Miscommunication Causes Serious Consequences Leading to Alienation and Discrimination Within a Society

In HTRLLAP by Thomas C. Foster he talks about how many authors include biblical allusions in their stories. The transformation of turning into an insect could actually symbolize his desire not to have to return to a job he hates. In part one it says, “Gregor goes back to bemoaning his life as a traveling salesmen.” The transformation into a bug can be seen as a freedom from the from what he thought to be a boring life.

1. Meursault is in a kind of sexual relationship. Everytime he sees her, he can’t stop his sexual attraction towards her. His thoughts are all about her physical features and sex. When Marie asks Meursault if he love her, he told her it didn’t matter. “A minute later she asked me if I loved her. I told her it didn’t mean anything but I don’t think so” (35).

     Throughout the story there is a metamorphosis that is taking place in his home. He has traded places with the family and is now living the life they had previously embelished in. His father begins to work along with his sister and his mother must now work and do the cooking and cleaning. Gregor on the other hand does nothing but daydream, crawl, and nap through his days. One ironic statement from his sister “He must go, if this were Gregor he would have realized long ago human beings can’t live with such a creature, he’d have gone away one his own accord. This creature persecutes us, drives away our lodgers, obviously wants the whole apartment to himself, and would have us all sleep in the gutter.” How selfish of her, had he not taken care of them and he was not the only one working

In Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis, Gregor’s life dramatically changes with the event of his transformation to a bug. His family is not in full acceptance of what has become of him and Gregor begins to lose himself. He had once been the provider for his family and now it is as if his family reproaches him for his inability to take care of them. Gregor wants to again have a role in his family yet recognizes that his family would be better off without him and dies. There are several situations that Gregor experiences that makes him lose all hope. From Maslow’s hierarchy of needs it can be be seen that Gregor loses his humanity including the essential needs to humans such as his safety, his desire to be successful, and his desire for affection from others. The desire to feel love from his family and their rejection is the final event that leads to his depression and at the end to his death.

First lets show how this happened in The Metamorphosis. The lack of sympathy the author had for Gregor was amazing. He went through a change in his life that no one thought would be possible. He went

An Essay on The Metamorphosis The Metamorphosis is a story about a regular man called Gregor Samsa who goes through the grueling challenge each day of going to a job he does not like so he can provide as much as possible for his family. All Gregor’s life consists of is getting up, getting the train to work, making temporary relationships with people and then going back home to do the same thing again the next day. In this story one morning Gregor wakes up to find that he has turned into a beetle and this stops him from completing his daily challenges. Personally I believe that Gregor turning into this beetle is a way of him getting out of the everyday monotony of daily life and it is also showing the rest of his family how much he does for them without complaints.

Ever since the metamorphosis, Gregor’s perception of himself begins to change as his family sees a bug more than their own son. Gregor does nothing but lock himself in his room.

Meursault was introduced as a young man whom recently found out his mother, Maman, died. He was not the most emotional person, but he dealt with his feelings the best he knew how. Meursault lived his life on the verge of truth and honesty. He was honest within every aspect of life, from women to freedom. He was never certain about anything in life ,but one thing he was sure of, death was inevitable. After murdering an Arab, he was on trial in front of many people being interrogated with many questions about why he did what he did, but also to evaluate his psyche about the situation. Unlike others, Meursault did not hide from the truth and that is what others could not cope with. Living his life the way others were afraid to, Meursault was the outcast in his society.

Meursault's character is the determining factor in his conviction and sentencing. His social rebellion is deemed immoral and abominable. The reader and the novel's characters both try to rationalize Meursault's actions in order to give his life meaning. But according to Meursault, life is meaningless and consequently needs no justification.

Gregor?s becoming an insect symbolizes the changes in Kafka?s life from being a slave to his father and doing everything that his father wanted him to do (for instance being a lawyer) to doing nothing at all.  Gregor?s death symbolized that Kafka had failed to communicate with his family.  They thought of him as an insect, and he too thought that he was an insect, because he was looking at himself through their eyes. Through his family?s eyes they saw Gregor as an insect.  He wished that they could love him for his true self, even though he was in the form of an insect.  If Gregor was able to be accepted as a insect, by his family then maybe he would have been able to metamorphosis back into a human.  They could not except him he was different than them and people are afraid of change and someone who is different.  Same thing with Franz, writers were unknown to the Kafka family in a way almost bug like or alien to them.  They could not handle the change.

Richter discusses the main theme of The Metamorhosis as change. He feels that Gregor’s entire family, not just Gregor, undergo a metamorphosis. When Gregor turns into an insect, the life of everyone in his family is deeply changed. Gregor’s family often takes the work that he does for them for granted. Gregor’s father found himself in some trouble with his business and Gregor was forced to help support the family. The unappreciative, lazy family is greatly changed when Gregor undergoes his metamorphosis in the climax of the story. Gregor’s family soon realizes that they all of their lives will be much harder with Gregor as an insect.

Meursault is an independent and absurd guy who refuses to lie about himself to save his life. At the beginning of the book he avoids conversation and showed existentialism. For example, when the caretaker asked him, why he doesn’t want to see his mother’s body, he just simply said “I don’t know”. Another reason is when he would say, “marriage, no marriage, who cares.” Towards the ending of the book he starts to open up. In order for him to realize how wrong he was, he had to suffer the consequences. Meursault states, “For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone; I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate(2.5.165). “Meaning, he finally has awareness and is open-minded about his life.

Understandably, Meursault is a complex character—he is not a true hero nor a true villain,

He has no initial reaction to the news of her death, and at her funeral service he did not bother to even see her before she was buried. His lack of emotion is evident in the very first lines of the book, “Mother died today. Or maybe it was yesterday, I don’t know.” This shows that Meursault is hardly caring for his mother. Society’s standards would result in him to be in absolute mourning and wanting to go as fast as possible to her body. This is not the only example of Meursault’s lack of emotion and care for factors in his life. He does not care for love and marriage after having intercourse with someone; the society standard at this time was to get married if two partners had intercourse. He does not care for promotion and career advancement when his boss offers him a better job opportunity; the standard at that time and right now is to pursue the best career possible. In these scenarios Meursault is living free from the chains, and does whatever he thinks is right to do. Eventually, society rejects him and his ways, and he gets in trouble with the law. He is judged by society and his ways are ridiculed, making Meursault appear to be a monster.

Kafka’s Metamorphosis suggests to his readers to take a glimpse inside a dysfunctional atmosphere triggered from a painful childhood, to see how influential each member of the family contributes to the dynamics, but also to learn how to make light of the situation with acceptance. Kafka is reflecting on his own relationship with his family in Metamorphosis. He sees himself in Gregor, or is he him.