Gregor Samsa Symbolizes Change in Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka

Gregor’s major transformation occurred not when he turned into a bug, but through the changes in his life. Gregor’s life before the changed into some sort of bug was like a bumble bee. He would go through life doing as others told him. In

     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

Now since Gregor is an insect, he is physically incapable of going to work. Gregor’s physical isolation from the outside world speaks to his general alienation from modern society. Despite the fact that he has finally been granted his wish, Gregor is overwhelmed with feelings of guilt and shame at being a parasite to his family. Before he encounters anybody, Gregor still clings to the hope that he’s part of “human society,” and thus can be helped or cured by other human beings:

Turning the character into a giant, monstrous insect helps the author demonstrate the situation in which a person becomes absolutely vulnerable, helpless and pathetic. At that very moment of Gregor’s new form the attitude of the family becomes absolutely clear and transparent: everyone feels ashamed and diverted from the personality of Gregor. Betrayal of his mother and his sister is nowhere near what Gregor would have ever imagined. His relationship with his father was rocky. He never expected the mishap to become so realistic and his lift to be so heartbreaking. So the main

Gregor was betrayed by society turning its back on him due to the transformation from human to a human-sized bug. After the metamorphosis, Gregor was pondering the idea of what people would think of him in his new form. He had high hopes that society would still accept him. "A man might find for a moment that he was unable to work, but that's exactly the right time to remember his past accomplishments and to consider that later on, when the obstacle has been removed, he's

Isolation not only changes the personalities of Gregor and his family, but also it changes the role and duties Gregor plays in his family. Before the metamorphosis, Gregor worked alone to provide for the entire family. For example, in the beginning, before the transformation, he says, “But besides that, the money Gregor had brought home every month he had kept only a few dollars for himself” (4). This shows Gregor’s selfishness and his family’s heavy dependency on his income. It establishes the fact that Gregor’s family’s loyalty to Gregor was strong because the family depended on Gregor for their own survival, and shows how they betrayed him by disregarding him after he became an insect. The isolation of Gregor caused by the transformation not only affects Gregor’s role in the family, but also changes the role of Mr. Samsa. Mr. Samsa originally told by Gregor: ”Now his father was still healthy, certainly. But he was an old man who had not worked for the past five years and who in any case could not be expected to undertake that much” (17). This shows how irresponsible Mr. Samsa acted for his family in the beginning. Mr. Samsa, a man in his 50s, blamed his unemployment on anxiety and depression from a past failed business. Mr. Samsa changes his role as the useless drag to the provider of the family, and even obtains a new job as a bank manager.

Many people have sometimes found themselves in some really terrifying situations, only to wake up shortly after and realize that they were dreaming. In “The Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka, the main character Gregor Samsa is a traveling salesman who had devoted his life to taking care of his mother, father, and sister. That is, however, until he woke up one morning and found himself transformed into an insect. At that point, he became useless to his family and had to come to terms with his new identity as a bug. This, of course, was a totally different life to have then the one he previously held. Identity is an issue that most people encounter at some time or another, so the “metamorphosis” is somewhat a day-to-day occurrence for these individuals.

The deterioration of Gregor's life was in part due to the ostracism associated with his being turned into a bug. Once his family found out what happened, they banished him to his room, and his parents could not even bear to look at him. Prior to his metamorphosis, Gregor was an integral part of the family. He provided the money by which the family survived. Yet as soon as he changed, he was labeled an outcast, who was useless to the family, and therefore not paid any attention. He felt this ostracism, and it made him not want to continue on in life, he gave up because he felt unloved.

The most significant consequence of Gregor's transformation is not his insect form, but actually his loss of language; without language, Gregor loses the power to express who he is and control his own life. http://www.shmoop.com/metamorphosis.

One of the reasons Gregor morphed into a bug is so the family could go undergo their own transformation instead of always relying on Gregor. The transformation was more of wakeup call for the family so they could realize that they shouldn’t put all the financial burden him and that they should share the responsibility for the debt and income. Another reason why Gregor turned into a bug is because bugs are mostly considered insignificant and little and most of Gregor life he was just someone that the family looked up to for money reasons and he never got to enjoy his life or even do normal things such as relationships. Immediately, he’s concerned about how’s going to get to work “I’ve got to get up, my train leaves at five” (Page 8) and isn’t worrying about his health which shows how worried is about his job because he knows that income is going straight to his family

Prior to the metamorphosis Gregor led a physically isolating life with little time for anything other than superficial relationships. Hinted at the beginning of the piece he longed to break free from his traveling salesman's job and shrug off the financial burden placed on his back. The metamorphosis was equally as mentally imprisoning as to what it was physically. Gregor was unable to express his emotions or even communicate his needs to his family this ultimately led to the family’s gradual shift of resentment towards him solely because they were unable to see how much of their once family member remained.

Firstly, The Metamorphosis was published in 1915, a time where society judges one another. After Gregor’s transformation into an insect his family was unable to accept who he really is and as a result, they locked him in his room and also quarantine it. Gregor’s family discarded him because they fear that someone will find out about their son and with that society will shun them because they’re different. Gregor, of course did not plan on transforming

Change plays a major role in one's life. It is what makes one’s life unique and different. In the novel, The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, Gregor Samsa, the protagonist, initially appears as a respectful young man working as a traveling salesman to pay off his family debts and provide for his family. But then Gregor goes through a transformation that turns him into a gigantic insect. Even though Gregor’s sister, father, and mother undergo many changes, the most significant transformation that occurs in the story is the change in Gregor, from an ordinary working man to a gigantic insect. This initial transformation becomes only the first impulse, which causes a lot of changes in his external and internal world along with forcing him to adapt to his new position in the family.

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka is a novella that begins with an absurd concept. A man wakes up one morning to find himself transformed into a giant insect. While this concept for a story is certainly absurd, Kafka contrasts this plot with a rather dull, plain narrative. It may initially seem novel to explain a ridiculous situation in a simple manner, but this causes the novella to be quite boring.

Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis is a masterfully written novella about Gregor Samsa, a man who devotes his life to his family and work, for nothing in return. Only when he is transformed into a helpless beetle does he begin to develop a self-identity and understand the relationships around him. The underlying theme of The Metamorphosis is an existential one that says that any given choice will govern the later course of a person’s life and that a person has ultimate will over making choices. In this case, Gregor’s choices of his part in society cause him to have a lack of identity that has made him to be numb to everything around him.