F. Kafka, "Transformation": a summary, analysis, feedback

Vladimir Nabokov in his critical article "The Transformation of Franz Kafka" noted: "If the" Transformation "of Kafka seems to be something more than an entomological fantasy, I congratulate him on the fact that he joined the ranks of good and excellent readers" . This work, of course, deserves its status as one of the greatest literary creations and represents an example of the author's amazing imagination.

The book (Franz Kafka, "Transformation") narrates about one person, Gregor Zamz, who wakes up one morning and suddenly realizes that he has turned into a huge insect.

The instant and inexplicable transformation of Gregor, as well as the mixture of everyday and fantastic elements make this dream-like story surprisingly plausible.

Criticism

Published in 1912, the work caused conflicting reviews of critics. Readers noted that "Transformation" is one of the few works that Kafka sought to publish. After the death of the writer, interest in the story was very high. Critics wrote a lot about the thematic content of the work, some noted the realism of the novel, contrasting with the completely fantastic plot of Gregor's transformation into an insect. Stanley Korngold noticed that not a single reading does not exclude one-sidedness, but each time one wants to study the huge amount of criticism devoted to this work in order to better understand it.

Some researchers believe that the novel "Transformation" (Franz Kafka), the analysis of which is offered to your attention, expresses the feeling of alienation experienced by the author at the time.

He was not only a German living in the Czech capital Prague, but also a Jew during a cruel period of anti-Semitism. Kafka also felt pressure from his father, who wanted him to follow in his footsteps and become a businessman. This strange transformation into an insect is often seen as the result of the author's own feelings of isolation and inferiority. In this story, you can also see the allegory of genocide, in particular the Holocaust. While the writer himself died in 1924, when the main events of the Holocaust had not yet begun, many members of the Kafka family subsequently suffered from it.

Other critics find in the work references to the works of Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, considering "Transformation" as a simplified figurative interpretation of their complex philosophical ideas. Gregor's conflict with his father and this dream-like story are often compared from the point of view of the dream theory of Freud and the Oedipus complex. From the standpoint of Marxism, Gregor's inability to work is seen as a protest against cruel and inhuman labor in capitalist society and its destructive consequences for the individual. Some regard the terrible shell of the hero as Gregor's categorical refusal to obey the values and demands of society, like the Nietzschean superman.

F. Kafka, "Transformation": a summary

One morning, Gregor wakes up and finds himself in the guise of a monstrous insect.

Trying to learn how to manage his new body, he spends a lot of time and realizes that he was late for work (Gregor works as a traveling salesman). Trying to get him out of bed, first his mother knocks on the door, then father and sister.

Visit of the chief

Head Gregor comes from the office to find out the reasons for his absence from work. While the parents are talking to the boss, and the sister is crying in the next room, Gregor sneaks to the door of his bedroom, opens it and appears before them, shocking everyone with his new appearance. The hero's mother faints, and the chief runs out of the apartment in horror.

The father grabs the newspaper and the leader's cane and tries to catch Gregor, running after him around the living room. The hero eventually manages to reach the doors of his bedroom, but he sticks in the doorway. Father pushes Gregor into the room and closes the door behind him.

What did he portray further in the story "Transformation" Franz Kafka? Summary of the following events.

Confused and shocked by the terrible new appearance, Gregor and his family are gradually sinking into everyday affairs and worries. So weeks and months pass by. While the protagonist learns about the possibilities of his new body and his new addiction to rotten foods, Greta, his sister, takes care of the brother - feeds him twice a day and cleans the room.

Rearrangement of furniture

Once Greta discovers that Gregor likes to creep around the room, including walls and ceiling. She tells this to her mother, and they decide to take the furniture out of his bedroom to give Gregor more space. If before the hero always hid, when someone entered the room, this time in an attempt to prevent the idea of his relatives, he climbs onto the picture hanging on the wall.

When the women enter the bedroom, the mother sees Gregor and faints. Greta runs into the living room to bring her medicine, and our hero follows his sister, trying to help. When the girl turns around, she sees Gregor and flies back into the room in fright. Worried, he rushes around the living room until, in exhaustion, he falls on the table in the center of the room.

Wound

After a while, the father returns home. Greta tells him about what happened. The father in a fury pursues Gregor in the living room and throws apples at him. One of them falls into the back of the hero, paralyzing him. Suddenly, the mother runs out of the bedroom and begs her father to spare Gregor.

In order to heal the wound, the hero took a month. The door to Gregor's room remains open in the evenings, and he can observe the usual evening activities of the family. While the father is dozing in his work clothes, the banker, the mother sews the underwear, and Greta learns shorthand and French. The family hires a new cleaner, an old widow who often talks to Gregor. Parents decide to take three lodgers with them to somehow make ends meet.

Death

One night, residents invite Greta to play the violin in their room. Gregor is delighted with the game crawls right into the middle of the room, inadvertently catching the eyes of the audience. Coming first into confusion, and then into horror, the tenants announce that they intend to move out of here the next day without paying rent. After they are removed, the family discusses what to do next. Greta insists that Gregor needs to be rid of at any cost. Our hero, who at that moment is still in the center of the room, returns to his bedroom. Hungry, tired and frustrated, he dies early in the morning the next day.

A few hours later, the cleaning lady discovers Gregor's corpse and announces his death to the family. After the departure of the tenants, the family decides to take a day off and go to the village. Thus ends the story "Transformation" Franz Kafka. You just read the summary of it.

Genre - magical realism, modernism

This work, published in 1915, in 1912 wrote Franz Kafka. "Transformation," the summary of which you just read, refers to the genre of modernist literature. The fate of Gregor, a lonely traveling salesman, expresses a common modernist concern about the effect of alienation that appears in modern society. As in other works of this genre, the "flow of consciousness" technique is used here to depict the complex psychology of the protagonist. The story "Transformation" is a book (Kafka F.), which is also referred to modern magical realism with its comparison of fantastic incidents with reality.

Time and place

It is impossible to say exactly where and when the events of the story take place (Kafka, "Transformation"). The summary does not give an answer to the question of the exact time and place of action, nor does the product itself. The narrative does not indicate a certain geographical position and a specific date. With the exception of the final scene, when Zamzas go out of town, all action takes place in their apartment. This apartment overlooks the busy streets of the city and the hospital across the road, located near the bedroom window of Gregor. Apparently, the apartment is in the center of the city. She herself is rather modest.

Clamped between the parents' rooms and Greta, Gregor's room adjoins the living room. Restricting the space to lead an apartment, the author emphasizes the isolation of the protagonist, his alienation from society.

Gregor's character: analysis. ("Transformation", Kafka)

Let's look at two ordinary young people. None of them stand out with a special mind, beauty or wealth. You can even say that they are somewhat cowardly. Here they both once wake up and suddenly realize that they possess the abilities of insects ...

One of them becomes a superhero (Spider-Man). Wins the bad guys. Conquer the girl. Easily climbs the skyscrapers in his signature suit, causing admiration of others.

What else, Gregor Zamza, about which the story tells (F. Kafka, "Transformation"), the brief content of which you just read? He remains immured in the room and eats garbage. His family ignores Gregor, if not openly hostile. Dirty, in garbage and scraps, he dies of loneliness. That's how the hero of the story "Transformation" (Kafka) ends his life ingloriously. Reviews this story is very ambiguous ...

Gregor's transformation is so involuntary and grotesque that one involuntarily wants to turn to the past when trying to answer the question about what led to the fact that an ordinary guy had ended his life ingloriously by experiencing such a transformation. Kafka, reviews of the works of which have always been very ambiguous, and this time does not give a clear answer about the reasons for such a sharp turn of events in the life of his hero, leaving critics a wide scope for hypotheses. Unloved work, the need to support a family, dissatisfaction in personal life - all this, of course, is very unpleasant, but not enough to call such a situation unbearable. Ordinary problems of an ordinary person, are not they? Even Gregor's attitude toward his transformation confirms this. Instead of thinking about his new position, the hero is concerned not to be late for work. This is specially emphasized by Franz Kafka ("Transformation"). The summary of the work is given above.

New opportunities

But ironically, Gregor's mediocrity, which manifests itself in relation to this situation, does not prevent him from discovering some of the abilities of his new body. The fantastic situation, which has become for him a new reality, prompts Gregor to reflect on his existence as he would never have thought, being involved in the routine of everyday affairs.

Of course, at first this position does not cause him anything but disgust, but gradually, mastering new skills and skills, the hero begins to experience pleasure, joy, even the experience of a contemplative emptiness, referring to the philosophy of Zen. Even when Gregor is tormented by anxiety, the natural impulses of the insect's body bring him some relief. Before he dies, he feels love for his family. Now the hero is completely different from what he was before - an unsatisfied business traveler, as we see Gregor at the beginning of history. Despite the external pathetic condition, he seems more humane and humane than the other heroes of the story.

The final

We will not, however, embellish his fate. The story of "Transformation" Kafka ends up in the fact that Gregor dies in the guise of an insect, covered with garbage. He was not even buried properly. The dismal fate of the hero, her analysis ("The transformation" Kafka wrote in such a way that any reader involuntarily thinks about Gregor's fate) discovers both the advantages of unusual life and deprivation that those who are different from others should endure and for whatever reasons must abandon From a full life in society.