What the fuck was this book about?I didnt understand shit.Did gregor actually die or did he return to being human again?Why has he turned into bug in the first place?Overall, what was this book telling?
he didn't fit in and he was made to fit in in the end.
fuck the plot.
What the book was about is open to interpretation and everyone can have an opinion on it, like with most literature. There's not correct answer. That's the good thing about books, make you think.
One perspective that I enjoy is that it's a critic on the way society treats the mentally ill and how those illnesses affect the person itself.
>>7659667
It doesn't matter why he turned into an insect. What matters is that the book shows how quickly those close to you can turn against you. It's a reflection of guilt.
>>7659873
But that's exactly why it matters if there was a valid reason for him being turned into an insect. Was he guilty of anything but loving and providing for his family?
Just about being an outsider or a burden. Like debilitating illness.
>>7659987
look at the description of the bug what other people does to it and what changed in him in his reflection of his new body
>>7659667
What I loved about it was the feeling of absurdity and helplessness, that such a terrible thing happens to a decent guy that tried to help his family, on top of all his weariness from work, and how it makes his family go against him and terminates his life. It's a nightmare.
>>7659987
>Was he guilty of anything but loving and providing for his family?
No, and yet they treated him like shit for turning into an insect/roach, which he had no hand in. What does that tell you about unconditional love and support?
>>7660034
also, "how it happened" is irrelevant, and further, the fact that it just happened one day makes it even creepier, like it can happen to anyone out of the blue.
>>7659667
>>7659667
What would happen if a purple elephant appeared from nothing? The answer is unknown, because were that to happen, the laws of that universe would necessarily be different. Turning into a bug is the same phenomenon, and the dilemma of it is represented in Gregor; his being is a loophole out of which order, civilisation, sanity leak, and which, for the sake of those things, must be stoppered. Their universe, nothing they know, can work so long as Gregor's possibility exists, so long as they're forced by his continued presence to acknowledge it. His possibility does continue after his death, but no longer visibly so. The ontology he represents is again safely veiled outside their epistemology. They can again cultivate their gardens with the confidence that water makes plants grow, work brings men profit, right-action earns God's favour, etc.
If you want to read totalitarian themes into it, it's totalitarian subjects being shown the secret of their oppression, and then killing the one who showed them, so they can forget.
its about masturbation.
It's about
H O M O S E X U A L I T Y
>>7660072
It includes homosexuality, it's about anything that you don't have a say in it.
Including if someone found out that you have a sexual attraction to little girls, even if you never touched one.
>>7659667
Here's something interesting about the timing of posting about this book:
This Sunday is Transfiguration Sunday in many churches. 'Transfiguration' (and its verbal form) come from the same Greek word as does 'metamorphosis' (in fact 'metamorphosis' is the exact word). Just FYI for people.
>>7659873
Extrapolate. I didn't get that at all.
>>7659667
I'm trying to read this in german, it's been so far hard as fuck
>>7661882
It's literally obvious. It's not even a theme, its the plot
>>7659667
It recounts what it's like being Jewish of course
The instinctive dehumanization of NEETs
It's just a basic, but eerie satire on antisemitism
>>7662324
You're basic.
>>7662816
Can't you imagine Kafka reading this shit to his friends, laughing his ass off while putting on some kind of accent?
Reading the ending, how the old jew is trying to marry her daughter to make some shekels
As >>7659678 said, the book is vastly open to interpretation. In my opinion, the book was about mourning. Gregor didn't turn into an insect, he died. His family couldn't get their shit together until they overcame their grief.
Weird shit happens in the universe for no understandable reason and life goes on
>>7661932
It's been way too long since I read the book. I read into it as the mental illness and alienation issue.
>>7664803
It can still be that, but it's also how quickly those closest to you can turn against you, whether it's due to mental health issues or whatever.
>>7664803
He works his ass off to support his family. Then once he turns into the insect they completely forget about this and just treat him like shit for turning into a bug. At the end they celebrate after he dies, like he was the source of their problems all along despite him initially being the only thing keeping the family afloat.
You are ALL ABSOLUTELY WRONG ON EVERYTHING.
It's about DISCRIMINATION
It's about anomie: how one man tries to continue living a "normal" life even as he becomes increasingly alienated from his world.
This is why Kafka is one of the most important writers of the 20th century: because he reflects the same alienation we all feel in modern society, of striving to be "normal" even as our circumstances become exceedingly extraordinary.
>>7659667First, there isn't any metamorphosis in the book. Die Verwandlung means The change.
So, it is the story of a guy who one day wake up like a big bug.
The family is worried and they don't what to do and do nothing.
The guy is an insect until he died and at the end nobody cares.
That is it. It means nothing. Or everything.
I dunno, I'm no historian, so I don't really know any of socio-political factors during the time in which the Metamorphosis was written, so I'm just going with a more universal theme:
I thought it was about burden. To sum it up in one word, that is. It could be the burden of a grown man who has not married and lives with his family. I don't know much about German (or Czech?) culture, so I'm not sure if this a huge family issue. But the ideas of imposition and burdening were emphasised in my opinion.
Or maybe it was about depression, even grief, or anything holding a family or entity from progression.
Proof I see of this interpretation is the final scene, where Gregor Samsa's sister "stretches her young body." Clearly from this line the family is "moving on" from something that was holding them back.
I find the end scene to be similar to the Grapes of Wrath, whereRosasharn is getting her titty sucked by a starving man, and she runs her fingers through his hair and "smiles mysteriously". Of course, I still never figured out the significance of that. But I feel like the Metamorphosis was much less (for lack of a better word) pseudo-sexual.
Sorry if any of that made no sense.
>>7665657
>But I feel like the Metamorphosis was much less (for lack of a better word) pseudo-sexual.
Kafka was obsessed with sex so don't count on it.
>>7665097
They're worried because he's not able to work and support them, not out of concern for him. They do care when he dies. Though by care I mean they're happy that he's dead.
It's about alienation. The turning into a bug was played straight in the book, but it was just an absurdist way to examine the burden a sick person places on their dependents, even those who theoretically ought to care about them. The main chr. goes from prized bead winner to an embarrassing, disgusting invalid. In the end he dies, and his family is relieved at no longer having to tolerate the burden. Tis not a very happy story.
>>7659667
Do this next.
http://www.kafka-online.info/a-hunger-artist.html
>>7665673
>not a very happy story
This is what made Kafka unique as opposed to western literary traditions, where it's happily ever after. I think pessimistic works were more of an eastern-European/Russian tradition, so I think Kafka was inspired a lot by that. Actually, I used to think Kafka was Russian when I was younger, just based on how morose his stuff was.
>>7665692
Hunger is really important in the Metamorphosis aswell.
>>7665704
That's an interesting idea, that Kafka was inspired by the Russians. True or not, I love the morose approach and I didn't mean that it isn't worth reading because it is sad. My favorite fiction is the pessimistic Russian stuff.
>>7659667
Yes OP, he goes back to being human and he ends up marrying his sister so that they can finally share his room so that the parents can keep renting one of the other rooms. This way everybody's happy. He even gets his old job back and the only aftereffects are a slight allergy to insecticides and an ovipositor for a penis.
>or did he return to being human again?
How do you even come to this?
>>7659667
Are you fucking retarded? Don't read anything else because you are amazingly stupid and you are not made to understand anything.
>>7666750
>What does this supposed to mean?
Do you just expect a straightforward answer to a question that has baffled critics for centuries? Even Bloom, who proposed the interpretation quoted here >>7666575
is not so sure anymore. Recently he had a fit of apoplexy over this and I've heard he's on life support, hence the conflicting rumours about his death.
>>7666750
She swept him up with the garbage, my G
