Hi,
Anyone have recommendations for reading on the idea of health and vitality/youth as manifestations of evil, or the relation of health/strength with evil?
Reason I’m asking is that ending scene in Kafka Metamorphosis where the sister stretches her "healthy young” body has very sinister undertones (was just reading it) and want to think more about this and see what ppl have said,
thanks

Недавно купил книгу,гуляя с подругой и прочитал ее за 4-5 дней и хочу поделиться с мыслями насчет коротенького,мрачного рассказа Кафки

#Spoiler Alert#

( I used to read novels as a kid, but did not continue my habit of reading. After a long time I wanted to return to read so I purchased some books this week, one of them was this one. I just finished reading it and here are my thoughts. )

Gregor Samsa was killed. Everyone was relieved at last. Because it does not matter the fact that his father after getting his whole life to work, made some very big mistakes that lead to an enormous amount of debt, but got excused for having a son like Gregor Samsa, so he did not need work anymore. But on the other hand, Gregor who just stepped into his youth, had to work to pay off his father's debt. And he did, for five years he worked his ass off and he did pretty well. He did not care about himself, rather he paid his family's daily needs, reduced his father's debt, and planned to send Grete (his sister) for a good music school. Seems like he tried and did very well, that nobody needed to work in the family except him.

But when he got transformed into a vermin (which is a metaphor, I think), they trapped him inside his room for months, did not try to know why it happened, nor tried to get help even though the hospital was across the street, they just locked him inside so that nobody gets to know about the situation. For them what would other people think was more important than their son/brother's condition.

His father treated him like an animal, his mother fainted (almost) every time she looked at him and Grete, his sister, although fed him, cleaned his room from the start was the one who talked about getting rid of him. Gregor Samsa did his best to serve his family, even so that the other three of them combined could not match his earnings. He did not deserve the treatment he got; they left him to die 'cause he wasn't useful anymore. If anyone except him was turned into a Vermin in his place, then I think he would give his 100% to do something for help. But unfortunately it was him, so his family's ignorance got him killed at last.

The metamorphosis shows how people are measured by what they bring to the table rather than as a human being or even as a family member. It also shows the dark side of capitalism by the tense nature of Gregor when he was being late for work , Capitalism dehumanises us .

For me, the most disturbing part was when his sister started crying out loud and saying,
'That thing is not my brother and we should get rid of him, and also when his father said, 'If only he could understand us in this situation, even though Gregor wanted his family to understand him(Irony)but they refused to value him now that he was of no use.

I'm a (long-graduated) English Lit major and I was a huge Kafka nerd and did one of my independent studies on Kafka. He was the author that got me into "serious" literature as a teen, opening my world beyond the purely escapist lit I'd been reading up to that point and helping me realize that classic literary authors could actually be really interesting and weird and worthwhile.

I suspect my own introduction was not an unusual one, as it was The Metamorphosis, still one of my favorite novellas of all time easily, in fact one of my favorite books of all time period. As Kafka said, "literature should be an ax to the frozen sea inside us," and that's exactly what The Metamorphosis was for me.

I would go on to develop a deep love for The Castle, and many of his short stories (for some reason I particularly love Blumfeld, an Elderly Bachelor) while also reading Amerika, The Blue Octavio Notebooks, much of his Diaries, and his biography by Max Brod. Oddly, I never did read The Trial, I was kind of "saving" it for last, but never ended up getting around to it—I figure it'll be a fun one to tackle soon now that I'm a bit later into life. I was always fascinated by his proclivity for leaving stories unfinished. I sort of love that The Castle does not end, but simply stops, which calls to mind another great quote attributed to Kafka, "The meaning of life is that is stops."

Anyway, just curious about how and when some of you other Kafka fans reading this got your start into his weird world, and maybe what it was that "clicked" for you about him. Thanks!

Heard Janice STFU in the car and as soon as I heard “so long since youve messaged me” i had to… since people are always posting fake quotes here’s something kinda funny 🤷🏾

One of the most common interpretation of the story is that it is a portrayal of how a person's status depends on his "value": his "usefulness" for other people. It is a fair interpretation, of course, but I want to share my thoughts on this.

Although it is apparent that Gregor's family's economic condition after his transformation is what drives the overall plot, I think there's one aspect that is really to not be understated, and that is the inability of communication between Gregor and the rest of the family. I think this somewhat mirrors the condition of an ill/bedridden member of a family.

When one family member becomes sick and bedridden, there is an emotional barrier for social interactions between the rest of the family and the ill-person. Although not as extreme as having to interact with a vermin, interactions with an ill-person will soon become a chore that is not always pleasant (feeding, cleaning, helping with meds, helping with pain). This "unpleasantness" is rarely expressed to protect the feelings of the ill-person, but overtime, it will pile up into disinterest of interacting with the ill-person any more than what is necessary.

There is also a literal physical barrier. A bedridden person is situated in one room while the rest of the family does their activity anywhere else. This makes it so that 1) Interacting with the ill-person will be inconvenient (you can't wait for them to pass by the kitchen) and it is easier to assume what they need instead of to ask and 2) the ill-person uses all of their senses to interact with the outside world (voices from behind the walls, the lights between the door cracks, footsteps, etc).

I find that these barriers are mirrored with Gregor's condition. They can't talk to each other. They can't eat on the same table. Gregor can only assume the family's actions through the sounds from behind the walls. The only time they ever interact is when Gregor's sister feeds him. He can only watch as the family eats their dinner and his sister plays the violin for the three guests.

Reading The Metamorphosis through this lens helps me understand about the dynamics of my own family, and families in general. As a kid, I used to think that the hall between my grandma's room and the living room is what separates us. I just hadn't find a way to express it. Kafka made me found a way to express it.

It's been awhile since I read The Metamorphosis so this isn't a detailed breakdown. And I'm not sure if this is more about me sharing my experiences or about interpreting Kafka's writing, but I think it kinda overlaps with this one. Interpreting a story is always a little about seeing it through your own perspective.

Anyway, that's all from me.

Has anybody else notifed similarities between Edgar Allen Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum" and "Murders in La Rue Morgue" and Kafka's "In the Penal Colony" and "A Report to the Academy" respectively? Both of the first set involve an abstract and bizarre form of punishment and the second an intelligent ape "mimicking human behavior". I love both these authors and from googling i know kafka read at least some of poe. Do you think these stories were inspired by the ones of Poe listed above or were his take/expansion on them?

I’m recently reading The Trial and was wondering how the house in which Josef K. lives can be seen and made a sketch.
Since I’m reading in German I wasn’t sure about the name of K.’s neighbour.

Am I the only think of this?

I recently reread *The Metamorphosis* and tried to develop a specific interpretation of it. Here’s my take:

Human relationships that last do not primarily rest on affection, blood ties, or moral duty, but on the value that each individual brings to the relationship. This value — whether economic, emotional, or social — determines both the nature of the bond and the role each person plays in it. As soon as the nature or intensity of that value changes, the relationship itself is transformed.

Gregor Samsa is the perfect illustration of this mechanism. Before his metamorphosis, he is the family’s provider: he brings economic support and stability. This value is what gives him his central place and maintains the family balance. After his transformation, no longer able to provide the same value, the relationship metamorphoses as well. Gregor ceases to be a son and a brother and becomes a burden, an object of shame, and finally of indifference. The way he is described evolves in parallel with the value he represents.

What makes this particularly striking is how deeply it is rooted in the Kafkaesque absurd. Gregor’s transformation into an insect is never explained: it happens without cause, without justification, without meaning. And it is precisely this absence of meaning that reveals the cruel truth about human relationships. The absurd does not only lie in waking up one morning as vermin; it lies in the realization that family love, which we believed to be unconditional, collapses with the same cold indifference the moment an individual is no longer “useful.” Kafka offers no metaphysical consolation: the world keeps turning, the family adapts, and Gregor dies in indifference. Here, the absurd is not an abstract idea — it is the concrete experience of discovering that even the most intimate bonds rest on a calculation of value, and that this calculation can collapse without reason.

Kafka shows us that this phenomenon is not extraordinary. In everyday life, we constantly observe that the intensity and quality of our relationships vary in proportion to the value we invest in them or that others attribute to us. Love, loyalty, or family solidarity often turn out to be conditional: they last only as long as the economy of value remains balanced. When that balance is broken, the masks fall.

So *The Metamorphosis* is not merely the story of an absurd physical transformation; it is a relentless meditation on the fragility of human relationships and on the deeply utilitarian nature of what we sometimes naively call love.

What do you think? Is this reading too utilitarian, or does Kafka really push this logic to its limit?

Published as part of the Fontana Modern Masters series, originally 1974, this edition 1979.