Friday, November 29, 2013

Metamorphisis Response



“Metamorphosis” is quite disturbing when one pauses to think about the novella. Gregor, a travelling salesman supporting his family by being the only source of income, simply wakes up one morning as a giant, man-sized cockroach. It all goes downhill from there. I found myself with a distinct dislike for his family and their mistreatment of Gregor, not because they fear him as a big bug, but because they are resentful that they need to work. The selfishness of his family and their mistreatment of him simply grew worse and worse, until they forgot about him and moved on with their lives, leaving Gregor to die from a rotten apple lodged in his back.

This story makes one question one big thing: Why does Gregor never question his being a roach? 

There is a possibly that this is an allusion to the treatment of the mentality handicapped. After all, if Gregor dissolved from a functioning member of society into a socially maladaptive individual incapable of taking care of himself or his family, then it explains his own acceptance of the situation. He is not really a bug. He simply thinks himself a bug or his being a bug is symbolic of what he family sees. A handicapped grown man who used to be industrious is someone who his family could resent, or see as vermin. And his degradation and abandonment and later death is all accepted by the family as the only reasonable end for a man they could no longer recognize.

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