ANALYSIS OF

“METAMORPHOSIS”
Language & Literature

NOVEMBER 28, 2020

MOSTAFA MOHAMED ALSERAFY
Green Land International School
Having family responsibilities and concerns just has to make you a more understanding person.

Family responsibilities are crucial specially if you are the person that controls or lead your

family, and that makes the hole responsibility on this person. Controlling and have the full

responsibility is something hard to have that needs to have self-management skills and that is

what differentiates between a family and a family; from its host. The theme of family

responsibility is shown in the novel “Metamorphosis” as that the major character Gregor Samsa

immediately thinks of his job after his transformation how he would come out of this situation

and return back to his work. This is a sense of realization that his hard-earned money is running

his home where his entire family is living. Even when he has passed many days in that state, he

carefully listens to the conversation of his family and thinks solutions in his mind as a bug. After

Gregor's transformation, he becomes entirely reliant on his family, in the way that they, before

his transformation, his family relied on his wages and didn’t have any other source to get money

from, the only source they actually used is Gregor’s wage. Gregor had feelings for his family

before himself and that indicates and shows more the theme of having true family responsibility.

Gregor cared about his family and were are they going to have money from even before thinking

and putting solutions after he transformed, and although as his job as a salesman supports the

family financially, and Gregor takes his role seriously. He often sacrifices so his family can be

comfortable, although he does sometimes feel slighted (meaning he doesn't think his family

appreciates him enough).

In the novel metamorphosis the theme “family responsibility” is shown and highlighted, “You

amaze me, you amaze me. I thought you were a quiet, dependable person, and now all at once

you seem bent on making a disgraceful exhibition of yourself”. Family responsibility is shown in

another quote also by Gregor Samsa “The chief clerk must be detained, soothed, persuaded and
finally won over; the whole future of Gregor and his family depended on it!" These quotes show

the theme carefully (Family responsibility). Unfortunately, after his transformation, every

member of the Samsa family abandons Gregor, wanting him to simply disappear. They are

disgusted by his appearance, and there is a sense that they somehow feel betrayed by his

misfortune. In the end, he sacrifices himself once again for their needs. His lack of freedom to

act, as well as his family's growing frustrations toward him, are factors that play into his

listlessness and eventual death. Gregor's father may bear the major responsibility for his death

because of injuring him with the apple, but no one in the family is blameless. At the story's end,

Grete, the mother and father feel happier and freer once they no longer have to worry about

Gregor.

The uniform the father wears for his job symbolizes the father’s dignity, as well as Gregor

Samsa’s shifting feelings of pity and respect for him. Throughout the story, we see the father

primarily from Gregor’s point of view. We learn about the failure of the father’s business, for

example, from Gregor’s thoughts as he overhears the father explaining the family’s financial

situation, and through Gregor we gain a picture of the father as a shiftless and depressed man

whom Gregor appears to feel sorry for but not necessarily respect. Mr. Samsa's uniform, with

polished, gleaming gold buttons, symbolizes the self-respect he experiences when he returns to

work and supports his family by his own means. Before Gregor's transformation he had rarely

left the apartment, changed out of his dressing gown, or combed his hair. However, once forced

to return to work instead of relying on his son, he seems impressed by his new role as provider.

Mr. Samsa’s uniform was the main symbol that symbolized the theme of (Family Responsibility)

because Mr. Samsa’s uniform shows how work for Gregor needs back his work and how much
he is worried and really anxious about what he is going to do, and also is that the main

independence from Gregor’s family is that they are relying on Gregor’s wage.

The irony in The Metamorphosis starts right away. As a reader, you don't expect your book to

begin with a character transforming into a giant beetle overnight, with no explanation given. Yet

this is exactly what happens. The first line of the story is, ''One morning, when Gregor Samsa

woke from troubled dreams, he found himself transformed in his bed into horrible vermin.'' We

are never told how he got that way. Actually, Gregor himself doesn't seem to care why. His

reaction to the transformation is ironic as well. You would expect a character to be upset, or at

the very least wide awake from shock. Yet Gregor thinks to himself, ''How about if I sleep a little

bit longer and forget all this nonsense.'' This reaction certainly subverts expectations. On the

other hand, Gregor's family is utterly horrified, and this leads to another piece of situational

irony. His family and the clerk from his job are continuously trying to get him to open his locked

bedroom door before they realize what has happened. " The chief clerk needs to talk to you

directly,' Gregor's father tells him. So, open this door, please." This is one of his family's many

requests.

Franza Kafka basically shows his audience and readers an insight into what kind of a relationship

he had with his father in The Metamorphosis but also gives us an account of a young man that

ultimately sacrifices every part of who he is for the wellbeing of others. Franza Kafka didn’t only

give symbolisms in the novel (Metamorphosis), he actually made symbolisms and connected his

symbols to themes. Kafka connected and use these methods to entertain his audience and readers

and to teach how to connect symbols with themes, and that really helped him in transferring

meanings or ideas to his audience.