetle." The family has taken in three fastidious lodgers, and, to accommodate them and their belongings, excess furniture and odds and ends have been moved into Gregor's room. All of this breeds in Gregor a growing resentment.
The three bearded lodgers are domineering and demanding. Not used to housing guests, the family is excessively deferent to the lodgers' wishes. The family eats in the kitchen while the men dine in the parlor. One evening, Grete begins to practice her violin in the kitchen. The lodgers invite her out into the parlor for a concert. She obliges, but the lodgers soon become impatient with the performance. Gregor, on the other hand, is profoundly moved. It is the first time he has heard his sister play in a long while, and he begins to creep into the room towards her. It is also the first time since his transformation that he finds the promise of succor. He wants to protect Grete's gift of talent from the indifference of these philistines, and to tell her of his intention to send her to the conservatory. One of the lodgers sees Gregor, and all three declare that they will leave the next day; further, they will not pay the rent that is due.
The family decides it must abandon the notion that this monstrous bug is their Gregor. If it really were him, Grete reasons, he would have gone away on his own and spared them this torment. Gregor, covered in dust and now barely able to move, skulks back to his room. The door is shut and barred behind him. Gregor agrees with his sister. He thinks of his family with love and affection. That night he dies.
The cleaning woman discovers the thin corpse the next morning and rouses the household. The family comes to look, then retires to the parents' bedroom to weep. When the lodgers emerge and grumble about the lack of a ready breakfast, the father commands them to leave immediately. They go, and the cleaning lady soon follows. Profound relief seeps into the family's bearing and countenance. For the first time since the metamorphosis, they are all free to leave the apartment together. They take a trolley out to the countryside. They discuss their future prospects, which aren't really so dire. All three have secure jobs, and now they can move to a smaller and more economical apartment. It is a warm, sunny day, and as the trolley rolls along, the parents look at their blossoming daughter and realize it may be time to find her a husband.
Commentary:
The lodgers are another comic element in this bizarre tale. They are drawn as caricatures: one martinet and his two marionettes. By kowtowing to this ludicrous threesome while in its own house, the family reaches the low-point of its misfortune. Yet the lingering presence of the insect son, the great burden, holds the family hostage. Only after Gregor's death does the liberation of their spirits occur, self-respect truly bloom, and the future become a bearable thought.
For most of the story, the narrating voice is closely linked to Gregor. It is not Gregor himself, for it maintains a detachment--a hint of humor in face of the absurd--that Gregor does not share. Yet the narrating voice has no more knowledge of the events of the story than does Gregor. It is confined with him in his room, it listens at the keyhole, it follows his reveries when the rest of the world is barred by closed doors, it departs when he faints, and it returns when he wakes. Yet, the narration outlasts the suffering protagonist. The narrating view expands to omniscience; it has seen death before, and it has seen life go on in its strange, twisted, yet utterly expected way.
©2006 SparkNotes LLC.
-www.sparknotes.com/lit/metamorph
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