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Lecture on Franz Kafka's 'The Metamorphosis' (Short Story Appreciation) (Patreon)

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2024-07-28 20:25:38
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Content

'There is hope enough, infinite hope — just not for us...'

Today we are appreciating one of the most iconic short stories of the twentieth century: Franz Kafka's 'The Metamorphosis'.

We're talking about literalising the metaphorical, animal transformation, the human condition, living to work vs working to live, truth in absurdities, mysticism, symbolism, the troubled life of Franz Kafka, and much more.

Timestamps:

0:00 ‘when Gregor Samsa awoke one morning…’

2:00 cockroach, beetle, or monstrous vermin?

3:00 relating to the stories of Franz Kafka

5:00 on being embarrassed to call for help

7:00 Kafka literalises the metaphorical

10:00 animalising & the human condition

13:00 anxiety of living against the clock

15:00 existential crisis & denial of death

16:00 Kafka’s humour & reading aloud

18:00 feeling pity for Gregor Samsa

20:00 filial obligation, guilt & burdens

21:00 when workaholics become sick

23:00 Kierkeegard’s view of absurdity

25:00 why do we speak in metaphors?

26:00 what was Franz Kafka’s life like?

28:00 feeling a sense of alienation at home

30:00 uncanny prophecy in Kafka’s work

32:00 what was Kafka’s work life like?

34:00 on the rise of the office worker

36:00 work life vs life of the artist

38:00 beginning vs end of Metamorphosis

39:00 the head clerk checks on Gregor

41:00 voice of guilt vs grovelling beetle

42:00 don’t apologise for being human

44:00 ‘I am desperate, like a caged rat…’

46:00 the conditioned official in us

47:00 working to live or living to work?

49:00 Kafka’s relationship with his father

50:00 Max Brod doesn’t burn Kafka’s work

51:00 Kafka suffers from self-loathing

53:00 why the process is the destination

55:00 short stories as inkblot interpretation

56:00 Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism, Christianity

57:00 animal transformations, trials, scripture

1:00:00 father bombards his son with apples

1:04:00 religious symbolism & the grotesque

1:06:00 Abraham and the binding of Isaac

1:07:00 is there any salvation in Kafka?

1:09:00 ‘infinite hope — just not for us…’

1:11:00 is Gregor Samsa not still human?

1:12:00 Gregor’s final moments & sacrifice

1:14:00 what metamorphosis falls upon us?

1:15:00 what did you make of this short story?

Resources to Explore:

  • Film Adaptation: It can be very rewarding to round your reading off by viewing an adaptation of the work. Seeing another's interpretation of a great story can clarify your own feelings about the themes. For 'The Metamorphosis', there is this film adaptation from 2012 available to view. How would you adapt Franz Kafka's iconic story? Can it be adapted? David Lynch, a lifelong admirer of Kafka, wanted to adapt this story but ultimately thought it to be impossible.

  • Nabokov on Kafka: Treat yourself to a viewing of this short television movie from 1989 in which Christopher Plummer plays Vladimir Nabokov delivering his lecture on Kafka's Metamorphosis at Cornell University.

  • Letter to His Father: At the age of thirty-six, Kafka wrote a long therapeutic letter to his father to hold him to account for his abusive parenting. His father never received the letter, but Max Brod published it after his friend's death. You can read it here, and also see selections and commentary around it here. It is painful reading, but it sheds a lot of light on the man behind the art.

  • Music: If you like to listen to music whilst reading, you may wish to check out this soundtrack, which a really creative soul has designed specifically to accompany a reading of Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis.

  • Prague Walking Tour: You can follow in the footsteps of Franz Kafka and see where the great writer lived, worked, and wrote some of his stories in this video.

Questions for You:

1) What is your personal response to 'The Metamorphosis'? 

2) What message do you take away from this short story?

3) What's the value of Kafkaesque storytelling?

4) Can you see why Kafka's friends laughed when he read his stories aloud?

And please do share with us your favourite passages, images, and ideas you've discovered from your reading of this short story.

Happy reading, everybody!

Files

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Comments

Gonzalo Broto

One thing that stood out to me this time around (I have read "The metamorphosis" several times) was the idea of a physical home. Gregor provided it for his parents and sister (his bedroom was sandwiched between his sister's and the living room), yet the first thing they do when he is dead is get rid of that house to find one of their own. I couldn't help but think of the whole episode as an act of "eviction", in which Gregor is expelled from his own dwelling, his own space, so not only his body and existence has been despised by his family, but also his support and all the things that came from him. It's a sad and harsh reflection on the state of society and family!

Jayne Conrad

It was interesting for me to read Metamorphosis again, decades after I read Kafka in school, with the perspective of a much older person with more life experience. I am reading a lot of sympathy in the comments for Gregor, how his job and family have victimized and dehumanized him, and while I don't disagree, I now sense of theme of what we would now call "codependency": the tendency to OVER-give in a relationship to cultivate your own sense of importance and the other person's sense of obligation, as a way to be in control under a cloak of "virtue". What should be a loving generosity actually turns into toxic manipulation. I did not necessarily have this feeling at the beginning of the story, but it developed as I continued to read, and especially at the end, when Gregor has died, completely alienated from his family. He lived as though they were helpless dependents only he could save, and they consequently assumed that role, but when Gregor changes and slowly fades from their family life, no longer the provider, but also not finding another role within the family, they find ways of taking care of themselves without him. At the end, when they are on the train together to start a new life, they seem greatly relieved to no longer be burdened with "gratitude" for things that Gregor provided that they apparently didn't even want: i.e., the too-large apartment that needed housekeepers and tenants (it is explicitly said that Gregor picked it out for them), that they can now let go of and move to something smaller, easier and more comfortable. They can find their own work, the sister can grow up and get married. The image of Gregor's sister standing and stretching her healthy young body is like watching their psyches uncurl from the cramped confines of their prior dependence. This isn't all to say that I feel no sympathy for Gregor: indeed, my heart ached for him, especially as his family expressed increasing objectification and disgust with him as he grew sicker and weaker in his "vermin" state. I shook my head at his groveling devotion to what appeared to be a BS job with a boss who himself seemed "inhuman" in his treatment of Gregor, and wondered why Gregor's appalling condition never seems to fully "sink in": why isn't Gregor more horrified or panicked about what has happened when he wakes up and looks down at his carapace? Maybe that's the point: he should have felt that horror and panic long before his physical transformation, he should have noticed his increasing alienation from his family, for whom he has become a remote entity. It now feels like a cautionary tale for anyone who wants to be too "heroic" in the world and lives of other people: it is virtuous to give, but that should not be one's sole purpose: it dehumanizes not only YOU, but also those who might be robbed of their own sense of competence and agency. It's easy to see Gregor as the blameless martyr surrounded by selfish, unsympathetic people, but now that I am older, it is easier for me to also understand how they have been shaped by their situation.

Donna F.

Banjamin, TY for an illuminating lecture. This was my first time reading this novella. I’d always thought that Gregor would still carry on his daily life as a bug, such as going to work. I’d imagined that his coworkers would just have to adjust to working with a giant bug. I found the story to be quite sad. It made me reflect on what happens in a family when people change. For instance, children who were loved and protected as small children are suddenly “othered” by themselves and their family members when they hit adolescence. In my family, I’d been coddled as a small child but when I started to have my own opinions as an adolescent, I was seen as an enemy. Gregor handled his changes with more grace than I did. I’m glad I read this novella.

AS

The charwoman is the greatest.

Anna

“The Metamorphosis” is the first story I’ve read by Kafka, and it left me stunned. I’m sure we’ve all experienced the themes found in this story to some degree: isolation and alienation, feeling like a burden to others, being underappreciated at home and at work, self-sacrifice with no reward, and enduring situations beyond our control. I found it both laughable and extremely sad when Gregor became so concerned about missing his train to work, despite the fact that he literally turned into an insect. It made me think a lot about toxic workplace culture and how people sacrifice their physical and mental health and happiness for the sake of a job. I also found it interesting that “The Metamorphosis” both begins and ends with a bodily metamorphosis; the beginning being Gregor’s discovery of becoming an insect, and the Samsa parents recognizing the physical transformation of their daughter into a young woman. Both of these transformations have different ramifications for the Samsa children, Gregor’s ending with death and Grete departing from adolescence and becoming a woman. This story also made me reflect on humanity and the qualities that make us human. With Gregor clinging to the picture of the woman on his wall, coming out to hear his sister play the violin, and retaining his memories and capabilities of abstract thought, he was holding onto the things that tethered him to his humanness, despite physically becoming an insect. But no one in his family seemed to want to remember Gregor's humanity, but instead focused on the "it" he became in their eyes. Overall, “The Metamorphosis” is a very tragic tale, but as with all great works of literature, I got a lot out of it.

Terri Matter

I have fallen behind and am very late to this discussion but feel compelled to respond to the overwhelming pain expressed in the comments. It is quite amazing that this story resonated so strongly with so many in so many painfully different ways, yet shared the common thread of grief for our own wasted and under appreciated humanity. I recall reading this in high school, and almost doubling over with this visualization of my own sense of alienation and ugliness. 50 years later it encapsulates the years spent working too hard for uncaring corporate entities and the too fresh experience of the pandemic which brought an unprecedented isolation, but also a communal metamorphosis and an ironic sense of freedom from the obligations that consume our lives in our daily existence.

Julie Nevin
>>146865785

I wonder how many teenagers, especially girls, feel that 'sense of ugliness and alienation' ? I certainly did! It's incredible to look back at photos and see we were actually attractive enough really !

Tamera Cameron

This was my first Kafka story and I didn't know what to expect. The story got under my skin way more than I realized at first. I had a nightmare that night after reading it with the theme of realizing that you're not as important to the people you love as you thought. At face value, the dream had nothing to do with the story. But Ben's comment about this story being a rorschach test was so insightful. Upon awaking I new that the dream and story were related. I always deeply appreciate these lectures as they help me see more layers of the works we're reading. I liked the story at first, but the ending dragged for me. Now I understand why (and that Kafka would agree!). But more importantly, I see that my unsettled feeling about the work is part of its brilliance. It disturbed me mostly because of how relatable it is. I can see myself in the story. I found the story very funny and bizarre at first. It's not hard for me to access Kafka's humour. The fact he looked out the window and felt melancholy about something other than being a bug was so amusing and telling. It wasn't mentioned in the lecture but this story made me think of the tragedies of the elderly or those who become ill and must be cared for by others. The feeling of being a burden, or even the dehumanization of dementia or severe illness, and not being loved, appreciated, and respected - that's real life horror and tragedy. There's so much more I could pull out of this story and more still because of the background Ben gave of the author. It's one I could see returning to again. I want to end with a big thank you to you Ben. This is everything I dreamed education could be. Your love of literature makes me so excited to read things I'd never thought I'd read. Sometimes I even get misty about it haha. Thank you for all the work you put in, it's making a big difference in my life. Cheers!

Terri Matter
>>147463541

Great post! I so agree with your feelings of gratitude towards this book club and Benjamin. I think it is incredible how this story can be related to so many different circumstances and stages in our human existence.

Tino Reed

Wow. The Robert Coles bit in the last minute of the lecture. “Do we profit from the human degradation of others? Is our comfort earned at the expense of terrible suffering?”I lead an incredibly comfortable life. My phone, my clothes, my job, ease of travel, food, water, ac, medicine, etc. All of these things in some ways come at the expense of others. The danger of these comforts can make people more bitter, more self involved, and entitled. A sort of metamorphosis. The challenge is to play against it. Let your good deeds far outweigh the bad.

Victor Bieniek

After listening to Ben's lecture, now I want to read it again! Thanks for the insights.

Craig Mckissick

I found this funny, oddly enough I decided not to go to my work today because I wasn’t feeling good and felt drawn to Kafka and read this in one sitting for the first time, which honestly sounds made up but I read this and found it funny and creepy, not thinking too much about it until listening to this and now I’m floored by it. I didn’t realise he wrote this in his spare time, I recall hearing before someone saying in relation to Kafka something along the lines of ‘ some people don’t have the attention span to write long fiction ‘, well that’s just wrong. This is definitely an influential work, it just feels so fresh but it has that feeling you’ve experienced it second hand through it’s derivatives at the same time. Kafka’s life story breaks my heart, I wonder what he would think of the world if he saw it now, I don’t think I’ll read his stories the same way again. I’m realising as I talk to people so passionately about literature that it’s pretty much lost on most people in my life and they think I’m in some fantasy land, which I am, but I don’t think they realise that I’m communicating with great minds. While they sit and watch the news and TikTok and engage in the everyday bulls*, yeah, who’s really in fantasy land because I’ve never felt this close to the truth