The Theme of Freedom in Kafkas Metamorphosis Essay -- Kafka Metamorph

The Theme of Freedom in Kafkas MetamorphosisOne of Franz Kafkas most well-known and most often criticized industrial plant is the short story, kick downstairs Verwandlung, or The Metamorphosis. The Metamorphosis is most unusual in that the first sentence is the climax the rest of the story is mainly falling action (Greenburg 273). The reader learns that Gregor Samsa, the storys main character, has been turned into an enormous insect. Despite this fact, Gregor continues to act and think like any normal human would, which makes the beginning of the story both tragic and comical at the same time. However, one cannot help except wonder why Gregor has undergone this hideous transformation, and what purpose it could possibly serve in the story. Upon examination, it seems that Gregors metamorphosis represents both his freedom from maintaining his blameless financial stability and his familys freedom from their dependence upon Gregor.Long before the story takes place, Gregor Samsas fath er had a business failure that left him deep in debt. His son, Gregor, works as a commercial traveler for the company to whom he owes money in effect, Gregor is slowly working off his fathers debt. Gregor is not happy with his job, which Greenburg calls degrading and soul-destroying, but believes that his familys existence depends upon him sacrificing himself by working at this meaningless... job, and so he continues (274). Heinz Politzer goes far enough to say that Gregor is a slave to his boss (276), which would imply that there is no escape for Gregor- at least, no conventional escape.However, Gregor does escape from his life of indentured servancy- by becoming a giant insect. Walter H. Sokel explains the effect of the metamorphosis on his occupat... ...om House, 1963Greenberg, Martin . The consternation of Art Kafka and Modern Literature. New York Basic Books, 1968.Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis and Other Stories. 1st ed. Translated by Stanley Appelbaum. New York Dover Public ations, 1996.Parry, Idris, The Talk of Guilty Men (1981), in Parry, Speak Silence. Essays, Manchester 1988.Politzer, Heinz, Franz Kafka parable and Paradox, Ithaca N.Y. 1962 Sokel, Walter H. The Writer in Extremis, Expressionism in Twentieth-Century German Literature. 1st ed. California Stanford University Press, 1969. Works ConsultedPawel, Ernst. A Nightmare of Reason A Life of Franz Kafka. 2nd ed. New York Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, 1984. Suchoff, David. scathing Theory and the Novel Mass Society and Cultural Criticism in Dickens, Melville and Kafka. 5th ed. Wisconsin University of Wisconsin Press, 1994.