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Nicole Davis

Mrs. Carter

English III/ 2 Blue

04-20-09

Metamorphosis Comparative Paper

The Metamorphosis is a novel written in 1912 by Franz Kafka. This novel was

originally written in German and translated into other languages. This novel is a perfect

parallel to Kafka’s life through the main character, Gregor Samsa. Just in the beginning

of this novel, there are already many comparisons between the lives of the men and how

Gregor is a mirror image of Kafka.

Just one simple comparison between Gregor and Kafka are their last names and

the way Gregor feels when he wakes in the beginning of the novel. Gregor’s last named

is Samsa and Franz’s last name is Kafka. The similarities are; the a’s are in the same spot

in both names and both k’s in Kafka are replaced by s’s. That is a very minor comparison

between the two men, but can still lead to another clue that they both share the same

lives.

In the beginning of The Metamorphosis, Gregor wakes up “from unsettling

dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin.” (Kafka 3). He is

no longer in his comfortable human body, but transformed into a vermin. This disturbing

and uncomfortable situation describes how Kafka felt before he started writing the novel,

and how he compares himself (Kafka) to his father. Kafka wrote a letter to his Jewish

fiancé, Felice Bauer, describing how he felt right before he began to write The

Metamorphosis. He says in the letter “I was simply too miserable to get out of bed. It
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also seemed to me that last night my novel got much worse, and I lay in the lowest

depths… I'll write you again today, even though I still have to run around a lot and shall

write down a short story that occurred to me during my misery in bed and oppresses me

with inmost intensity.” (Corngold 64). In this letter to Felice, Kafka informs her that he

had a miserable morning and that morning inspired him to write this novel.

In the beginning of the novel Gregor can’t get out of bed and he thought, “how

simple everything would be if he could get some help. Two strong persons—he thought

of his father and the maid…” (Kafka 7). Kafka’s father was a very strong and

intimidating man, but on the other hand, Kafka was sensitive and “weak”. Kafka was

constantly afraid of his father and he portrays this feeling in the novel as well. Gregor

questions himself, “should he really call for help? In spite of all his miseries, he could not

repress a smile at this thought.” (Kafka 7). Even Gregor himself is questioning whether

he really needs his father to be there, he smiles at the stupidity of even thinking he needed

his father’s help. Gregor and Kafka both dislike their fathers and don’t want them

involved in their lives or situations, even if they need their help. Gregor also mentions

that his father was strong and this also relates to Kafka’s father.

Also in the beginning of the novel, Kafka mentions a framed page of a magazine

with “a lady done up in a fur hat and a fur boa, sitting upright and raising up against the

viewer a heavy fur muff in which her whole forearm had disappeared.” (Kafka 3). This

decoration was a pornographic picture that, while his sister and mother were moving out

his furniture, he covered up the frame with his vermin-like body in order to save the

picture from being removed. “He squatted on this picture and would not give it up.”

(Kafka 26), this strong sexual obsession that Gregor has compares to Kafka’s
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relationships with women. Kafka had trouble with love, but he had previously been

engaged twice before. Kafka did have an existing relationship with woman, but as with

the picture, it was not very close, as though there was a piece of glass between the couple.

He was never able to love completely and broke off most of his relationships due to his

lack of self-confidence.

Franz Kafka expressed and mirrored his life and feelings through the

transformation of Gregor Samsa. These two men both saw their lives through the same

spectacle, but only one really existed.


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Works Cited:

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Trans. and Ed. Corngold, Stanley. New York: Norton,

1996. Pgs. 3-74.

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