Thoughts while reading Kafka’s Metamorphosis
Change is the only constant. But what if that change is unwarranted; water poured over a burning bonfire.
I recently happen to read Franz Kafka's “Metamorphosis” and it dawned upon me that there might come a time when I would change — I speak not only of the physical change that we undergo every moment but also something mental.
In Kafka’s story, the protagonist Gregor Samsa has transformed into some unknown creature. At one point in the narrative, it was a spider then was called a dung beetle and later gave the impression of a fly. Whatever Samsa was; it was clear he woke up as a creature belonging to the class Arthropoda. Disliked, dreadful and dishevelled.
Not that the idea of an insect looks hideous or grotesque but emanates a sense of greed, wanting to plunder and possessing that naive animal instinct to dominate. And that is how a utilitarian society looks at its minority (religious, sexual…). At some micro level, we all are those disliked, dreadful and dishevelled creatures, a minuscule minority of one.
Also, as I read this work of Kafka, Gregor changes the volume he occupies or at least that’s how his mental images are pictured in my mind. The creature starts as similar if not bigger than a man and progressively grows smaller. Is Kafka hinting at the progression of age — the number you must’s ask a woman and the number at which I shudder every time a form is duly filled?
Whatever Kafka might have meant, Gregor’s image in my head always evoked a sense of sadness and helplessness. It was unstated but it was accepted as Gregor’s fate to never be a man again. Is that what approaching old age feels like? You make peace with death and wait for that fateful day to arrive when the atheist’s question of a creator’s existence is answered. It’s discomforting.
As I flipped the pages, even though the words don’t shout at me; the mental images churned my gut. I felt like Gregor, undergoing a metamorphosis; looking at the mirror of my reality, helplessly watching those dreams puff out… And the bubble bursts.
My fingers then flipped the pages in a fastened agony and I saw the aspirations and desires fading into the abyss, dark clouds gathering and the thunder sounding the coming of an unwarranted change. It was not old age but something dark with no form: Death. What added to this Beelzebub of a though is the realization that someday life will be back to the primitive stage with a foggy memory of the past and the degrading mental ability.
The exasperating point is reached when everyone around forgets you, you are no longer there; invisible and not invincible. Then it occurred to me that was Gregor already dead? and the cause of his death was some unknown creature, the insect. Was the insect a representation of a totalitarian regime or a pandemic? And Kafka is telling this story via Gregor’s ghost, who takes varied forms or has been reincarnated in those various forms. What we are told is what Gregor’s soul assumes it would be like or are we witnessing his dying moments where there is the flash of life?
Whatever it is, it was jolting, unnerving and I was anxious. As I reached the last page, I relived a sigh but it was still gloomy. The metamorphosis had taken place. Samsa was now his sister. Not the same but certainly the one. I closed the book, with a series of questions lingering in my mind, a foggy memory of what I had read, still shaken by the abruptness. I was taken into Kafka’s world and back.