Disgusting Cockroach Lifestyle! | The Metamorphosis | Book Review

I remember being assigned The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka as reading in high school. I didn't read it then, of course. I do remember the general idea. I remember some of the questions I got wrong when being tested on whether I read it. But I especially remember the opening line. This was originally written in German, so the exact manner in which the line gets translated differs, but it starts by dropping the bomb: that Gregor, the main character, has become a giant bug. And this is what the book is known for. The book then follows the consequences of this fact.

Before, he was a traveling salesman. He would wake in the early hours of the morning and sustain the family, but we quickly find that he is not able to do this now that he is a giant bug, or vermin, as some translations render it.

I think there are two main points that I want to talk about in this review: namely the theme, and then the perspective.

Theme

When I went to look at some of the interpretations of the novel, it was bogged down by some odd discussion about what kind of bug Gregor transformed into. Some translations just outright say he is a cockroach. But none of this even matters. What matters is the theme. What matters is that Gregor was dependable and supportive, and then he suddenly became a bug of some kind—and now he is both useless and detrimental to his family. He is vermin. As such, he is discarded by the end. And I think this story goes beyond the mere question of whether poor families can sustain those who become unsustainable. It even suggests that those who are unsustainable become potentially disgusting, and most importantly, a burden that the family is better off without. Maybe it suggests that this would be ideal, in a satirical manner.

It is a very bleak picture of humanity, especially in past times, where poor people had less outside benefits than even today.

What I found to be interesting, however, was something I learned about Kafka, going into this novel. He apparently thought his stories were hilarious. This novella does not feel funny. Maybe this one story is the exception. Or maybe he's just my kind of guy, lol. I did see one probable suggestion saying that it might be lost in translation—that it might be more obvious in German. Or maybe the absurdity of turning into a bug is just humorous all on its own. And . . . it is, but the humor doesn't stick around.

The whole idea of your work being perceived so differently just because of a language change is so interesting to me. I would have to ask a German language speaker.

Perspective

For writing craft reasons, I think the perspective of the story also stood out to me. Overall, it is written in third person omniscient. The catch, if you want to call it that, is that Kafka is generally very restrained with how he jumps from one view to the next. Scenes are not scatterings of thoughts from multiple characters. Instead, much of the story's perspective has one pole at the beginning, that slowly shifts over the course of the novel. It starts essentially in Gregor's head, entirely. Slowly, there are subtle movements in perspective as the reader learns things that Gregor could not know. And once Gregor is absent, the shift is complete.

This perspective shift contributes to the strange but roundabout bleakness that this novel has, where the reader sees the struggle from Gregor's perspective, but once they are in the family's perspective, they are treated to a sunny ending that could have come from a slice of life piece.

Conclusion

Overall, this was an interesting novella to (kinda) revisit later on in life. I think I will give it an 8.5/10.

Video: https://youtu.be/XHVU_rDZk2Q